The Animation Options Blog

Some late night observations on the Chinese animation market from my seat at the Library Cafe in Beijing…

China is the fast-growing animation market in the world. With a total population in excess of 1.3 billion individuals, potentially 500 million people in mainland China can be identified as animation consumers. Domestic Chinese box office returns have increased 20% between 2005-2007. Due to increased international demand, Chinese motion picture distributors generated more than $2 billion RMB in global revenue during 2007 - an increase of 5.7% from the year before. In 2007, the domestic Chinese box office totaled more than $3.3 billion RMB (over $482 million USD). Analysts project that the domestic Chinese box office will gross more than $4 billion RMB by the end of 2008 (almost $585 million USD), and more than $10 billion RMB annually by 2013.

It is estimated that 11% of the Chinese animation audience is under the age of 13, with 59% between the age of 14 to 17 and 30% over 18 years of age. China has 370 million children, more than the entire population of the United States. Today, approximately 18 billion RMB (almost $2.5 billion USD) is spent by animation consumers in China, but nearly 90% of that money flows straight out of the country to Japan, and to a lesser extent the United States and Europe. Despite its visual proficiency, recent Chinese animation content has demonstratively lacked domestic market appeal due to an emphasis on education over entertainment. Like most children around the world, the viewing preferences of Chinese youth seem to indicate that they relate better to entertaining stories that provide a vivid reflection of their feelings, problems and dreams. Rigid characters, and plot lines that lack the sense of fun and innocence that children hold so dear, are roundly ignored. Chinese animators in the 21st century face not so much a technological or artistic challenge as they do a challenge in compelling storytelling.

Despite this challenge, or perhaps because of it, the mainland market is uniquely poised for an innovative and profitable future. The gross earnings of China’s animation industry across all media have already exceeded those of its live-action film industry. Building on a remarkable animation history, the Chinese animation market has grown increasingly sophisticated since the pre-Cultural Revolution days, with an appetite for content that seeks to combine Chinese cultural traditions with Hollywood story structure for contemporary resonance. In recent years, provincial Chinese governments have rolled out substantial plans to develop the homegrown market for animation artists and companies, in keeping with the policies set forth by the central authorities. These developments follow the announcement made by Beijing’s State Administration of Radio, Film and Television (SARFT) in August 2004 to launch three new national children’s networks and more than 60 broadcast stations providing an increased volume of children’s programming. 2004 was set as China’s “Animation Year”, and the industry generated revenue amounting to tens of millions of RMB. In light of this evolving landscape, it is no surprise that domestic animation companies and foreign co-production partners alike are eager for a place at the table.

Domestic box office returns as reported for Chinese animated feature films in 2008 range from $1 million RMB for “The Legend of Countryside Hero”, to a record-breaking $30+ million RMB for “Storm Rider: Clash of Evils”, over a theatrical run of 4 weeks each. However, revenues from the domestic Chinese market alone are not sufficient to cover the costs associated with high-quality animation productions. Successful international distribution must be part of the equation. In fact, international co-production deals and distribution presales are vital to the support of Chinese feature films on the mainland. While U.S. cinema is “America first, global second,” Chinese cinema is by necessity “global first, Chinese second”. For the near future at least, earnings in the China market can only ever be a secondary source of income.

Live-action Chinese films such as “Farewell My Concubine”, “2046”, “Hero”, and “House of Flying Daggers” have enjoyed box office success and critical acclaim around the world. In 2000, the multi-national production “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon” achieved massive success at the Western box office despite being dismissed by some Chinese film-goers as pandering to Western tastes. Nevertheless, it provided an introduction to Chinese cinema for many Americans and Europeans, and increased the popularity of many Chinese films that may have otherwise been unknown to Westerners. In 2002, “Hero” was made as a second attempt to produce a Chinese film with the international appeal of “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon”. The film was a phenomenal success in most of Asia and topped the U.S. box office for two weeks, making enough in the U.S. alone to cover the production costs. The successes of these films blur the boundaries between mainland Chinese cinema and a more internationally-based “Chinese-language cinema”. The merging of talent and resources from China, Hong Kong, Taiwan and the West indicate that Chinese cinema is poised to compete with the best Hollywood films. While Chinese animation productions have yet to emulate the successful precedent of their live-action counterparts, it is only a matter of time before a Chinese animated feature enjoys breakout success on the world stage.

