MA 3D Computer Animation

Because of the enormous influence of media, games; movies; television; advertising; online streaming, as works of art and as a medium of communication, cannot be separated from political factors.

Games: Political activists and politicians use online games to virtually visit people’s living rooms and seek attention for their messages. A Black Lives Matter activities created a monument on an island in Animal Sen, It features portraits of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor and other black victims of police violence. Virtual demonstrations of “Black Lives Matter” have also appeared in other popular games, such as The Sims, Grand Theft Auto and World of Warcraft. Many good games are more or less with their point of view to attack in reality some unreasonable situation, among them there are some games even completely represents a political views, such as “this is my war” is a standard anti-war theme of the game, but it doesn’t affect it become a good work.

Film: “12 Years a Slave” screenwriter John Ridley wrote an article in the Los Angeles Times criticizing “Gone With the Wind” for glorifying slavery or deliberately perpetuating stereotypes of people of color and calling for more attention. HBO Max was forced to temporarily pull the film from the shelves in the face of public pressure. Mulan is a very “politically correct” film, but it loses its logic and rationality due to its excessive pursuit of political correctness. Disney’s live-action mulan do not have the role of Li Xiang, the leading man animated film. Why is that? The reason is that In the anime, Li Xiang is Mulan’s superior, and the studio thought it would be uncomfortable for the public, if mulan to have a relationship with her superior, especially in the context of # MeToo. The values that the film intends to promote are clear: that women can not be subordinate to men, that women can be powerful enough, and can even surpass men perfectly.

TV: There is no need to say more about how popular of the 20-year-old sitcom Friends. There’s nothing wrong with it. However, co-creator of it, Marta Kauffman wept and apologized on an online show because the six main characters, all white, weren’t doing a great job of “ethnic diversity”… In order to be politically correct, more and more TV characters will guarantee “ethnic diversity” and are happy to include gay characters, such as original vampires ,modern families and etc.

Advertising: The campaign advertisement, which plays an important role in political marketing, has become an important field for political strategists. Since 2019, nearly 5 million political ads have aired on American TELEVISION, accounting for $2.3 billion worth of national and local television coverage. In addition to ads for the presidential election, there are other races for the Senate and The House of Representatives. The Communications Act prohibits broadcasters from censoring or refusing to air political campaign ads commissioned by federal candidates. The law does not apply to cable networks such as CNN or social media sites, where all the top candidates will spend tens of millions of dollars to woo voters ahead of the November 2020 presidential election. So as the total amount of campaign advertising increases, the share of negative ads continues to climb. Misinformation circulating on the Internet is increasingly rampant and can mislead voters. A negative campaign AD is an attack AD that focuses on the opponent. In a positive campaign AD, on the other hand, the campaign focuses on promoting the good qualities of its candidate.

Online streaming: Now, it’s easy to find gay dating sites or apps on the Internet, such as Grindr, Blued, etc. But just a century ago, it would have been hard to imagine LGBTQI+ rights being universally recognized. America’s first gay-rights group, the Society for Human Rights, did not emerge until 1924 and disbanded a year later under intense political pressure. The American Psychiatric Association still listed homosexuality as a Psychiatric disorder until 1973. Massachusetts became the first state to legalize gay marriage in 2004, and 37 more states and Washington have since done so. Today, the right of homosexuality is an important part of political correctness in Europe and America. Hundreds of activist groups have been formed in the US to gain legal and policy support for LGBTQI+ people. These activist groups fight for LGBTQI+ families to have the same immigration rights as other families, and for LGBTQI+ refugees fleeing persecution to be granted asylum in the United States. Gay groups and individuals can legally and equally express their hobbies and opinions on online streaming media.

