What If? Contrasting the Possible and the Fanciful
The film medium is literally fantastic.
Film takes you outside the limits of time and space. Animation can take you outside the limits of your own body. There is a type of film that deals with the ‘here and now’. It is called documentary filmmaking since it documents something that already exists.
Animation creates new worlds and fantastic characters who think and feel and live. Animation doesn’t need sets, location shoots, or actors. The only limit on your setting or characters is your imagination.
Animation is at its best when it depicts something that could possibly exist. It is counterproductive to duplicate reality in animation unless you are doing special effects that must blend in with live action. If you enjoy ‘realism’ you may want to work in this field or in live action.
An animated film’s weakness is usually the story. There is a fallacious belief that since animation is “just a cartoon” the story does not need to have the same dramatic structure as that of a live-action film. In truth, animation needs more structure so that we identify with the imaginary characters and their problems. Limitations need to be set. A story where ‘anything can happen’ or where characters ‘can do anything’ will lack suspense since your characters will easily solve any conflict that might arise. Supposedly anarchic stories like Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass take place in lands with their own set of rules. The odd characters in both of the Alice in Wonderland books always have an explanation for their behavior, which only Alice considers odd. We perceive Wonderland through ‘normal’ Alice’s eyes as she attempts to impose the laws of the real world on the fantastic characters.
Some stories reverse accepted realities. Jonathan Swift did this in Gulliver’s Travels when he had horses behaving like civilized people and manlike “Yahoos” acting like brute beasts.
[Fig. 5-1] Houyhnhnms were the equine rulers and Yahoos were manlike beasts in Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels.
Reversals can apply to character types as well as situations. Characters that work against type can create amusing story conflicts. What if bulls were peaceful, bank robbers were childlike, and dragons were timid poets? These characters have all appeared in memorable animated cartoons (FERDINAND THE BULL, BABY BUGGY BUNNY, and THE RELUCTANT DRAGON).
Consider things that could possibly happen to the characters and the story as well as those that can. Remember that animation is not restricted by the laws of physics or gravity! Believability is more important to an animated film than realism. We are able to accept an animated world where fish and rabbits talk, or where people travel to other planets without space suits. The secret is consistency. Each project has its own set of rules that guide the action of the characters and the development of the story.
What if insects ran the world and exterminated people? What if fish were able to live on dry land? You can start with a normal story situation and develop it in an unusual way. Try contrasting the ordinary with the extraordinary. Here is a simple example: A hound dog, a family pet, chases rabbits around the back yard of a suburban house. If this is as far as you go with the story, you can create an amusing story showing the dog’s interactions with little woodland creatures as depicted in Figure 5-2.
[Fig. 5-2] A very cute cartoon situation with very cute animals doing very cute things.
These characters can be fun to animate, but the setting and story have been used many times before. So it is once again time to ask “What if?” What if the story develops in an unexpected fashion? What if an alien spaceship lands near the doghouse? It could happen. But why stop there? Add more “what ifs,” developing what might result from this contrast between the normal and the unusual. Will this be a comic story? Try using extreme scale contrasts in your characters and prop designs. If the alien appears to be small and ineffectual, it may be totally harmless, or it might be a serious threat in a small package. Is this a dramatic story? Perhaps the alien will have a fearsome appearance. It can be larger and designed in a different style than the dog and the rabbits. Sketch several rough ideas for each character and draw thumbnails of some interactions between them.
I’ve decided to make this a comic story. Here are some ways that the alien’s appearance might influence the situation.
- What if the alien looks like a rabbit?
- What if it looks like another dog? What if it was a very small dog?
- What if the dog thinks the alien is a toy?
- What if the alien’s weapons resembled cookies or dog food and actually attracted the dog?
- What if the rabbits were very aggressive toward the alien?
- What if the alien’s other weapons resembled carrots and attracted the rabbits?
- Some exploratory illustrations appear in Figure 5-3.
