Ellen, “The Simpsons” is just a generic term when I use it, it stands for that tsunami of “populist” stuff we have been drowning under for many years. The funny thing is that most people, when confronted with my “Rembrandt or Simpsons” argument almost always give me the same answer: “But there are good writers behind The Simpsons.” Fine, but if so, if Quality has found a footing in “The Simpsons,” it’s no longer “The Simpsons,” it’s “Rembrandt” ("or at least, "near Rembrandt";-). As for the Disney features you played a big part in making me revisit (enjoying the experience a great deal as you know), those are not just any Disney productions, those are the "vintage” ones. More recent Disney stuff belongs to “The Simpsons” as far as I am concerned.

Ellen wrote: [Does the “how it is” approach to performance in animation (referring here to the legacy of Muybridge etc.) objectively fail to deal with “how I see it” or does it depend on the context?] Ellen, “How it is” is always “how I see it to be” anyway, the “thing-in-itself” is always the “thing-in-itself-for-me.” What happens in this context is determined by the subject’s awareness (or lack) of this simple fact: perception is constitutive, “reality” is always “reality-for-me” and only occasionally, does “my reality” coincide with “your reality” (and even then, who can be sure, and how?). The problem with the “how it is” approach is that, almost by definition, it is a denial or negation of the ”objectivity of subjectivity,” something akin to religious fanaticism, a form of fundamentalism (“the ayatollah's approach to animation?”;-). Make no mistake about this, humanity in under attack by those who would posit that much of that which is “human” is deemed to be inferior, “passé,” often accused of being “merely subjective.” The steamroller of mercantilism is crushing/flattening much of what, in my eyes anyway, makes life worth living. “Context” in this case can mean many things, the one that appeals to me most invites us all in as part and parcel of the happening, instead of being once again reduced to the position of mere spectator, of mindless consumer. Films that belong to that context are easy to spot, they invite and nurture repetitive screenings, they always show us (“me”) more, “my” seeing it changes the way “I” see (the way “I” am) so “I” can see it again as if for the first time. There are very few films around that sustain this, most now are, to me, fast-food-like, so unsatisfactory, with absolutely no lasting value. [This is to say that, in the right context, the physics based approach gains legitimacy and actually contributes to the creation of a satisfyingly subjective world.] High-risers built on quick sand are bound to sink, don't you feel that much of what we are thrown at these days is repetitive and uninspiring, that we are indeed stuck in a box we desperately need to break out of? This discussion reminds me of the days when I brought up the need for us to decide between Rembrandt and “The Simpsons,” and I still stand by that, in fact I claim that we are choosing between those two poles with every thing we do. Sure, it is easier to ignore this sad state of affairs and to try to make one's niche in this ready-made world-in-a-box, but is that something one can invest one’s whole being in? I sure can’t. I mentioned Miyazaki in an earlier note, with you (Ellen), we had fun one day in Ottawa dissecting “Spirited Away” frame by frame (it’s so rich, we did not get all that far in the time you had available). You may recall how impressed I was by the quality and depth of the “composition” in the few frames we looked at, every element was placed in such an incredibly sensitive and meaningful way, those were as much self standing paintings as they were frames from an animated film. What I mean to say by that is that even if Miyazaki’s films seem to “play” in the world of physics (what in his film does not conform to the world of physics is contributing to the magical sense, contrasting with the "regular world"), their form is so great that his images speak to each other and to us in ways that transcend the laws of world of physics, very much akin to “the whole is more than the sum of its parts.” So if some films “play” in a world seemingly defined by the laws of the world of physics, they speak to us in a way that last longer than a Big Mac probably because they likely transcend those laws. Windmills are giants after all (and if they are not, they ought to be!;-). But here I go writing a book again! Regards.

To Jean and Charlie- Re: communication within the boundaries of the laws of physics... here’s a new and possibly contradictory thought, provoked by your stimulating exchange: Does the “how it is” approach to performance in animation (referring here to the legacy of Muybridge etc.) objectively fail to deal with “how I see it” or does it depend on the context? This is to say that, in the right context, the physics based approach gains legitimacy and actually contributes to the creation of a satisfyingly subjective world.

