The problem of realism in Animation - Essay Example

PROBLEM OF REALISM IN ANIMATION Introduction Animation is possibly one of the most significant forms of creative expressions in the twenty first century. As an art, an approach, an artistic creation as well as a function, the concept of animation enlightens countless facets of visual culture, ranging from feature length films to prime time sit - coms: and from television and web cartoons to display functions on an array of innovative communication technologies. In a nutshell, animation may well be regarded as omnipresent. It is the ubiquitous illustrative version of the contemporary time. Animation, which was long dismissed as a mere tool catering solely to children’s entertainment genre, it has come a long way to achieve a position of imminence and today has come to be known as an art form, which embraces concepts well beyond the purview of the conventional domain of animated cartoon tradition; and owing to the widespread technological revolution, which has led to its metamorphosis into a medium of collective expression welcomed across the globe (Wells, 2002, Pp.1). Contemporary film production has and currently, is undergoing a rapid makeover ever since the onset of digital revolution. Film makers today, storyboard, shoot and edit their films with the assistance of computer manipulation of images commonly referred to as digital imagery. With respect to the ordinary audience, the most evident relevance of these technologies is the new wave of computer generated and computer enhanced special effects which are capable of generating outstanding graphic images – which have conquered new heights and reached the epitome of visual excellence. Examples include: the watery creature in The Alyss (1989) or the glistening, irregular shaped Terminator 2 (1991). The images viewed in these movies were unlike any of those witnessed previously. However, such swift transformations and the resultant changes is creating grave setbacks for film theory for the reason that the digital manipulation of ordinary images is so original and the artistic potential it presents are so unparalleled, that its impact on cinematic depiction as well as on the viewers reaction are inadequately understood (Prince, 2002, Pp.115). This paper seeks to analyze, explore and discuss the various aspects involved in animation with respect to its relativity to realism. The Concept of Realism Realism in visual arts and literature refers to the representation of themes, premises and characters as they appear in everyday life, devoid of exaggeration or elucidation of any kind. It is a way or ways in which artists and theoreticians have explored the representation of reality in art while reality refers to what is real. It indicates things as they exist in real life. It is a depiction of truth. Truth, on the other hand, refers to conformity to fact or reality. According to Gene Blocker (2002) there is no absolute or universal truth, or no single perspective or viewpoint. He further asserts this statement by suggesting that: “The things we refer to are not real, objective parts of reality; they are just ways of speaking which have caught on, become popular and then "internalized" so that we wrongly assume they accurately describe and reveal an independent reality" (Litch, 2002, Pp. 54). Realism is not merely limited to film; but forms an intrinsic part of all artistic fabrications. Photography is another medium which facilitates effective depiction of reality. According to Hirsch (2007): “Any visual element photographically represented has more inherent real-world content / charm because of its foothold in concrete reality” (Hirsch, 2007, Pp. 38). Although, it has been vehemently debated, that mere pointing a camera at something, does not facilitate effective revelation of the truth about the subject and hence ultimately becomes a surface representation. The definitive aspiration of realism is to leave “the content to speak for itself”, so that the film imagery remains as truthful as possible. But, without operating under a set of codes and conventions (which entails manipulating sound and image), the footage is at best implausible, at worst unwatchable. Bazin eventually determined that ‘…. Every realism in art was first profoundly aesthetic’ and that “... realism in art can only be achieved in one way - through artifice’ (Kolker, 2009, Pp. 78). Vivian Sobchack argues that the picture frame or window analogy in no way, truly productively portrays the vibrant association between the film subject and the viewer as they entail a state of submissiveness / compliance in the viewing position, and, they do not effectively reveal the composite relationship between the viewer and the film, which in turn, is revocable. In the modern-day appraisal of pointless, shallow, digital celebrated culture and its insinuation in the loss of the real, there is the proposition, which, although, is seldom