Ed's Newsletter - June 2009

FMX 2009
The FMX Conference on Animation, Effects, Games and Digital Media in Stuttgart, Germany was attended this year by 7,000 people from 41 countries. I have been participating in FMX for the past 8 years or so and stand in awe of what Thomas Haegele and his amazing team have parented. FMX is sort of like a warm-hearted cross between Siggraph, Annecy and GDC. As you would expect, the facilities are top notch, and the cutting edge tech staff can, if called upon, work magic. And there is this: In the best European tradition, Professor Haegele et al arrange events and dinners so as to enhance opportunities for relaxed networking. At one of the dinners I attended, for example, my table mates included Bay Raitt (Gollum and Valve), Dan Moscowitz (Spore lead programmer), Peter Plantec (Virtual Humans), a friend of Bay's who worked with him at Weta, and a student from Filmakademie Baden-Wuerttemberg. Conversation simply does not get much more stimulating. Here again is the link to FMX. I hope to see you there in 2010!

YOU WON'T SEE THIS COMMERCIAL IN THE U.S.
My good friend Andrew Daffey, from House of Curves in London, gave me an early peek at a new commercial he recently completed. Thing cracks me up. I would estimate we are about fifty years away from seeing this kind of spot in the U.S.. Nice work, Andy!

ACTING FOR ANIMATORS WORKSHOP SCHEDULE
June 17 Greenwich, Connecticut - Blue Sky Studios
Nov 4-7, Turin, Italy - VIEW Conference,
Nov 18-27 Swansea Animation Days (SAND), South Wales
Planning - India (some time between October and the end of the year)

CRAFT NOTES
Drawn to Life: 20 Golden Years of Disney Master Classes
This month I'll continue exploring the marvelous teachings on gesture analysis of Walt Stanchfield with quotes from this recently published book. If you do not already own this two-volume set from the Focal Press, I strongly recommend getting it. It goes right up there on the shelf next to Illusion of Life.

Draw ideas, not things; action, not poses; gestures, not anatomical structures.

This is one of the few areas in which stage actors have an advantage over animators. A stage actor has part of the battle won simply because he showed up at the party. He is already alive, and the audience recognizes that instantly. This fact - self evident though it may be - is the foundation upon which the entire theatrical transaction rests. An animator must endow a character on a cell or computer monitor the illusion of life.

Imagine yourself acting a part in a stage play. You have the first entrance to make. How, where, when, and why are all factors that would have to be worked out.

Most animators I know probably don't want to imagine themselves acting in a stage play. With respect to Walt, I would recommend that, instead of picturing yourself making an entrance on stage, picture the character you are creating doing it.

I think the concept of a left and right mode of the brain is helpful.

Whether it is referred to as right brain/left brain or head/heart or, as Karl Jung contended, "Anima" and "Animus", it all amounts to the same thing. And Walt is very correct.

You, the artist, are in a sense, a mime too. They do it with their body - you do it with pen and pencil.

Uh oh, the "mime" thing again ... I have talked to a lot of animators who have had the opportunity to sketch mime artists, and they all enjoyed it because the mimes would simulate an action. But here is the rub: While it is true that mimes communicate without words, there is a very major difference between what a mime does and what a speaking character does when he is gesturing. Gestures are not the same thing as mime. The impulses to gesture and speak occur simultaneously in the brain, and it happens naturally, without training. Mime is an art form and requires study.

Like (a) baby that involuntarily reacts to emotional suggestions, I want the viewer to react to my drawings.

Quoting Tolstoy: "Great art is when a great man who has the highest life-conception of his time tells what he feels."

When people see a good actor doing his thing, they may be unskilled in the art of gesture, but will know what is being portrayed and will be able to empathize with the actor.

Boy, I wish I could have had a few minutes to compare notes with Walt about gestures. I know what he is getting at here, but the truth is that humans don't empathize with gestures. We empathize with emotion. We see a gesture and react empathetically to the emotion behind it. In this sense, animated characters are exactly like their stage-actor counterparts. It is all about emotion. Here and elsewhere in Drawn to Life, Walt seems to be suggesting that stage actors are focused on delivering just the right gestures to evoke emotion. Stage actors do not think about gestures when they are in a performance. To do so would be considered an acting error. This is one of the big distinctions between what stage actors do and what animators do. It is a necessary part of the animator's art to think about gestures.

So strive for a drawing technique that is flexible in helping you to communicate the story you are trying to tell. Communication is what makes an artist a great artist.

I'm thinking that the quality of empathy is a needed ingredient in becoming a good animator....One needs to be sensitive to the feelings, emotions, and passions of others and be able to portray those feelings to an audience ...

Empathy is an essential ingredient of being alive and being human. Everybody except sociopaths already has empathy. Animators and stage actors -- and psychiatrists and novelists and live-action filmmakers and others - should be conceptual about how empathy functions. A doctor takes his little rubber hammer and taps your patellar tendon, and your knee jerks. Animators give their characters the illusion of life - i.e. thinking and emotions - and the audience will automatically respond with empathy.

Attitude, curiosity, interest, enthusiasm, discovery, awareness - those are all mental attributes that keep one alive and fresh and growing.

Amen. And those words would be a perfect epithet for Walt Stanchfield himself. Oh, how I regret not having the chance to know him personally! But at least we have these marvelous books. Special thanks Don Hahn and Focal Press.

Until next month...be safe!
"Actors are Shamans"