Reference:

1. Limin Cui, 2020. What should players do when faced with political correctness in games? Available from: https://www.3dmgame.com/original/3742435.html
2. Kristina Reymann-Schneider, 2020. Animal Brotherhood: How Games are Politicized? Available from:https://www.dw.com/zh/%E7%BE%8E%E5%A4%A7%E9%80%89%E4%B8%AD-%E5%8A%A8%E7%89%A9%E6%A3%AE%E5%8F%8B%E4%BC%9A%E6%B8%B8%E6%88%8F%E5%A6%82%E4%BD%95%E8%A2%AB%E6%94%BF%E6%B2%BB%E5%8C%96/a-55356217.
3. Wikipedia, 2021. Politically correct. Available from: https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E6%94%BF%E6%B2%BB%E6%AD%A3%E7%A2%BA
4. Zhaoyin Fen, 2020. Us election: Why do big-money campaign ads Matter. Available from: https://www.bbc.com/zhongwen/simp/world-54243454
5. Qin Lin, 2020. Film Review of Mulan — Uto of feminism and Freedom. Available from: https://zhuanlan.zhihu.com/p/238205723
6. Junqin Zhang, 2020. How does social media regulate campaign advertising? Available from:https://www.dw.com/zh/%E7%A4%BE%E4%BA%A4%E5%AA%92%E4%BD%93%E5%A6%82%E4%BD%95%E8%A7%84%E8%8C%83%E7%AB%9E%E9%80%89%E5%B9%BF%E5%91%8A/a-51955367

First, what politics affect media? It seems to me that the impact on the most media comes mainly from political correctness. Political correctness refers to the self-censorship that gives priority to certain ideas in speech, behavior and policy out of consideration of ideology, values and public pressure, usually to avoid causing offence to certain groups of society. It can also be used literally to refer to the official position, the mainstream values of society. The media must follow, or report or guide awareness within this framework. Political correctness is often seen as a restriction on freedom of speech, requiring influential politicians, public figures, media, and educational institutions to meet certain conditions when making statements and transmitting information. Politically incorrect statements or actions can result in criticism, attacks. The parties may be marginalization, job loss, and even civil or criminal prosecution.

For example, in terms of ideology, the media should pay attention to the correct guidance of the viewpoints in the reports on the colored people and homosexuality, without any discriminatory connotations.

In terms of consumption, the media need to promote resource conservation and low-carbon life, not illegal activities such as drug use.

In politics, in many European and American countries, media propaganda can influence the outcome of presidential election to a great extent. In turn, the president can also use the media to publicize and persuade the public to accept their ideas and new policies.

Individual enterprises or companies are also subject to legal restrictions when they use the media to promote their products. For example, they are not allowed to carry out false publicity, or exaggerate the efficacy of their products, and they are not allowed to promote addictive drugs or other harmful products.

In the case of current events, in some cases, media real-time coverage can be influenced by political factors. For example, after mass sexual assaults in several German cities on New Year’s Eve in 2015. Since most of the offenders are Muslim refugees of North African origin and Afghan origin, the German governments and media at all levels covered up the case in order to “support the political correctness of accepting foreign refugees”. After the case was exposed, it drew strong criticism from all circles. Some comments said that “Germans pay a heavy price for ensuring ‘political correctness'”, that “political correctness” is the root cause of the refugee crisis in Germany today “, and that “the pursuit of ‘political correctness’ at all costs is creating chaos and even tragedy for Germany and Europe”.

If the media violates these principles, they may be attacked in public opinion, to a certain extent, prosecuted by the judiciary, or punished more severely by law.

Reference:

Wikipedia, 2021. Politically correct. Available from: https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E6%94%BF%E6%B2%BB%E6%AD%A3%E7%A2%BA

I create 6 biped poses to camera: 3 action poses and 3 drama (emotional) poses.

I learned and knew the importance of follow through ,overlapping and secondary action in animation.

I learned and knew the importance of squeezing, stretching and timing in animation.

