Project 1- hide and seek-01

Response for Fallen Art

Fallen Art is a great black humor animation, also it's full of political metaphors in character design, details and the plot.

Through the dramatic character design I can realize the characters' social statue and personalities. The soldiers are skinny and weak,it matches their lowest statue,the plebeian class. Also their eyes are hided by their caps that stands for the situation of obeying orders without question. the military officer and the chief are big and strapping, which indicate their strong power like ruling class. But the difference between them is the hidden eyes. The military officer wares a caps which hides his eyes as well as the soldiers, it express the same meaning that he is the one who following the orders. However, the chief is the only one who didn't use any tool to hide his eyes, because he is the one who has the most power; he realizes every truth and can command all of the people in the animation.  I think the design of doctor is the most interesting character for me.  He looks like a skeleton in white coat, it could explain his marble-hearted personality. A doctor should help people keep their lives, but here the doctor ignore the soldiers' lives and calmly takes pictures. Under the martial environment, the doctor has lost his ethics and help ruling class control their people.

The unfair treatments also ironically show in many details of the animation. For example, the warning sign for no photo, the smile medals for the dead soldiers, the soldiers don't know the true purpose till them died. Another detail, from the picture I realized the previous chief is much thinner than now, he is crazy in art, and he look happy in his younger photo. So I know the chief used to be a normal person who loves art; and he has friends who made him happy. For now, power make him fat and sick. He still loves art but use power to make it in a more cruel way (kill his people to make art). He is lonely in his room with no one around him, I guess maybe his friends has been frame up by him, in order to get power. He miss his previous time (he cries), but he won't give up his statue and power so that he is cruel and trough. Politic is dark, war is ruthless.

Otherwise, the organization of the plot is ingenious. At the beginning the director make a set of event to attract audience's curiousness, then display the truth unexpectedly. That's make audience interests in the story until the end. At the same time, the director didn't directly show people the ruthless of the ruling class, the darkness of politic and the cruel of the war; he use a black humor story but make people think about these things. The influence of the animation for the audience is much better than show them up a serious one.

So many thing I can learn from the animation.

Studio presentation

Studio presentation by Xiaoyue Hong

Animation Name: Atama Yama/ Mr. Head

Animation Link: https://vimeo.com/22361976

    This animation was directed by Japanese animator Koji Yamamura. I think it is a successful animation and make people impressive of it. The reason is its strongly Japanese nation style and high quality production, which indicate on sound, version, story and details.

    The story is based on one of traditional Japanese Rakugo stories (In Wikipedia’s explanation,  Rakugo is a form of Japanese verbal entertainment. The lone storyteller sits on stage, called Kōza. Using only a paper fan and a small cloth as props, and without standing up from the seiza sitting position, the rakugo artist depicts a long and complicated comical story. The story always involves the dialogue of two or more characters, the difference between the characters depicted only through change in pitch, tone, and a slight turn of

 the head). This is the primary factor that attracts people to watch it. When the male storyteller is speaking the animation’s name by using the standard Rakugo style, they know a great show is coming up. Through the whole story, there are only storyteller’s voice, samisen playing and some sound effects; but they won’t let people feel bored. There are several reasons. First, the storyteller uses both speaking and singing to describes the humors story. With the emotional narrative, it makes the sense of ridiculous comedy. Second, even though there is one person to speak, he appropriately changes his accent and tone to play different characters. The story becomes more vivid. The last, with the cooperation by playing of traditional instrument samisen and the using of sound effects; they enhance the whole atmosphere that the storyteller. The sound is successfully enough, people can understand the story even they just listening it.

    For the visual style of the animation, Yamamura combined traditional Japanese style and modern manga style. He used the light yellow as the basic color of the animation, to both imitated conventional rice paper, and made a retrospective feeling. Also the linear in the animation combines west solid style and east line drawing style. Meanwhile, since this is a Japanese absurd story, the characters must funny and have Japanese personality. Correspond with the story, the protagonist has been designed like a chunky and hairless middle-age man. He has bushy brow and big circular eyes. This is a typical middle or lower level mid-age male looks like.  

