Blog 6 – Something that looks simple does matter

You may feel that the title of blog is a little burdensome. “What? I go back home after 8 hour tiring work or studying. I just want to relax and get rid of anything. Now you want to say even having dinner needs thinking” Yep. What we eat is considerable for anyone. Something may not result in a specific situation very soon but it may get an influence after a certain time without your knowing. Like the animation, when somebody take as simple and naïve or anything else, they ignore the potentiate impact in people’s minds.

At the very beginning, I notice the bias that animation is naïve is simple by itself. But the people have that thought may not be simple. There must be some gaps between the bias and minds of those animation fandoms, especially the adult fandoms. Some aspects of animations may not be known by some people holding the bias. A reality is that there are thousands of Chinese animation fandoms who watch animations most of which come from Japan. I think animation is not simple at all. It is very attracting and has its own very specific charms. Since the majority of these Chinese animation fandoms are the adolescents, their parents, the educators and the entire whole society need to care about the fact. Because the growing adolescents may have strong curiousness and desire to simulate the actions or the characters from the things and animations that they are close to, we should pay a lot attention to animations. Of course, we always hope that our young children can inherit our cultures generation by generation. But the children are been impacted by animations from other countries. It is good to access these foreign animations since they are good works. But if the children only access the foreign animations, the impact from the foreign animations on the children are not predicted and uncontrolled and this status could influence the inheritance of local culture. It is very needed to change the situation somewhat. If we don’t do something, we are irresponsible to our next generation. How do we change this situation? How do we make a deep changing on it? We cannot ban the introducing of foreign animations because this method is simple and not considerable at all. Meanwhile we cannot stop the children access the foreign animations online. What we can make effort is to make good animations and compete with bravely. That's it? No. We need to make clear the situation of Chinese animators right now. They have invested too much money in the animation industry always, but why cannot they create excellent animations right now. Yes, the technologies they used are advanced but they don’t focus on the storytelling in animation for the next step. Storytelling is the core of animation. They should invest their passion and concentration here next.

Furthermore, the establishment of animation rating system is the foundation of this industry. The rating system is not only the guideline for the audiences but also the free stage for the animators. With the boundaries set by rating system, they know what to focus.

In this article http://articles.latimes.com/2012/apr/11/business/la-fi-ct-disney-china-animation-20120411, I think the understanding that foreign prominent animation media help develop Chinese animation industry is full of ambiguities because they don’t understand our culture at all. The ideas come from the inside of our animators. Don’t copy and don’t be lazy.

Blog 5 - Even removing the origins

I changed the direction of my voices to animators until I revised the linked draft 2 and composed the final synthesis essay. From one of the peer reviews for my essay, it is said that “your paper” was still a bit broad…it could be still be narrowed down”. From another peer review, it wrote that “I get kind of lost when reading it”. Both of the comment points showed that my essay was still quite a loose, although I had tried to use subtitles and revised the ending of each sections. It was still not that focused. I tried to figure out that question and found that the targeted audiences I imagined changed from this section to that section. In Technology and storytelling section, I compared the utility of technology and the focus of storytelling to the animators. In Paradox of animation: entertainment and education section, I tried to persuade the parents that animation can be teaching but not just entertaining. In Culture inheritance section, I wanted to show that animation as a culture product can convey some kind of cultural values and influence the in heritance of culture to the general people. I guessed that the present reader might not be concentrated all the time. They may feel like “are you still talking to me?” So I changed the direction of voice to animators mainly and used the teaching and cultural values that animation may have, to persuade animators that what kind of animations they should make and why.  Since then, in the academic introduction, my working thesis changed to what animators should do from re-evaluate the values of animation. Moreover, I tried to drag the working thesis into the ending of each section to make them whole. Later, I also changed the title of my essay from the expectation of animation to that animators should do. Finally I found all the parts, no matter the introduction and sub sections, they connected closer.

To shorten my linked essay 2, I also removed the paragraph that talks about that some people consider animation as childish because the imagined audiences are more focused on animators. But all of my persuasion can still be conveyed to general people because the understanding of teaching and cultural values of animations matter to them. The common consciousness of building and developing animation raises from the public. Since I have showed that the teaching values of animation, it is obvious to the audiences that animation is not simple just for children. Although this bias on animation is the important reason I started out my essay, the essay could be more directed if removing it.

