Sigh...... Couldn't resist.
Except for those who work their asses off to file their taxes early to appease the Martinsburg Monster...
Sigh...... Couldn't resist.
No this is not a Maverick Quickie. This is just one of my few year end posts I want to do.
Besides, Maverick Quickies are a tad bit longer in the paragraphs but I just wanted to make a post.
I don't know how I got ahold of this but what the hell... here it is:
Porky's Breakdowns of 1939.
Breakdowns, the old school term for the Modern Outtakes you see in the DVDs of today's movies.
Nowadays, Breakdowns are more or less used for complimenting your actions.
Back then, you couldn't watch these due to things like the HAYS OFFICE and the fact that at the time, there was no such thing as home video
(TV was too new at the time and film was still on acetate film stock)
But things have changed since the HAYS OFFICE dissolved in 1968 and with the proliferation of the internet since the mid-1990s, we all have access to this wonderful blooper reel..... I'm sorry.... BREAKDOWN REEL...
So what's all the Hullabaloo about this cartoon?
Well for our Cuss-Obsessed viewers, It's the only time Porky Pig officially swears.
It all starts with Porky being filmed.... or animated hammering a nail.....
To be honest, 2023 certainly wasn't really a great year for animation....
I felt too inclined to do this year-end post that's not a Maverick Quickie but I didn't do something like this when my Blog used to be in my WIX website so that's going to change right the F now!
I've compiled what I think are the real winners of 2023's animation scene.
For starters, we have MY ADVENTURES WITH SUPERMAN.
Holy Shit, I didn't expect this to be one of the best diversions away from what executives were trying to mandate on their artists but it certainly wasn't the first.This may be one of the best iterations of Superman to appear on the animation scene.
My guess it's mostly the story and of course the redesign and retouched personality of Lois Lane who for some reason became the breakout star of the show but for me, it's the art style. It's a nice change from all that puppet-rigged bullshit that's still permeating the 2D animation industry but Superman really does subvert all those expectations of what you can get artistic-wise.
When I look at a show like this, It really should be a figurehead for telling executives at their faces that ANIME IS THE FUTURE OF ANIMATION WORLDWIDE!!!!
Even though it doesn't look the part with it's TV-PG rating, the art style is a dead-giveaway that this version of Superman is meant for adults which explains it's place in ADULT SWIM.
The Season 3 finale of THE OWL HOUSE
No, I haven't watched OWL HOUSE in full......yet. But I have paid attention to the production scene.
A lot of us viewers are kind of still mad at Disney's executives for screwing over Dana Terrace thinking that Owl House is not a fit for the company when in fact it really was since the show had huge potential but come on, executives should not have the right to screw both creators and the fanbase like that.
I won't spoil the rest of OWL HOUSE but the final season follows our protagonist going back to the Boiling Isles for a final battle with a mastermind.... again, I need to rededicate my time to watch this show so forgive my wax-philosophical. Once I binge-watch from beginning to end, I'll provide a new update on a 2024 post but aside from behind the scenes turmoil, this has to be the best ending to a tv series with a more serialized storyline and a good love story for both Luz and Amity.
Scott Pilgrim Takes Off (AKA Scott Pilgrim: The Anime)
I already did a post about this show back in November 23 2023 but need I say more about this show?Good Question but before that........
Yes, I know this is filler but on the previous post about Animation Acting, I was supposed to use some example animations I pulled from LinkedIn via my iPhone's Video Capture but the upload didn't work too well.
Dammit Blogger! It's bad enough that I had to put up with you sometimes failing to paste my photos before I refresh the page, now I can't have high res video uploads?
....... I'm calm now......FLAMINGOS ARE BIRDS.....
So while we wait for my other posts as they're now on the backburner until I deal with this video resolution nonsense, lets switch gears with a brand-spanking-new topic on why Cartoon and Anime Characters have to wear almost the exact same outfit each episode?
Yeah, It's a little weird and unrealistic since in real life and in live-action films, nobody wears the same outfit from one day to another until they've done a load of laundry but as explained by Doug Funnie in the 1993 episode "DOUG EN VOGUE" cartoons found a way to get around the Identical outfit problem by having a character's closet having an entire stockpile of outfits that look exactly the same.