Charlie, First of all, thank you for the kindness of your comments matched only by their depth, you make this exchange a very pleasant experience indeed. I don’t want to drag this discussion too long though I feel it touches on important issues (this is the stuff SAFO used to deal with, especially during its last edition). When I see Miyazaki’s work, I feel a lot can still be done in “traditional” character animation, for me his work is up there with the best filmmaking can offer, at that level, all I can do is shut up and enjoy, I then have no beef with character animation and storytelling, none. It’s the other stuff that bugs me and unfortunately, “that” stuff seems only too capable of dominating the market. Yes indeed, financial help,and sponsoring, will be and are required if any one of us is to have the means to explore new avenues beyond the short length many of us are limited to by our “budgets.” Short of that kind of financial support, very few will be able to make visible that which they sense is possible, if not needed. Places like the NFB are essential for this, but it too just suffered another round of drastic cuts, something I hope to write about soon. Major studios seem very unwilling to support experimental work, they seem to not understand the direct relationship between “pure” and “applied” research , and which actually feeds which. I do not feel too optimistic about the future, at least as far as the renewal of the form is concerned, unless production costs drop so dramatically that individuals will be able to finance their own feature length movies, and though I think that will eventually be the case, I don’t see that happening any day soon. Here’s another thing: you say that “We communicate through human expression in a world bound by the laws of physics.” I don’t want to enter into something that could be very esoteric (“How real is real?”), but I want to say this: we are above all symbolic beings, our experiences take place mostly in the symbolic world of emotions and feelings, of expectations and disappointments. In that sense, I believe we give far too much importance to the laws of physics and to so-called “objective” reality, especially in animation where anything can (and should) happen. If animation is indeed an art form, its playing field is that of symbols and transpositions, not that of mere “reproduction” of an assumed-to-be-real “objective world.” No matter how refined an anal retentive rendition of details of this “objective” world our work can produce, it still will not do justice to the interaction between the “parts” (where does the whole end and the parts begin?). In one of my AWN articles, I’ve picked on the legacy of Muybridge and its negative impact on how we approach motion in animation. I think the same applies to how we treat just about any facet of human experience when it is time to transpose it to another plane, from “real life” to that of animation. Quite literally, the transposition is missing, instead of dealing with “how I see it,” we fall for that pseudo-scientific angle of “how it is.” Yet, whether we like it or not, we are first and foremost subjective beings, and our first commerce with the/our world is subjective, through and through. Even our sacrosanct “objective world” is accessed, always, through our subjectivity, we can’t escape this as perception itself is subjective, and constitutive of the world we may then proceed to analyze, draw, whatever, but always after we have seen it. I honestly believe that if animators, of any kind, were more aware of this “primacy of the subjective world,” the films we would see would really “blow our mind” instead of, so often, merely boring us by their predictable linear repetitiveness. (End of rant;-).

Jean, I agree that many students currently in the system are not interested in the habitual form. It has also been true in the past. I know because I taught in an animation college for 6 years. And it is true that many of the colleges teach the traditonal style of animation invented in the days of early motion picture photography, practiced at a pretty high level by artists like Windsor McCay but enhanced and refined through the early years of studio animation where the Disney studios brough it to a very refined level. I agree, the 2D art seems stuck in that form and at that level. But there are certainly more people pushing at the form these days with new advancements in computer technology and the economic ability it provides for animated films to be done in the hands of individuals not connected to the mainstream industry. But again, I am not arguing form right now. I am saying that developing a high level of performance animation is not comfortable for people. That indeed may be a matter of choice, that students are unwilling to prepare for the stale demands of a stagnant industy that demand high levels of animated performance for mass market productions. I'm not sure that is the sense of choice I get from the students I meet. Certainly there are more students these days that aspire to more individual expression in their approach to the art of animation film making. Even then, I would suppose that some of those want to express their ideas with engaging and finely tuned action and acting performances. Both Bingo and Ryan had high levels of animation performance. The plastecine film I mentioned had a high level of performance analysis as well. Whether it was a case of desire, natural ability, receptivity to the instruction that all the students recieved, or personal research and study beyond the curriculum, I can't tell. But I could tell that in whatever the style of film created in either traditional and 2D, there were a mere handful of students that felt comfortable with the process of performance animation, for whatever reason, be it technology, format or time constraints. Where is the industry headed ? Hopefully in a creative direction that is more driven by individual or smaller company ideas and expressions. The technology allows for more of that. For the individual and smaller companies, the prosepect of shorter films with increased story telling and expression possibilities still needs funding of some sort either through government support, corporate or individual investment. Someone has to fund project development and for the most part, even an individal needs to rely on other people to make a film. Long format films usually cost more and require more people to assist production. Of necessity and by design, they are packaged for uniformity and require that many artists achieve the same quality and consistancey of product to contribute to the overall design and storytelling style. Bigger money means higher levels of decision making and different constraints so that initial investments are protected. The decision makers tend to make safe choices for obvious finalcial reasons. That is probably why there are not more wildly innovative long format films. I don't believe that enhancing the ability of students to achieve high levels of performance animation is a bad thing for either the individuals or companies who may hire them. I don't necessarily believe that animation schools are doing anyone a disservice by serving the industry. The potential of enhancing performance animation training in schools has the potential to serve everyone better, even the student and artist aspiring to create groundbreaking films. If you have every seen a weak high school performance of Shakespeare or other classic plays, you may have experienced how poor performance can kill brilliant ideas. My guess is that this would be true of even the most innovative of filmic ideas. We communicate through human expression in a world bound by the laws of physics. We communicate through an art, that is fabricated and relies on all the principles of good design. We communicate in sequential time and perhaps the limitations of storytelling and expression in the realm of time are too strongly linked to the standard formats we use. But again, mass comunication has formats that people are used to. Perhaps the internet, personal broadcast and mobile communication will change that in the future, but for now the people that spend the money want to invest in things that make a sure return. Innovation is risky and it will take the smaller risk takers to push the boundaries or the big money that is willing to venture out into the relatively unknown to bring innovation to the form. The bottom line for me is that performance animation is still a worthy thing to teach people. And if it is a substantial building block for a great variety of final formats, then students should be as comfortable with performance animation as they are with drawing from life. Education should build strong foundations that will enable students to direct their own expressive abilities and levels of excellence Judging from the greater abilities of graduating students to achieve excellence in life drawing, the teaching methods produce as higher level of success than the methods for teaching performance animation. Admittedly more complex than drawing the figure, i still think that a greater comfort level should be achieved when it comes to the pure ability of the student to express performance in their graduating year. And just like any professional in their field, the education and learning continues all through life. Thanks for the challenging thoughts, Jean and keep pushing the boundaries and leading the way to an industry that is perhaps not yet born.

