GCSE MEDIA STUDIES INSET Animated Film A Teacher’s Approach

Animated Film Animation and the Film Industry From Still to Moving Image In the early years of cinema animation was central to the development of film itself and grew to become part of the comedy feature genre. Film is based on the idea of the ‘persistence of vision’ in that a single image when run repeatedly creates movement in time.

Animated Film Growing from the photographic experiments of Muybridge and others and the invention of machines like the Zooproxiscope and the Zoetrope. These developments can easily be demonstrated to students by asking them to produce a simple flick book. This simple process of producing single drawings on separate pages with subtle changes and then flicked quickly lays the basis for animation, creating movement with still images. The possibilties of this process soon became apparent as a form of public entertainment with the development of ‘What the Butler saw ‘ machines at fairgrounds and seaside piers. The possibilities for linking these images to a narrative later developed and the animated film was born. Animation clearly demonstrates the ‘magic of the cinema’ in that images are created to captivate audiences gathered in darkened rooms to entertain in a variety of ways, through laughter, fear and tears.

Animated Film In the early days of the Silent film, magic and tricks were the key animation features. In these early years of cinema, adults were probably the main audience and the animated short laughettes or laughograms as they were called became a mainstay of the cinema programme. Often shown before the ‘reality’ film of newsreels or drama, animated films provided humour, with slapstick spectacles and narrative through animal protagonists and fantastic events.

Forms Styles Genres Stop Motion Cel animation Claymation Experimental Cut paper collage 3D animatiom objects Computer graphics Glass painting Saw dust, chalk dust,soot

Contemporary animation Animated film Theatrical Release 2006 Curious George Universal $58 Ice Age 220 th Century Fox Computer animation $195 The Wild Disney Computer an. $37 Over the Hedge Dreamworks Comp an. $155 Cars Disney Pixar Comp an $243 A Scanner DarklyWarner Ind. Computer an. $5 Barnyard Paramount comp.an. $71 Open Season Columbia comp an. $ Meet the Robinsons comp.an. Disney $97 Shrek the ThirdDreamworks Comp.an.$ 321 Ratatouille Pixar/Disney Comp an. $203 The Simpsons Movie 20 th Century Fox $182

Analysing Animated Film Spirited Away Analysing Genre Animation Codes and Conventions Hand Drawn Cell animation Symbolic codes Setting Dress codes colour Mise en scene Narrative storyline/theme Characters ProppStructure Todorov Representations Audience Target Effects Everyday uses Organisations Distribution / Marketing

Analyising Spirited Away Genre Japanese Cel animation Realistic style Fantasy sub genre Narrative themes Greed/ Parents/ Children Characters Heroic female rescuing greedy parents RepresentationsFemales/ young girls