The new situation has the poor alien continually bedeviled by a dog and woodland creatures that lack the proper respect for its mission and/or person. Its defenses are useless. This leads us, and it, to the logical question: How does this story end?
[Fig. 5-3] Here are some aliens: some doglike, some rabbitlike, all completely ineffectual.
Draw rough on lined yellow sketch pads while you are experimenting with story ideas and character designs. The lines on the pads provide built-in “rulers” that help set the characters’ scale and room for the notes you take during story meetings.
Your final designs should be in color and drawn on white unlined paper or card. Draw variations in scale as well as design and see which characters work best together. Designs may use tone or color (recommended). Work rough and don’t cross anything out. How would the plot develop if the alien was large and threatening? What if it looked like a different animal? The different physical and emotional properties of the aliens and the Earthlings will change the story.
[Fig. 5-4] Yellow sketch pads provide construction lines and are cheap and easy to obtain. They are very useful during the development period when the character design and story are still in flux.
Beginning at the Ending: The Tex Avery ‘Twist’
Remember this Golden Rule of Animation Pre-production: ALWAYS know where, and how, your picture is going to end, before you start production.
The ending and beginning of the story should be determined before you work on the middle section. The middle of the story can be expanded or contracted as time and budget allows. You have to start somewhere, and your ending must be there.
Some films are constructed on the “moving train” pattern where the action is already under way when the story begins. Cat chases mouse, dog chases cat. Little time is needed for establishing shots since the characters’ situation is evident from the start of the film. These films typically build a series of gags, each one stronger than the other, with the most spectacular one at the finish. The Road Runner and Coyote cartoons are good examples of the “moving train” story.
Director Tex Avery delighted in creating meticulously plotted hyperbolic stories that broke all the rules of animation, but he once found himself stumped for an ending.
I interviewed Tex Avery about story construction in 1978, and we discussed this exceptional film.
TEX AVERY: When analyzing a cartoon situation you should consider these three points: Is it a good situation? What can you do to develop it, and how are you going to finish it? Can you “switch” the story or do it in a new way?
Don’t use dialogue unless it is absolutely necessary. You shouldn’t tell what is happening on the screen.
NANCY BEIMAN: Would you have an idea of the total picture, beginning and end, from the start? Or would you build a film from a basic gag or situation and do the beginning and end last?
TEX AVERY: We’d generally start with the beginning and ending first. This leaves you room to ‘fill in’. You should have a definite finish. A switch or surprise ending is good; a “tag.” You can build up one situation to a ridiculous extent … and when the audience feels that you can’t go any farther, you “top” it, thereby surprising them.
When constructing a story, you should start listing gags, not necessarily in order. Don’t throw any of them out yet. Dovetail them until the gags become stronger and stronger. The gags don’t have to be related to one another, but each should top the previous one.
One picture we didn’t know how to end was BAD LUCK BLACKIE. [Author’s note: This study in superstition is the story of a black cat that assists a small white kitten by repeatedly crossing a bullying bulldog’s path; each time Blackie does this, ever-larger objects immediately fall in from offscreen and hit the dog on the head.] We built that picture so that it went from the bulldog getting hit by a flowerpot to the kitchen sink to a battleship. To sort of get a little humor into the thing we had Blackie run across the dog’s path differently each time—once on tiptoe, once like a Russian dancer. This was a gag within a gag. Finally we couldn’t think of anything else to drop on [the bulldog]. How do you end it? Well, you’re obliged to come back to the hero at the end of a cartoon. So you pull a switch—the kitten [now painted black] turns nasty and laughs like the dog did all through the picture.
NANCY BEIMAN: You didn’t have that ending from the start?
TEX AVERY: No. We didn’t know where we were going to end up.
Interview with Tex Avery © 1978, 2005 by Nancy Beiman.
Although Tex refers to gags for short Hollywood cartoons, this manner of story construction is standard for plot points in feature films as well. An animation story is not an uncharted journey. Everything must be planned beforehand.