The most interesting thing I found is that animation is a culture product that reflects the local culture and custom. At first, I could only find the teaching function of animation. I realized that animation can influence the inheritance of a culture until I found an essay talking about how Confusion values and Japanese animations link together and the influence by anime to the Japanese society. I think that was a very bright point because I always thought animation is just an entertainment and it wouldn’t have some very significant impact in the public. So I think this point is very arresting and thoughtful.

Blog 3 - Detecting the animation in other domain

In the second part of my research process, I introduced a source to explain the concept of motion capture. I added this to give a specific illustration until I did a peer review with my partner using the X/Y strategy. Since having studied IT major in the previous college and worked in IT industry for a few years, it is easy for me to understand the specific technique in animation. But for some of audiences, such as the people working in agricultural industry or other industries where the computer may not be used much, it could be a little difficult for them to understand what I talked about motion capture. This also reminded me other places that needed furthermore explanations.

I also found another useful resources from online Databases. One particular resources that I found is from a professor studied in the nursing education area. She composed her essay based on dozens of survey from the students who attended a course and were taught with animation. She found that the efficiency of learning can be enhanced when employing animation because the animation is active and imaginative. The students felt good on it. This is a good resource for my essay since this is an important meaning of animation that is valuable in education. Meanwhile, the author claimed that storytelling is a way of inheriting culture which supports my view that animation can convey cultural values because animation is one kind of storytelling.

I interviewed an adult who has worked for several years. I started the interview by asking what animations he watched in the childhood and if he still like to watch animation after growing up. He gave some examples such as Mr Black, Tranformers and The Lion King. He said he still like to watch animation even now. When I asked why he still like it, he said animations are full of humor and fun and they are relaxing. For the question of comparing the Japanese and Chinese animations, he stated that Chinese animations lack of imagination. Sometimes, our animators overemphasized what kind of elements, especially the Chinese custom elements, are used and they don’t focus on how to use these elements to create more interesting stories, which leads to the issue that Chinese animations are boring. Another difference is that the skills of image design used in the Chinese animations are not mature. In other words, the scenarios look so fake. The utility of technical software is not used as fully as the Japanese animators do. For the question of how to figure out the current Chinese animation industry, the interviewer referred to the byproducts of animation. Actually animation can produce quite a lot of byproducts such COS-play, stationery and video games that could provoke a lot of consuming from young people especially the high school students. In reverse, when those byproducts are developing, it can encourage the making of animations by animators. So this is a two-way tactic that enlightened me a lot.

Blog 4 - Survey the thoughts

Except for the last two questions asking about the age and gender of participators, other questions are about Avatar movie, adult animation, if we should pay attention to animation as culture production, if animation ratings are helpful for the development of animation industry, becoming an animator and so on.

         For the question of Avatar movie, I want to learn about the responses of such movies combining live actors and animated actors from the participators. Some people may have a stereotype that animation usually is naïve just for children because the plot and the expression of animation in terms of images look simple. But in Avatar which is one the most popular movies in 2011, many people may have seen before. In this movie, by employing the motion capture technique, the wonderful and sophisticated Pandora world and Pandora people were created and they are the most attracting scene in this movie compared with the other real world. The animated part is not simple and definitely it is not just for children. In this situation, I want to know whether people still feel those animated characters are childlike? If not, I can guess what the potential reasons are. Is it caused by the story behind the outlook of this movie? Or just due to the new design of animated characters?

         Normally, we would not consider animation as one kind of culture production but an entertainment that may be teaching. For real, some animations are very funny and interesting and usually children animations are supposed to be somewhat educational. But rarely, animation is taken as a culture production reflecting some cultural values, morality and ideology. This is understandable because the story in animation is an image expression by the animators. But this values and views can be conveyed to and even influence the audiences. As for the culture inheritance and history aspects, this phenomenon needs our serious attention. So I want to know what answers from participators are when being noticed that and may guess how far the participators can think about the question.

