𝕃𝕒𝕦𝕣𝕖𝕟_𝕄𝕒𝕩𝕨𝕖𝕝𝕝 𝔹𝕝𝕠𝕘

We had resumed our class as normal with Yuan back. For week 7 she had went over our assignment 2 which includes the industry report and essay. But most importantly choosing a topic, research question and the methodology of it. 

For the essay we must have;

• An answer to a question 
• Discuss an issue or point of academic contention.
• Make a cohere agreement supported by appropriate
• Secondary research – review existing literature 
• Not usually for a specific audience 
• Structure Intro themed content sections – conclusion – reference – appendices (where used).
• Might contain images, but does not contain diagrams, table, figures “Why  is animated film Porco Rosso considered as Hayao Miyazaki’s veiled autobiography?

Choosing a topic – Start with an idea, a question, an observation a what I like to know more about. This coursework is my opportunity to research something that Interest’s Me! 

Yuan continued onward with the explanation of the industry report as well and how we would need proof and evidence for the report. Since I’m doing the essay part this wouldn’t be part of the assignment I need to focus on. After the presentation I had made a plan on listing doing different topics which would be the main focus of the essay such as horror, sexuality, gender, disability, documentary on a music video or movie, villains, mental issues and finally lighting. 

That way I have ideas and my interests that I can focus on involving the topic question that I would have to answer.

Ryan had returned this week for another presentation on Animated Documentary with the conflict of combining art and actuality. He showed us the Zara’s story with Zara in live action with her animated dog. We then moved onto the styles of documentary:

Bill Nichols’ theorised 6 modes… but their differences are nuanced:

–Observational: undisturbed actuality; no influence from the filmmaker

–Expository: objective “voice of God” narration – the “ David Attenborough” style

–Participatory: the filmmaker interacts with the subject – the “Louis Theroux” style

–Reflexive: relies on audience engaging with the filmmaker’s perspective

–Poetic: almost exclusively about creating mood and emotion

Performance: filmmaker becomes the subject

In recent decades, “presenting information” has become a flexible definition, meaning most productions inherently take on a persuasive form, whether it’s to make you side with a perspective, question the information provided or simply feel a certain way.

The question is… does the influence of the filmmaker hurt or benefit what information we learn from a documentary?

We watched a short film koyaanisqatsi which shows us life and the speed of time. 

The spark brothers montage of past music videos and concerts they’ve done showing their weirdness is the cool. 

A short film of Drawing from memory where a man draws from memory events which happened and didn’t happen.

Why do we Use Animation in facts

Emerged in the 20th century, but was largely denoted to PSAs and information films.

-Alternative way to present supplementary information without directly addressing it.

-Visualising unseen knowledge e.g. the feelings of participants.

-Basically… it tried to grow acceptance towards using art to portray “fact”.

-However… this has caused much debate and controversy as we’ll later see…

Visualising autism

A Is For Autism (1992) – Tim Webb used creative contributions from autistic participants to visualise autism in a way never seen before.

Snack And Drink (1999) – Bob Sabiston et al used a Rotoshop program to similarly experiment with raw audio footage of an autistic teenage.

BBC Four – Autism for kids on visualising kids with autism.

The Conflict

The notion of absolute authenticity is being challenged with the rise of subjective experiences… but this can lead to bias and misrepresentation in the wrong hands.

-Opposition believe it downplays fact in favour of individual experiences.

-Supporters argue intimate stories reveal “ignored realities” and encourage empathy.

-Opposition suggest audiences might struggle to tell what’s real and what’s not.

-Supporters give audiences more credit for separating the real from the abstract ie. Animation is evidentially not authentic, it’s about verisimilitude.

WALTZ WITH BASIR (2008)
by ari folman

Folman’s reflexive documentary aimed to showcase his efforts to recall his memories of the 1982 Lebanon War using talking head interviews and dramatic re-enactments. The animation helps remind the audience that memories are prone to distortion so cannot be explicitly “true”.

How is animation used to make us empathise with the participant’s personal experience of the massacre?

-Does using animation (instead of live-action) make the “recollection” or “re-enactment” feel honest?