However, even international theatrical and broadcast success is not enough to maximize the animation industry’s profits (especially when broadcast revenues reimburse just 10% of production costs on average). In 1999, $21 million RMB (about $3 million USD) was spent to produce “Lotus Lantern”. The animated feature film nearly broke even at the box office, but failed to capitalize on any related ancillary products. However just two years later, the animated film “Crazy for Song” saw two-thirds of its profits come from the sale of related merchandise. And while the American cartoon “Transformers” was broadcast for free on Chinese television, subsequent profits from toy sales amounted to $5 billion RMB. Ancillary animation products occupy an increasingly large market space in China. The annual sales of related stationery products is more than $60 billion RMB (approximately $8.8 billion USD), while that of children’s toys, food and clothing is more than $20 billion RMB, $35 billion RMB and $90 billion RMB respectively. The annual sales of children’s DVDs and publications in China reach only $10 billion RMB annually, no doubt affected by the high degree of piracy on the mainland. The future development of these ancillary profit channels will depend upon effective regulation and enforcement at the state and provincial levels.

Piracy of Hollywood blockbusters is rampant in China, and also has a negative impact upon the theatrical profitability of Chinese films. However, the piracy of films on the mainland has resulted in an unconventional yet functional symbiosis between the Chinese film and television industries. While piracy makes most Chinese films unprofitable, television series and consumer products based upon pirated films are incredibly popular and profitable. Savvy Chinese film directors leverage upon this phenomenon by creating television series and ancillaries based upon the movie, which ironically receives free advertising through piracy.

Finally saw “Bolt” this evening here in Beijing… in stereo, and entirely in Mandarin - no dubbing or subtitles!

While I look forward to viewing the film in English, I have to say that I found it to be extremely entertaining, even while only catching the few Chinese words that I currently know. There’s a lesson here for all those “talky” animation filmmakers (and you know who you are)!

Congratulations to everyone at my old stomping grounds of Walt Disney Animation Studios on a fine piece of work! You have much to be proud of.

Congratulations to WALL-E for its Best Picture win from the Los Angeles Film Critics Association. Who knew that a movie filled with trash could be so seductive? Of course, when assembled by the fine folks at Pixar, it’s hardly surprising at all.

A joke going around Hollywood (so I hear from Beijing) is that some of the Los Angeles film critics voted for the movie they saw in the first half of WALL-E, while the other film critics voted for the movie they saw in the second half of WALL-E. Clearly, this film suffered from a case of split identity, but I don’t think it was WALL-E’s sojourn into outer space that made it seem like two different films. Rather, I believe that it was something more fundamental: WALL-E is a weak hero - not in the “good” sense, but in a poor storytelling sense. And coming from the fine folks at Pixar, that is surprising.

In a good film, EVERYTHING should impact upon, and emanate from, an active hero. Unfortunately in WALL-E, we have a rather reactive “hero” from whom much is taken and little is given. Eve completely steals the action from WALL-E, who is left with little more to do than be in the right or wrong place at the right or wrong time. But the biggest flaw in WALL-E is this: the REALIZATION moment of the film lives not with the hero (where it should), but with a secondary character: the corpulent captain of the Axiom. What does WALL-E learn? Apparently nothing. And how does WALL-E feel about humans after discovering that they abandoned him to clean up after the party? We’ll never know. As in Forrest Gump, “Stupid is as stupid does.” WALL-E merely gets his memory back to square one, and is satisfied to finally hold hands with Eve while self-indulgent humans stand gleefully around a seedling that is sure to be wiped out in the next massive dust storm (forgot about those?). So, we can expect WALL-E2 to feature the humans ditching earth again after pizzas fail to grow on trees.

But, hey, at least the fire extinguisher gag was cute.

Ramin Zahed, Editor-in-Chief of Animation Magazine, invited me to write a byline piece sharing my personal insights on the revolution in original Chinese animated content.

That an overzealous young proofreader “corrected” the reference of Russian live-action filmmaker Andrei Tarkovsky to Russian animator Genndy Tartakovsky only goes to show the unexpected sources that contemporary Chinese animation directors draw upon.

Kevin Geiger
Beijing

I’m currently en route to Beijing, where I will be resident for the next year. I can only respond to urgent emails as I am able over the next couple of days, but hope to establish high-speed internet access ASAP for Skype calls and video conferences. Cheers!

Kevin Geiger
President & CEO
Animation Options LLC
EMAIL: kevingeiger@animationoptions.com
SKYPE: animationoptions

Imagine a system of protection for content creators that required you to register your work in a centralized government respository, at your own expense, before you could file an infringement suit in court. Imagine that this monopolistic repository charged ever-increasing fees, with no competitive pressures to drive costs downward. Imagine furthermore that you were required to register your work within 3 months of publication or prior to infringement in order to recoup attorney’s fees and receive statutory damages, and that you were in any event at the mercy of corporate interests with powerful legal teams and deep pockets. And as for international protection, forget it - the system effectively washed its hands of that arena. Finally, after all this, imagine that the system prescribed that your work should ultimately become part of the public domain - to be used by anyone in any manner that they wish - irrespective of your wishes or intentions as represented by your descendants. And then visualize how this system could be exploited by corporate interests for commercial gain at the expense of the very individuals it was purported to protect.