The more older your get, the more you crave things that are in your ball park.
That's the mentality I've seen in generations that grow up. They crave things with more spice, more gusto, more..... well.... everything.
And that includes acting.
But what about Cartoon Acting?
Well the thing is, cartoon acting is more or less 75% generic acting.
But hey, It's New Years 2024 so Let's do a post about cartoon acting based on a Company.
And today's topic is DISNEY ACTING.
This style of acting is more or less based on the fierce belief by animators and historians that you have to use all 12 principles of animation to make it into the realm of anything animated.
The reason for this style of acting being mandatory at Disney and some other studios is because of the age old belief held by both Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnston saying that cartoon acting can't reach the subtleties and presence of live-action acting.
And really, I don't blame them. Cartoon Acting certainly can't reach the subtleties but you can make do with inspiration from Live-Action acting if you take the effort.
But where are my manners, Lets see what principles are used for this style of acting that seems to be favored by the industry for some reason.
1. SQUASH AND STRETCH
2. ANTICIPATION
3. STAGING
4. STRAIGHT AHEAD VS POSE TO POSE
5. FOLLOW THROUGH/OVERLAPPING ACTION
6. SLOW IN AND SLOW OUT
7. ARCS
8. SECONDARY ACTION
9. TIMING
10. EXAGERATION
11. SOLID DRAWING
12. APPEAL
12 Principles of animation my ass. I've read many stories about how certain animators would rather truncate the 12 principles into what they feel is essential but the way I see it, they truncate the 12 principles to fit whatever style they use for their animations.
To me, I believe in this thing called Animation Principle Truncation where you cherry-pick which principles are the most essential to your art style.
I'll give you my results at the end some other time but to say that using all principles is a waste of your own time and talents can be both a kick to the nads and an understatement.
Back in 2009, Disney Animator Will Finn posted this article on his blog about truncating your essential principles. Here's the Link:
https://willfinn.blogspot.com/2009/03/finding-my-inner-pintoff.html
While I can do away with Squash and Stretch, Follow Through, and Overlaps since those are too distracting for my own tastes, Will Finn should have retained inbetweens and antics.... though I'm mixed on both.
Antics in general are for the more cartoony aspects of your work but they way I see it, it's overused, even in CGI because we've come so far and most animators who kiss the feet of executives still think it's still got a chance to entice the folks.
Thing is, Antics are sort of downplayed by Disney and Dreamworks by this point. They still do it but not when you're aiming for psuedo-realism so that leaves Sony Pictures and Illumination as the only modern CGI studios that encourage more antics in their animations.
For me, I can't even grasp antics properly even though I somewhat do it. It's even used in my SHASTA RUN animation I've done in Lasalle College.
Now as for inbetweens, I'm more mixed on that. Inbetweens are nice if you want to smooth out the action but not every scene is going to be inbetweened.
And as far as I know, Most Anime don't touch it since they always lower down the frames for character actions that aren't a fight scene.
So for example, This scene from Dagashi Kashi has Hotaru cooling her spicy lips with her hands. The action of cooling your lips is already executed perfectly by just having Two up and down motions of the hands so Inbetweening the hands with more frames just won't cut it because not only would that look out of place for a comedic anime but it would cause the budget to overshoot.Now don't get me wrong. Anime still does some inbetweening but that's mostly for fight scenes or if it's a big movie like AKIRA.
But where are my manners, I need to get back into topic about Disney Acting. And good thing too. Brer Rabbit's been gesturing to me that I need to talk about the hand mimes
To me, Disney Animator's obsessions with Hand Miming to the dialogue needs to simmer down. I've seen so many hand mimes in Disney Cartoons New and Old that it's distracting me from looking at the one important thing in cartoons: THE FACE.To tell you the truth, Nowadays if I wanna see Hand Miming in the media, I can just look at THE 8-BIT GUY'S YouTube videos since it works so much better than in Cartoons.