Charlie Bonifacio said: “After attending a recent year end at one of the animation schools it occurred to me that the majority of students graduating were afraid of animation, of animating classically. Strangely enough, the best performance animation was done in plastecine. There were a large number of good, even great, storytellers and designers, but students aspiring to the performance level of animation were few. “ Charlie, there is another way to read into what you just said: 1) students may not have been afraid of animation as much as they felt uninterested in it (the habitual form is stifled, stifling, almost dead), and 2) isn’t it fitting that that kind of animation (“moving characters about in taken for granted 3D space”) is a natural for plasticine, while it is only one of the many possibilities of drawing/painting? There is indeed an animation industry that requires specially trained workers, and many people will only be too glad to fit that bill, but that industry is totally stuck in a form that, in my view, really needs to be exploded. Possibly the biggest criticism I can throw at animation as I see it is that it is almost never questioning its form, it is as if most people wanted to be/fit in and not rock the boat, or more importantly, it is as if they were so very easily willing to settle in a prefabricated world made by others and not find/create their own. The current stifled form of habitual animation was at some point a breakthrough of sorts, but it has since lost that edge. The need for new ways is great as far as I am concerned, but the stronghold linear story-telling has on most animators is such that we seldom see a piece that can give us hints of what animation could be. In that sense, I got a bigger jolt from Chris Landreth’s “Bingo“ than I did from his “Ryan,” but that may be because I have had for some time the sense that Chris was/is one of those by whom the much needed renewal of the form of animation would start happening in a major way. I have not given up on that yet but do not think that renewal will come from schools, the minute they decided to "serve" the industry, they lost the chance to be agents of (much need) change.

Strong performance is so intrinsic to good storytelling, especially in longer format animation, that you virtually can’t have one without the other. Where does technology come into it? Technology does open and close doors in ways that affect performance but I wonder about the idea of recognizing the limitations of software. Do we know what its limitations are? I like the idea that we should look to the human element, ideally to challenge conceptions of what the software can and can’t do, most particularly because commercially driven cycles of what is and isn’t possible can be hard to break once established. In this case the cycle looks like this: a certain approach to using software is established and that only allows a certain level of performance and that restricts the kind of storytelling that is possible and then both investors and younger animators come to believe those are the real limitations of the medium because they’ve never seen anything else so that’s the approach they continue to take and so it perpetuates. Especially in a moment when both 3D and 2D are in increasingly flexible technical states, wouldn’t it be nice to see an effort to explore the outer limits of their potential boundaries rather than hem them in? For example, Stephen Barnes’ suggestion for giving 2D a sharper digital pencil could open 2D performance right up. But what would be the point if there were neither investors to fund it nor animators to take advantage of it? By the way, to Zaki- the advancements in CG-2D didn’t quite fit into this article but I hope they can be addressed in the future.

