The thesis also explored the history and technical functionality of the GIF, and how the format was used in social media. An additional question was also how to adapt the principles of animation and the additional basis of animation using Pikku Kakkonen's vector graphics.
Description of the history of animation
It can be said that historically GIFs were being created long before digitization, as the short animation loops that could be observed using a phenakistoscope are - essentially - manually created GIFs. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the stop-motion animation technique was widely used in films (Stop Motion Central 2018).
Principles of animation
Disney ’s principles of animation
Staging”, the third principle is a method that has also been used in theater art. Solid Drawing”, the 11th principle means the importance for the animator to be able to understand a three-dimensional drawing.
Additional foundations of animation
This means that the pose of the character is planned in a C- or S-like curve, which makes the animation more dynamic. It makes a big difference in the movement and emotion of the character to consider which part of the body is leading the movement.
The technical execution of animation
Genres of animation
Today's traditional animation is usually produced using drawing tablets and the appropriate software that creates frames and sheets of animation. Practically, stop motion "stops" movement, but a sudden appearance in animation is considered ideal when animating using the style in question. This genre of animation is stop-motion animated, but the animation specifically uses puppets that can be shaped like clay during the animation.
The cut-out technique is also used when animating using a computer, while the puppets are also often rigged. 3D animation is also often adapted to feature films due to the realistic look it allows today. Similar to digital cut-out animated characters, 3D characters are also rigged and animated using a similar method in a three-dimensional setting.
The animations of the project were made using the cut-out style, as it is a suitable technique for animating two-dimensional digital graphics.
Pixel based graphics
The main reason 3D animation is gaining popularity among animation studios may simply be its slightly faster creation speed compared to hand-drawn animation. Pikku Kakkonen uses sets of specific visual images that have been created specifically for the brand's visual appearance. Therefore, when considering the thesis animation project, it became clear that the animations would be executed using images based on Pikku Kakkonen's brand, especially vector graphics.
Vector based graphics
Animation works as a tool when interpreting a story or other visual communication that would not be possible to visualize using actors or sets. Symbolism is often used in animation as well, which can make the overall experience of the medium quite special, as it leaves more room for interpretation. Most of the film is presented through acting, but some scenes portraying violence and predatory behavior involving children are presented through animation.
Animating the scenes may have been the only option for performing them, as it would be inappropriate to perform them using actors. Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988) by Robert Zemeckis can be used as another example of additional animation. Zemecki's film was revolutionary in introducing an entirely new way of using animation in acted cinema.
While Zemeckis' film was one of the first feature films to combine live action and animation, Disney created similar live action shorts as early as the 1920s (Seastrom 2019).
Adaptation of storytelling in animation
Animation and visual arts
The artistic message will be more important than the technical execution of the animation, which is common in contemporary art - the animation is not planned to follow the principles of animation and is left suggestive, leaving more room for interpretation taking into account the artwork.
Aims of production
The interaction between the characters is minimal and there is no effect – apart from the text – that happens behind it. A key part of planning the animated GIFs was also inventing the visual narrative in them, which was executed by creating animation breakdowns. Considering that animated GIFs were set to be between one and several seconds long, it was challenging to get any major story into them, which left the narrative in them pretty thin.
These shorts were set to be 10 to 15 seconds long, which made it a little easier to create a simple plot for them. However, since I was the only animator and physical editor on the project myself, it proved challenging to animate and edit the animated shorts in time with the GIFs. To save some time, in one of the animated shorts I used a pre-existing animation sequence from one of the animated GIFs.
When the format was back in free use after 2004, there was a similar phase where GIFs decorated people's blogs and profiles on one of the first Internet community sites called Myspace.
History
In its early use, GIFs were used as a decorative element on websites, as this was the only way to personalize them. The use of GIFs as decorative elements on web pages has declined as web design has evolved. The company owned the patent for the LZW algorithm used in GIF and wanted to start making money from it.
This caused the use of the GIF format to freeze until the year 2004, when Unisys' patent expired. GIF servers like GIPHY allow anyone to upload a GIF online—when following the site's guidelines—and spread it to Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, and other social media platforms. But how did the graphics interchange format survive its 'dark period', even when other image formats were created which have better resolution.
However, it is worth mentioning that some social media sites do not support GIFs but prefer to use videos instead.
Technique and the limits of it
GIFs can also be created by anyone with access to the internet or specific smartphone apps, which have a function that converts a video into GIF. Using an existing video clip for a GIF takes less time and can be considered fairly easy to create, but animating the clip will take more time and require more technical knowledge of animating. The PNG was originally developed for photos as an alternative to JPG, while GIF was planned as a still and eventually moving image format.
Compared to PNG's ability to include over 16 million colors, it can be argued that PNG is a better file option for photographs and other more complex pixelated images than GIF. GIF is suitable for short animations and video clips and can be used as a format for simple game graphics and logos. Many websites and apps like Instagram also make it possible to convert a GIF from a video file and edit it to some extent.
As mentioned earlier, this convenience may also be part of the reason why the format may remain in use.
Adapting GIF animation
- Social media
- GIF in use of brands
- GIF and visual arts
- Emotions
In these temporary posts – also called Stories – users can use decorative elements in their posts. Scott McCloud – author of Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art – divides them into three categories. According to Pikku Kakkonen's information, this is to provide safe content for 3 to 6 year olds for television, internet and mobile app (Pikku Kakkonen info n.d.).
After my internship with Pikku Kakkonen - at Yle Children's Programme's public office - in autumn 2018, I had the opportunity to do my thesis project for the education. All Pikku Kakkonen's social media updates are in the hands of the show's art director. This was an idea to add elements to Pikku Kakkonen as a brand, thus creating a reason for the project.
Some of the GIFs were created purely for Pikku Kakkonen public offices as decorative elements and as info graphics for Instagram Stories.
Description of the process
At the start of the project, certain guidelines were given for the content of the animated GIFs by the art director of Pikku Kakkonen. In the software in question, all the individual parts of the animated images were arranged in their own layers. Halfway through the project, I was exposed to some of Pikku Kakkonen's earlier short animations, which were performed using the graphics.
Another additional foundation can also be detected in one of the animated GIFs called the "Skateboarding Chick". After the art director approved the basis of the narrative, the animation was also executed using After Effects. The viewing of Pikku Kakkonen's GIFs increased steadily during the months of publication of the GIFs.
The most views were in the month of the release of the GIFs, which have since declined.
Final Thoughts
Being able to work on different compositions in the same scene while adding sound to the animation made the execution of the animated shorts ideal. Better visual consistency between all the project's animations was also easier to maintain since they were done with the same program. Nevertheless, given the look of the desired animation style, I didn't have much visual reference to Pikku Kakkonen's previous animations using the vector graphics.
For example, if each frame of the animation would have been drawn separately, the amount of finished GIFs would have dropped drastically. All in all, I found it challenging not to have much visual reference of the animations with Pikku Kakkonen's vector graphics. However, it turned out that simply studying the principles of animation – even when you are a skilled drawer – is not enough to be a skilled animator.
After the project, I was left with the feeling that following the principles of animation, as well as the additional basics of animation, would be easier to follow if the animation genre of the project was - for example - hand drawn animation. At times, this required cutting back on the animation editing in order for the project to continue. However, the graphics fit the nature of the project like a glove, as it was found that vector graphics with solid color surfaces were a good choice for animated GIFs.
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