Author: marissatso

In class 16, we investigated more Japanese animation and I am also interested in watching so much. The most memorable piece watched in class is the Astro Boy, which is created by a really talented animator, Osamu Tezuka, worked in Toei and found the Mushi Production.  The animation style in Astro Boy was no longer imitating the American style, but more like inventing a new style of his own. The characters and ideas of the story in so attractive and interested me to watch more after the first episode. I enjoyed watching a lot. We also watched a lot different Japanese animators’ work in the class and Yoji Kuri work was really out of the blue. The story of his animation was so unique and weird, letting me to be so bewildered after watching and wanted to know the reason behind in his story. The style of his animation is plain and like Red Bull animation (HAHAHA).

Marissa

Japanese animation now is a really popular type of animation over the world and this make me so much interested in the history of the animation. Surprisingly, Japanese animation is not widely popular and seen before wartime, Japanese animation was becoming more popular in the wartime which Momotaro was an icon of war at that time. Throughout the animation watched in class 15, I mostly enjoyed the Momotaro, diving sailor. The style of animation at that time was mostly imitating the American animation style, while American animation at the time already becoming so popular around the world. The song in diving sailor was so attractive and interested others to watch, the characters in the animation, mostly animals moved fluently and beautifully drawn. Although it is just a minute animated film, I can feel the meaning behind the animation as a propaganda short. Momotaro series watched in class were mostly interesting and attractive.

Marissa

In class 14, we have gone through the animation history in China. Most of the animation in China shown in class are based on the fairytale story, mainly the story, Journey to the West, which is about four creatures(???) going to the West for the buddha. However, my most appreciated one will be ink wash animation, as ink was is not allowing any mistakes, animators need a lot concentration when making the ink wash animation. Tadpoles looking for their mama is an ink wash animation created by Te Wei. When I was small, I had already been listening or watching this story( Probably not this one though J ), when I watched the original one in the class, I can feel the hard work of Te Wei on doing ink wash animation and the animals in the story are so cute to look at. I enjoyed watching it a lot.

Marissa Tso

In previous lesson, we listened to 3 talks, two from China and one from Hong Kong. I enjoyed the one from Hong Kong the most. Through that talk, I gained knowledge on the history of Hong Kong animation, knowing the golden age of Hong Kong animation and some talented Hong Kong animators. Through this talk, I liked the animation Disposition by Mak Siu Fung. I learnt and so impressed that the 15 minutes long animation was made by his own, in around 2 years’ time. The whole movement of the character and also animals are so fluent and realistic, the music and sound effect are adopted properly and the meaning behind made me fall into deep thinking on the disposition of human and the relationship between hunter and prey.

Other two presenters from China presented really fantastic 3D animating skills, however I think the story of the animation is one too bloody and one too boring. However, I still enjoyed their skills on rendering.

Marissa Tso

This is a Czech animation directed by Hermína Týrlová, Josef Pinkava, Milos Komárek. It was an animation with live models and puppet. The story was about a boy and a cloth. The story begins in a house with a cloth looking at the dripping hose, a boy coming back home, taking the cloth away. The cloth then started its adventure nearby, and experienced danger such as rubbish bin. At last, other cloth came and stopped the flooding, whereas our main character cloth was still playing.

I believe the cloth is controlled as a puppet using string, and the movement of it is so steady and fluent. The idea of the story is also interesting, as the cloth is tied with a knot, the knot is like its head and the appearance is so much like a rabbit (WHAT???). In this animation, we used a different angle to explore the world and it is a funny experience.

Marissa Tso

The killing of an egg is an animation watched in class 12, a short animation produced by Paul Driessen and Nico Crama in 1977. The animation started with a man planning to eat an egg as breakfast. When he taps the egg, a voice appeared from the egg. The man continues tap and finally smash the egg with a fist, the voice ends. However, killing an unseen victim soon is being punished when he finds out that someone is tapping his home, ending with his house comes down over the man.

This animation shows a stylistic way to tell a story with simple ideas, but yet conveying an inevitable fate. The whole action is taking place in a single frame and the perspective does not change much. In this limited time and space, Paul Driessen still successful convey the story, showing his mastery of story telling and his mature style of animating.

Marissa Tso

‘Neighbours’ was a pixilation animation produced by Norman McLaren. Pixilation is a kind of stop motion animation but with live actors involved. Using this technique, live actors and the crops need to move slightly in every frame. Therefore, I really appreciated what Norman McLaren and the actors in this animation, in which the motion is really smooth even the jumping and throwing scene. This was an anti-war animation about two men living peacefully in a cardboard house, until a flower blooms between their houses and they fight each other to death for owning the flower.

Surprisingly, this animation was inspired when Norman McLaren’s stay in China, when he saw the beginning of Mao’s revolution. It might be a very strong film about anti-militarism and anti-war, when the audiences saw the ending of two men fighting just for a little flower. There were also different translation of ‘Love your neighbour’, aiming to spread this message to the whole world.

In Class 09, we have learnt the composition of movement and the most impressed are the Hen Hop and Neighbors. Hen Hop is a drawn-on-film animation by Norman McLaren, I like how McLaren draw the animation to be so dynamic that even the title “Hen Hop” in the beginning is like dancing. Also, I am so impressed by the swiftness of the movement and the transformation, transition between two objects, for example the word “O” and “N” are gradually transformed to a dancing object (an egg with legs?).

This animation is music-driven, and it looks like a musical to me when watching a dancing chicken with lively music, I feel so energetic when watching this short. It is also funny to see how the chicken dance in different strange ways, such as with its head off or stretching its leg wide open.

I have heard in class that McLaren had stayed in the farm in around 2 years for studying the movement of chicken, inspired me to understand that the fluency of the movement of one object, even for creating a animated short, need long investigation and research.

As I mentioned in the previous post, I had also watched another Mickey Mouse short, The Mad Doctor. It was in a horror tone (is Halloween month HAHAHAHAHA Trick or Treat!!!!), about a mad scientist who kidnapped Pluto and Mickey came to save him.

The story was quite simple, but the animators still illustrated it really well. It is in black and white, but still having fantastic shading and lighting effects, helping at times to give some depth to Mickey’s design as he enters the Mad Doctor’s castle. The door lock scene is the same as another horror short, The Haunted House, which the door locked by itself after Mickey entered the House.

I loved the skeleton tricking Mickey the most, reminding me of the Skeleton dance watched in class. The Skeletons are playful and I laughed when watching it (Although it was a horror :D).

It was terrifying when I saw Mickey was also get caught and nearly been killed by a large saw. But at last it ended in a heartwarming way that I enjoyed to see.

In this weekend, I had watched two Mickey Mouse short, The Mad Doctor and The Karnival Kid. Both of the shorts are black and white but I enjoyed watching them.
In the Karnival Kid, I am impressed by listening the first Mickey Mouse line ‘Hot Dogs! Hot Dogs’ voiced by Walt Disney. I felt a little familiar in the start of the film when a cow walks away from the camera, similiar strategy has been applied in the animated short, Plane Crazy.

It is impressing to watch this short, including how the hot dog was given a personality and two cats singing in the last scene. I can see the Mickey Mouse in this short was slightly different and the atmosphere of the whole animation was not really consistent with the style and personality of Mickey and Disney later output. This can show the graduating improvement and optimisation of the character Mickey Mouse.