entirely elucidated, that it is precisely the characteristics of the classic realist text criticized by film theory i.e., character psychology depth, narrative coherence, and so on and so forth, which exemplify the implication now lost in postmodernist digital culture. Classical realist narrative and photography, whilst perhaps not revealing the reality, had sense as well as profundity. The severely critiqued concept of photographys indexicality is thus, revived. If any given pragmatism presumes and verbalizes its own meticulous replica of the real world then it is hardly astonishing to assume that in postmodernist theories the hyperrealism as an outcome of computer graphics has been construed - not as offering a more comparable representation of the genuine world, but rather as indication of its disappearance (Dovey, Lister, Grant, Kelly; 2009; Pp. 145). Perspectives and Discussion on Realism and Animation: The extent - and type in which the emotive command of animated films may be recognized is subjective to another factor which is predominantly characteristic to the Disney artistic sense and has culminated into a debatable issue as animation finally commences to garner the attention it warrants within the framework of film studies. This factor is the excellence of practicality with which animated film may be instilled. Several significant figures who celebrated the high merits of the animated medium in the early years of its growth sensed that animation was invigorating and exhilarating specifically since it could travel past the artistic restraints of realism. Any such discussions and debates about animation would be insignificant without the mention of the pioneer in animation industry – Walt Disney. As Disney progressed from the more chaotic landscape of the cartoon short into his characteristic improvement of the animated feature, however the company embraced a relatively more rational visual. Colossal technical and artistic reserves were brought to allow increase and expanding the competence of animated film to estimate to the real world in terms of the notion fashioned by motion and surface detail, although at the same time, preserving the authority to exclaim fantasy sequences and devises. Such an aesthetic reallocation was of substantial importance and has aggravated an assortment of decisive reactions amongst theorists and historians of the medium. Michael Barrier, for instance, exemplifies the intimidating vision of the new Disney aesthetic when he writes that: "Once it had been established that a story was a fairy tale or an animal fable, "fact" dominated, in the form of a very subtle but ultimately parasitic animation, separated from live action only by a leavening of caricature". Similary, other writers, such as Paul Wells have assumed more hesitant views, recognizing that while Disney fixed an aesthetic style which was inherently tied up with conservatism, consent and appeasement, modernist elements in the aesthetic also withheld the capability to challenge this affinity and facilitate more open readings betrothed with present-day schedules (Whitley, 2008, Pp.6). It is not the eminence of realism which shapes viewers reactions to the thematic concerns of animated films. The manner in which the principles of specific genres are organized is evidently as noteworthy as the outcome tenable by any overarching devotion to the tenets of realism (Whitley, 2008, Pp.7). CGI & Realism: CGI or Computer Generated Imagery has essentially redefined the way we connect with film – as a practice, in its making, its deliverance, as well as its treatment. CG has also affected on the artistic and sociological implication of film among audiences. CGI essentially, refers to construction of models and animating them through technological aides such as the computer. The impact and transformations caused by the advent of CGI is evident from the way in which people and scenes are portrayed and graphically morphed to provide a visually excellent image that is close to realism. For instance, consider the scene from Forest Gump where the portrayal of an amputee, being moved from a hospital bed and carried, legless, through a three dimensional space. The scene left the viewers surprised as the fact that the actor’s limb is digitally removed from the film is difficult to comprehend. Traditionally, such a depiction would have entailed use of such techniques as folding or tucking the actor’s limbs behind his body concealed neatly with a loose fitting robe. Furthermore, in the same film, the viewers were exposed to more such visual treats, courtesy digital technology, whereby they saw photographic images of President Kennedy speaking to actor Tom Hanks, with dialogues scripted by the films writers. One of the most extensively publicized applications of CGI, which left the viewers amazed beyond imagination, is the images of moving, living, and gigantic digital dinosaurs in the famous Steven Spielberg’s movie