Can you picture that? Shouldn’t be too difficult, because it’s our current system of copyright protection: well-meaning, flawed, subjective and increasingly outdated. However, to listen to some of the opponents of the Orphan Works legislation currently working its way through Congress, you’d think that a full-scale assault was underway on the Constitution of the United States (insert Dick Cheney joke here).

I blogged at length on this topic a couple of days ago, so the point here is not to rehash. But there are a few ignorant misconceptions being irresponsibly promulgated as fact that must be addressed in the interest of informed discourse.

MISCONCEPTION #1: “All of your existing works will effectively be orphaned with the passage of this bill into law.”

This distorted reading of the pending legislation is predicated upon the misinterpretation that content owners/creators will be required to register their works in non-existent databases in order to keep them from turning into orphaned pumpkins when the clock strikes twelve. The Orphan Works legislation winding its way through Congress does indeed propose databases (both public and private) as one way for owners/creators to register their ownership, but THE USE OF SUCH DATABASES IS NOT REQUIRED TO RETAIN COPYRIGHT OWNERSHIP OF YOUR WORK. (Please take a second and read that line again.) Furthermore, the lack of identifying marks on a work is not in and of itself sufficient cause to consider the work “orphaned”. Here is the language to that effect from H.R. 5889:

(iii) LACK OF IDENTIFYING INFORMATION- The fact that a particular copy or phonorecord lacks identifying information pertaining to the owner of the infringed copyright is not sufficient to meet the conditions under paragraph (1)(A)(i)(I)

Just as you are not currently required to put your name on your works, nor affix a copyright date, in order to enjoy copyright, neither are you required to do so in order to protect your works from being considered as “orphaned”. Copyright is still yours as soon as your work is fixed into tangible form:
http://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ1.html#hsc

(Having said that, common sense should dictate that the more ownership information you provide on any piece of creative content, the better. It’s in your interest to make it easy to know who created your work, and how you may be contacted.)

MISCONCEPTION #2: “These privatized databases will be free to charge whatever they like to register your work.”

Of course they will be free to charge whatever they like, but so what? In the first place, the use of these registries is not REQUIRED. In the second place (simply for the sake of argument), when have you ever heard of a registry service in which fees went UP over time? Are URL registries getting more expensive every year, or less? Are web hosting services getting more expensive every year, or less? (Oh, wait… I just thought of a registry that is free to increase their fees with no competitive recourse: our present-day U.S. Copyright Office.) In the third place, the Orphan Works legislation clearly states (as one of four minimum requirements for due diligence on the part of content users):

use of appropriate databases, including databases that are available to the public through the Internet

Got a website with your work on it? Then you’ve got a database that is available to the public through the internet.

MISCONCEPTION #3: “You will need to scan all of your existing works, at your own expense of up to $100 per piece.”

Ok… first of all, for those of you who are paying $100 a pop to have your works scanned, I’ll do it for $75. No, wait - make that $50! And then I’ve got a bridge in Brooklyn to sell you… cheap! Who in their right mind pays that to have anything scanned? More to the point, you don’t have to scan any of your physical works in order to protect them. The very fact that they are fixed in physical form qualifies them for copyright protection and, as mentioned above, identifying marks are not even a prerequisite for protection against “orphanage”. Obviously, your work can be physically stolen, the same way that someone can steal your camera or your car. So if you want to “lojack” them through scanning, that’s certainly your prerogative. But if you truly can’t sleep at night over this (and don’t want to spring a hundred bucks for a scanner), you can always take the “low-fi” approach, buy one of those “do-it-yourself” rubber stamp kits for $10, and tap the back of each drawing with your name, phone number, email and copyright date while you’re watching “America’s Got Talent”.

If you’re posting your work online, it’s a simple enough matter (although again, not a requirement) to slap a copyright date on in Photoshop and also throw some ID in the file’s meta - if you’re so inclined. (I trust that those of you with your shorts in a twist over the potential copyright infringement of your work are all running legit copies of Photoshop, right? Of course you are!)

MISCONCEPTION #4: “This is all just a corporate power grab.”

Sorry, but it isn’t. The Orphan Works legislation currently before Congress - imperfect as it is, but better than it was - has been introduced to address the very real concerns of curators, archivists, librarians, publishers, writers and documentarians who avoid using abandoned archival works for fear of potential legal action. In our extremely litigious society, such fears are regrettably not unfounded - to the diminishment of the free exchange of ideas and the public good.

Will some corporate interests attempt to influence and take advantage of new copyright law? Absolutely - just as they do with existing laws. That is the nature of corporate interests. All the more reason for artists to engage in reasonable debate and thoughtful participation, rather than indulge in irrational fear-mongering.

In closing, I’d like to leave you with thoughts from two esteemed individuals in our industry: Steve Worth, Director and Archivist at ASIFA Hollywood, and Michel Gagne, noted artist and animator.