CREATURE COMFORTS (1989)
BY NICK PARK

Just for fun… Experimenting with real footage and audio allows you to tell unique stories and highlight the crucial fact that context matters and the style of presentation has is powerful stimuli on the audience.

Creature Comforts used non-actors from council estates and retirement homes to recreate Vox Pop style interviews and recontextualised the audio for comedic effect.

NEVER LIKE THE FIRST TIME (2006)
BY Jonas odell

A mix of short films on the subject of sex, virginity and consent. 

Consider how it elevates each story using animation to portray the emotional perspective of each participant.

-Does it enhance you understanding of their experience?

-Does it feel “manipulative” or “persuasive”?

-Does subjectivity truly hurt the truth?

Ryan (2004)
by Chris Landreth

A short film we watched back in first year in semester 1 or 2 about the animator Ryan.

Landreth meticulously implemented animated psychological realism to show not only the feelings of both Landreth and his subject matter Ryan Larkin, but also encouraged the audience to interpret information and drawn their own conclusions.

Notice how it combines several modes of documentary and relies on animation to accentuate complex information.

This gives me quite a few ideas on my assignment 2 essay on documenting a specific music band, or animation film that is both live action and animated. However I still have other options when it comes to gender, sexuality, disabilities e.g. autism, horror for young audiences or a documentary of a music band. 

For this lesson a man called Ryan Hollinger had came into our class with his presentation on Animated Horror 

He talked about horror beyond the scare

Our relationship with Fear and invoking Negative Stimuli:
– Disgust, anxiety, anger, distress, sadness, etc.
– Sometimes challenges Moral Sensibilities.
– Most animated horror focuses on the Psychological, the Grotesque and Dreams.
– Heavier emphasis on imagery, either symbolic or personified.
– Scares can be equally “gratifying” as they are “nihilistic”.
– Facing your fears in safe/entertaining way can be cathartic

The styes of animated horror

REALISM/“UNCANNY”
– Emphasis on verisimilitude.
– Typically “gritty and ugly”.
– Subtle presentation.
– Naturally off-putting feel.

EXPRESSIONISM
– Exaggerating real life.
– Stronger colours/shadow.
– Stylised character designs.
– Can be used comedically.

SURREALISM
– Distorts reality.
– Rejects accessibility.
– Typically cerebral.
– Sometimes mixes styles.

ALL STYLES WORK TOGEHER TO ELICIT REACTION

Horror is always fighting for two methods of thought:
THE VISCERAL & THE CEREBRAL
ALL STYLES WORK TOGEHER TO ELICIT REACTION
(Emotional/Feel) (Mental/Think)

He then showed us examples of movies we’ve or haven’t seen over the years like Fears of the Dark, Krampus with the animated flashback, Paprika, monster family and the game little nightmares.

Games included like silent hill that we analysed in class like the other short films had much horror in the early days. Even talking about fear to the young audiences like kids or teenagers or young adults. Like movies the black cauldron with the skeleton army rising, Coraline going to face the other mother and escaping, monster house eating the two cops and eating the cop car and finally the nightmare before Christmas opening scene/song which everyone enjoys playing for Halloween. 

It gives me some ideas on the assignment 2 but in the mean time I will wait for the next couple of weeks to plan and write out my essay for one of the topics.

We had presented our presentations in class in random order throughout the last 3hrs. Our Group 7, the article of gestures with puppets were shown to the class. 3 members including me were present and bestowed our notes and slides to the audience and our honest opinions on the article if we agreed or disagreed with the author of the article. It met the 10 mins of how long the presentation should be and included our links into the very end, on where we got the images, the article and clips from to add into our bibliography. It was an excellent presentation I must admit since it rather smoothly as well as the other groups whose presentations were inspiring. 

Week 3 was our tutorial week for our group presentations before the assignment due next week. I met up with both Charley and Charlie and discussed plans for the presentation and who was doing what for article. Our Article is about Puppet Animation Films and Gestures Aesthetics. We had selected our own parts, opinions and to cover someone else’s slide if one of us did not appear for the presentation. 

Till then we have been working on our own slides before the Wednesday and to finish our own peer assessment for our group 7. We also held voice chats to prepare for our presentations this wednesday.