Tex mentions the “obligation” to show the hero at the end of a cartoon. This device is not used in all animated stories. DUMBO, PINOCCHIO, and DUCK AMUCK are examples that break this ‘rule’. In the case of the alien-versus-dog-and-rabbits story described earlier in this chapter, you may have more than one hero to consider! The story may have no heroes at all. As story and layout man Ken O’Connor stated, “Circumstances alter cases.”
Exercise: Draw two or three thumbnails for a comic ending and two or three more for a dramatic ending to the alien-versus-dog-and-rabbits scenario discussed in this chapter. You may use different character designs for the two stories. Work on lined yellow paper and keep your early drawings rough. Add color to your final designs.
[Fig. 5-5] The end or a new beginning?
“I can’t believe that!” said Alice.
“Can’t you?” the queen said in a pitying tone. “Try again, draw a long breath, and shut your eyes.”
Alice laughed. “There’s no use trying,” she said. “One can’t believe impossible things.”
“I dare say you haven’t had much practice,” said the queen. “When I was your age, I always did it for half an hour a day. Why, sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.”
—Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland
The hardest assignment I have ever received was to “do whatever I liked.” You can run off in all directions if you don’t set the rules for your project at the start. Rules allow your new animated world and your characters to function with their own set of natural laws, which might not be those of the real world.
Here are some Rules created for the “Road Runner” cartoons by Chuck Jones and story man Mike Maltese:
- The Road Runner never leaves the Road.
- The action always takes place in the American Southwest.
- The Coyote’s clever traps invariably backfire on him.
It ultimately does not matter that the Coyote does not catch the Road Runner. Jones defined the Coyote’s mindset and the point of the series by quoting George Santayana: “Fanaticism consists in redoubling your efforts when you have forgotten your aim.”
Be sure to follow your own rules. If you have created a world where characters can breathe underwater without special equipment, it is disturbing to have one character suddenly find it impossible to breathe unless there is a need (and an explanation) for it in the story.
Every detail of character and setting should contribute to getting the story across as clearly as possible. If your story takes place in ancient Greece, but characters can ‘pop’ forward to modern times, be sure to explain the rules of your new world so that we understand how and why this time shift happens. If your character must go against a rule—say, by befriending a character that we, and it, see as an enemy—establish your rules first before they are broken. For example, everyone knows cartoon dogs and cats hate each other. Or do they? In Chuck Jones’ FEED THE KITTY, this rule is reversed when a tough bulldog falls in love with a cute kitten. Conflict arises when the dog tries to hide his new friend from his mistress, who has told him that he may not have any more “things” in the house. The kitten is placed in situations of extreme danger, but when all is revealed to the mistress, she lets the dog keep the kitten.
Exercise: Sketch some simple characters for the following four situations. Next, list some rules that might affect the character relationships and the story. Illustrate each rule with a thumbnail of the characters in a recognizable setting. Work on lined yellow pads to help you scale the size of the characters. Keep the sketches very rough and do not cross anything out. After you have drawn a few characters sketch possible conflicts and endings for each situation.
- A difficult mother-in-law is visiting her daughter and son-in-law. The mother-in-law is a Witch.
- Children on the first day of school. The characters are all single-celled organisms.
- A hunter chases a small animal. Consider different animals and locations that might influence the story. Is the hunter a human or an animal?
- Your story takes place inside and on top of a dresser. All of your characters are
Remember, your first idea may not be the best one. Keep an open mind about story and characters at this point. Experiment with different situations and don’t take the obvious way out. The rule in some story sessions is to ‘never say “No”’ at this point in development. An idea that seems odd at first may become ‘right’ later on. In story as with animation, it is better to go ‘too far’ and pull back than to not act strongly enough.
You are now refining your characters’ appearance and investigating how they act and interact with one another. Do your designs have appeal? We will define this essential quality in the next chapter.