The insightful Steve Worth:

Keep in mind what we’re talking about when we discuss “orphan works”. The images you post on your webpage under your domain with your name on the page and perhaps even on the image itself along with a copyright notice will never be considered “orphaned”… not as long as a person who wants to license the image from you can contact you to negotiate terms. “Orphan works” by definition have no reachable owner to discuss licensing with. The creator is dead. The publisher is no longer in business. There is no transfer of title on record. The work is basically abandoned.

The difference between this orphan works legislation and fair use is that the orphan works legislation establishes a method for licensing material that appears to be without a legal owner- fair use requires no permission or license at all.

And the enlightened Michel Gagne:

Personally, I’d put a cap of, say, 50 years on copyrights, then a work would enter public domain. That’s it. This way, work could be archived easily without interference. Work could be repackaged by entrepreneurial archivists and be rediscovered by new generations.

Artists are here to enhance our world and their work should be given to humanity after a certain amount of years. And that’s coming from someone who has close to 30 IPs copyrighted.

Peace and love, my friends.

Amen to that!

Kevin Geiger

Something of a panic has gripped the independent creative community over the Orphan Works legislation currently working its way through Congress. The outcry began over the problematic Orphan Works Act of 2006 (H.R. 5439), which suffered a well-deserved death in September of that year, and resurfaced this spring with the introduction of the revised Orphan Works Act of 2008 (S. 2913, H.R. 5889) on April 24th. Unfortunately, there has been no shortage of fear-mongering since that time, with artists crying “Fire!” in crowded movie theaters on blogs and discussion boards across the Internet. To make matters worse, creators who have yet to even review the proposed legislation have been only too eager to dog-pile in outrage over the “corporate power-grab” which this apparent infringement on their rights supposedly represents.

Before I go any further, let me fully disclose the context from which I speak. I was schooled in the fine and applied arts, and have made my living both as an independent artist and in the animation industry. I have registered various copyrights and trademarks over the course of my career, and have no interest in seeing my creative work used without my consent. So, in the world of “users” and “owners” (those who use copyrighted work and those who create and/or own it), you can place me squarely in the camp of “owner”. In short - I’m a content creator. Yet I see the need for Orphan Works legislation, and firmly believe that the process should not be feared and obstructed, but rather engaged and capitalized upon. (Indeed, the Chinese word for “crisis”, wei ji, literally translates as “dangerous opportunity”.)

Orphan Works legislation attempts to address a long-standing problem that recently came to a head at the Holocaust Memorial Museum, where curators are sitting on a vast collection of family photos from Holocaust victims - unwilling to exhibit them for fear of statutory damages and attorney’s fees. These photos are so-called “orphan works” with no identifiable owner. The problem of orphan works is very real. In short, an “orphan work” is one that is protected by copyright, but whose creator/owner cannot be identified and located. Given that copyright law currently protects your work for the course of your lifetime plus 70 years beyond your death, there is plenty of time to lose track of who owns what - especially in the case of unmarked works. Those in favor of Orphan Works legislation include most curators and archivists, librarians and publishers, writers and documentarians. Steve Worth, Director of ASIFA Hollywood, puts it thus:

As an archivist at a non-profit museum and library, I would love to make the material in the ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive more widely available. But unless the situation changes, the treasures we are accumulating will be bottled up in a building on Burbank Blvd. It’s important to be able to get the information out to the people who can use it in the way that they want to be able to access it. The idea of a library being a big building with marble walls and bookcases is a thing of the past. So are archives that make you sit at a table and wear white gloves while someone hands you a box and stands over your shoulder watching you while you open it. Today, the greatest library, museum and archive in the world is sitting on everyone’s desk and it’s connected by a wire to everyone else’s desk. Copyright law needs to change to reflect those new realities, if it doesn’t it will continue to be an impediment to learning.

Those opposed include many fine artists, photographers, designers, writers and other content creators. The Illustrators’ Partnership of America, the National Press Photographers Association and the Advertising Photographers of America have been leading the charge for protest and action. Nevertheless, the Professional Photographers of America, the Picture Archive Council of America and the North American Nature Photography Association support the current House bill. The Graphic Artists Guild, while not supporting the legislation, has asked its members to refrain from writing protest letters.

Mark Dery of print magazine, not an advocate of the Orphan Works Act in any way, nevertheless takes an even-handed view that is quite frankly missing from most of what passes as discourse on this topic:

Clearly, the tangle of copyright law that constricts the public domain and criminalizes noncommercial remixing—that recut Star Wars video or music mash-up you just uploaded—needs detangling. But, just as clearly, we shouldn’t trample the rights of the individual creator in our rush to throw wide the gates of the creative commons. The right of copyright holders to determine how their works are used must be balanced with the right of fair use. The ability of the individual creator to profit from the sale of her work, free from infringement, is desperately important. But so is greater access to the orphaned works of artists lost in time.

