The editor as animation inbetweener

With digital compositing and digital special effects, the traditional edits of cut, dissolve and wipe, are being augmented by a more complex, yet liberating, creative process. This paper will explore how the language of film editing may be shifting and evolving due to new tools at the filmmakers disposal (and the ease with which to use them).

With the convergence of all media into the digital realm, the distinctions between animation and live-action filmmaking are continuing to blur. In fact, editing live-action film is now often similar to the process of animation. In many ways, the film editor is becoming like an “animation-inbetweener, ” of the “key posses” that have been “drawn” by the cinematographer.

This new animator/compositor/editor uses a variety of methods for creating inbetweens in order to connect two distinctly different scenes. These can include the use of; morphing, animated mattes, digital animation, and controlled complex dissolves. Not only can this process create a unique visual style, but in addition, new languages can also be explored.

Eisenstein was very interested in how new meanings can be created by the linear juxtaposition of distinctly different scenes. But what does it mean when these two scenes are allowed to evolve into each other?

Furthermore, the editor, can now easily allow selected elements to transcend between shots. It is now possible for the editor to decide what portions of the scene are most important, and what the viewer should take with them into the next scene. What should be highlighted, or what elements should be suppressed.

In order to illustrate these ideas, this paper will look at the earlier film editing theories of, Eisenstein, Pudovkin and G.W. Pabst, and the traditions and theories of animation. It will also showcase contemporary compositing/editing examples.

Australian animation : Neil Taylor

Comprehensively documents the working process, techniques and philosophies of Australian animator Neil Taylor.

Australian animation : Dirk de Bruyn

Documents the working process, techniques and philosophies of Australian animator Dirk de Bruyn.

Australian animation : Alex Stitt

Documents the working process, techniques and philosophies of Australian animator Alex Stitt.

Australian animation : John Scheffer

Contains never before published data, and represents the only text available that comprehensively documents the working process, techniques and philosophies of this historically important Australian animator. This book consists of original research, based upon video interviews of the animator.

The animation of psychology

This thesis investigates 'Frankenstein', in the light of Cultural Poetic practices and modern psychological theories, illustrating the pivotal role it played in the transition of developmental psychology from philosophy to science. Drawing on Locke, Rousseau and Godwin, Shelley presents the monster as an exaggerated case study of the danger of ineffective nurturing.

Architecture, animation, and the mediation of time

The thesis includes theoretical and practice based project work that examines the role of animation within architecture, and the relationship between change, time and design through techniques of animation.

Automating the creation of 3D animation from annotated fiction text

This paper describes a strategy for automatically converting fiction text into 3D animations. It assumes the existence of fiction text annotated with avatar, object, setting, transition and relation annotations, and presents a transformation process that converts annotated text into quantified constraint systems, the solutions to which are used in the population of 3D environments. Constraint solutions are valid over temporal intervals, ensuring that consistent dynamic behaviour is produced. A substantial level of automation is achieved, while providing opportunities for creative manual intervention in animation process. The process is demonstrated using annotated examples drawn from popular fiction text that are converted into animation sequences, confirming that the desired results can be achieved with only high-level human direction.

Injection, detection and repair of aesthetics in home movies

This paper details the design of an algorithm for automatically manipulating the important aesthetic element of video, visual tempo. Automatic injection, detection and repair of such aesthetic elements, it is argued, is vital to the next generation of amateur multimedia authoring tools. We evaluate the performance of the algorithm on a battery of synthetic data and demonstrate its ability to return the visual tempo of the final media a considerable degree closer to the target signal. The novelty of this work lies chiefly in the systematic manipulation of this high level aesthetic element of video.

Interactively browsing movies in terms of action, foreshadowing and resolution

We describe a novel video player that uses Temporal Semantic Compression (TSC) to present a compressed summary of a movie. Compression is based on tempo which is derived from film rhythms. The technique identifies periods of action, drama, foreshadowing and resolution, which can be mixed in different amounts to vary the kind of summary presented. The compression algorithm is embedded in a video player, so that the summary can be interactively recomputed during playback.