Pixilation

Pixilation is the term used to describe the technique of animation which involves taking pictures of living things and showing the pictures quickly to give the illusion of movement. This makes the living thing look unnatural and move in an unnatural.

Wikipedia says “Pixilation (from pixilated) is a stop motion technique where live actors are used as a frame-by-frame subject in an animated film, by repeatedly posing while one or more frame is taken and changing pose slightly before the next frame or frames. The actor becomes a kind of living stop motion puppet.”

The first animation we looked at was Food by Jan Svankmajer. It uses pixilation, clay motion and live action to make it almost real, but not quite. The types of camera shots they use are close ups, long shots and medium shots to very good effect in my opinion.



It uses the humans as vending machines to convey the truly meaning I think It has , I believe it is about Eternal damnation and the people who are queuing up outside the room to become vending machines are symbolic of those whose souls are heading to hell.

Another animation we looked at was Neighbours by Norman Mclaren. It uses pixilation only. The types of camera shots it uses are close ups, long shots, medium shots and it also has a establish scene in Neighbours.

It uses to Neighbours arguing to convey the message of how human greed and corruption can lead to violence. Were as if the humans shared violence wouldn’t happen and neither would war. It also shows war can lead to death and nothing really comes from war.

Both of the animations used pixilation and both tried to be odd and stand out, They both show the bad sides to the human race. They also both use close up, long shots and medium shots.

Food was different as it involved food and didn’t show you the message clearly, also it was really disturbing. Whereas Neighbours showed the message quite clearly and wasn’t as disturbing. Neighbours also used music and more comedy as well as that is had an establishing scene.

I think both of these animations are really good and use pixilation and their camera shots to great effect.

The website(s) I used where Wikipedia and videos are from youtube.

Monty Python

The techiques the Monty Python used were many. One was getting a picture and cutting out the mouth and chin. Another was the legs moving out of time with body and they used the techique of using odd shaped pictures of people as well as, Enlarging images, Use limbs with pictures they don't go with, Deformities, Unco-ordinated, eyes moving but pictures of face is still.

These techniques are used to create humoe which is the style Monty Python use. The Monty Python animations also tries to stand out and be surreal. The animations used fadec colours and victorian backgrounds. Monty Python also seems really british. A lot of the music sounds like old british music.

Wikipedia says "Gilliam's surreal animations have a distinctive, memorable style, mixing his own art, characterized by soft gradients and odd, bulbous shapes, with backgrounds and moving cutouts from antique photographs, mostly from the Victorian era.

The animation method is still images/stop motion which is a bit like pixlation but with im ages instead of people.

The Monty Python Animations where made by a man called Terry Gilliam. He was born in Amercia but then lived in England and became a a english citzen.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dB-1d9fM3OU

I used two websites for this information. Youtube and Wikipedia