The Fourth Dimension of Animated Reality - Research Paper Example

 The Fourth Dimension of Animated Reality ABSTRACT  Animation has become a means to think the unthinkable and materialize the impossible in the film world. Abstraction and sublimation are crossing the threshold of reality with the aid of this new found technique. Animation films and animated parts of live action films have brought back the culture of story telling with an irresistible charm. In the global perspective, the folk tales based on rural myths are being retold blending them with the globalised and ever-evolving urban myths. This study deconstructs the text of the film, ‘Kung Fu Panda’, in the light of this global scenario. India, in particular has emerged as the potential candidate for becoming the global animation hub, as this country abounds in fairy tales as well as worthy professionals who can realize them in full spirit on silver screen. Even on television, the space for animation is expanding at a very fast pace. Television and the global market as such function as secondary outlets for the commercial process involved in marketing an animation film. An array of toys to video games are produced and sold based on each successful animation film. Creative persona of humans has once again reached a threshold of transcending reality. Introduction The Kung Fu warrior confronting a bunch of thugs in a way side inn; the image so familiar soaked in the aura of Golden China, the Orient. Has Chinese culture nothing to offer than martial arts? Though this criticism is valid, these movies seem to be quite palatable, especially to the global audience. The 2006 animation film, ‘Kung Fu Panda’ also begins with such an image sequence. Beckerman (2003: preface 9) calls animation the “ultimate fantasy medium” and says that its scope ‘goes beyond live action film and television.” Hollywood has given the film buffs of the world a number of animation films that surpass live action movies in plot, production, technical perfection and aesthetics. All of them narrated simple fairy tale story lines yet attracted the whole lot of adult audience and became crowd pullers. If we go in search of this newly found interest in animated fairy tales, we are bound to find certain unique features of human mind. The human narrative itself ever since its beginning has been caught in the delightful entrapment of story telling. Stories have contributed to the collective memory and thereby the survival of human race. This study envisages finding out what memories and responses a modern animated film like ‘Kung Fu Panda’ has evoked in the minds of the global masses so that this film became a resounding success. In this process, this study will also trace the growth path of animation in history, its importance in the present scenario film making and its future, particularly in relation with the Indian scenario. Animation: A Brief History In animation, ‘space’ in between drawings are converted into ‘time’ factor taking advantage of the laws of perception of motion by our eyes. To cite a simple example, when a torch is moved in an arc, an illusion is created and the observer can see a whole circle of light. This is what science calls the persistence of vision. Animation is based on this phenomenon as also early motion picture was. Picture flipping thumb cards were another common adaptation based on the persistence of vision. The origin of animation can be traced backed to the practice of drawing pictures in a particular way so that they show the passage of time. Even the cave men are found to have drawn such multiple pictures. The simple toy of our childhood, a round disc with two strings attached at the ends of the diameter and two different pictures on the two sides derives from the same principle. When the strings are stretched away from the disc, it rotates in semi-circular movements thereby giving us a mixed vision of the two pictures. If on one side, the picture is that of a bird and on the other side that of a cage, we see a bird in a cage. All these examples make it clear that animation was embedded in our culture long back than we might have perceived. Human race has been for centuries, familiar with these techniques in their simplest forms. Thus animation can be seen as an art with a history which may partially explain its hold on the modern film audience. The famous ‘Muybridge photographs’ of galloping horses taken using 12 cameras in 1872 was a real breakthrough in the progress of this technique. Animation on film as such was born towards the end of nineteenth century (Beckerman, 2003: 3). In 1900, James Stuart Blackton presented a quick sketch show on vaudeville stage and this was filmed by Edison Motion Picture Company and was titled ‘The Enchanted Drawing’ (Beckerman, 2003: 3). This was a very distant and vague attempt at animation, according to Beckerman (2003: 3). At that time, Phenakistoscope, an early animation device and Edison’s movie machines, Kinetograph and Kinetoscope were already in existence (Beckerman, 2003: 3). Emile Cohl’s ‘Fantasmagorie’ was filmed in 1908 which was a step forward on Blackton’s work. In 1916, first feature length animationa titled ‘El Apostol’ was made in Argentina. Films like ‘Koko the Clown’, ‘Farmer Alfalfa’ and ‘Felix the Cat’ followed. 