There is great pressure on Congress to adopt some form of Orphan Works legislation, based upon the notion of the “Public Good”, which tends to outweigh consideration for individuals claiming economic impact. Like it or not, there is a societal need to facilitate the free exchange of information and ideas that all but guarantees some form of Orphan Works bill will eventually pass. For artists to pester Congress to reject any bill whatsoever is ultimately more harmful, as it removes any incentive for our lawmakers to accommodate the genuine material concerns of content creators. Far better to encourage our public servants to include language that protects the rights of creators and owners while also addressing the principle of the Public Good. And as for “Private Evil” (the aforementioned “corporate power grab” that some of my colleagues are whipped up about), yes - it’s true that most companies will be happy to see an Orphan Works bill become law… just as it’s true that there will be some that seek to take advantage of the situation. But taking advantage of situations is all in a day’s work for corporations. It’s to be expected, if not embraced. So, what possible sense does it make for artists to effectively remove themselves from the table by “just saying no”? None, from where I sit.

The 2008 Orphan Works legislation provides for a limitation on statutory damages and/or attorney’s fees imposed against the user of a copyrighted work as long as the following hold true:

• The user undertook a qualifying search to locate the owner, and could not find him/her
• The user identified the owner to the extent possible when using the work
• The user stopped using the work if the owner surfaced and requested a cease-and-desist
• The user acted in good faith in searching for and negotiating with the owner
• The user paid royalties to the owner on a “willing seller, willing buyer” standard if the use was commercial in nature, for certain usage categories

The 2008 legislation also includes the following:

• A study of the copyright registration deposit system by the General Accountability Office
• A requirement that orphan works be identified with a special symbol to be determined by the Copyright Office

In addition to the above provisions contained within the recently passed Senate version, the House version of the Orphan Works Act (H.R. 5889) contains these considerations:

• Delay of the effective date of commencement until the earlier of 2013 or the date on which the Register of Copyrights certifies two databases that can be used to search for works
• A requirement for users to file an advance Notice of Use with the Copyright Office
• Allowance for judges to award extra compensation if a work was registered

As of this writing, the Senate has passed its version of the Orphan Works bill. Given that the House version of the bill contains language that is more amenable to content creators (such as the requirement of a Notice of Use), the smart play is to encourage your Representatives to stick to their guns and not adopt the Senate’s language.

It goes without saying that you should always be sure to cover yourself by:

• Registering your work with the Copyright Office
• Marking physical copies with your name & contact info
• Embedding metadata in digital copies with your name & contact info
• Requesting credits on print uses of your work

Nevertheless, it is important to note that while registration of your work is strongly advised as a matter of practice, you are not required to register your work to keep it from becoming “orphaned”. Registration is valuable because it protects your rights to the fullest extent possible, but if you can be identified and found without the benefit of a registry, then your work cannot be considered “orphaned”. It also cannot be considered an orphan work simply because a user is unwilling to look for you, or because you decline to license or sell it. Believe it or not, even a lack of ownership information attached to a work fails to automatically qualify it as “orphaned” (much in the same way that you are not required to brand your children with your name in order to keep the state from rustling them up).

The matter of what constitutes a “reasonable search” for the owner is the primary concern of users and owners alike (though for opposite reasons, obviously). A fair and feasible standard must be created that takes into account variations of commercial and non-commercial use, among many other factors - such as whether the private sector should be allowed to offer registration services, and what fees might be involved. This is an area in which the most incendiary claims are being made by those opposed to Orphan Works legislation, including that:

• Your entire body of artistic output will be automatically “orphaned” with the passage of this bill into law
• You will be required to scan and register, at your own expense, every piece of artwork you have ever created in order to received copyright protection

In the first place, the use of an “orphan work” requires, at a minimum, the following due diligence (as specified in S. 2913):

• a search of the records of the Copyright Office that are available to the public through the Internet and relevant to identifying and locating copyright owners, provided there is sufficient identifying information on which to construct a search;
• a search of reasonably available sources of copyright authorship and ownership information and, where appropriate, licensor information;
• use of appropriate technology tools, printed publications, and where reasonable, internal or external expert assistance; and
• use of appropriate databases, including databases that are available to the public through the Internet;

Given these provisions, which represent the minimum definition of a “reasonable search”, it is hard to imagine litigation-shy corporations appropriating works willy-nilly like kids in a candy store. When in doubt, the instinct will be to avoid trouble. And any companies that lack this instinct are already liable to infringe (and prepared to fend off court challenges) under current law, so the “new” concern is ultimately a wash.

Let’s also take a good look at that last provision: the use of databases that are available to the public through the Internet. Got a website with your work on it? Then your work already fits Congress’ definition of being in a database available to the public. Infringer beware! And to my earlier point about finding opportunity in the face of “crisis”, imagine the traffic benefits to sites such as The Illustrator’s Partnership of America or Animation Nation if they offered free database services to their members. Makes plenty of Google Adsense to me.

