report master class children's animation 2015

Cinekid for Professionals Cinekid for Professionals Master Class in Children’s Animation

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Cinekid for Professionals 2015

www.cinekid.com

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The Netherlands is a global leader in live action drama for children and has a strong grounding in animation. Both disciplines are very successful and win prizes both at home and abroad. There are many talented and successful animators in the Netherlands whose scripts are developed primarily using the power of the image, but their work is not often written for, nor focused on, young audiences. The Masterclass Children’s Animation comprised an exchange of knowledge and skills between animators and live-action scriptwriters and asked the core question: how do you tell a good story for children using the power of the image? Dutch and international experts and filmmakers talked about modes and rules within animation, and about writing for children, in order to share their experiences and exchange knowledge. It was a programme for animators and live-action filmmakers who together can provide both the inspiration and the know-how to write top quality children's entertainment. Paul Wells Director of the Animation Academy (Loughborough University, UK) and Chair of the Association of British Animation Collections ‘Never let an adult save the day’ Through his extensive experience within all aspects of animation creation Paul Wells offered a comprehensive set of guidelines for aspiring and even experienced animation writers. The times they are a-changin’ but the children they are a-changin’ too, said Wells. His own daughter, aged 14, knows a lot more than he did at that age. The phenomenon of kids being more advanced now than their counterparts in previous generations is a big issue in


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the UK. Is this a worldwide phenomenon? If so, how do you deal with it in your animation writing? Or not at all? How do children’s age and identity relate? There is a growing need to think about the international cultural and social context of the stories. Co-production and the increased travel of productions over the world highlights the intercultural differences (an issue scriptwriter Fiona van Heemstra would illustrate with examples later on). Very often, said Wells, animation is not produced for the domestic market alone. Furthermore, most new children’s animation should be thought of as cross-platform. Evidently, production is becoming more complex, even without taking into account parents’ increased sensitivity towards what children see on screens. As a writer, animator or director the priority should be the child but more and more people are weighing in on the process. Chekhov to Chuck-ov How do live action and animation relate? Wells used what he called the Chekhov to Chuck-ov paradigm to highlight the differences. (Chuck-ov, incidentally, refers to Loony Tunes director Chuck Jones.)

Chekhov was writing for actors and directors. In animation you write for directors, voice-over artists and animators

In animation you’re writing to get purposeful action OF characters, live action writing requires prompting action IN characters. In animation motion, is everything

In live action, writing is about the motivation of backstory and subtext. In animation it’s about motivating core physical or temperamental characteristics. Most characters have no backstory. It’s all about the physical characteristics

Live action mostly has a plot-driven narrative. In animation it’s


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mostly concept, design and sequence-led narrative

In live action, character is revealed through behaviour, essentially internal. In animation it’s essentially external

Animation tools

1. Fabrication: the physical and material creation of imaginary figures and spaces: we know that we create worlds with their own rules and their own inner logic

2. Metamorphosis: the ability to change via a. Transformation: literally becoming something else or b. Mutation: becoming a hybrid of two or more things or c. Translation: revealing something about a former state by becoming another state (eg Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde) or d. Propagation: splitting/doubling to create a number of elements. This in itself creates all sort of different dynamics simply because it’s so central to animation practice

3. Condensation: the maximum effect using the minimum of imagery: major focus

4. Symbolic association. Animation relies heavily on symbols 5. Penetration: using internal elements such as dreams. Every

shampoo advert has an animation part. These inner workings can not be visualised any other way

6. Controlling time: you have the ability to slow it down or speed it up

7. Performance: the translation of action into character 8. Choreography: making motion useful and pertinent 9. Anthropomorphism: the imposition of human traits on animals,

objects and environments 10. Sound: the great catalyst in animation

Practical guidelines A useful touchstone when selling your idea is if you can link your production to a literal concept people can more easily grasp the concept you’re pitching, said Wells. A reference to Roald Dahl for instance can do wonders. More elaborate pitching requires what is traditionally called ‘the series


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bible’ which is specifically important in animation when creating the context of the world being created. It specifies the audience, how many episodes, the general tone of the animation, the overall idea, setting, characters and atmosphere. Pingu A good example of working with other cultures, said Wells, is the intended US launch of Pingu, a British-Swiss stop-motion animated children's comedy television series, centring on a family of anthropomorphic penguins who live at the South Pole. The main character is the family's son and title character, Pingu. After months of research into and meetings about the possibilities of the launch it boiled down to cultural differences. A powerful league of American mothers objected to the launch because Pingu had a naughty streak and because he didn’t speak proper English. He was much too angry a bird for their tastes. They were afraid children would imitate the creature and cause havoc. These dynamics, said Wells, inevitably influence the writer. Phineas and Ferb Wells put forward Phineas and Ferb as an example of a rich and well thought-out series that offers valuable lessons to students of animation:

- Undertaking impossible tasks and projects as if they are normal play activities, which is what children do. They create worlds as if they were real. You can push that in animation

- Engage in mythic or imaginary worlds as if they are real - Authenticate surreal situations - Access real world activity not accessible or executable by children,

which offers an opportunity to talk about complex themes - Self reflexive: the series often plays with conventions of animation - Uses bricolage techniques: songs, small narratives, knowing

conventions Important elements in writing comedy for children

- Don’t be fearful of low level toilet humour - Most actions are exaggerated or in some level performative - Make the most of puns and wordplay


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- Use the grotesque: caricature often filters the first level, real world horrific effects

- Children’s problems and moral questions are often best addressed through humour