• Squash and Stretch-defining the speed, rigidity and mass of an object by distorting its shape during an action. Squash and stretch applies to characters and also exaggerate facial expressions. It’s very important to keep the volume of the object consistent.
• Timing and Motion-spacing actions to define the weight and size of objects and the personality of characters. This principle states that the personality and nature of an animation is greatly affected by the number of frames inserted between each main action, basically if you have many drawings that are very close together in between the two main poses the action will be very slow. If you have very few drawings that far apart from each other, the action will be very fast, one simple action can have 10 different meanings depending on how many frames you give it.
• Anticipation- the preparation for an action to give the audience a clue as to what is happening next, as well as to make the action appear more realistic. One example is when a character is about to jump before leaping into the air. He has to prepare for the action by crouching down to build energy, it’s like a spring that coils up before releasing. If this character jumping without any anticipation, it will looks very unrealistic because the energy to jump comes out of nowhere.
• Staging-presenting and idea so that it is unmistakably clear. You want to be in full control of where the audience is looking,all of the elements of the scene work together to move the viewers eyes around the screen.The main action of the scene should be very clear and simple. It can’t be upstaged by all the things that are going on. This takes attention away from the main point, it should also have proper timing, it’s not just about controlling the viewers eyes, it’s also about conveying ideas.
• Follow Through and Overlapping Action- The termination of an action and establishing its relationship to the next action. This is the technique of having body parts that appendages drag behind the rest of the body, and continue to move in the body stops follow through and overlapping action are often associated with another technique called drag these names all describe the same thing but in different ways.
• Straight Ahead Action and Pose-to-Pose Action-The two contrasting approaches to the creation of movement.The first method straight ahead, is where you draw the first drawing, and then you draw the second drawing and then the third drawing, and so on. It’s basically animating as you go. The second method post a pose is where you draw the beginning and end of each main pose and go back later to fill in the drawings in between.
• Slow in and Out- the spacing of the in-between frames to achieve subtlety of timing and movement. this principle refers to the way pretty much all movements start slowly build speed and finishes slowly, this is one of the most important principles to achieving lifelike motion.
• Arcs- the visual path of action for natural movement. So let’s say that we were given these key poses and we’re told to fill in the poses in between, simply taking the midway point between the poses will not work, because this looks way too mechanical, the ball needs to follow an arc. Of course we also need to consider the Slow In and Out caused by gravity.
• Exaggeration-Accentuating the essence of an idea via the design and the action. Basically every action pose and expression can be taken to the next level, to increase the amount of impact on the viewer, making the idea or essence of the action more apparent and real.
• Secondary Action- the action of an object resulting from another action. This principle is often associated with overlapping action, although according to Frank and Ollie, it means something very different, secondary action describes gestures that support the main action to add more dimension to the character animation. For example, a character may be walking angrily, the primary action is the legs and the secondary action is everything else, the arm swinging the head bobbing and the facial movements. It’s important not to let the secondary action dominate the primary action.
• Appeal- creating a design or an action that the audience enjoys watching. basically characters that you animate should be somewhat pleasing to look at, they should have some kind of charismatic aspect to like about them, or they are interesting to look at. Here are three steps to doing it, first use a variety of shapes, second play with proportions, third, keep it simple.
• Solid drawing this principle is about making sure that forms feel like they are in three dimensional space with volume weight and balance. When doing a rough pass of the character use basic solid shapes like spheres, cubes and cylinders to construct the character instead of circles, squares and rectangles. This will help you be mindful of the space they’re in. Avoiding symmetry and drawing perspective lines on the ground to keep track of their distance from the camera, so that you can know when to draw them bigger or smaller.

Examples of who have imitated or been influenced by it:

The example I can think of that mimics Disney’s real animation aesthetic is from Universal pictures: The Voice of Joy. The setting of characters and camera editing in Disney animated movies can always give people a strong shock. The Voice of Joy, in both editing and character design, imitates Disney’s hyperreal animation aesthetics. In particular, the Voice of Joy mixes the songs with the plot of the movie, which is where Disney is good at. In the film, montage editing is used in many places, and the lens narrative is smooth, concise and the theme is clear. At the same time, each character has a distinct personality, and the film integrates songs and dances with the plot. One of the characteristics of classic Disney animation is broadway-style songs and dances, which undoubtedly strengthens the sense of melody and affinity of the whole cartoon film, thus making it easier for the audience to accept the emotions and attitudes conveyed by the cartoon film.

