Do any of you feel like talking about ways of developing empathy for animated characters?
I bought two disks of "Jane and The Dragon", a truly remarkable series. In almost every episode I am made to feel for the characters, not just watch them move around on the screen.
This show made it through two sessions before getting the axe. So it is possible to produce shows like this one and make money for doing it.
I saw a only a couple of episodes of Jane and didn't care for it. I think it was more the art direction. Both the characters and BG's all seemed very high key, and with the texture the put on everything it was hard it differentiate the characters from the backgrounds.
But never mind that.
I feel that to in order to empathize with characters, you need to develop the characters' personalities. Each character has to have their own destinct personality and always encounter and react to events in their personality.
A good example of this are Chuck Jones's Looney Tunes. Chuck cast Bugs, Daffy and the gang into different stories, but they always react the same ways. So the characters have a set personality that you can depend on, so you can relate to these personalities.
Before Any project I work on, I try to figure out each chracter's personality and keep it consistant. I know I've done my job when viewers pick up on the characters' personality.
Any way, that's my take on it. What's everyone else's oppinions?
Aloha,
the Ape
...we must all face a choice, between what is right... and what is easy."
All I can say is study Iron Giant for how they build empathy and rapport with the characters. Or any film that has characters and situations that move you.
"We all grow older, we do not have to grow up"--Archie Goodwin ( 1937-1998)
Iron Giant, yes that is a good one and I think there are articles here at AWN.
Agree with Ape.
I think J&D has great potential, and skills behind it, but the art direction fails, and in a visual medium, that means everything falls apart.
.::Blog::.
So art direction of the art is a key element to making a character empathetic. For example "Kung Fu Panda", the colors red and blue were sharpen differently depending who was on screen, does that sound right? Where you going somewhere else with the art direction... thing?
I wasn't. I was just stating my opinion about Jane. Although art direction does play a part. You normally wouldn't color a character you want to feel sorry for red. And you wouldn't normally color a mean, agressive character blue.
In order to get the audience to empathise with a character, you have to get the audience to care about them. You do this with personality. If Brad Bird didn't establish the Iron Giant's child like wonder for his personality, the rest of the movie wouldn't have worked. It's actually not a child personality, he is more like Lennie from Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men. He is the good natured soul with immense strength but limited mental abilities. Again, if this personality wasn't strongly established and got the audience to care about him, you wouldn't get choked up at his final sacrifice.
Watch the Iron Giant and PIXAR movies and listen to the director's commentaries, I believe the talk about establishing character's personalities.
Aloha,
the Ape
...we must all face a choice, between what is right... and what is easy."
What I find very fascinating about Aardman's Wallace & Gromit shorts is how much the creators get out of the two main characters. We're dealing with a bland, mild-mannered, slightly obtuse bald guy and his stoic dog whose only defining facial feature is his brow, both living in a satirically quaint, distinctly British world. However, through extremely clever writing their everyday adventures build up to comedic thrillers with outrageously funny action scenes. The way they make the audience feel especially for Gromit as the ever-enduring whipping boy is pure genius.
I just saw "Coraline " and there was no shortage of expressions with that character. They not only replaced the head but the head parts as well. Great movie, not sure why it is not in on more screens.
I've just this minute finished watching Dumbo for the first time and I had so much empathy for him that it made me cry when he visits his locked-up mother. I felt so sorry for them both. It's an amazing empathetic performance purely conveyed through acting because he doesn't say a word throughout the film!
On another note, how amazing is that pink elephant sequence? Wow!
Visit my website:
Claire O'Brien.com
Haha, I revisited Dumbo a few weeks ago too. Rewatching the pink elephant scene as an adult was HILARIOUS! Love the crows too...
But back to the original post... emoting in animation. Sounds like a lot of the posts place character empathy in the hands of the writer. I suppose you can render all the facial expressions you want but if the story falls flat, the emotions won't matter. Dumbo, Wall-E, Wallace and Gromit are all superb examples of subtle emotions being conveyed... and though the stories within which these characters are placed are TREMENDOUS, the subtle emotional cues can be chalked up mostly to the animation. I highly doubt the scripts called for every eye-brow twitch (although Wall-E's BLEEPS and BLIPS were scripted!). But can anyone think of an example of a film where the story was emotional or should have been... but the emotions conveyed by the animators fell short? That would be interesting...
Treasure Planet
Atlantis
Titan AE
Most cheapquels
Stuff like GIJOE the animated movie, lots of anime.
