[ SECRET POST #1666 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #1666 ⌋


Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.


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Notes:

Posting these up without comment threads so you can see them at least, if LJ stops breaking. Working on getting the threads up



Secrets Left to Post: 06 pages, 150 secrets from Secret Submission Post #238.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 1 - broken links ], [ 1 - not!secrets ], [ 1 2 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeats ]
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments and concerns should go here.

Comments

[olesia]

It's the rotoscoping.

[margerydaw-s2.livejournal.com]

This, seriously.

[olesia]

Didn't most of his films use that, too?

[margerydaw-s2.livejournal.com]

I'm afraid I can't say for sure.

[(Anonymous)]

In the human characters, at least. Titan AE did for sure, and I think Thumbelina (but I've never seen it so I can't be sure) and maaaybe Ann-Marie in All Dogs Go To Heaven.

[(Anonymous)]

Came here to say this!

Fun fact: According to my trad. animation professor, it's impossible to rotoscope a good-looking walk cycle for some reason. They always end up looking off. I'm not sure if Dmitri's walking was done "the normal way" or rotoscoped or what, since I haven't seen the movie in a while, but... There you go. Possible explanation for the way he walks.

[olesia]

I'll be honest, I haven't actually been able to watch this entire film; the first time I tried was a few months ago, and the rotoscoping (plus the inconsistent accents; everyone had russian accents, except the lead characters, who were also supposed to be russian) kept falling into Uncanny Valley.

I wouldn't be surprised if unbalanced/awkward walk cycles were part of it.

[(Anonymous)]

Watch for sliding, too. Most of the time, the characters are ice skating through scenes. And they had such issue with keeping size and proportion- watch Dmitri mount the stairs in the palace. It's terrible. They had such a bitch keeping the facial features centered, and the mouth lines were a bad idea. Yeah, people have mouth lines, but it looks awkward on an otherwise smooth face. Mouth lines are typically for denoting age.

[olesia]

Aha, I think I remember that! Though I think I was blaming it more on the fact the character was walking on a presumably icy path at the time? But if it continued like that...
My stopping point was at IN THE DARK OF THE NIGHT EVIL WILL FIND YOOOOOOOOU, because everything was just too much for me.

It still kills me that everyone in the cast was like VE ARE RUSSIAN UND VE SPEAK IN THE TONGUE OF THE OLDE COUNTRY and then you had Anastasia who sounded like every American teenager ever.

And isn't it that you're pretty much never supposed to actually draw dark lines on a face unless you're indicating wrinkles or scars? Shadows maybe, but not actual lines...

[(Anonymous)]

Honestly I don't think it's as bad as that. Yes the rotoscoping makes the walking animations look slippery and the limb movements are disjointed, but I liked the facial animations because they were so odd. Dmitri's mouth lines were one of my favorite parts of his appearance because you don't usually see that in a young animated hero. They're usually made to look perfect. The lines (and the wonky nose) made him more unique looking.

But then I really do like the general look of rotoscoping, even if it is a lazy way to animate. I prefer the looks and movements of characters like Snow White or Anastasia, as opposed to ones like Ariel or Mulan. It isn't perfect, but I love the realism behind it.

[(Anonymous)]

IDK, while Anastasia had it's fair share of awkward animation, it still looks more "real" than the way Disney's human characters move. I'd argue that, on the whole, it at least looks good.

I think Dmitri's animation was definitely rotoscoped. Either that, or the animator was scarily accurate in portraying how a man walks and holds himself.

[(Anonymous)]

More real than cartoons but not as real as life is where the Uncanny Valley lies. The characters' appearance in Anastasia was a huge turnoff for me, personally.

[circuitously.livejournal.com]

That was my first thought too!

[(Anonymous)]

Yeah- just commented to that effect. Anastasia is actually a really shoddy film, animation wise. It has a few beautiful scenes, but it is not Disney caliber. Which isn't to say it's not quality storytelling or anything, but it's really cheap.

Obviously everything else is up to opinion, ie: personality, endearing flaws, etc. But his movements are realistic because they came from a real person. :|

[(Anonymous)]

If you don't mind enlightening me, what exactly is rotoscoping? I don't know much about animation, but you've piqued my curiosity.

[olesia]

Short version: tracing, usually to save money.

Long version: the production first films real life actors and actresses going through the action of the scene, or film movement through a space/setting. Then the team of animators go frame by frame of that live action footage and draw over it, thus creating a copy of the motion that can be then used for a cartoon. If you remember that really old Superman cartoon series from the 40's, the characters were rotoscoped. Snow White was, too, for the human-proportioned characters (thus why the dwarves and animals seem so stylistic/cartoony in comparison to the people).

For something like Anastasia, it means that the more "realistic" looking characters -- Anastasia, Dmitri, so forth -- have more human-looking proportions and motions, rather than the more "cartoon" style the OP is disenchanted by -- which crops up in the minor characters and the pets/animal sidekicks in that same movie, anyway. It's a shorthand for getting real-looking expressions and motions, but often times the film winds up with dissonance between characters that are rotoscoped and those that aren't, or like one of the other anons was saying, between the characters and their surroundings.

Of course, most animated films do use live actors/filming thereof as reference, but rotoscoping is more specifically the going-frame-by-frame to convert, rather than having artists watch footage and go "oh yes that's how the arm should move here, this is how much of the back we see at this angle."

I'm not an expert, so I may have gotten things wrong, but this is the general idea!

[(Anonymous)]

Ah, that makes sense. Thank you for the explanation! :)