References to references to references....

Today we discussed Intertextuality, the idea that nothing is original and everything refers to something, whether intentional or not. A lot of people were opposed to the idea that no idea is completely original, but it seems perfectly plausible to me. Your ideas might be relatively original, but you still got the idea somewhere, due to something, whether consciously or not.

The part about references made me think of what is probably the most referenced bit of media in modern history: Star Wars. Family Guy did a few extra long Star Wars episodes, and referred to even more unrelated stuff in there. For example, a Doctor Who one in the video below.

Now of course what makes this so popular is that it's done so extremely well. Only an animation could achieve this extent of clever jokes I believe, simply because - as was said in the first seminar - it is a fake medium and this has practically no limits. Trying to replicate these references in a live action movie would cost ridiculous amounts of money for relatively little merit. This is most likely why these "parody" sort of programs like The Simpsons, South Park, Robot Chicken and Family Guy turn to animation. These shows have even been known to reference each other or even the writers personally. For example, the creator of Family Guy is Seth MacFarlane. He does the voices of several characters such as Brian, Peter and Stewie. Seth Green is the creator of Robot Chicken and also does the voice of Chris in Family Guy. Both series did a Star Wars parody, though Robot Chicken did it first. After the Family Guy one, the characters argued about which is better with each voice actor vouching for their own show. The video below shows this scene, though unfortunately it's very low quality.

Another interesting video on the topic of Intertextuality is "Everything is a Remix". This truly goes to show how we all are inspired by something or other, which can be seen especially clearly in the Star Wars examples. It's rather ironic, seeing as Lucasfilms is one of the most adamant filmmaking companies when it comes to copyright issues. The pot calling the kettle black indeed.

Everything is a Remix Part 2 from Kirby Ferguson on Vimeo.

Wait, it means what?

We discussed some fairly confusing subjects this week regarding semiotics, a term particularly hard to define mainly because it encompasses so much. I find the subject of linguistics and meaning especially very interesting. After digging through Daniel Chandler's website Semiotics for Beginners, it reminded me a lot of all the reading on Linguistics I did in the past.

A man of particular interest to me is Paul Grice and his maxims. His general theory is known as the cooperative principle and describes how people interact with each other through a few maxims. Paul Grice himself defines the Cooperative Principle as follows: "Make your contribution such as it is required, at the stage at which it occurs, by the accepted purpose or direction of the talk exchange in which you are engaged." His maxims describe how people should speak to communicate succesfully, such as be truthful, clear, relevant and offer enough information. However, this is of course not how people speak. There is of course a lot more to say on this subject, but since this is a blog post and not a book, I'll skip the maxims for now.

What's more interesting is his theory on what is implied, which he calls implicature. What a person says and what he means can be two different things, and more importantly; nobody will ever say something for no reason at all. Even things that might seem irrelevant and unimportant are said for a reason, may it be simple social bonding (nearly all weather-related conversation) or an implication towards something else.

Now how does this all relate to animation? A lot, I think. The Cooperative Principle can be applied to animation too. Animation is something we create from the ground up, which means that everything in an animation is there for a reason. In live action this is not the case, something might be caught in the film accidentally, the object itself won't have any meaning at all. I'll illustrate with an example from UP. In the movie clip below is the scene at the beginning of UP, where the old man's life with his wife Ellie is summarized. In these scenes, Ellie is represented by the colour magenta. Many of the lighting around her is magenta, seen most prominently in the church where they get married. After she dies and Carl returns to his home, the last shred of magenta fades away from the house, showing that she is well and truly gone. This is no coincidence. The light didn't happen to be purple that day. Because everything in an animation is orchestrated, some amazing things can be done, as clearly proven by this amazing film.

Editing can of course achieve some measure of this effect in live action films. But creating an animation forces us to think about it. In a live action film, such effects MAY be considered. In an animation, they will always be considered, there is no choice.

And so it begins...

And so I find myself blogging for yet another educational institute. Though this time far more lenient, with a post required once a week instead of once a day!

The first lecture touched on some very familiar subjects to me. As an ex-communication student I'm more than a little familiar with Shannon & Weaver's model of communication and I must admit I was feeling more than a little bit smug about it. It was even rather nostalgic. However, rethinking it all turned out to be an excellent experience. All the knowledge I thought was more or less useless, will certainly come in handy in my future animation-related floundering.

Seeing Entropy and Redundancy in an animation context puts the terms in a different light. I have learned I tend to lean towards the redundant side of it all more than the entropic. Seeing as most of my favourite films are Disney and Pixar ones. That's not to say neither of them are entropic. In fact, I believe the latest Pixar films have found a sort of glorious equilibrium between the two. They reach a massive audience and are still hugely entertaining.

We've also discussed the use of the right side of the brain in creativity, and how our society is focused on the use of the left side. The left side focuses on linear reasoning, routines, language functions such as grammar and vocabulary and literal meanings, whereas the right side handles the unexpected, intonation/accentuation of speech and contextual meanings. The unexpected vs. routine? Doesn't that sound familiar? As we move from 1900 to now through history, the left side of the brain is used more and more in most Western countries. And if we compare an early Disney film like Bambi to a modern Pixar one like Ratatouille, it does seem like the latter is trying to reason with us much more than the former...

All in all, food for thought!