Principles for creating animation

- Every child wants to feel loved and wanted - Every child should feel important and supported in the things they

like - Every child should be directed to see and to value, and not to

judge differences in others - Every child should find safe opportunities and growth within the

animation - Every child should be supported in their health and well-being

Final tips

- Observe and engage with children: I’ve always thought that children are the closest things to aliens we’ve got. They perceive the world so differently

- Read children’s literature - When writing, think text and illustration at the same time - Think of children as the providers of subtext and the consumers of

stories. Pick their brains, watch them play - Think about the particularity of the child’s world: parents, siblings,

toyshops (Toyshops are a particularly good idea, think of Toy Story)

- Don’t patronise them - Never let an adult save the day - Help them develop and be curious through your work

Fiona van Heemstra: Scriptwriter for live-action as well as animation scripts that include The Adventures of Pim and Pom (2008) and Kika and Bob (2014), the shorts Dag meneer de Vries (2012) and Munya in mij (2013) and the feature animation Pim and Pom’s Big Adventure, with Tingue Dongelmans (2014). Currently she is working on the animated series Vos en


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Haas, the stop-motion feature De Wraak van Knor and the feature film Miss Sing Song Suriname. ‘Two male cats in a basket were a problem’ After writing the successful stop-motion

short Munya in mij, about bullying, Fiona van Heemstra was asked why she chose animation over live-action. She thought deeply about why she had focused primarily on animation for the last ten years. Quite simply, she loves animation, so that’s that (she said). But she outlined other motivations too.

1. The international potential of animation 2. Writing for children 3. The writing process itself

International aspect Animation, said Van Heemstra, has a much wider range than live action. She has written for 2D and 3D, rotoscopic animation and stop-motion and without exception all her work has travelled the world. “And of course you have to deal with culture differences. With Pim and Pom there was an American sales agent who had trouble with the fact that two male cats were sleeping in the same basket.” She often takes the international market into account during the writing process. The main characters in Fox and Heir love to have fun and are the best of friends, but they also have their dark sides. They are bossy, greedy, sometimes mean. That leads to funny situations, but the English consultants think differently, said Van Heemstra. “They think the characters should always support each other and provide an example. Sometimes I really felt stuck between the Belgian writer who wanted the


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cheekiness of the characters reflected and the English advisors who wanted a more constructive and friendly tone.” Writing animation for children After a press screening for Pim and Pom one journalist wrote that the film was way too cute. I was astonished, said Van Heemstra. “He didn’t take into account for whom the film was intended. If he’d been at the screening for children, he’d know that some situations in the film were really scary and emotional for younger audiences. The only ones that can tell you what to write are children. They are my source of inspiration. They give you a perspective and details I would never come up with. Animation is the best way to convey my messages for me.” The writing process itself Van Heemstra emphasized the importance of images when writing, of which she uses many. Sometimes sketches are available, sometimes she has to create the story world from scratch. For Munya in me she thought of colours that could counter the grey setting and relieve the film’s harsh situations. And specifically the possibility of using colourful elements from Turkish culture, because that was Munya’s background. “If anybody asks me now why I choose to write for animation, I know what to say”:

- It allows me cross borders - I love the teamwork - Animation is the ultimate way for me to reach out to children. I

was in a cinema for a screening of Munya in me with 600 children. After the film a girl stood up and said in front of all the children that she was bullied by someone in the cinema. And she said “I HOPE because of this film that this is going to stop right now. And anyway, I’m not going to put up with it anymore.”


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Now or Never! Two projects were supported by Now or Never!, a programme of the Media Fund, the Netherlands Film Fund and Zapp, for the development and implementation of culturally diverse children’s drama. The teams behind Tex and Kop op! speak about the hows and the whats. Tex Marc Veerkamp & Tingue Dongelmans (script) and Joost van den Bosch and Erik Verkerk (direction and animation) Producer: Ka-ching Cartoons, co-producer: Bos Bros Contrast became the big thing in Tex At first the makers of Tex didn’t think Now or Never! was right for their project. Its multicultural theme just wasn’t for them, they thought. How things changed. Suddenly there was the idea of a boy who had just moved to another country and didn’t fit in. They created Tex, a cartoon character who appears in a live-action world. The strong collaboration between the writer and director was essential from the start. “Eric took a random picture of a classroom and put a quickly-drawn kid in it”, said co-writer Marc Veerkamp. “We immediately saw that this was a story about contrast and we immediately felt empathy. Contrast became the big thing in everything in Tex, like the contrast between techniques (cartoon and real life). We make use of all the old cartoon jokes (eyes out of

sockets, tongue rolling down the street) but try to give them a new spin. Also, one of the big advantages is that it is metaphorical. Tex’s dad is working in safety commercials doing the very dangerous jobs that other people don’t want to do. Like being hit by cars. Animation offers a wonderful


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opportunity to play around with this.” Kop op! Job, Joris & Marieke (script, direction and animation) and Lotte Tabbers (script) Producer: Viking Film. Previously they made the Oscar nominated A Single Life. ‘Being John Malkovich meets Puberruil’ As with the Tex team, Job, Joris & Marieke weren’t immediately inspired by the idea. But then they took a good look at the blackboard in their studio with a list of ideas that they wanted to realize one way or another. One entry read: something with a headless character. The idea of the film is that there are three friends. They go out to play and find an old washing machine. They shoot a ball into the machine, put their heads in and lose them. They of course have great fun with this, but at some point they have to go home. Now what? They return to the machine and get each others’ heads back. They pitched it as Being John Malkovich meets Puberruil. Let’s say the exception confirms the rule. Either the directors or the writer approached it particularly as a project for children. But children get it anyway.

report master class children's animation 2015

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