Building a Scene in Maya

TERM PAPER: Special Effects in Animation and Live-Action

My first two term paper scores were both above 80; I will not be writing a third term paper.

Outline for Third Term Paper

Special Effects in Animation and Live-Action

   Introduction

Thesis: The Ocean is often an element in many films that a crew must make a creative decision on how they would like to portray it and by what methods to use to make it believable.

Introduce: Two films portray that portray the ocean be different means, Bruce Almighty and Song of The Sea. One achieves this by using practical effects and the other with computer graphics.

Paragraph 1

Song of the Sea is a film where the ocean is a major character. It is highly stylized and often times appears symbolic. The crew working on this animated film chose to animate the sea with computer graphics in a 2D animated style. It is intentional portrayed as unrealistic, instead the animators decide to use stylized symbolization to make the ocean look unique and mysterious. The crew took artistic liberties in rendering the ocean. Storms were also stylized and animated to appear very dramatic for effect.

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In the film Bruce Almighty the ocean appears as it does in the real world. The crew do not take any artistic liberties, instead use practical effects to make the Ocean look as believable as it does in real life. The ocean was not actually used in the making of this film, instead a giant reservoir of water was filled up to make a miniature lake on the Universal Studios set. Then a giant wall behind the manmade lake was painted by an artist to make the background appear as though it was the horizon line and the sky. These practical effects keep us from being pulled out of the move by appearing jarring and unrealistic. A storm was achieved by having a large sprinkler system in involved in where the water was drained from the floor and recycled to return to the sprinkler system.

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Both film took different routes in portraying the Sea and both did a good job of capturing the feel of an ocean. Depending on the style of the movie and whether or not live action or 2D animation is gives the crew several options on how to tackle rendering the sea. Both achieve making the sea appear believable by using their own methods.

Conclusion

Relating back to Thesis

Ending statement

Stop-Motion Character Animation

I worked with a partner, Leda Annest, for this homework assignment.

Leda animated the majority of the stop motion and I shot the photos and worked on post production editing.

Science Fact or Cinematic Fiction?

 Improbable Paths of Action

Humans love to experience stories. We all have those daily mundane duties to get through, and we all occasionally seek something to take our mind off the repetitive. For some, shifting their attention to cinematic media is the perfect outlet. We crave films that make us feel sensations we would otherwise rarely feel. That is why I, along with plenty of other folks, enjoy sitting down to enjoy animations. Growing up, my family didn’t have a TV, the only time my brothers and I were able to watch cartoons where when we would visit our grandparent’s home. There, we would huddle around a rather small tube television in my grandparents’ living room and watch whatever was on during the day. Naturally, we gravitated towards cartoons. These rare TV sessions became our favorite time. It was then that we were able to experience a story, and best of all we were doing so together. We were so jazzed about just being able to watch cartoons we didn’t care if they didn’t seem physically possible, in fact it was for that exact reason we loved the cartoons. For us, the funky physics of cartoon worlds are what caught our eye while flipping through channels. Cartoons are notorious for bending the laws of physics, especially when it came to exaggerating paths of actions. Extreme paths of actions in many of the cartoons would often make us laugh or even feel amazement. Such paths of actions are not hard to find in cartoons such as Recess, Ed Edd & Eddy, and Samurai Jack, a few of my favorite cartoons to watch with my brothers.

When it came to a cartoon that a kid could relate to, Recess was the show to watch. Recess is an animated cartoon that first aired in August of 1997. It didn’t take long for me or my brothers to realize that when it came to realistic physics, Recess did not follow the rules. This is evident in the episode titled “I Will Kick No More Forever” where Vince, one of the main five protagonists of the animation is playing kickball as other children watch and cheer him on. 

Vince is considered to be the best at kick ball. Of course to prove their point the animators of Recess had to push the laws of physic to really show off how talented Vince is at kick ball. Below is a snapshot of Vince kicking the ball so far and high up, that it lands a few blocks away in a garbage dump. Clearly if this was attempted in our world, a mere kick would not have landed the ball where it did in the show. The arc of a path of action of the kick ball is exaggerated to prove that Vince surely must be the best.  

His friend Gretchen comments: “No question about it, nobody can out kick Vince, and I mean nobody.”

Yet a few moments later, and unexpected and indifferent challenger shows off just how far more capable they are compared to Vince. Ashley begrudgingly goes up to the kick the ball merely to get it over with and go back to chatting on her cell phone. 

The children watch the ball rise far higher than expected and go on until the path of action lands the ball all the way in China. The ball lands with such tremendous force that upon impact it creates a crater in the ground. 

As the story progresses Vince loses all confidence in his ability and gives up trying to play kick ball. It is only when he is encouraged by his friends that he tries again, and this time his kick becomes even more outlandish than the last. Vince kicks the ball so hard it ends up leaving Earth’s atmosphere and ends up in space.  This feat is only possible in the realm of cartoons, as a ball kicked by a normal fourth grader in the real world would simply not be able to reach escape velocity.

