10.13.2005

Sergio Pablos Lecture

For those of you who don't know who he is, he's a very talented animator who's been an animation supe for Tantor in Disney's Tarzan, and Dr. Delbert Doppler from Treasure Planet. I recently attended a lecture by him which was awesome and I'd completely recommend to anyone who has the chance to do so. He covered a lot of stuff regarding his thought process and workflow when animating. He not only reiterated the basics, he also got into details such as what we as animators should be looking for and thinking about when animating. While some of it was a fresh reminder (which we always need), other things were new and very interesting to think about, which I'll proly get to when I get all my notes together in an orderly fashion (its on the to do list for ALL of my animation notes - I'm just in the process of moving to a new apt. right now so everythings a mess) However one thing that's fresh in my head due to an incident today was 'business,' and what good business is vs. bad business, kinda like character traits as well in a way, and maybe where to pull these from. I'll try and keep this short and simple (which I'm sure I won't) because i could easily ramble on about it forever because theres a lot to cover, but what he does, and I do, and I'm sure a lot of you do, is, you notice things other people do in real life and or good movie actors and you store those things in your head to use at a later date for whatever reason, some things get used, some don't, doesn't matter, just store'm.

The reason I thought about this is, this morning i was in the bathroom washing my hands and I noticed the guy next to me washing his face, hands, etc. and when he was done he took the paper towel and cleaned up his area of spilled water very meticulously. It was something very interesting at the moment because it was pretty unique to see him doing this (at least I thought). Most people could care less about the little water spots or mess's they make, especially in the public bathroom no doubt, but this guy was very much into cleaning up his minute mess. Proly just a habit or something he developed over time which was unique to him, or a quirky little piece of business that was just 'him.' Who knows were it even came from, maybe his mother always made him clean up after himself...dunno...however....*click, stored as interesting business for a character trait someday maybe" Where I'd ever use that I don't know, a neat freak kinda guy, a person who worries about germs? who knows....but it was very interesting to say the least.

It's nicer to pull buisness like this from real life because more people can relate to it most of the time or have seen this from someone they know. People can relate. That was a big point of Sergio's, make the characters/their buisness relate. When thinking about acting choices for a scene it's better to pull from these kinda things rather than to think about how your favorite animator animated a scene, or chose to 'act' out the scene. An example he gave was a scene he did from T. Planet where D. Doppler is about to eat his food and he smells the food using his hand by waving the scent of food up to his nose. His wife does this kinda thing and he's always thought it was ridiculous or pompous in a way but he stored that bit of information in his head and used it on doppler because doppler was kinda pompous and proper and it just fit for the character in this particular scene so he used it. Very cool.

Sorry if this makes no sense, this is all off the top of my head and I don't know if I'm explaining it to well, need my notes. But i hope it kinda makes sense and I'm not stating the obvious here.

It's just little things in life I guess that can be sooooo interesting, buisness is good in a shot always, guess it's just a good reminder for us all to think about the "right" kind of buisness for the character and don't just add buisness for the sake of it. Think about the character and how it's relating to what they're doing, or who they are, what they're saying, feeling, etc. and make it 'relate.' THAT type of 'buisness' ...is golden.


Man I'm long winded today, sorry, I gotta work on this.
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10.12.2005

Trailers

First my apologies for the run on sentences and long winded blog. I'll try and keep it shorter next time. ;P

So at lunch I was having this discussion with some fellow co-workers about movie trailers and how important they are to a film. Proly cuz we just saw a few things, a 'sneak peek' trailer from OUR film earlier that day and weren't too pleased with some of it - however it wasn't a theatrical release so whatever I guess. Then there is/was this film contest called "Trailer Park" where people have taken exisiting footage from any movie and re-edit it into a different and creative movie trailer than what was released. The main goal was to take the feeling of the movie and push it in a different direction than the original. Nothing about the footage or audio could be changed (minus the music track) Some examples are here and here. Brilliant stuff, just brilliant. It's amazing how much a movie can change just based off editing and music. Imagine seeing these trailers, then going to see the original film. *insert keeanu reeves voice* "Whoa."

I mean a movie trailer can literally make or break a film as well. Some trailers you see them and they are edited sooooo good you want to go see the movie right away. For example. The new Harry Potter trailer...now I'm not huge -arry pott'a fan, but sadly I must say when I went to see the Corpse Bride, this trailer came on and I was sooooo stoked after watching it that I actually preferred to see THAT right then and there over Corpse Bride (it pains me to even say that but it's true). It just goes to show you how a movie trailer is cut can be sooooo important. There's sooo much skill that goes into making a good trailer and I think most people overlook it and take it for granted?? I mean, a movie could be pretty awesome and have a shitty trailer, take Shaun of the Dead for example, great movie IMO. Not so hot trailer. I don't think many people went to see this movie because of the trailer. The trailer did nothing for anyone, therefor the movie didn't do so good. Then you take the new Star Wars trailers....awesome trailers. Bad movies. Now that's 'kinda' a bad example because people were gonna see Star Wars regardless of the trailers, but who knows. It's just the general idea. Make any sense? The trailer should get you excited to see the film, not wonder what the movies about after you see it. I mean theres times when you see a trailer (and i know this has happened to all of you) where you see the trailer and your like...uhh...so whats it about? DOH! Don't think I'm see'n that one. I mean sometimes a second trailer comes along and redeems the film, but still, you SHOULD be able to make just one trailer (therefor not giving the whole movie away by doing 8 trailers just to get people FINNNNNALLY excited to see the film) You should be able to just do it with one. (I do however realize that the more trailers they put out there the more buzz and constant reminder people have for it, but eh, I think if you saw just one awesome trailer for a movie that'd be enough. Ok, I'm ranting....ending it.

The other thing that bugs me about CG trailers vs. Live action trailers is that sometimes you can tell that the dialogue has been changed from what's in the original shot in CG trailers. They don't do this in live action trailers (at least I can't recall very many times where i've noticed it)...why do this in CG trailers. Is it because it's CG and they feel they can get away with it more easily. Uhh...no, not only is the lipsync usually waaaay off, but theres also this thing called, acting which probably doesn't match the dialogue!! BAH! OK, ranting again...k done.

So I dunno, maybe it's just me because I like editing and surround sound, I like being excited to see something, or a good trailer, or just plain good editing with killer sound as loud as it can go. *shrug* I get excited for those kinda things.

Phew, ok i'm almost outta breath. *sigh* Thanks for reading.
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10.10.2005

Horrible News for Aardman....

Apparently a fire destroyed a huge wherehouse where a lot of the old wallace and gromit sets, stages and props were being housed. The sets from the shorts - "A Grand Day Out," "The Wrong Trousers" and "A Close Shave" - props, sets, everything, etc, they think are all destroyed, along with those from "Chicken Run" -- their first full length feature. Sooooo sad. Luckily all the props, stages, etc for Curse of the Were-Rabbit (which I KNOW! all of you went and saw this weekend - cuz it's No. 1 at the box office here in the states and is awwwwwwwwwwesome) wasn't in that wherehouse that burned down. So thankfully 'something' is left. However, it's very sad news.

CNN Article
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