“But… what about all of my work in physical form that has not been digitized?” Well, at the risk of sarcasm, are you expecting a corporate paramilitary team to come rappelling into your house to separate you from your art? If so, you’ve probably got bigger problems than orphan works. If not, take the same precautions with your sketchbooks that you do with your checkbooks, and employ sensible measures to collect and protect your digital droppings.

The Orphan Works Act is certainly not ideal, but neither is current copyright law. Is the former being put forward in the spirit of Fair Use, just as the latter was? Yes. Are there problems with the former and the latter? Yes. Can we imagine the possibility of abuse of the former? Yes. Can we acknowledge the reality of abuse of the latter? Yes.

As with any piece of legislation, there will be pros and cons, unintended consequences and unforeseen benefits. But the train is rolling. You can block the track and get run over, or you can jump on board and help steer. So by all means, write your legislator immediately - but consider your stance carefully.

And don’t forget to sign it!

Cartoon Brew has posted the above comparison of a storyboard drawing from Walt Disney Animation Studios’ forthcoming feature “Bolt” with a rendered still frame from the movie, under the heading: “Storyboard vs. CG”. No matter that the drawing was probably created in CG as well. The blog entry proceeds to lambaste Disney’s CG production crew (including, I would presume, John Lasseter - who now oversees everything) for failing to adhere to the “character design”.

With all due respect, the good folks at CB seem to have confused storyboarding with character design. Storyboards are NOT character designs. If they were, you’d see the character “mutate” from sequence to sequence according to the varying styles and sensibilities of the board artists. And nevermind that the much-lauded storyboard panel reads like a freakish D-cup amputee. We can all be thankful that it’s not a character design.

A more informed title for this comparison would have been “Storyboard vs. Production”. For, contrary to the stance of the Cartoon Brew blog entry, the discrepancies between the images above are not the product of some inherent deficiency in the CG medium or in CG artists, but rather a consequence - for better and for worse - of the production process. You can present just as many examples of 2D films that have lost their charm along the way when the boards are compared to the cels. And any loss of appeal from storyboard to final output is ultimately the responsibility of the director, who approves everything - by affirmation or by deference.

Let’s review some of the reasons that final frames evolve from the storyboards, in both 2D and 3D animated features:

1. The storyboard is not a character design. It is a drawing that illustrates a story point.
2. The storyboard is a springboard for the scene, not a cage.
3. The storyboard is a single drawing meant to encapsulate an idea, while the rendered still frame is a discrete slice of the interpretation of that idea.
4. The character designer is free to design for the medium, according to the director’s wishes.
5. The director is free to design the character based upon the medium, the appearance and/or performance of the voice actor, or any other reason they like (for example, I can see Mark Walton’s expression very clearly in the design of the CG character).
6. The layout artist is empowered to compose the scene according to the director’s wishes.
7. The animator has license to interpret the scene in service of the director’s evolving vision.
8. The 2D ink & paint artists or 3D lighting artists are not limited to the storyboard artists’ toolset.

Now let’s review some of the reasons that final frames sometimes do indeed “de-volve” from the storyboards, in both 2D and 3D animated features:

1. The scene is noodled to death (by artists, directors, executives or some combination thereof).
2. The production artists are under enormous time constraints.

Is “Bolt” the pinnacle of CG animation? From what I’ve seen of it - no. The unique style of Chris Sanders’ characters and revolutionary painterly backgrounds displayed in the “American Dog” boxcar test at SIGGRAPH 2006 are sorely missed. But the scene pictured above was pretty funny, as I recall from the trailer. Animation is meant to be enjoyed at speed, not picked apart frame-by-frame by fanboys in an agenda-driven navel gazing exercise. Not that there’s anything wrong with that.

There will always be those who prefer the boards to the renders, who prefer 2D to 3D, etc. God bless America, we’re all entitled to our opinions. But are directors not permitted to let their films evolve organically and make aesthetic decisions that deviate from the boards, lest they incur online sniping? The very qualities that are often touted as “superior” in the drawings (and are quite enjoyable in measured amounts) can alienate audiences in large doses. I’m reminded of the prologue to “Kung Fu Panda”, which I loved (both the opening sequence and the movie). Many of my friends and colleagues remarked, “That was great! They should have done the entire movie that way.” Well, sure - if you want the audience to (try to) focus upon a “cool style” for 91 minutes as opposed to really identifying with the characters. Aggressive stylization tends to distance the audience from the performance: you find yourself “looking at” as opposed to “being with”. (Tim Burton’s films have this problem - beautiful as they are.) A little of that goes a long way, and I think Dreamworks called it just right in the transition. Of course, this is only my opinion. There’s more than one person out there who will use this very point to explain why 3D is “inferior” to 2D.