The Hand Pantomime thing is an old stand by that has dated all the way back to when Cartoons were without Sound but for some reason, Disney still believed the hand pantomimes can still work in today's cartoons and that's why I've seen characters like Bernard, Lumiere, etc use this gesture so many times.It's since been downplayed in later parts of the Renaissance but it still creeps up.
Animators like Ralph Bakshi, Mike Judge and Danny Antonucci also criticize the use of Disney Style Acting as not only overused but also archaic to the point they wonder why on earth our USA based animation houses still stick with this style of acting when most of the medium's intended audience are going to crave more.
Believe it or not, I was looking at this article on TV TROPES about this style of acting and I was surprised to discover that RUGRATS also discouraged this acting just because it's so unnatural for Babies to be acting like this.
Check out this JPG file. Especially since my Blog doesn't redirect photo examples to a new page.
The episode was promised it's retakes and aired on MAY 1990 as scheduled but it's not without it's slipups such as this Mrs. Botz Animation that looks a bit smooth and out of place in THE SIMPSONS and yet.... it looks more threatening.
I've seen my share of Ralph Bakshi flicks and despite him saying he dislikes Disney acting, he sometimes slips up. And this is more apparent from these screengrabs from WIZARDS' uber-famous THEY KILLED FRITZ scene.
So why am I making a post on Disney acting? Well I've been paying attention to Disney's performance in both the box office and critical reception and so far, it's not been good.
The critical reception is a mixed bag but the box office performance has overall abysmal to the point that the company is no longer in the Billion Dollar Club since all their films barely have reached the Billion dollar mark in the box office.
And no, WGA and SAG-AFTRA had nothing to do about it. It's just Bob Iger being.... well.... Bob Iger.
But on the other hand, at least he isn't as god-awful as Bob Chapek was so I could cut him some slack.
And Iger is still better than that asshole David Zaslav.....
(Somebody put an stick of ACME M80s in Zaslav's desk.... hehehehe..)
But back to topic. It's clear that the company had a real bad year for themselves that they hope to fix their wrongs in 2024 but only time will tell if they do that. I'm more concerned if Iger will keep up his promise to improve on the company because I read an article on Facebook that he's exhausted and I'm not going to lie, I'd too be exhausted if my company keeps up with flops to the point that I'd quit while I can.
Thing is though, I'm not an executive and I'm not a CEO of a company. But then again, considering my rage against executives and CEOS for not listening to viewers and artist, purging content, etc, I be glad to just be in the middle ground.
Anyhow, I hope the company bounces back in the New Year.
If you've watched the Classic Looney Tunes cartoons of the 30s, 40s, 50s, and early 60s, you'll know that for every Looney Tune Cartoon, there is an art director with his unique style not just in the art but also with animation acting, character portrayals, etc.
They were all under one roof: Termite Terrace.
I can list almost every one of them but instead, I'll truncate them to the most well known of the classic era.
We have TEX AVERY
Or to take TV TROPES's word for it, GO ALL OUT WITH CARTOONS.
His is also one where he appeals more towards adults.... at least for an era dictated by the Hays Office.
It's pretty Obvious the innuendos that Tex Avery loved to use in his shorts whether it be Warner or MGM really had an influence on Joe Murray's ROCKO'S MODERN LIFE as well as some other other cartoons.
Then we have BOB CLAMPETT.
This guy is my personal favorite... as well as John Kricfalusi's personal favorite as well.
What sets Bob Clampett from the other cartoonists in WB is his style of taking from other company's art and acting styles but tweaking them to make it his own.
This is exemplified by his frequent use of the Squash and Stretch principles used by Disney and Fleischer and making it even wackier than it ever was.
Fun Fact: Bob Clampett actually wanted to work at Disney and Disney wanted to hire him but that never happened due to part of Disney's upper brass being already filled with enough animators so Clampett instead went to Termite Terrace where he was Tex Avery's understudy.
After Avery left in the early 40's, The decade belonged to Clampett. He churned out the most famous of early 40's animation you can ever get at WB at the time and he wasn't fazed by all the WWII madness unfolding at the time.
Not even the War would prevent the rise of BUGS '"BIG CHUNGUS" BUNNY.