Their first production as an animation company was Andre and Wally Bee 1984. Although it now appears somewhat outdated in style, at the time it was revolutionary. Creator and forefather of Pixar, John Lasseter established several new techniques for the production of Andre and Wally Bee. These include motion blur and spherical, teardrop bodies which allow for greater fluidity and dynamism of the characters.
Despite their great skill as animators, Pixar have never been able to master the human form. Their attempt in the short film Tin Toy (see clip below) did not produce the most realistic results. The baby appears almost demonic as its eyes are lifeless and its face appears aged, not youthful. Nevertheless, the company did win an Oscar for the production.
Since Tin Toy, Pixar have seemingly adopted a more stylised approach towards the presentation of people within their films. For example, The Incredibles has an entire cast of humans, each of which has a distinct appearance and characterised form. This is exemplified through the character of Jack Jack (see image below), whose appearance contrasts greatly to that of the baby in Tin Toy.
Jack Jack, the baby from The Incredibles
On the other hand, the company must be praised for their fantastic ability to bring life to even the most inanimate object. This level of anthropomorphism is best exemplified by the lamp which features in the Pixar credits. The character is faceless, yet the animators convey emotion through the positioning of the lamp's shade and the beam from the light bulb. I think that this ability is one which makes Pixar such skilled animators. The attention to detail in their productions is fantastic and the significance of humour in their film narratives make the movies all the more enjoyable.
Towards the end of the lecture we looked briefly at Japanese animation, or anime as its known. Its a style of film which I really find difficult to enjoy. I know it has a cult following, even here in Britain, but I'm just not one of the crowd who find it so fascinating.
I can appreciate the imaginative quality it has and as a character student I can also appreciate the character design of many of the monsters and fantasy beings. However, I feel that the overall anime style is quite repetitive and characters all appear quite similar. We saw a clip from My Neighbour Totoro and I found it relatively enjoyable.
Like Pixar, there is an ongoing humour throughout the narrative, which I like. But my favourite scene from the extract we saw was when the character of Totoro and the young female protagonists use their minds to magically cause seeds to germinate and grow suddenly into a huge tree. Its a really lovely sequence as the characters all mimick the thrusting action of the tree growing skywards.
still from My Neighbour Totoro
After we had seen the clip Bill made an interesting analysis of the above scene by comparing the sprouting tree to the mushroom cloud from the Hiroshima bomb. It was something which hadn't even crossed my mind, and yet it was an extremely strong reference, which one could consider somewhat controversial from a Japanese artist.
Famous image of the mushroom cloud created by the bomb on Hiroshima
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