Examples of who resist it:

The example I can think of against Disney’s authentic animation aesthetic is Tom and Jerry, created by William Hanna, Joseph Barbera, Fred Quimby, and Chuck Jones. First of all, the biggest difference between it and Disney animation is that the expression of the protagonist’s emotions and intentions is not in language, but in the facial expression, body and movement of the role. We can see that the emotional communication and inner activities of Tom and Jerry are all conveyed through their rich and accurate facial expressions and body movements. They almost have no dialogue, but the animator can fully express their inner emotions through animation. This is completely different from Disney’s real animation aesthetics, and Tom and Jerry further magnifies the unique charm of animation in expression and body expression.

In many cases,  language weakens their emotional and inner reaction expression. Tom and Jerry can accurately express the inner activities of characters by depicting a series of facial expressions and exaggerating and refining their body movements. For example, the little moments, the little hesitations, the little silences: when Tom floats in the air and realizes that there’s nothing down there, and then he falls off, the excessive exaggeration, the subtle humor, not only brings laughter, it’s also different from Disney’s animation aesthetics.

The second Tom and Jerry episode

Timeline for the history of film:

• In 1895, cinema began moving pictures projected onto a big screen.
• In 1877, Muybridge settled the bet by setting up a system of 12 separate stills cameras.
• In 1891, the American inventor Thomas Edison had perfected the Kinetoscope.
• In 1892, Emile Reynaud projected the first animated film on his Kinetoscope.
• In 1895, Robert W Paul and Bert Akers had invented the first British 35 millimeter camera .
• Robert W Paul demonstrated his projector the theatre graph on the 21st of February 1896 the same day that the Lumiere system was displayed in London.
• The Derby shot by Robert W Paul in June 1896 is one of the earliest examples of newsreel.
• In the 1900s, they are they seem to be variety acts but they’re actually filmed using cinematic techniques this was a very popular acting in France.
• Spanish film has been hand colored each separate frame individually painted since 1907.
• About 100 years ago, George Méliès imagined the future we’re heading towards a Channel Tunnel and George Méliè made a film about the Channel Tunnel.
• In 1897, George Melia built the world’s first film studio here in Montreuil.
• A studio was built by Charles Pathé in 1904 the glass ceiling allows natural daylight to flood in and they make a couple of films at the same time in the same studio.
• Pathé were producing 16 films a month employing up to 1700 people and with a worldwide distribution network a cottage industry became a global phenomenon.
• In 1900, George Smith showed special effect for the first time in film.
• In 1901, James Williamson for the chemist working in Hove and he also develops photographic film and film so this is how he started to know the pioneer filmmakers who work in the city. and he later went on to build a film studio this. He was one of the first filmmakers to develop multi shot films and also for dramatic effects cutting from one shot to another from differen cameras and different camera angles to create a dramatic effect.
• In Mary Jane’s mishap made in 1903 George employs a close-up.
• In 1897 a woman called Alice Guy-Blaché was making film history. here in France Alice Guy-Blaché became one of the world’s first female directors and producers when she started making film as with Gaumont.
• Alice Guy-Blaché began making films for Gaumont in either 1896 or 1897, and she’s a pioneer by either date.
• In 1903, Alice showed how do you introduce novelty into standard street scene. In Alice Guy-Blaché’s wonderful film the race for the sausage she shows complete mastery of the comedy chase.
• In 1905, Alice Guy-Blaché in Spain compared these people’s reaction to a camera with a modern crowd.
• In 1913, babies were often used as comic props in the film.
• A predominantly working-class entertainment the musical provided ready-made acts for the early years of cinema. Fred specialized in parodies of dramatic stories. In 1913 a British film company produced the Battle of Waterloo.
• By 1909, Georges méliès was outdated the action was so far away from the camera it was very difficult to get personality across.
• In 1901, Andre deed appeared in a couple of Georges méliès films and so studied camera tricks first hand. he was spotted on stage by Charles path, a founder of the path a film production company and was given a chance to star in his own films.
• Andre deed left passe in 1908, he joined eat ala an Italian film company.
• In 1912, these films not just always accompanied by music also had sound effects to them.
• Max Linder made his first film appearance in 1905.
• When Hollywood took over as the leader of world cinema the end of the Great War. The language of cinema was already fully formed. not only had film pioneers invented the moving picture camera and projector but also invented film techniques. Editing, fades, screen wipes, double exposure and early systems for color and camera movement.
• In 1923, Melies burned the 500 negatives of all his films.
• The trip to the moon shot in 1902 was one of the most famous films at the time you know, and this is the first ever worldwide success in fiction film and one of the most important science fiction film ever.
• World War one had claimed Max’s and his wife’s victims.

