Ed's Newsletter - October/November 2008

CHICAGO ACTING FOR ANIMATORS WORKSHOP
SATURDAY, OCTOBER 25TH, 10AM-5PM
After some on-again, off-again scheduling, I will definitely teach an Acting for Animators workshop in Chicago this Saturday, October 25th. If you are taking it for the first time, the price is $100. Drop me an E-mail at edhooks@edhooks.com if you are interested.

STANISLAVSKY IN FOCUS, 2d edition
This book, written by USC professor Sharon M. Carnicke, is essential for anybody who wants to understand the nuances of modern acting. Ms. Carnicke understands the work of Stanislavsky better than anybody I have ever come across and expertly explains how his theories influenced American acting styles. I recommend her book to you heartily and without reservation.

ACTING FOR ANIMATORS WORKSHOP SCHEDULE
Nov. 12-18, United Kingdom, various classes, some open. (Contact kumar@twelvej.com).
Nov. 21st, Stockholm, Sweden (Electronic Arts)
Nov. 24-27, Swansea Animation Days, Swansea South Wales
Nov. 29th, Ludwigsberg, Germany, Academy of Performing Arts Opening Celebration, a speech of welcome.
Dec. 1-5, Ludwigsberg, Germany Filmakademie Baden-Wurttemberg (closed workshop)
Dec. 12th, Barcelona, Spain – Grin Games (closed)
Dec. 15-16, Oporto, Portugal --Escola das Artes Universidade Católica Portuguesa (closed)

CRAFT NOTES
UNCANNY VALLEY REDUX

Recently, I was watching a documentary on the History channel entitled “The Secrets of Body Language”. Interesting stuff. The point was made in the film that only 7 percent of what we communicate with one another is via words. The other 93 percent is via expression and body language. Presuming that is true – and I don’t have any reason to doubt it – this means that animators working on photo-real humans, performance capture and such need to be paying much more attention to body language.

The thing about being in the Uncanny Valley is that the more your animation improves, the more likely it is that you will become even more deeply mired in the Valley. We humans are not conceptual about how precisely we pick up meaning from one another. Sometimes, it is in the form on a “hunch”, and sometimes it is straightforward. Gestures and body language tell a more compelling story than words. Our sense of sight is many times more powerful than our sense of hearing. Therefore, what we see will tend to over-ride what we hear. Did you ever talk to a nervous person who is trying to act casual? His body will betray him. (Not to inject politics into this, but John McCain’s body language is very full of tension and nervousness, whereas Barrack Obama’s body language suggests coolness.)

I also have been looking at on-line trailers for a variety of video games recently, and I am struck by how 99% of them tend to have the same overall rhythm. Life isn’t like that. Sometimes, people dart here or there, and sometimes they sit pensively in a car. What I notice is that animators are getting better at depicting realistic expression and attitude – but that is not enough if you are trying to crawl out of the Uncanny Valley. Even if you can create a portrait of a photo-real human that is real enough to hang in a portrait gallery, you still have the problem of acting. People act in pursuit of an objective. Also, people react. The way I perceive things directly impacts on how I react to them. If you get in my face and yell at me, I am going to have a different physical reaction than if you leaned in and kissed me on the cheek.

Body language is chock full of status transactions. (Read “Impro” by Keith Johnstone) The last person to go through a door, for example, is the one with the highest status. The documentary I saw included a fascinating exchange between Begin and Arafat at Camp David, when President Clinton was trying to broker a Mid-east peace. The party moved from the yard to inside the house, and neither Arafat nor Begin wanted to be the first one to cross the threshold. “You first”, “No, please, you first”, “Oh no, I insist, you first” – they went back and forth on the porch. Finally Begin literally grabbed Arafat by the back of his neck and shoved him through the open doorway, claiming the high-status position for himself. This is the kind of exchange that most of us would not focus on if it were not pointed out, but it is part of the fabric of human behavior, and it bears directly on the puzzle of the Uncanny Valley.

Years ago, when my daughter was a little girl, I used to let her watch me teach acting classes. Most of the material in the classroom scenes involved subject matter that she could not understand at her young age. Still, she could tell whether the behavior of the actors struck her as “correct”. If they were tense, or if a scene did not have a negotiation, I would notice her shifting around in her seat, glancing at the ceiling, rocking her legs back and forth, etc. When a scene was going well, she got still, even if she didn’t know what it was about. She became fixated on it. I quickly learned to keep an eye on her because she was like the miner’s canary. I trusted her gut reaction even though she didn’t know a thing about acting. She, like kids everywhere, was a PhD expert in human behavior even if she didn’t understand the context. This is the challenge of the Uncanny Valley. The answer is not going to be found in dialogue, folks. The way out of the Valley is non-verbal.

Until next month...be safe!