After attending a recent year end at one of the animation schools it occured to me that the majority of students graduating were afraid of animation, of animating classically. Strangely enough, the best performance animation was done in plastecine. There were a large number of good, even great, storytellers and designers, but students aspiring to the performance level of animation were few. This situation is difficult for both producers of classicalyl drawn animation and CG performance animation. Stripped of any arguement over preferred mediums, the students aren't developing the skills necessary to do performance animation for whatever reason. I believe that the current education system is doing a good job at developing the storyteller and individual voice of the next generation but the larger "fast food" comercial producers will still be wanting for good solid animators that understand physical and emotional performance. There is a faacination and a fear about animating. It's challenges are unique and can be extremely engaging on an emotional level. The problem can be that if you fail at animation, the impact is felt at a deep level. Many students want to avoid that kind of failure and so don't dive into the challenge of animating as readily as other animation related tasks such as storyboard, design, layout and painting. Traditionally, students will do anything else but dive into thier animation projects, an emotional sort of procrastination and fear of failure. I believe we need to develop ways of making animation more accessible and less daunting. We need to do that for both CG and classical, long format productions. Strip away the medium and the skills for both are the same, a solid understanding of performance and motion physics. Independant expression films will always have their own style of storytelling and animation techniques and I feel the current market is ripe for fostering the more independant voice in storytelling styles, more now than ever. Longer format films that require sustained believability in character and personality will need a different kind of animator. CG humans and effects creatures and monsters will require the same skills and talents. One way or another we need to provide an educational experience that will foster and encourage development in all these areas and with the noble desire to develop the individual storyteller, we don't ignore developing the outstanding animation performance artists. The combination of both individual creative design and storytelling technique with outstanding performance animation may be where the industry need to turn in the future.

I feel that the 2D versus 3D conflict is probably a non-issue, what is at stake here is the quality of the vision driving the work done in any format. Given the incredible hold story-telling has on most things animation, one is likely stuck, if abiding by animation’s habitual rules, in a box where it’s all about moving characters/puppets in a often taken for granted space. This is very close to where painting was at during the 19th Century and it tells me that animation is yet to find its Cézanne, let alone its Giacometti, Pollock and so on. Drawing is still at the root of it all, it is the tool/discipline through which, with which,an artist uncovers/shapes his/her vision. For one thing, the moment one really looks at a figure (or anything else for that matter, “out there” or “in here”), one notices that the line between “this” and “that” is extremely elusive, and if one is to be true to that experience, one finds oneself less and less able to submit to the dictatorship of fake clarity so prevalent today in the world of commercial animation. Drawing has traditionally been the means by which art students opened up to the reality of their ambiguity, to the validity of their own doubt., their own precious not-knowing It is now merely introduced and taught as a way to learn how to fabricate lies (meaning “fake clarity”), and therefore the chain of delusion perpetuates itself. I have very little faith in animation’s ability and willingness to reconsider itself, I see a strong parallel between the world of oil driven greed (which pollutes the planet to an incredible, possibly irreversible degree) and that of profit driven animation (it’s like fast food, we know it is not good for us but we are eating it anyway, and eating lots of it too, possibly “just” out of habit) I’ve written on these subjects at length here at AWN so I won’t replay the tapes, but I will however once again quote Alberto Giacometti: “The problem with realism is that it’s got very little to do with reality.” Can animation help, or even drive, our search for meaning, or is it merely going to be/remain a pain--killer on that often difficult journey?

To Ryan G and Keith Lango: First, I totally agree that are great performances out there in 2D and CG- ones that are very real within their contexts and have deep roots in classical principles. I also agree that the current employment conditions for many young animators don’t exactly encourage development of the finest skills (though I hope people in that position don’t let that stop them from finding other means to this end, such as doing a little film of their own). But there are other factors in play here. In retraining his animators, Landreth wasn’t undoing their studio experience but rather their school training. He put them on a different road and got a new kind of result. That result doesn’t alter what Pixar has accomplished by using classical as part of their foundation but it sure changes the context of CG. And as animators in this field and particularly as educators in this field, we can’t ignore that change. The explorations of these last three articles don’t point to throwing out classical principles or traditional skills as part of the foundation of CG (in fact, they offer good reasons to consider keeping them). But they do point to the importance of not taking the current training approach as a new orthodoxy and the need to reconsider the role traditional skills should play. Classical skills, without question, have for many years given 2D animators the strongest, most versatile foundation possible but whether those skills provide the same level of foundation for CG- a much wider and significantly different context than 2D- is in question. But answering that question was not the point here; the point was to make sure that the question was asked. Do we need to expand those skills or go deeper with them or compliment them with other elements? This is the kind of question which we have to keep our minds open to if we are going to arrive at a fully developed foundation for CG, one that will serve it as well as the classical principles in their current (soon to be “classic”?) form have served drawn and Pixar style CG animation.