Album and Song Reviews

For more inspiration I thought it would be a good idea to look at reviews of the album and the song itself to see if any ideas would spring to mind when reading them. Here are a few I found (I have highlighted key words and phrases that I have found interesting and useful)- 


'The inspiration for this album is the work of Polish writer Bruno Schulz (1892-1942), whose dark, Kafka-esque surrealism makes a nice fit with Tin Hat's lush yet disturbing mix of Eastern European folk, 20th century classical and free improvisation. Titles like "The Secret Fluid of Dusk", "Dead Season" and "Black Thursday" give some idea of the mood. Even during the sprightliest moments, there’s a finely honed dissonance at work which suggests that something not quite right may be lurking in the shadows. This is made most obvious on Kihlstedt’s urgent, breathy rendition of "Daisy Bell" (aka "Daisy, Daisy"), which suggests that Daisy would be best advised to avoid hopping on the back of a bicycle built for two and taking out a restraining order on her would-be suitor instead. Elsewhere the mix of beauty and creeping dread is more subtle. "The Land of Perpetual Sleep" manages to be sinister and dreamily beautiful simultaneously; violin and clarinet trace a wounded, sickly melody over a gentle ripple of harps, dobro and drones, while "Janissary Band" sounds like Stravinsky played by a strangely infernal clockwork machine'.(Review BBC)


'The guiding inspiration behind it is Bruno Schulz, the Polish-Jewish novelist and artist (1892-1942), whose Street of Crocodiles was once made into an animated short by the Brothers Quay. Tin Hat's acoustic, off-kilter soundscapes may have a filmic resonance, but their tunes have proper structures and should reach way beyond the art-houses. Violinist-singer Kihlstedt is a huge talent, and my only quibble is that The Sad Machinery of Spring includes only one vocal feature - a hallucinatory, reimagined Daisy Bell, complete with a bicycle bell.' (Review The Guardian)


(Off Kilter - not in perfect balance/ a bit askew) 

Group Discussion

On Monday 7th February John, Rick and Me had a group discussion about the ideas we had so far, we took it in turns to explain our ideas and then discuss with each other what we could add and improve. I went first and i played my chosen song 'The Land of Perpetual Sleep' by Tinhat Trio to the group and we came up with loads of suggestions as to how i could respond to the sound and research into the meaning of the song and the artist. To respond to sound i could listen to the track over and over and use different materials John suggested that talking to fans and reading reviews of the trio may help gain a greater understanding of how the music is responded to that i may not have thought of. Looking at the album art and photographs of the musicians may help in the way of style and possibly content. Rick also suggested that by looking at the name and how an audience would interpret may spur ideas and a narrative.

Walt Disney's Fantasia

Coming away from the more abstract animtion I decided to look at animation to sound where a narrative is portrayed and straight away I came across Walt Disney's Fantasia (1940).
The overall purpose of Fantasia was to bring Mikey Mouse back to life whos popularity had declined. The feature length film consists of eight animated sections set to pieces of classical music conducted by Leopold Stokowski which all feature different narratives to fit with the mise-en-scene of each piece of music.

In this particular scene from the film 'The sorcerers apprentice' Mickey Mouse is almost used to portray the role of the conductor of the orchestra interacting with objects that are helped along with different sounds. This interaction between character and object portraying sound is a technique I want to play with within my animation for example shapes, objects, animals ect... The music in the scene is also used to portray the emotions and feeling of Mickey Mouse through out the animation with the music being jolly and then turning into panic and fear this is something that can also be considered when planning my narrative.

The Nutcracker Suite is split into a few different scenes where in which different creatures and flowers are used to represent the different sections within the music. Towards the start of the scene graceful faries, flowers and fish are used to connote a calm and peaceful tone within the music all with elongated fins, petals and wings gracefully moving around their surroundings. However this is then shortly followed with a juxtaposition of thistles that represent rusian dancers bouncing around the page in a frantic mannor as the pace of the music increases. This is also a technique to be considered - changing characters and story through out the scene creating a bit more of an abstract feel but each with their own narrative.

Animation to Music

As I have chosen to animate to sound I flicked back to my first year sketchbooks to uncover the wonderful works of Len Lye. We first looked at these when creating our own scratch films however we didn't add sound till the very end of the process. In this particular animation named Kaleidoscope (1935) the use of shapes, textures and layering create a very light hearted and upbeat mise-en-scene relating to that of the music chosen. It is also nice when the colours and patterns change completely to contrast with each other to portray different sections of the music something that i should defiantly consider with style, colour and content.

Again the same technique is used within Colour Flight (1937) the colours, the amount of texture and contrasting scenes makes it exciting to watch and engages the audience to want to keep on watching as it continues to change. This is why I want to choose a piece of music that has a bit of an inconsistent change to be able to add visual excitement and contrast within the piece.

Another example of animation to sound that I found looking back over my first year work was the animations of Oskar Fischinger.

Early Abstractions (1946-57) is similar to the animations by Len Lye in the way of aesthetics, this is the only difference with what I am thinking as I want to create characters and a narrative instead of just using shapes. However looking at these animations has helped give me an incite into creating the right feel for the chosen song.

David Hockney

David Hockney is another artist who produces sketches of figures and what I like about these is the use of very assertive lines. The lines appear confident and precise creating a very personal touch allowing them to be very striking and bold. This is also a technique I could try when trying to create the right mise-en-scene for the chosen song. The lines could possibly change through out the animation to fit in with the different sections of sound creating a sense of variety to allow me to keep the interest of the audience.

Egon Schiele

After creating such a successful rotoscoping piece i thought this would be a wise choice of technique for my final major project. After creating a personal map as suggested by a friend who is currently studying interactive arts at MMU i found that my greatest art based interests revolve round life drawing. From the heading of fine art life drawing has to be most fascinating to me as so many techniques are used to portray the human form. One technique in particular that i have picked up from my very first life drawing classes in college was the line drawing technique. This is when you use only one line trying not to remove your pencil from the page allowing your focus to remain on the subject. A way in which this could be used in my proposed animation is to rotoscope as i did within the 'Feel good' brief by tracing around the frames but in this particular style. I think it will give the animation fluidity and freedom much like a song.

Initial Thoughts

Looking at the Uni year so far I feel it has been the strongest most enjoyable year since the very start of uni 2 years ago! It has taken a while for me to get into the swing of things but I finally made it just in time for the most important year.

So what has worked successfully for me over this huge development?
1. A more hands on approach to my animation rather than just sitting at the computer all day struggling.
2. Creating my own briefs and short animations.
3. Making sure deadlines are met and asking my peers and tutor for help when needed.
4. A technique that worked well for we was rotoscoping as it allowed me to gain a hand drawn approached with a bit more assistance to that of traditional animation.

Things that still need to be improved on:
1. Time Management - at the start of a project jump straight into it instead of waiting till about 3 or 4 weeks into it.
2. Adding sound to the final piece.
3. More in depth research and more critical analysis to back up my actions and decisions.

After reflecting on these I have decided to choose a song/sound track as a start so that I can interpret my own narrative to it so that the animation and sound work well together as they should. I will look at a range of different genres and sounds to make sure I have made a good choice that is both interesting to listen to and create interesting visuals. In regards to the sound I am not sure at all what I am looking for however I would like it to be something with different sounds throughout and not just one continuous beat. This is so that I can have a character interacting with the variety of sounds that may create different scenarios.