Here's another interesting post from "SuperSally", who appears to be an insider--from the recent Robert Zemeckis/Rupunzal JHM forum:
supersally said:
To the comment that said that motion capture is being condemmed before developed, I would like to point you back to history.
Motion Capture is just rotoscoping in 3D. Like the dead, souless forms that you get when tracing from a photo and playing it back, motion capture is the exact same thing in 3D. People who talk about this as a new medium dont know their history of animation and "why" things look dead rotoscoped. Read the Illusion of Life section on the use of reference. It is all there, why this is a problem.
Secondly, regarding Dick Cook.... for those of you who believe that the suites truly understand what the artists are going for and doing, you are extremely naive!! Dick Cook is looking at the bottom line dollars..... not the quality..... how to get the most money out of the film... not the quality of how it gets done and making something a classic. Walt Disney was both an artist and visionary...... he wanted the quality and artistry of the project to transcend just the amount of money it made. Today's WDFA is being run by suits..... not artists. That is the problem and the artists are not being listened too. Lasseter doesnt care about the artists at WDFA guys.....he doesnt know them...... he cares about maintaining Pixar clout and keeping his guys employed. It is terribly sad in every way.
Animators, like artists, make choices about their work..... they choose the best, most economical way of making a statement.... to find the soul and clarity of what their character and its thinking. The choice, the economy..... the most potent way of conveying character is the thing that misses in both 3D (mo capture) and 2D rotoscoping. Several artists can be drawing the same model, but will all choose different things to emphasize in their drawing..... that is the choice that make a great animator so much more potent and powerful than any data capture device.
Also, 80% of the emotion read of a character is in the posing NOT the face!! Good posing, good draftsmanship, good choice in gesture makes a character come to life. Mo cap makes no choice.... selects no keys, selects no pose and pushes it to maximize meaning.
The rule at Disney is: "good posing will save lousy facial, but bad poses with decent facial will never work"
Glen Keane says: "the animators job is to not make drawings that move, but drawings that MOVE THE AUDIENCE."
Mocap and rotoscope ill never make those decisions. End of story....
February 7, 2007 11:24 AM
You can’t just have your characters announce how they feel! That makes me feel angry!
BTW, The Natural is about baseball in the way that Titanic was about a big boat sinking. It's secondary to the emotional story. I'm no sporting fanatic but I love this movie. I think you'd like it too.
The Natural was the only film that, upon walking out of the theater, I immediately walked across the street to a record store and bought the soundtrack album.
Brilliant score :idea: .. I actually like to think of it as a symphonic piece in its own right.
Also, I know this whole Pixar/Disney thing can get kinda confusing, what with the whole "OK is Disney Pixar, or is Pixar Disney, what IS there relationship now anyway?"
So, here's some facts, many of which are probably already known, and be warned it's from Wick, but at least it's a handy reference:
Disney's acquisition of Pixar
Wikinews has news related to:
Disney buys PixarOn January 24, 2006, Disney announced that it had agreed to buy Pixar for approximately $7.4 billion in an all-stock deal. Following Pixar shareholder approval, the acquisition was completed May 5, 2006. The transaction catapults Jobs, who was the majority shareholder of Pixar with 50.1%, to Disney's largest individual shareholder with 7% and a new seat on its board of directors. Jobs' new Disney holdings outpace holdings belonging to ex-CEO Eisner, the previous top shareholder who still held 1.7%, and Disney Director Emeritus Roy E. Disney, whose criticisms of Eisner included the soured Pixar relationship and accelerated his ouster, who held almost 1% of the corporation's shares.
As part of the deal, Lasseter, Pixar Executive Vice President and co-founder, became Chief Creative Officer (Reporting to President and CEO Bob Iger and consulting with Disney Director Roy E. Disney) of both Disney and Pixar Animation Studios, as well as the Principal Creative Adviser at Walt Disney Imagineering, which designs and builds the company's theme parks. Catmull retained his position as President of Pixar, while also becoming President of Disney Studios, reporting to Robert Iger and Dick Cook, chairman of Walt Disney Studio Entertainment.
Lasseter and Catmull's oversight of both the Disney and Pixar studios did not mean that the two studios were merging, however. In fact, additional conditions were laid out as part of the deal to ensure that Pixar remains a separate entity, a concern that many analysts had about the Disney deal.[4]
Some other points of interest concerning the deal:
If Pixar had pulled out of the deal, they would have been required to pay Disney a penalty of US$210 million.
John Lasseter has the authority to approve films for both Disney and Pixar studios, with Disney CEO Robert Iger and Disney Director Roy E. Disney carrying final approving authority.
The deal required that Pixar's primary directors and creative executives must also join the combined company. This includes Andrew Stanton, Pete Docter, Brad Bird, Bob Peterson, Brenda Chapman, Lee Unkrich, and Gary Rydstrom.
There will be a steering committee that will oversee animation for both Disney and Pixar studios, with a mission to maintain and spread the Pixar culture. This committee will consist of Catmull, Lasseter, Jobs, Iger, Cook, and Tom Staggs. They will meet at Pixar headquarters at least once every two months.
Pixar HR policies will remain intact, including the lack of employment contracts.
Ensures the Pixar name will continue, and that the studio will remain in its current Emeryville, California location with the "Pixar" sign.
Branding of films made post-merger will be "Disney Pixar" (starting with Cars).
[edit] Executive leadership
Steve Jobs served as Pixar's Chairman and Chief Executive Officer until May 2006, when the company was bought by Disney. Jobs then took a place on the Disney board of directors (also becoming Disney's largest individual shareholder). Today, Catmull serves as president of the combined Disney-Pixar animation studios, and Lasseter serves as the studios' Chief Creative Officer. Catmull reports to Iger as well as Walt Disney Studios chairman Cook. Lasseter, who has greenlight authority on all new films, also reports to Iger as well as consulting with Roy E. Disney.
You can’t just have your characters announce how they feel! That makes me feel angry!
On The Natural...the score was used on an Oscars clip, which is where I first heard it, and it was so powerful and emotional.
Years later I finally saw the movie (I was too young to see it when it came out) and remembered the music and was overjoyed I'd found out what it was. I ordered the CD as soon as it was released.
On Disney/Pixar: that arrangement is just for the Pixar movies, basically s its always been. Disney films will go out with the "Walt Disney Pictures Presents" logo on it, thought there's talk of a "Walt Disney Animation Studios" logo coming into play.
The JL article is discussed on AN here. VERY interesting thread, with an excerpt from another animation site, where the point that American Dog competing with Toy Story 3 in the same summer, and how that translated into what happened....
The JL article is discussed on AN here. VERY interesting thread, with an excerpt from another animation site, where the point that American Dog was competing with Toy Story 3 in the same summer, and how that translated into what happened....
"Apparently there were several reasons for the change. Firstly, Lasseter wasn't a big fan of Lilo and Stitch, which meant he wasn't a fan of Sanders' artistic sensibilities. The second was that Sanders and Lasseter weren't getting along when it came to this new movie. Not only that, American Dog in its original form was going up against Toy Story 3. Guess who would lose in a situation like that?"
You can’t just have your characters announce how they feel! That makes me feel angry!
