FIT3084: Moving Pictures

In the previous lecture:

• Appropriate online use of still images of different formats.
• Image colour palettes & compression schemes.

In this lecture:

• Animation: What's it good for? How do you make it?
• A brief look at sound as it relates to video/animation
• How do you digitize video/animation for electronic playback and editing?

*NB This lecture relies heavily on material presented on video tape. Most of the video material cannot be published on the WWW for copyright and practical reasons. It makes little sense to publish the comments about the videos without the source material itself so you'll have to attend the lecture and take notes!   Animate - breathe life into, enliven through... Movement Character / Personality Feeling / Emotion Etc. etc. etc. Movement is a powerful medium through which to convey a message. (Go ask Charlie Chaplain!)

References

Here's a page of animation visual references. There are more mentioned throughout these lecture notes. The best thing to do to improve your work (besides practice) is to watch lots of animation and film (reading about it is helpful too, but not as useful as watching it.)

Some sample reference books:

• Thomas, F., Johnston, O., The Illusion of Life, Disney Animation, Hyperion, 1981 (The character animator's Bible)
• Whitaker, H., Halas, J., Timing for Animation, Focal Press, 1981 (A good intro. to what the title says)
• Sibley, B., Wallace & Gromit, A Close Shave Storyboard Collection, BBC Books, 1997 (Good to flick through)
  
• Ashford, J., Odam, J. Getting Started with 3D, Peachpit Press, 1998, (A basic book introducing 3D modelling concepts)
• Zettl, H., Sight Sound Motion, Applied Media Aesthetics, 2nd edn, Wadsworth Publishing, 1990 (A good general reference on making film/video footage work)
  
  
• Nielsen, J., Designing Web Usability: The Practice of Simplicity, New Riders, 2000 (An excellent book with some helpful remarks on animation for the WWW and lots of other good stuff)
• Lynch, P., Horton, S., Web Style Guide, Yale Univ. Press, 1999 (More useful tips on video and the WWW are in this book too!)

Gertie the Dinosaur was the first real animated character. Gertie was created by cartoonist Winsor McCay in 1914. Unfortunately, due to copyright restrictions, Gertie cannot appear in person on this site. But you can read about her and check out some pictures elsewhere on the web.

Animation is the process of creating images one at a time to be displayed rapidly in sequence giving the illusion of movement...

Persistence of vision is the blending together by the eye/brain of rapidly displayed sequential images, giving the illusion of movement.

• Individual images forming an animation are called frames (after the frames on cinefilm).
  
  
• Frames may be shot in 'realtime' using a cine or video camera to make a film or video.
  

Animation or film frames must be stored for rapid, sequential retrieval and display if persistance of vision is to be relied upon for creating the illusion of movement.

Zoetrope (Geneva Museum of the History of the Sciences)	Image disks (Geneva Museum of the History of the Sciences)

How can you create the images to be photographed, digitized or flipped through?

Live action:

• Real event / documentary
  
  
• Acted performance

Animation:

• Hand drawn / painted
  
  

  Multiple pictures are produced on paper, canvas, acetate 'cels' or anything else. These are photgraphed one at a time onto film. Eg. "Astro Boy" by Osamu Tezuka, "Mickey Mouse" by Disney

  
  
• Directly marked onto film
  
  A strip of cinefilm is scratched or drawn onto directly with pens and other implements. The result is played 'as is' through a cine-camera.
  
  
• Glass sheet / sand
  
  A sheet of glass is used as a board for depositing paint. Each frame of the animation is painted, then photographed, then the next frame is constructed by pushing the paint around on the glass, and so on. (Note that each time the animator makes a new frame, the image/source for the previous frame is destroyed!) The same process can be carried out by drawing images in a bed of sand.
  
  
• Stop-motion animation
  
  

  A figurine, ball of clay or other solid model is 'posed', photographed, moved a little and rephotographed ad-infinitum. Eg. "The Nightmare Before Christmas" by Tim Burton, "Wallace & Gromit" by Nick Park (If clay models are used, the process may also be called 'claymation' If models resting on a table are used, the process may be called table-top animation. [Nothing to do with table-top dancing])

  
  
  
• Computer animation
  
  The computer is used to model objects and manipulate them in a 'virtual' space, producing images of the objects as they are manipulated. These images are deposited onto film. Eg. "Toy Story" & "A Bug's Life" by Pixar/Disney

If you can see it and change its appearance, you can animate or film it!