There's tons of badly animated material out there.
"We all grow older, we do not have to grow up"--Archie Goodwin ( 1937-1998)
>> But can anyone think of an example of a film where the story was emotional or should have been... but the emotions conveyed by the animators fell short?
I think Penny, the girl in "Bolt" fell short. Didn't quite buy the torn feeling when she was asked to perform with Bolt's replacement. Didn't really care when they were re-united.
I thought Coraline and the other-mother were simply reacting with little to no emotion. Coraline could have been a little more frightened, a bit more distressed over seeing ghosts and the whole eye/button thing. The other-mother turned nasty a little too quickly. On the other hand, I was very empathetic to Wymie who conveyed loneliness, fear, worry, and bravery.
I think today's "safer" animation yields less empathy from the audience. I mean, they're really MEAN in "Dumbo", "Charlie Brown's Christmas", "The Little Mermaid", and "Cinderella". The characters get hurt and you really feel for them.
Interesting thread
I agree with the above poster. I think when a character, any character from any medium, is developed the writer and whoever portrays the character (actor or animator) have to work off each other. A good script and story arc are always necessary if an audience is to believe that the emoting character on screen is actually feeling something.
I think most characters for movies, books, animation, whatever have formal/informal biogs worked up for them. To truely get inside the skin of a character and help deliver its emotional side I would suggest doing that anyway; figuring out who your character is personality-wise and then thinking about how it would look and react in whatever situation its' placed in.
Hi all!
This is my first post here. I've been reading like a mad dog! :o
This is a really interesting topic for me because it's one of the issues I was faced on a film project I finished last year. The way I see it, the emotion felt by any character is a direct result from two things.
1. The situation the character is currently in (story).
2. The character's ability or inability to handle that situation, and how they perceive what is going on at the time.
I am no stranger to cartoons, but brand spankin' new to animation. I imagine the concept of getting your live actors to portray the characters in a film are a very similar challenge to getting the animator to portray the correct emotion in an animation. That's not to say that an animator doesn't interpret the story and situation for themselves, much as a live actor would. I'm just saying that the writer probably sees the scene for what it truly is before anyone else, and most likely has a better idea of what is intended for the scene which could be a problem if the team doesn't have really good communication. I agree with what laurencfreeman said about the writer. Ultimately, it falls on the director to understand what is going on and make sure that the meaning gets across to viewers. However, if the writer doesn't get those points across to the director, it could get lost in the process.
Wow, did I just ramble that much? You all have the right to disregard my next post because of that. :rolleyes:
Jeremy
blog.nexusinfinite.deanlabs.com
Empathy & sympathy, one of the most interesting part in animation or film for me. A few months ago I'd made long research and finished a thesis around this subject.
These are some of my findings and scribbles in a very small, tiny chestnut:
1. Understand you character
“The animator will flounder with indecision unless he can get inside the character and know precisely what actions are right for that personality. As long as there is any confusion the drawings will be vague and indecisive.” (Johnston & Thomas, 1984, p. 27)
Get to know you character and get close to him/her...even closer than your closest friend.
2. Physiological, sociological, and psychological makes a round character.
3. What is your character capable of? Can he do more than that? In short...what is his maximum capacity? Does he develop throughout the story?
Make conflict(s) to to let him handle the stuff.
4. Open emotions by showing identification, evoke sympathy/empathy by not only showing the actions, but also reasons behind those.
If you have more to add on these, feel free. =)
~[COLOR=Magenta]Art is the only way to run away without leaving home.[/COLOR]
It sounds to me like you have covered all the bases.
here is a link to spice and wolf. use the veoh links or if you have veoh tv that can be used also. it picks up pace after the first one. but you shouldnt skip the first one
http://www.instantz.net/anime/Spice_and_Wolf.html
My local network broadcasts this currently. Have to admit I watch it Saturday mornings. Better than the other fare most Saturdays. But the first few times I viewed it, the 3d layouts were painful. I do like the characters and the storyline. I would enjoy it more without all the endless 3d pans over the brick.
I appreciate the characters: a stupid dragon, a herioc unconventional Jane who steps outside the box.
So it wasn't the animation that grabbed me it was the writing over the other crap out there.
Pat Hacker, Visit Scooter's World.
wontobe you might find the series spice and wolf interesting. if possible watch the subbed version. the original intent is lost in the dubbed version
All I have seen is some internet hits about upcome releases. I will keep an eye open for it.