         The first profit of animation ratings that people normally think should be the protection for audiences. What are other functions of animation ratings? In my opinion, it can also protect the animators because rating system provide a safe place where animator can focus on one type of animation and create freely for the target audiences. They may not concern much about the possible risks. They don’t need to worry about the audiences for that the animations are suited because the rating system would take over that. So I want to learn about the deep recognition of rating system from the public. If we can understand the thing we want to do, it could help us as much as possible.

My survey link is https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/C2LLTJM.

 

Blog 2 - It Could Never be Simple

When I began to think of what topic I would select, I planned to write something that might not be that abstract like the topic Melancholy in the previous English class. So I decided to talk about animation because it is close to my life. I have never stopped to watch it since I’ve grown up. That’s the same for some of the adults. I know this could be taken as naïve for other adults especially the parents. They may try to be mature in front of friends. Some parents may get a feel that animation is so simple because they may have been spending too much on watching the children animations with their kids. There’s a common sense that animation is supposed to be simple and created for children first, while the needs of adolescents on the types and contents of animations are not satisfied well at most time. Let alone the adults’. So a development of animation would not happen since all the audiences cannot see the animations that they want to watch. Only a small group of audiences always has the chance to watch the targeted animation. So what? Is it really important and needing our thinking? Anyway animation is just one kind of entertainment. It may not be considered as serious as the textbook that is treated as the significant education for students. It may just want to tell a tiny story. It may not leave anything in your mind after you watch it for three days. It may just make you laugh for a while. Does it require our more consideration and research on it? I was thinking and trying to dig out the meanings behind.

         The answer I thought out is yes because this status that foreign animations play a role in our mass media market could lead to several results. One result is that older adolescents and adults get inclined to watch the prominent animation from Japan or America where the animation industry is quite developed and get influenced by the cultural values reflected in the animation. I don’t object importing the animations from other countries. It is not a bad thing to touch them. But I cannot evaluate how deep these foreign animations can influence. No one can do it. We don’t need to publicize our own cultures and core values all the time but we have to build it because our children and adolescents like animation and are probably being influenced. And then the inheritance of our local culture may have somewhat in danger. The other result is the quality of the foreign animations has become a standard in the heart of our animation fandoms. That means our animation fandoms have already had high requirements on local animations. Once there is a little deficiency in our animation, it is easy to be pointed out and criticized by the fandoms. So our animators have very high pressure. Why aren’t our animators able to generate excellent animation? We don’t lack of human, technologies that are imported directly by using a lot of money, and foreign resources. What do we lack of on earth? Some foreign media said that Chinese students are very inflexible and not creative. Well, I think this is not the root reason. So it could be meaning for my topic if I can find out some deeper reasons.

         May I should find it from the bottom of animation that is what animation is in essence. What should a good animation look like? These years, we have spent plenty of money on the technologies to make 3D animation or introduce foreign big animation companies. So what? We simply think that once we have advanced technologies we can generate great animation. However it turns out that we still can’t succeed in the box office such as Legend of Rabbit. We do tell stories but it looks like the Kung Fu Panda. “So this is just copying.” What I see is confusion that means our animator don’t know what to create. Because Kung Fu Panda succeeded and our audience couldn’t believe and ask for a prominent animation that included our culture and panda, Legend of Rabbit was born in this situation. It does talk about Kung Fu and Panda. But the plots are just dry. The audiences actually want to see a new good story. They want great storytelling in the end. What can tough the audiences is the actions and the change of feelings from the characters, not the technologies. We may find the sources from our lives.

         As we know, rating system is the basis of animation industry. But except for guiding the animation audiences, there must be some benefits from it I need to find out so that we can see more importance of it. I remember a Hong Kong director said that since there is no proper rating system in the film market in the mainland he is not free to create one type of film freely in the frame of rating system. Because the film needs to meet a lot of kind of audiences including adolescents and adults, it could not be too much violent, horrific or romantic and so on, which bothers the film makers. I think the animator could encounter a similar situation.

         Since I explored much on each key term in my alternative perspective like I did in the vignette, I would use most of its contents in my synthesis essays to explain those key term in detail. But I still need to think about abridging the first synthesis essay carefully and make them more focused on a certain problem and serve for my working thesis well.