*NB The examples of animated films given above are not necessarily favourites of the lecturer. They have been included as examples only!

Animation and / or film may be used for

Artistic purposes Storytelling Displaying data (scientific visualization) Conveying false / misleading information (advertising, evidence in court!) Instructional purposes Many other purposes too!

As with all your work, don't lose sight of your message!

Examples of inappropriate (or annoying) animation on the web

• A "blinky-flashy" page.
  

• A storyboard is a comic-book like version of an animation or film in which each cell corresponds to a single shot.
  
  
• A shot is film-speak for a sequence of images / frames depicting a continuous action from one point of view.
  
  
• Storyboards are used as a working reference in film and animation creation.
  
  
• Storyboards contain visual representations of camera shots and often other relevant information.
  
  
• Problems can be solved in storyboarding without the expense of producing animation or shooting film.
  
  
• Storyboards are best produced with pencil and paper!
  
  

Major areas to master in film or animation production.

Details to read through in your own time...

Object Space & Motion

• Objects or characters to be filmed/animated need to be designed/constructed/chosen. The approach depends on the kind of work.
  
  
• Remember you'll need to reproduce the object up to 25 times per second of animation.
  
  
• Complex characters may take a long time to animate. This is true whether you are drawing them by hand or using a computer!
  
  (Compare Gertie to Jurassic Park dinosaurs and note that: complex != interesting)

Space (including screen space & setting)

• Is the space / setting well established?
  
  
• Is the subject distinguishable from the background?
  
  
• Is the image appropriately sparse or dense?
  
  
• Is the image well composed? (A big question!)

• Movie may be 'in there' to begin with:
  
  
  • Computer animation
    
  • Handrawn animation using paint program
    
    
• Movie on video tape
  
  
  • Need camcorder / camera / VCR with AV computer able to 'grab' (capture/digitize) video
    (A Firewire port and Firewire digital video camera will also do the trick)
    
  
  
• Record movie using a camera directly connected to a computer
  
  
  • Need camcorder with AV/Firewire computer able to grab video OR
    
  • Need serial/parallel/USB port camera
    
  
  
• Scan in handrawn images or cinefilm sequence
  
  • Need a flatbed scanner (and lots of time) or a film scanner

• This technique works best for frames which GIF compresses well
  
  
• The GIF file is linked into a web page as a normal image
  
  
• The GIF file contains animated frames assembled using freely available software
  
  
• The browser loads the GIF file and cycles through the frames to playback your animation automatically!

• Compresses many different types of frame sequences well
  
  
• Formats displayed by browser using plugins or helper applications
  
  
• Can play soundtracks synchronized to animation
  
  
• Assembled using software which may be free (or very expensive)
  
  

*NB Software like Macromedia's Director & Flash can also be used to create animation. These may be displayed in a web browser using plugins.

For example, here's a site of movies.

• Apoidea, Alan Dorin (screened in class)
• Ambient 5, Music For Casual Encounters, Alan Dorin (screened in class)
• Turbulence, Jon McCormack (available for purchase: Odyssey productions)
• Alice (In Wonderland), Jan Svankmajer (available at Film/Video archives)
• The Wrong Trousers, Nick Park (at your Monash Uni. video library) Other Wallace and Gromit material is available online at the BBC.
  

Other sites of interesting animations & characters include:

• PIXAR 3D feature films & shorts. Home of "Toy Story", "Luxo Jnr."
• Neon Genesis - Evangelion Anime series on Siren video & DVD
• Astro-Boy Anime series
• What is the Matrix? Well? What is it? Remember back that far?
  

• Animation is very time consuming to make
• Animation is great fun to make
• Animation is great fun to watch
• Animation can be made in a diverse range of ways
• Animation is a very effective medium for conveying a MESSAGE!

Courseware | Lecture notes

©Copyright Alan Dorin 2008