RHYTHM
There are different ways to lead the eye to the center of interest. It depends on what the story requires. You may have to show important detail surrounding the character; it can be some secondary action or a few elements in the background that have to be arranged.
The available time for that is important as well. If you can spend a little while with your additional information, you might lead the eye in smooth curves. Otherwise, you need to go straight or combine different directions.
But in any case it is important to find the right rhythm. All the necessary elements of your composition have to be balanced. You can use the variety in shapes and values as well as carefully arranged color to get the best results.
The idea is a rhythm of the best-balanced design elements and camera arrangements along with a well-choreographed action. The next important step is to connect all different scenes in a sequence. Their rhythm creates the visual language of your movie.
finding the right RHYTHM
compare positive/negative shape
BALANCE of SHAPES
These are some simplified composition studies using all different ingredients to find the right rhythm. Characters are not included. In the next chapters, I will show you more examples on how to find the right composition of environment and action.
STYLISTIO VARIETY
Most animated movies today have their own style. Short films from independent filmmakers especially show unusual visuals. A lot of them are experimenting to find a new look. In a way, all these films are personal pieces of art, and an artist has his own style.
When it comes to bigger productions and animated feature films, that definition is a bit more complicated. In this case, the film is not the showpiece of a single artist; it is the combined effort of many artists.
To avoid a confusing mixture of different artistic handwritings, the
big studios of the past decided to have one artist design the look of the film and then have the others follow.
Most of the time a designer was chosen out of the team to come up with that style, and in some cases, an artist from the outside was hired when his style fit the story. For example, in the thirties, they hired Gustaf Tenggren and Kay Nielsen for Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs and Fantasia, and more recently Gerald Scarfe for Hercules. Walt Disney even had Salvador Dali work on a short film concept that was finished (after a long pause) only a few years ago.
In the early years, most of the larger studios had their own distinctive style; MGM’s Tom and Jerry shorts; Warner Bros. Looney Tunes shorts; Fleischer’s
Popeye shorts from Paramount; Disney’s Silly Symphonies, as well as the Mickey, Donald and Goofy shorts; and later, the Hanna-Barbera series.
It was not just the diversity of the characters starring in these shorts; it was the look that made them immediately recognizable.
One of the most important designers was Maurice Noble for Warner Bros. He created a style that influenced a lot of other designers. There were other important designers and painters such as Jules Engel, John Hubley, Saul Bass; and at Disney, Mary Blair, Ken Anderson and Eyvind Earle.
They were influenced by modern art, as well as by illustrators like Ronald Searle and The Provensens. And they influenced each other. After UPA started to produce highly stylized shorts in the early fifties, a whole revolution in the look of animated movies shorts such as Toot, Whistle, Plunk and Boom and Paul Bunyan.
Around the world, some fantastic-looking shorts were the result of that development too. Films such as The Great Jewel Robbery and Don Quixote Bozzetto’s Sr. Rossi series; and France’s Paul Grimault and the Halas-Batchelor shorts from London.
The variety is even bigger today with so many commercials, movie titles and the Internet. And let us not forget all the different techniques such as puppet, clay- and CG-animation.
I hope that films of the future will continue to look interesting and will inspire new generations of filmmakers, and hopefully, art will remain more important than technique.