Timeline for the history of animation:

• In the seventeenth century with the magic lantern, the magic lantern was a machine. That projected images that could have parts that moved and were projected onto a screen in front of a wide audience. These moving images were considered as animation.
• The first actual animation would be in the eighteen hundreds was the former drug.
• The eighteen hundreds also gave birth to another animation contraption: Zorro.
• Now are in the nineteen hundreds now that video cameras are about, animation truly could start to exist on the big screen, start with humorous faces of funny faces.
• In 1914, the first characteristic animation come out, dirty, the dinosaur. It was the first smooth drawn animation with fully moving animals or creatures in good quality and a scene.
• In 1928, Steve by Willie is about the sound, the music in the animation, it was the first information to produce music as sound.
• The Wall Street crash of nineteen twenty nine. Because of the great Depression, more and more cartoons were being made, and people’s love for animation grew stronger. Because of this, it led to walk Disney producing something that will change animation forever.
• In 1947, Snow White was the first ever feature film to be created by Disney. The movie used a bunch of different and new techniques, like rotoscoping, a technique used to get real human movement.
• With loony tunes booming in nineteen sixty nine and claimation being Hollywood’s way of creating real looking monsters.
• From nineteen seventy nine to nineteen eighty three, two men will join Lucas Films and develop a new type of animation.
• In 1970, animation wasn’t just Cartoon Show the movie. It was also being used for advertisement, like the Avert the Crestter Bear advert.
• In 1986, Pixar was founded, the animation, CG. CTI means computer generative imagery. It is making animation using computers. Basically you would make your character out of triangle.
• In 1995, Animation was really booming, but Pixar releases a full feature, CGI film. We have the help of Disney called Toy Story, and boom the world with the new film.
• In 2009, director James Cameron creates the Avatar that was mainly, which created by CGI.
• In 2014, CGI became a dominant species of animation.

Timeline for the history of VFX:

• In 1993, stephen Spielberg’s Jurassic Park revolutionized computer graphics.
• In 1995, ilam created the first computer animated title character in the film Casper. The first feature length film made entirely by computer animation, and the first in a long history of box office hits for Pixar.
• In 2001, square Pictures created the 1 Hyper Real, fully computer generated feature film based on original designs.
• King Kong was remarkable for having the largest number of visual effect shots in a single film. And was awarded the Oscar for best visual effects in 2005.

My understanding of them:

Whether it is animation, film or FVX, their development and improvement is a step-by-step process. No matter how rudimentary these attempts or devices may seem at first, they evolve into stunning technologies through iteration and development. Animation, for example, began as a series of images viewed in succession, and has evolved into full-fledged 2D and 3D animation. Every small innovation and invention has the potential to advance the industry. In fact, we are also in the long river of history, and the current progress, which looks not so shocking, but can make animation more perfect. Virtual reality, for example, has the potential to dramatically change the way movies are watched. Once the virtual reality technology is perfected, it will have a great impact on the traditional way of watching movies, but the effect of watching movies and entertainment will be greatly strengthened. Meanwhile, in the future, once the motion capture technology is perfected, the creation cycle and cost of animation will be reduced to a great extent.

Reference:

Silent Film Locations, 2015. BBC Paul Mertons Weird and Wonderful World of Early Cinema. [online video]. Available from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=87km5sFrIQQ [Accessed 8 Oct 2021].

Jack webb, 2014. History Of Animation Documentary. [online video]. Available from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sfzy05M-nzY [Accessed 8 Oct 2021].

World Documentary Channel, 2016. A History of CGI Characters – DOCUMENTARY. [online video]. Available from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jZqSAYE5Mrw [Accessed 8 Oct 2021]

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