1930s and 1940s saw the classic animation works by Walt Disney. In 1927, the legendary Mickey Mouse was born and his story was the first full-fledged sound animation film. 1930s was the decade of colour cartoons. Soon ‘Popeye’ and ‘snow white’ (which was the first animated feature having colour and sound) inherited the legacy. The production cost of ‘Snow White’ was $1,4888,000 and it collected $8,538, 000 (Beckerman, 2003: 45). It was being realized that animation films were no small game. Technical experimentation in animation was moving on a very fast pace. ‘Willie the Worm’, an eight minute cartoon was telecast on NBC in 1938. Meanwhile, Mickey Mouse went global and other animation films followed suite. Films like, ‘The Lion King’, ‘Pinocchio’, ‘Shrek’, ‘Mary Poppins’ etc. were either adaptations of Western Fairy tale Classics or stories conceived in the line of Western stereotypes. The human craving for spectacle was finding its ultimate abode in these moving, talking, yet less live depictions. It was a coming alive of childhood for both the spectator and the medium itself. Methodology The 2006 animation film, ‘Kung Fu Panda’, marks a paradigm shift in this march of Hollywood animation bandwagon. For the first time, the story and characters belongs to the world outside West. In an animation film, it is slippery to establish emotional empathies and sympathies of the viewers with the characters, especially if they belong to an outside world. The talent of a gifted actor is not present there to rescue the film for its emotional part. In such a scenario, it was wise for the makers of the movie to follow the foot prints of Chinese martial arts movies, of which certain amount of guaranteed success could be expected. The global audience was already conditioned to be entertained by such movies. This study will make a qualitative analysis of the film text in relation to the plot, narrative style, technical aspects and the message conveyed by the film. The findings of this analysis will be correlated with the Indian situation so as to impart a sense of direction to the mushrooming Indian animation Industry. Kung Fu Panda: An analysis of the narrative text Primarily, what gives ‘Kung Fu Panda’ its universal appeal is of course the hero’s journey narrative archetype used in the construction of the story line. This pattern is essentially the reflection of human growth and change irrespective of country, race or any historical period (Glebas, 2008: 284). In this story also, there is a typical mentor who teaches the hero to face the perils of the long journey, a trickster, the father geese in this case, who initially prevents the hero from listening to his heart’s call, allies of the hero who helps him and the dark forces which he has to fight (Glebas, 2008: 284). First we see the hero, the Panda leading an ordinary life. Then he is drawn into a hitherto unfamiliar world of adventure. After facing several life and death situations, he is rewarded for his courage and determination to complete the journey. As the story moves forward, the hero also passes through a psychological journey in which he overcomes fear and acquires a more refined self. In this aspect, this film is a sequel to all the hero’s journey movies that we have seen in Hollywood and Bollywood and animation movies like ‘The Lion King’. There is an element of predictability in such story lines which can be tricky if not filled, in between, with unexpected twists and turns. Or the viewer will loose interest. But this story line also reassures the viewer that all is going to be well in the end. Here we shall also remember that human nature, whatsoever adventure-loving it may be, needs to have certain degree of certainty to feel comfortable in real life situations. Chinese culture and music is extensively used in the film, whether it may be the basic theoretical and cultural gamut of martial arts or the depiction of the mundane on the margins of the narrative. Beckerman (2003: 44) has observed that in an animated film, apt music can make better the “ story, animation timing, colour rendition, animated effects, improved camera tracking, and multiplane photography.” On the other hand, this film text can be read as a ‘Western Superhero’ movie, a factor that contributes to its appeal to the American and Europian audience. The idea that one has to believe in oneself which is the all time favorite of ‘celluloid America’ is the striking message of the film. The film promotes such an