Recess was not the only cartoon that had questionable physics. In the show Ed Edd & Eddy, there are plenty of wacky moments one can remember. Ed Edd & Eddy is a cartoon that aired in January 1999. The physics of this world are reminiscent of Warner Brothers Looney Toons. Just as in Looney Toons, Ed Edd & Eddy pushes physics to extremes for comedic effect. In the episode titled “Sir Ed-A-Lot” the three Eds find themselves babysitting Ed’s younger sister, a spoiled and short tempered little girl named Sarah. She demands that the boys entertain her and her best friend Jimmy. It is then that Eddy is forced into entertaining Sarah by juggling for her and her friend. 

To make this scene funny, animators of the show decide on exaggerating the amount and size of the objects Eddy juggles. He ends up juggling more than eleven items, such as a canoe, a refrigerator, and a recliner just to name a few. 

Not only would this be impossible if attempted in our world, but the path of action that the objects follow are also inaccurate. If a person were to attempt to juggle in our world, the path of action an object takes, such as a ball, follows a parabolic arc.

Even if Eddy was somehow miraculously strong and coordinated enough to juggle objects of that mass and shape, the path of action needed to represent it accurately would need to be changed.

This brings me to the next cartoon where exaggerations are done not only for comedic effect, but also to showcase astonishing accomplishments. Samurai Jack is an animated show that began airing in 2001. Jack is a samurai that is extremely capable with a sword and an open minded individual who capable of quickly picking up new abilities. In one such episode titled “Jack Learns to Jump Good” Jack is taught by a wild man and his family of apes how to jump at a super human level. The wild man startles Jack with his extreme his jumps, which puzzles Jack. He states “I have never seen man fly.” to which the wild man replies “I no fly. Jump good.”

To prove his point, the wild man then takes off into the sky in one jump and does not come back down until thirteen seconds later. It is then that the wild man and his family agree to teach Jack how to “jump good”. At the end of the episode Jack’s hard work pays off and he is able to jump just as well as his teachers. In one scene Jack jumps from one tree top to another.

The path of action’s shape is a correct parabolic arc, yet the scale is incorrect. With Jack’s newfound talent he is able to jump more than six times his own height, a stunt that a normal human without any aid would not be able to accomplish. Assuming that Jack is of average male height (6 feet and 3 inches) the jump he made would reach a height of approximately 43 feet. A jump of that scale made by a human in our world would break the current world record of highest jump (8 feet).

When it comes to attracting an audience, cartoons don’t always need to correctly portray real world physics to be memorable. In the examples from the cartoons we have discussed, we clearly see paths of actions greatly altered and exaggerated. It’s true that the laws of physics of these animations when in comparison to our physics are flawed. Whether due to negligence, comedic effect, or even because of low animation budgets the lack of actuality does not bother me at all. In my opinion, it is just the sort of feature that I feel makes cartoons from my childhood so much fun to watch.

Outline: "Science Fact or Cinematic Fiction?"

Outline of Second Term Paper

1.       Introduction

A)     Draw audience in with hook.

B)      Introduction of topic: Plenty of animated TV shows have questionable physics.

C)      Theme:  List off a few of my favorite cartoons as a child which had outlandish physics.

D)     State thesis statement: Cartoons are notorious for bending the laws of physics, especially when it came to exaggerating paths of actions.

2.       Body Paragraphs

A) Ed Edd and Eddy (Episode 1: “The Ed-Touchables”)

-When Eddy is jumping on Edd’s bed he does a couple of small flips and then floats up to the ceiling on the third bounce.

-Eddy grabs onto Edd’s bed, holds it above his head and then smashes Edd over the head with it in one fell swoop.

-Eddy tries to sneak up on Ed and jumps up into the air, he hangs in the air too long, is caught mid-air, falls to the ground too slowly and is given a noogie by Ed.

-Sarah throws a tantrum, jumps up, somehow flips herself upside down with her feet in contact with the ceiling, and grapples the air plane toys hanging off the ceiling.

-Jonny is caught by the Eds and attempts to run away. He jumps up, kicks his legs about in midair, and then proceeds to shoot forward out of frame. (Classic Road Runner style).

B) Samurai Jack (Episode 14: “Jack Learns To Jump Good”)

-Jack jumps up into the air, the arc’s apex is approximately three times his height.

-The wild man that Jack encounters in the forest jumps up into the air off screen but stays midair for 13 seconds until he returns to the ground.

- Jack jumps from tree to top to tree top in huge parabolic arcs 5 times his height.

-A boulder rolling downhill crashes down onto a gorilla in a path of action resembling one that should belong to a bouncing rubber ball.

C) Recess (Episode 11: “I Will Kick No More Forever”)

-Vince kicks a kickball which soars up into the air and lands a few blocks away in a city dump.

- Ashley Q.  kicks a kickball which takes off and lands in China with a force so powerful it creates a crater on impact.

-Gretchen flicks a “glorp” ball (an invention of hers) which shoots off haphazardly bouncing off the walls and floor for 8 seconds.

-Vince kicks a ball so hard it somehow ends up leaving Earth and ends up in space.

3.       Conclusion

A)     Summarize

B)      Restate Thesis

C)      Ending Statement

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