UNIT 33 ASSIGNMENT 1 -The Development Of Stop Motion Animation

During this unit we have learnt about the different types of Stop-motion Animation such as: Claymation, Live Action and 2D Drawing. We have also learnt about the different genres that an animation can fit into. The final thing that we have learnt is to spot the Principles Of Animation. There are 7 principles of animation, they are as follows: Gravity, Arcs (so movement), Time, Anticipation, Secondary Action, Persistence Of Vision and Overlapping and Follow Through.
                                                                                                                                                                   

From watching 'Claycat's The Raid' we saw examples of the first principle: GRAVITY. In simple terms the principle of gravity is what makes the animation more realistic. In this screenshot you can see that when the character was shot they fell backwards and out of the window which makes the animation more realistic.



The second principle is the principle of ARCS. The principle of arcs are the movements that a character makes, making the animation and the character more believable. For example in 'The Raid' the cats break the principals of animation as their walking was unnatural -they shuffled which had a humorous effect on the audience.

Another principal of animation is the principle of TIME. This means the time it takes to make the action happen or the number of frames needed to move an object. The less frames there are the faster the time and vice versa the more frames there are the longer the animation is. To accelerate the animation you would increase the distance between the movements quickly where as for deceleration you would decrease the movements gradually. A key thing to remember is that the right timing is the difference between looking from side to side.

ANTICIPATION is the idea that the head must turn to look into the off screen space so that we can anticipate someone coming into the frame. It basically means something that a character does which helps the audience to anticipate what will happen next.

SECONDARY ACTION is where you add secondary actions to emphasize the main action, it give a scene more life making it more realistic. For example if a person is talking in the street and there are other people walking around or a truck picking up bins in the background or if someone is walking and they swing their arms it helps to emphasize the main action by making it realistic rather than taking focus away from any action going on in the foreground.

The PERSISTENCE OF VISION is a theory that a strip of still images in any order can look animated if viewed by the human eye at a certain rate -for example a flipbook.

Finally there is OVERLAPPING AND FOLLOW THROUGH. Follow through means that the body part will continue moving after another part has stopped. Like when you flex your muscle and move your arm down, your elbow will stop moving but your arm will continue moving. Overlapping is the tendency that body parts will move at different rates -your leg will move on different timings than your head etc.

                                                                                                                                                                  

Timeline

Phenakistoscope -developed in 1832

Zoetrope -developed in 1833/1834

Praxinoscope -developed in 1877

Willis O'Brien born in 1886

Kinetoscope -developed in 1889

Ray Harryhausen born in 1920

THE TALE OF THE FOX -Stopmotion film (Puppets)

Produced by: Louis Nalpas and Roger Ribeche (written by Johann Wolfgang Goethe) -1930

Target Audience: I'm not quite sure but I would say historians and people who enjoy old films because it is of an old style and it is a stand-out film compared to the stop-motion we see today. Also children may be interested in this because it features animal puppets which may make children laugh. 

Jan Svankmajor born in 1934


Lee Hardcastle born in 1985

PINGU -Stop-motion for Children (Claymation) 

Produced/created by: Otmar Gutmann and Silvio Mazzlo. -1986

Target Audience:  Children. It is suitable for children because it features brightly coloured settings and characters, it has a funny and simple narrative which would attract a younger target audience.

Modern Technology -software released in 1989

THE NIGHTMARE BEFORE CHRISTMAS -Stopmotion Feature Film (Claymation)

Produced by: Tim Burton and Denise Di Nova. -1993

Target Audience: Teenagers -boys probably because it is about skeletons and it is dark and about Halloween which would attract boys as it is a common interest. It is unusual and funny (surreal) which would attract a younger audience.

STRAWBERRY SWING-Stopmotion Music Video (Real People/Live Action) 

Produced by: Markus Dravs, Brian Eno, Jon Hopkins, Rik Simpson -2009

Target Audience: Coldplay/music fans, adults, teenagers. 

POST -IT NOTE ARCADE -Stopmotion (Objects)

Produced by/created by: Michael Birken -2013 (youtube) 

Target Audience: Students and adults would be the target audience because it is surreal and bright which would attract a younger audience but the complexity that went into making it would be appreciated by an older audience as well. Another target audience would be gamers due to the video game themes throughout the video. 

AN UNLIKELY RIDE: BINARY BIKE -Stopmotion (Real people/Live Action)

Produced/created by: Bringham Rupp and Jarel Morrow. -2013

Target Audience: Young people (boys most likely) would be the target audience because the stop motion is about bikes and it features a boy on a bike. It is quite random and would seem like an adventure which is something that stereotypically a boy would like. People who like bikes or sport would also be a good target audience.

