Principles of animation
The principles of animation are arcs and gravity. Arcs are the space where arms or legs move to make an object have human movement - up and down, forwards and backwards. The principle of gravity is where if an object falls in falls to the floor and follows the rule of gravity. Both bring the effect of realism but can be broken for entertainment purposes. Time is an important principle because it's how many frames you need for the action to happen, the less frames you use the less time you have and the more frames you use the more time you have. Persistence of vision is the idea that the human eye can see a strip of images and see it as an animation, for example a flip book.
Overlapping is another principle and it means that whilst an objects or persons arm is moving, their legs are moving at a different rate and follow through means that something keeps moving at the same time another part is still - for example if someone's sat down and their thigh is still yet they're moving their calf, this is follow through. Finally the principle of anticipation, humans can't jump without bending their knees first so in an animation you have to bend their legs so it follows the same idea and makes sense.
1964
Claymation Rudolph the red nosed reindeer, directed by Larry Roemer. Target audience: young children, fairytale story fans.
1979
Jack Frost directed and produced by Jules Bass and Arthur Rankin Jr. Target audience: children, those who like traditional stories, older people.
1980
Equinox by David Allen, target audience are students to adults.
1998
Bob the builder produced by Jackie Cockle. Target audience being young children.
2005
2011
Stop motion music video directed by Greg Jardin, produced by Daphne Raves. Target audience: young/teenage girls, fans of this music genre.
2012
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Live action video made by Simon Lachapelle. Target audience are teenagers and gaming fans.
2013
Paper stop motion ad for Volvo produced by Ambi Fauri, the target audience are adults.
ANALYSIS
Wallace & Grommit and The Curse of The Were-Rabbit.
It follows the arc principle at 0:27 when they click their mugs together then lift them to drink from it.
When they go down the slide they follow the principle of gravity because they're heading downwards from 0:21 to 0:23.
Both of these create the effect of realism because Wallace's character is human so to make it believable he has to follow these principles. Grommit follows these two for entertainment purposes, his character is a dog but has human qualities - he can drive a car for example at 33:24. The effect this has is that it makes it funny because obviously in real life dogs don't have these characteristics.
37:23 - 37:25 uses the principle of following through, the rabbit burps and Grommit puts his harm out and wafts the smell away, keeping his upper arm still but lower arm moving. The effect of this to create humour because along with his disgusted facial expression it makes the audience informed that the smell is horrible which we wouldn't know without it because he can't speak.
"In Your Arms" music video
The persistence of vision is used a lot in this video because the background changes a lot. An example is from 1:34 to 1:39 where she wipes down and the background changes to a beach, because it was taken frame by frame then but together it follows the persistence of vision because the human eye sees it as an animation as it flows so seamlessly. The effect of this is just to change the scene but it also impacts the audience as it's creative and interesting to watch.
At 1:06 to 1:09 she has to move her arms to push herself forward to create the illusion that she's skiing ,using the principle of anticipation to have a realistic effect.
Volvo TV advert
From 0:05 to 0:08 when the car first gets its wheels we can see the time principle being used, the right amount of frames had to be taken so that there was no jolty or sudden movements, the wheels had to turn to make it have a realistic effect on the audience - which it does.
0:13 to 0:15 is an example of the principle of overlapping being used, whilst the car is driving through a paper forest, the surroundings are growing/being made up and the same time. The effect of this is an aesthetic for the audience because it's nice to watch and unique but it doesn't make them feel any emotion.
OLD VS NEW
The development of the principles is quite obvious, in the 1964 Rudolph all the moment is sudden and quite stiff and positions go from one to the next quite jerky. Compared to Wallace and Grommit 41 years later, everything is a lot smoother and the arc principle is used to make the movement look more realistic. The models are made to a much better quality in more recent stop motions, looking more sleek. As time has gone on I think people have got more experience with stop motion and its logic so skills have gotten better in terms of using the right amount of frames so it flows and editing all shots together. Also the camera angles are just basic in more dated stop motions with all the action unfolding in front of the camera from one angle whereas in newer ones we see the action from different angles and the camera even moves around the characters.
I think the music video has made best use of its principles because it includes a lot of them - persistence of vision, secondary action, time and anticipation. All these make the end product flow seamlessly, look impressive and make the scenes look realistic.
The Volvo ad was the best at targeting its audience in my opinion because it targets adults and the advert was mature using neutral colours and just shown the product which is what they're interested in. It was straight to the point with no frills, the car was advertised showing the different colours/interiors you could get.
GENRE, STYLE AND AUDIENCE
I think puppet stop motions are better for a younger child audience because the characters can be created to attract children. For example the 2012 film "Frankenwweenie" is a stop motion animated film using puppets and it was a huge success at the box office.
Children need a simple and easy to follow storyline and young girls more so like puppies - which is a main feature and boys typically like a scary element which allowed the creators to make a film and create characters which caters for both genders.
Claymation is a style that's best used to make something for an older audience, late teens and up. Clay allows you to make your own model as well as narrative so really you can make what you want, an example is Lee Hardcastle who makes a lot of 18+ stop motions made out of clay and the material allows him to make characters and add things like blood splats and weapons so that older audiences will find it more interesting/comical. 1:03 is an example of this where cats get shot and clay is used to symbolise blood because they have the flexibility and have the creativity to do so using clay.
This can also be said for fans of the horror and gore genre fans, clay can be used to show blood and weapons and antagonists/protagonists can be made and it can follow the stereotypical horror narrative.
CGI is another style suited to sci-fi fans because the plot of sci-fi's are typically futuristic and weird creatures. Making models of space ships and aliens can look very amateur whereas CGI allows you do create a more professional looking model that looks believable. the 2009 film Avatar is an example of this, the CGI aspect replaces prosthetics putting an actor in a high tech suit, letting them deliver their scene then special effect people will bring it to life.
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