Which brings us to the tired ol’ CG bashing at the heart of the Cartoon Brew blog entry. CG artists and animators are used to it, of course. We’ve put up with the sneers for years, often while being asked to help train the same folks who regarded our medium with such disdain. I still recall the 2D animators (some good friends) who hung a computer in effigy from a tree behind Disney’s Southside building during a company party as “Home On The Range” was wrapping, and then bashed it to pieces with sticks while we 3D folks watched from a safe distance. I’m sure it sounds funny now, but it was less so at the time. You can imagine how awkward the punchbowl conversation became.

Over at The Animation Guild Blog, a thread on Disney Animation Studios quickly turned into a referendum on the (de)merits of the CG medium, with one anonymous poster (of the many “anonymi” at TAG) emphatically declaring both that “there isn’t even such a thing as an independent CGI animator”, and also that “There will never be a Glen Keane of CGI.” I must admit that I love absolutist statements that include the word “never”. In fact, I now have “There will never be a Glen Keane of CGI” taped to my monitor. Glen’s animation shines through as Glen’s despite the army of in-betweeners, cleanup artists, painters and scanners who work over his drawings. And there’s no reason why an animator cannot reach the same heights in CGI. Perhaps even Glen himself.

As anyone who has worked with one knows, the computer doesn’t provide you with anything that you don’t input yourself. The computer follows instructions, and its output is only as good as the quality of those instructions - provided by human beings. Great 2D/3D animators, such as Nik Ranieri and Dick Zondag, don’t just take “what the computer provides them” (as the TAG commenter maintained). They are active partners in the creation of their CG characters. They work directly with the modelers and TDs to define rigging capabilities, facial controls and the like which push the boundaries of the art and truly personalize it. When you look at the scene of Buck Cluck talking to Chicken Little in the car, you can “see” Nik the animator. It is every bit a personal performance, evocative of his other great work in 2D. Animator authorship IS possible in CGI. I’ve seen it, and I’ve worked to facilitate it.

Some people like to talk about the “limits” of CGI. Well, let’s explore these “limits” for a moment:

1. The computer allows you to place points (and hence construct & deform surfaces) wherever and however you like in 3D space.
2. The computer allows you to create pixels of whatever color you like.
3. You can have as many points and pixels as you care to, and are supplied with a powerful array of high-level tools to assist your creative brain, your perceptive eyes, and your skillful hands.

I don’t know about the rest of you, but I see COMPLETE FREEDOM. The only limitations you face are your own as an artist… or those of your schedule/budget.

So, I look forward to the day when the mediocre work produced by some is not used as justification to slag an entire medium out of fear and ignorance. I look forward to the day when we no longer speak of “2D animators” and “3D animators”, but simply of “animators”. I look forward to the day when the members of the animation community truly come together as one, instead of wasting valuable time, energy and goodwill lobbing stink bombs at each other.

And I look forward to the day when “The Glen Keane Of CG” indeed shows up, and no one even takes note of her as such - for the digital medium she works in is like water: transparent, and in fluid service of her performance and her story.

—

P.S. - The day after I posted this, I was informed that the artist who drew the storyboard image above is the very same individual who approved the model, look and fur groom of the CG character and also the same person who directed the animator assigned to the shot that the rendered frame is taken from. Chew on that, Cartoon Brew!

At the SIGGRAPH 2008 conference in Los Angeles this past week, I saw one of the the most depressing student films ever made. It was shown during a panel I participated in entitled, “Teaching Computer Animation For Results”, hosted by my old friend Craig Caldwell of the Griffith University Film School in Brisbane. Each of the four presenters focused upon an educational segment (I drew the “graduate” straw). The short film in question was screened during the undergraduate level portion. In it, a flabby animator pulls an all-nighter in his cubicle. He stares at the cavorting cartoon character on his monitor and wearily laments, “I use to like bears.” Noticing that his coffee pot is empty, he gets up to leave his cube in search of more java. But his ergonomic chair blocks his exit - subtly at first, and then with mounting confrontation. The animator’s desperate attempts to escape this nightmare prove futile as he is forced back into the chair - which “soothingly” rubs his shoulders as he sobs uncontrollably before his unsympathetic monitor: slave to the mis en scene.

The beat outline for this film was described as follows:

• An animator pulls an all-nighter during crunch time
• He notices that he is out of coffee
• The animator tries to leave his cubicle to get more
• He is prevented from doing so by his chair
• The animator learns that there is no time for coffee during crunch time
• He learns that he should do his work without complaint

Somebody slit my wrists now… please. Frankly, I’d expect this sort of “story” from an animation school in North Korea - not from one located in the Southeastern United States. Needless to say, the student filmmaker has probably already been gobbled up by a major studio who is happy to see that someone “gets it”. Who wouldn’t want an employee who “understands” that they can’t leave their cubicle for a cuppa?