The Jurassic Park, which was an epitome of digital photography, being used on such a grand scale in movie making. The apparent irony thereby lies in the fact that – the creation of plausible photographic images of objects which cannot be captured on camera and the computer imaging abilities which facilitate such photography, tends to confront some of the established hypothesis surrounding the concept of realism and the cinema which are personified in film theory (Simpson, Utterson, Shepherdson; Pp. 87 - 88). Scrutinizing the expansive imperative contradiction towards animation in both the popular press as well as film - academic circles, Paul Wells has observed that conversations of animated illustration are desired if the function which animation holds, in our wider cultural framework is to be a reappraised: “The idea that animation is an innocent medium, ostensibly for children and largely dismissed in film histories, has done much to inhibit proper discussion of issues concerning representation ….Though some attention was paid to the ostensible content of certain films, the complex ways in which animation problematises the representation of gender and race have yet to be discussed” (Wells, 1988, Pp. 187). The modes in which animated illustrations correspond have progressed as an outcome of the medium’s contiguity with other art forms, most remarkably comic illustration and live-action films. Traditionally, popular animation and live-action have always been analytically entwined, each practicing the other’s codes and conventions at the same time, preserving an evident distinctiveness from one another. For example, certain modern feature animations imitate the mannerisms of conventional live-action photography, such as lens-flare as observed in the 1995 animation movie The Toy Story and camera-shake – as observed in the 2001 animated feature film Final Fantasy: the Spirits Within. Likewise, live-action now freely applies “invisible” animation to create a more inclusive scene, along with other striking features such as falling leaves in the college campus in the movie A Beautiful Mind (2001), or physically modifying Nicole Kidman’s nose to look like that of Virginia Woolf in The Hours (2002). There exist several other realistic apprehensions which outline the creation of an animated character, besides those of caricature. Character animation shares a common attribute with the live-action / action-adventure genre with respect to its fundamental anxiety with the surplus of the body i.e., while creating a two dimensional animation, the fantasy of motion is attained through the formation of diagrams with minute interstitial modifications from one image to the next: “When the film-maker uses the term ‘animated film’ he uses it in the narrow sense of the work of a graphic artist recreating on paper or celluloid separate phases of movement which give the illusion of continuous action when they are projected in sequence on to a screen (Halas, Manvell, 1959, Pp. 11). A character, as a stable and intelligible creation, is only accomplished if the succession of images is of synchronized permanence. In order to sustain this constancy, the animator refers to “model sheets” which illustrate the character from all angles, ascertaining a reliable and non-contradictory image. In an endeavor to create as rational an image as possible, animators resorts to a wide range of production strategies with a view to guarantee the hyperrealist directive of the maneuverability of sequences from one image to the next and so on. These include model sheets which demonstrate the characters from all angles, composition categories, life drawing, film orientation matter, desk-mirrors for learning facial expression, and the advancement of task methodologies which endorse a progression of iterative, recurrent line-testing as a fundamental production practice. References: Whitley, D., (2008). The Idea of Nature in Disney Animation, Ashgate Publishing Ltd., Pp.7 Simons, J., (2007). Playing the Waves, Amsterdam University, Pp. 27 Litch, M. M., (2002). Philosophy through Film, Routledge, Pp. 54 Hirsch, R., (2007). Light and Lens: Photography in the Digital Age, Elseiver, Pp. 38 Kolker, R. P., (2009). The Altering Eye: Contemporary International Cinema, Open Book Publishers, Pp. 78 Stephen Prince: True Lies - Perceptual Realism, Digital Images and Film Theory in Turner, G., (2002). The Film Cultures Reader, Routledge, Pp. 115 Wells, P., (2002). Animation: Genre and Authorship, Wallflower Press, Pp. 1 Dovey, J., Lister, M., Giddings, S., Grant, L., Kelly, K., (2009). New Media: A Critical Introduction, Taylor and Francis, Pp.145 Simpson, P., Utterson, A., Shepherdson, K. J., (2004). Film theory: Critical Concepts in Media and cultural Studies, Taylor & Francis, Pp. 87 – 88 Wells, P., (1988). Understanding Animation, Routledge, Pp. 187 Halas, J., Manvell, R., (1959). The Technique of Film Animation, Focal Press, Pp. 11 Read More