                                                                                                                                                                   

The Nightmare Before Christmas

For this animation I would say that the Genre is Fantasy. I say this because it is set in a place which is magical and unusual, the characters aren't natural they are mystical and creepy which are generic conventions of a Fantasy film. The target audience for this I would say are teenage boys because the narrative is dark and full of creepy settings and unusual characters which would appeal more to a male audience,  I say teenagers because I feel that children would find the animation scary perhaps and it would appeal to a slightly older audience. In this clip we see examples of some of the different principles of animation. At 0:12 you see a good example of the principle of follow through as we see Sally moving her arm down this makes the scene more realistic to the audience. Another principle we see during this video is the principle of Arcs -at 1:00 we see Jack The Skeleton walking around, the way he walks is natural which follows the principles of arcs making the animation more realistic and showing the movements as more precise allowing it to flow more. At 0:35 we see an example of secondary action when a creature walks in the foreground -even though he is in front we were focusing on Sally who is sat down. Doing this helps to make it funny which breaks the generic conventions of the animation and widens the target audience. If they hadn't used this principle the animation may not have had a good effect on the audience, it wouldn't have made them laugh or recognise the humour. 
                                                                                                                                                                   

Post-it Note Arcade 

Unlike the previous animation this stop motion is not made out of clay so we will see differences in the way it is made and in the principles it follows. I would say that this animation is in the surreal genre because it is very brightly coloured and it isn't something that you would see in your everyday life which makes it unrealistic and slightly weird or random. The target audience for this would have to be adults and gamers as it has a video game theme throughout which would attract people that play video games and adults would be able to appreciate the skills it took to make this kind of stop motion and they would be able to recognise the famous characters shown in this animation. In this clip we see the principle of time being used. The acceleration has been increased to make it look as though the picture is animated. We see this specifically from 0:12-0:20 this allows us to follow the action which keeps the audience interested and amazed if they weren't to accelerate the timings then the animation wouldn't have the same effect on their audience as it wouldn't be fast paced which often video games are and the narrative would be lacking as it would just drag on too long and people would lose interest. At 0:58 we see an example of arcs when the mouth of the pac-man character moves like it would in the video game using this principle of arcs helps the audience to relate and recognise the character which would intrigue the audience and have a good effect on the audience drawing them in -if the animation weren't to follow the principles of arcs then the animation would lose its appeal and it wouldn't be believable to the audience.
                                                                                                                                                                  

Pingu

This animation is another claymation animation however this time its target audience is children, I know this because of the bright colours and the funny theme of the show. In the clip we see various principles of animation being used. For example at 1:45 we see an example of secondary action when pingu walks he swings his flippers which adds more realism to the action and by using it, it has a funny effect on the audience making them laugh.

At 1:55 we see the animation break the principles of arcs when pingu slides and shuffles along the floor which makes the animation funny and gains the audiences's attention and interest if the animation were to follow the principles of arcs it would make the animation seem more natural but it may have lost the entertainment factor on the audience and possibly lost some of the humour however I don't think that it would have made a huge impact on the audience if it weren't there. 
                                                                                                                                                                   

Old VS New

Over the years we have seen stop-motion animation go from strength to strength, changing the face of animation. The oldest video from my blog is The Tale of The Fox using puppets from the 1930's which I will compare with one of the newest videos from my blog The Unlikely Bike Ride. From looking at both videos I can see that both styles differ, the bike ride animation is using live action whereas the fox animation is using objects. In the Tale of The Fox we can see that the change between certain shots looks jumpy and it doesn't always look like a fluid movement of poses, this shows that there aren't enough shots per second which makes it look rushed. It does follow the principles of arcs making it realistic but I think that the main issue with this animation is the age of it so the models do look really old, as it is in black and white the lighting isn't brilliant and it just makes the animation look dated.  As it is that old the skills used for this animation aren't as good as animations made nowadays.The sound in the animation is good having various sound effects. 

In the Unlikely Bike Ride we see that the skills have adapted through time, the movements aren't jumpy giving it a good timeframe allowing the audience to follow it fully. The animation is using live action which allows the animation to naturally follow the principles of arcs however it defies the principles of animation at 0:25 when the boy jumps off of the edge realistically he would fall not fly onto a bike which makes the animation a bit surreal and different to what you would normally see. Comparing this to the Tale Of The Fox we can see that the narrative in this animation is more creative which shows that stopmotion has developed and broken away from the generic conventions. The setting and set designs are clearer and more detailed in this animation making it look sharper. 
                                                                                                                                                                   
Genre, Style and Audience

Genre and style go hand in hand to bring in specific audiences, often animations bring in more than one specific audience. From analysing the animations I gathered and from the work that we prepared in class notes I feel that Claymation is better for children as it uses bright colours and animated characters - for example the children's show Postman Pat. These bring a funny aspect to the animation, giving animals human like aspects such as being able to talk or walk on 2 legs like in Wallace and Gromitt. However other animations have been made using clay which aren't aimed at children such as Lee Hardcastle's Claycat's EVIL DEED II which is funny as the principles of animation break, in this screenshot we can see the cat standing up which is unrealistic and it is screaming which makes it funny and shocks the audience which shows that audiences and styles are changing. 

Apart from claymation we can see that there are genres more suited for different styles. I think that for the fantasy genre often it is a mixture between claymation and live action.