Now, I’m no pollyanna. As an animation industry vet, I’ve seen the good, the bad and the ugly. I’ve put in my share of overtime - burning the midnight oil on studio assignments and independent projects alike. I’ve dealt with work-induced RSI, back pain, stress and exhaustion. I know the realities of our business, and it’s not all kittens and unicorns (even when we may be animating kittens and unicorns). So, I wasn’t bothered by the fact that the film’s hapless protagonist didn’t get to take his prescribed union coffee break, or was probably working unpaid OT, or had clearly let his health and personal life go to pot in the service of a menial “effects wizard” position. What bothered me was the loss of fire in the belly, underscored by the opening gag line: “I used to like bears.” Here was a self-portrait (or soon-to-be self-portrait) of an artist whose spark was extinguished, who was forced to sit at his desk and feed the machine without pause like one of those human Duracells in “The Matrix”. There’s nothing wrong with “paying your dues”, but NOT at the cost of your soul.

Ironically, this was a perfect segue into my own segment on the graduate level. The three hallmarks of a graduate education in computer graphics & animation as I see them (based upon my tripod of experience as a graduate student, professor, and recruiting animation supervisor) are as follows:

• Building a bridge: to the industry, academia and/or private practice
• Learning how to learn
• Finding your voice

In addressing these points, the seminal question that I posed to the SIGGRAPH audience was this: “What are you preparing your students for?”

• …a job?
• …a career?
• …or a vocation?

While these three are not mutually exclusive, they are hierarchical. There’s certainly nothing wrong with a job. We all need one - coming in handy as they do for little things like clothes on your back, food in your belly and a roof over your head. But one can easily shlep along from job to job without any sense of a career arc, which is the next level up. Preparing a student for a job involves training, while preparing a student for a career requires education: if job preparation addresses the buttons and menus, then career preparation addresses the concepts and principles underlying those buttons and menus. And vocation preparation addresses the vision that these functional aspects serve. The distinction between career and vocation is that between artisan and artist: the distinction between the hand and the heart. And even the major studios need more of the latter, whether they know it or not.

Which brings me to the subject of the animation industry’s relationship to academia - a dissertation in itself, but something that I will touch upon briefly here. On my flight to Taipei a couple days ago, I was flipping through the latest issue of 3D World magazine, and came across an article in which industry “pressure group” Games Up? was bemoaning the skills crisis in UK games development, and laying blame squarely at the feet of UK schools and universities. In the first place, let me observe that the stance of “pressure group” is very telling, and significantly different than that of “support group”. A “pressure group” is a pointed finger, while a “support group” is a helping hand. And guess which one is superior in terms of intention, commitment and results? My suspicions regarding the attitude of the companies in question were confirmed by a subsequent comment in which an art director spoke ruefully of CG candidates with “salary issues”. Note to companies: like it or not, when demand exceeds supply - as it clearly does in the landscape addressed by the CG World article - any “salary issues” belong to YOU, not your prospective employees. That sword cuts both ways.

The article posed the question: “Are graduates up to the job?” I’d like to turn that right around and ask: “Are companies up to the job?” Are companies willing to partner with schools to create mutually-enriching programs? Are companies willing to democratically support the percentage that is “irrelevant” to them, in order to more effectively seed and leverage upon the percentage that is “relevant”? Are companies brave enough to pleasantly surprise themselves by looking for talent outside of their cookie cutter preconceptions (anyone remember the days before “digital content departments”, when CG artists came from the ranks of biology, architecture and dance programs)? Are companies forward-thinking enough to realize that what they want today is not necessarily what they need tomorrow? And are companies committed enough that if they can’t find what they need today, they don’t just stand there pointing fingers from the self-satisfied ring of their “pressure group”? Rather, they invite schools into their circle: they get involved. It’s a symbiotic relationship, and the more prescient studios - such as Sony Imageworks with their IPAX program - are already wise to this.

That said, I’ll advance the “radical” liberal arts notion that there’s more to an education than turning out “a good little worker bee”. As a student, you should ask yourself: “Do I want to be a drone, or a trailblazer?” And as an institution of higher learning, you should examine yourself: “Do we want to turn out graduates who slot neatly into the job opening of existing production companies, or do we want to turn out graduates who revolutionize the industry, and knock those companies on their @sses?” What is the more inspiring goal? Which philosophy best serves our students (and ultimately our industry) in the long run?

And to the kid and his instructors responsible for the short film about the animator trapped at his desk, take it from a seasoned pro: there’s ALWAYS time for coffee!

A swift kick in the @ss from the legendary Ralph Bakshi, at ComicCon 2008.

Just DO it!!!

(Thanks to Stephen Worth at ASIFA-Hollywood for the question and the video.)