individualistic mind set even in contradiction to the Chinese tradition of putting destiny and collective ritualism above individualism. Thus Chinese culture is often left behind only to act as the picturesque background, though rich it is. Selecting Jack Black, Angelina Jolie and Jackie Chan to give voices to the main characters, a sequence of cinematic memories are evoked in the minds of the Hollywood-charmed viewers. The voices themselves explain the characters partially and it becomes easier to establish the rest. Though the animation movies deport actors from the scene, successful ones have shown a tendency to bring them back as body less voices. Voices, being the most intimate of all media, establish the actor in the minds of the viewers more forcefully than if they were bodily present. It is only because they realize this potential that star actors take the pain to pledge their voices to these seemingly unimportant animation characters. In terms of global marketing strategies, an animation film can open up special avenues to en-cash upon the legacy of the film even after it is out of the silver screen. ‘Kung Fu Panda’ was an apt example of this phenomenon. First, there is always the possibility of a sequel which in this case, is in the pipeline, then there are the toys- to-video games array of saleable commodities based on this film. There is an official website to keep the film alive in the memories of film buffs. Films like ‘Kung Fu Panda’ can never be underestimated as merely a children’s film. There can only be very few Hollywood movies which could equal the high-end technical inputs that went into this film. Whitaker et. al. (2002: 14) states that only by synchronising the four elements, the character, choreography, scene changes and camera movements can smoothness in visual flow can be achieved in an animation film. He (Whitaker et. al. 2002: 14) also draws our attention to the fact that for each minute of an animation film, about 100 story board sketches are needed. Matte paintings were used to depict the exterior shots while real time lighting techniques were developed to give a more dramatized effect. Animation: The evolving horizons Animation films thus offer a bowl with the right mix for success to the globalised film audience; emotion and action in the right proportion, fun and emotion in the right blend and also Western and Oriental in the proper mix. From 1930s onwards, design in animation has taken a lead and also moved away from realistic depictions (Beckerman, 2003:54). Beckerman (2003:54) also cites some examples of this in “the crayoned Baby Weems portion of the ‘Reluctant Dragon’, the wild visuals of the dream sequence from ‘Dumbo’, various episodes in the ‘Three Cabelleros’, the flat background painting in ‘Johny Appleseed’, and the colourstyling of ‘Once Upon a Winter Time’.” Animation films can be clay animated, computer animated, drawn on film, paint-on-glass animated or stop motion animated. They can also be 2D or 3D animated. White (2006: 20) says that the most difficult challenge before an animator is the “realistic, humanesque” character and that is why most animators chose to animate animal stories. Dialogue rendering lips are another tricky task to depict. 3D animation characters have to be built upon skeletons and the movements of these characters need to be synchronized to the movements of joints and spine of the skeleton (White, 2006: 32). But 3D animation yet has miles to go before it can claim to have become a perfect technique. An animator starts his work by deciding the shapes and proportions of the characters, then colour models for the characters are created and foreground and background compatibility is examined (White, 2006: 40). Rotoscoping, the method of drawing over live action and effects animation, the method of animating things in the background other than characters, have been two milestones in the development of this art. Parent (2002: 10) lists major techniques used in computer animation as, “squash &stretch, timing, secondary actions, slow in & slow out, follow through/overlapping action, exaggeration, appeal, anticipation, staging, and straight ahead versus pose to pose.” The first five techniques mentioned above “establish the physical basis of objects in the scene; the next three are the “principles that address the aesthetic design of an action or action sequence”; anticipation and staging are the parameters for how to present the action to the audience and straight ahead versus pose to pose is about “how a motion is created.” (Parent, 2002:13). Thus a synthetic three dimensional environment is manipulated along the movements of 3D objects as well as cameras. This multiplicity of movements is what gives an animated visual its dynamics. The process of making of an animation film moves in the following order; the story department translates verbal into visual and story