           

Another example is Japanese salary men. Slender eyes, orderly hair, suits and poker face are their dramatic feature. Yamamura showed the all feather on his characters. Because of the suitable style and character design, Atama Yama is full of the taste of Japan.

      

    The story is attractable, because it has many unreal factors. For examples; cherry blossom tree grew up on the man’s head, people go to his head to admire the beauty of the flowers, people keep play in the left pond, a cycle about his head and the pond, the man died into the pond on his head. These ridiculous plots divide the world from the real world. Normally, fantastic story is charmingly. At the same time, there are some points connect reality and unreal world. Like the single lost shoe from the drunk man; he is one of the small size people who enjoys the flower, but when his shoe throws into the protagonist’s instant noodle bowl, the shoe becomes as the normal person’s size.

Otherwise, even though the story is absurd, the details for the people are follow the reality, like the behaviors during cherry blossom party, and the cherry blossom follows the growth rhythm. Just because the mixed fantasy and reality, make the story ridiculous but doesn’t break away from people’s real world; and that’s the greatest point to write the story.

    The last but not least, there are so many description of details in the animation that let people realize many unknown information just from version. For instance, the protagonist’s thrift can be indicated the background of the protagonist’s home, the used plastic bag for picking up cherry, the rolled toothpaste, etc.

   Because of his thrift, he eats the cherry seed and then people see the next ridiculous plot. Also, while the protagonist is chewing the noodle, the people on his head chew their food with his beats. There are so many details there, which make the plot completely and make the story vivid.

    As an absurd story, it arouses people’s feeling. As a Japanese animation, it displays Japanese culture very well through its sound, version and story.  National one is the world one. Japanese animation can be popular, because its unique culture, creative style and high quality production; these are Japanese animation’s features.

    What are yours cultures feature? How can you display it?

pdf download address:
https://docs.google.com/file/d/0BwkFsOMWc2FEQXp3bnBaZ1ZQVWs/edit

New storyboard for project 1

Project 1- Story changed- the new story

Project 1- Animate

Comments for William Kentridge: How we make sense of the world

Before I watched this interview of William Kentridge, his animation Felix in Exile has already given me a deep impression. Through this video, I realized more things about his life experience, his thought about the world, and how and why he made animation and short films; that make me getting more respect for him. He kept trying many different careers and failed, until he decided to go back drawing at his age of 30. So he made it successfully.  He thought making animation is like a demonstration about how we make sense of the world. Thus, people can feel his feeling, understanding and emotion to the issue he focused on through his works. He use the unique method to draw; like making animation on the book, and using the same sketch to make motion movement by revising part of the drawing. Those brings people different sense of art style and make people catch the extra thing, for example, the clearly timeline. He also thought it is not necessary to write a script first and then make the animation, because it will ruin so much potential  of the development and possibilities of the story. Therefore, his work includes so many incredible and imaginative factors that surprised me. I think Kentridge  is a good sample for me to develop my animation career: loyal to self, relief the imagination, try hard to find and practice new things, break the rules.

Two points of thinking of Heidegger Reframed

    Heidegger said, "the essence of art, is the setting-itself- into- work of truth". Also he thought the essence of art is from work. The " work" which has mentioned in the whole article is not means the art object, it is work of art. Here he emphasizes the  "work'' and  ignores the ''creator''.  For a work, the creator which is like a media of production is not important, the core is the work itself. That reminds me the book Death of Author. There is a thought that the name of the writer in a article or book is not important, because it has no effect for the content, so for some extents, the writer is dead. Meanwhile, in Heidegger's book, work includes literary, so the idea in Death of Author supports Heidegger's opinion. If the creator is not important for an article, the important thing is its truth of article itself. The " work" which has mentioned in the whole article is not means the art object, it is work of art.

    About the "truth", it is not equal with the "corresponding  theories of truth", and it also different with mimesis. As the example of Van Gogh's painting in the article. The peasant's shoes appears in his painting; for the fact of shoes have been painted, is a mimetic display without  substantive thing shows on the shoes. For this angle to judge, there is no "truth" . However, for another angle,  in the painting, the space and the shoes indicates the relationship as shoes essence in the objective world. So here exists the "truth". The truth is not like the thing I saw through my eyes, but the thing reflects in the meaning of philosophy.