board is created, art department prepares the designs and colour schemes, modeling department creates characters and the environment in which they live, the layout department transform 2D into 3D, the lighting department creates the lighting schemes, and the camera department finally renders the frames (Parent, 2002: 17). Animation and post-modernism The acts of viewing and perceiving of animation films are highly conditioned by the filming styles established by Hollywood movies (and also Bollywood movies, in case of Indians). In the beginning, the animation film makers were trying to recreate the unique and special camera movements as used in a live film. But now the threshold has been passed. Now animation films present frames and camera movements which have yet not been achieved by the techniques of live film making. For example, in the film, ‘Kung Fu Panda’ the display of martial arts can in no way be copied by a human actor, whatever the sophisticated technical support that he or she may get. Wells (183) opines that “ animation has always exhibited an intense pre-occupation with the real and its representations because it has fundamentally resisted reality as its governing aesthetic agenda.” Post-modernists like Wells (184) believe that: “the alienation techniques used in animation films satisfy a post modern agenda through their “future oriented innovative temporal imagination, iconoclastic attack on the institution, organization and ideology of art, technological optimism bordering at times on euphoria (and) promotion of popular culture as a challenge to high art” It is also argued (Wells, 188) that animation blurs conventional notions of “gender, species and indigenous identity.” Such ideological underpinnings predict a new unbiased open space to be unfolded in the future, where expressions are made more free and imaginative. In Kung Fu Panda, this argument is true from the very beginning, when we are introduced to the fat, clumsy, mundane hero. A goose is shown as the father to ‘Po’ which blurs the racial feelings of superiority and inferiority. Even a mantle is presented as a warrior. Nobody is superior based on the species that he or she belongs to. A great lot of imagination is required to break such basic conventions in thought. This is the promise of freedom that animation presents before our new film makers. India : The untapped potential Indian movies are also opening their windows to animation. In the Oscar-nominated film, ‘Lagaan’, the clouds were animated in the sky so as to appear exactly in the dramatic moment prepared for them. Another film, ‘Mohabbatein’, showed maple leaves blown away by wind in a Mumbai suburb. The animation firm, Maya Entertainment had a role to play in the making of the Hollywood movies, ‘Star Wars: The Phantom Menace’, ‘The Mummy’ etc. Apart from Maya Entertainment, firms like Toonz Animation, Pentamedia, Crest Communications, UTV Toons and JadooWorks have made a place in the international animation world. The 1990s saw the emergence of a number of prestigious animation training centres all over the country. Another speciality of Indian animation scenario is that it can provide highest quality animation at the lowest prices available in the world. Computer-based animation also helps film makers to bring about a cost cut amounting to 30-40 percent. Animation can occupy in India, the space left unexplored by the high budget block-buster movies. It can become the common man’s tool for film making as digital technologies get more and more inexpensive. Television can and is supporting this movement in its difficult transition period. Conclusion It is high time that Indian films try to use the narrative possibilities of animation other than using some occasional special effects. The success of the hollywood animation film based on Chinese culture indicates a market demand for tales from the East. India has a rich tradition of story telling which can be a perennial resource for animated films which blend the Eastern stories with the Western sensibilities. The uniqueness of the global audience is that it craves for new images from new cultures. Apart from being the mystic land of elephants, snakes and ‘sadhu’s, the flamboyant Indian story board has to come alive with its bright hues and shades. References Beckerman, H (2003) Animation: The Whole Story, New York: Allworth Communications Inc. Whitaker et. al. (2002) Timing for Animation, Burlington: Focal Press. Glebas, F (2008) Directing the Story: Professional Story Telling and Story Boarding Techniques for Live Action and Animation, Burlington: Focal Press. Wells, P (1998) Understanding Animation, London: Routledge. White, T (2006) Animation from Pencils to Pixels : Classical Techniques for Digital Animators, Maryland Heights: Elsevier. Parent, R (2002) Computer Animation: Algorithms and Techniques, San Francisco: Morgan Kauffman. Read More