MACA Journal - Leo Davies

Having been a fan of Masaaki Yuasa’s for a while, it’s shameful to admit that I hadn’t seen his directorial debut, Mind Game (2004). It was while watching the presentation of one of my classmates that it was brought to my attention, as it seemed like the exact kind of thing I would be really into.

Yuasa, aside from generally having a great sense of perspective and figure, is a master of the absurd, colourful and zany. He generally doesn’t limit himself to keeping on-model like most Japanese animation directors. Mind Game, however, takes this love of abstraction to a new level, featuring dozens of different art styles within the same narrative, as the film revels in the insanity of its visuals. 

Comedy is typically about subverting expectations, and with animations that are comedic, a sudden shift in art styles can have a very humorous effect. It certainly leaves an impression, for example, watching an episode of SpongeBob, and seeing the 1922 vampire, Nosferatu, appear as a non-sequitur joke.

With online culture, it feels as though absurd and surreal humor is becoming more popular- which might contribute to the intended humor of an art-style switch. The Adult Swim series Smiling Friends, created by a pair of YouTube animators, makes frequent use of different animation techniques for the simple purpose of juxtaposition, making the world feel more bizarre, and consequently funnier. Something intentionally low quality, presented in the right way, can make the viewer feel as though they’re in on the joke. 

Where Yuasa perhaps differs with Mind Game, is using this shift in art styles to create discomfort and humor at the same time. The film’s characters experience a steady decline in their mental state, with scenes getting gradually more nonsensical throughout. 

While it may be easier to use an art style shift as a punchline, it’s a tool that can easily express more complex emotions. Mind Game’s attempt at a sex scene is delightfully abstract, featuring the characters changing into insects and animals of different colours, and shifting into a mix of oil paints.

It’s usually expected, of course, that a film will have a consistent and coherent world. But I think animation has the ability to break past that, even if it’s at the risk of confusing the audience. Several factors can influence this- Yuasa has stated in a 2004 interview with The Japan Times that the budget of the film was a factor, as well as the fact that Japanese audiences will more readily accept something “unpolished.”

Personally, I really enjoy animation that leans more absurd, and that focuses more on the psychological, and metaphorical. I might also have a fairly bizarre sense of humor. I’d really like to incorporate more mixed media elements into my own work, even if I often feel I don’t have the confidence to do so. 

I found it difficult to concentrate on the Simulated Work Experience, with all the different projects I had going on. For that reason, the project got off to a slow start. Unsure of who should make the initial contact, it took me a week to send my first email, and another week before I could meet my second year collaborator in person.

Pochara’s project was very interesting to me, but as a personal film based on his own experiences, I wasn’t sure where to begin with my work. The role I was given was to create concepts for the background art, and to work on the character designs.

Pochara provided the main character design, which would serve as a basis for my own concepts. My task was to create a younger version of the main character. Zhehui, the other first year who was working on the project, sketched a few ideas for his outfit, so I only drew the character from the shoulders up.

I struggled at first to adapt to working in the style of the film – in particular,  drawing with thin linework is a bit of a challenge to me. My thought was that this wouldn’t be important, since it was only a concept. However, when comparing the two side by side, having them be stylistically consistent would give a better idea of how the final product should look. 

I had a bit more freedom when designing the grandfather character. It felt odd being given this task, since it was based on a real person, but Pochara provided me with a moodboard and assured me I could work from there. 

Starting with two concept sketches, I received more positive feedback for the face shape on the right. I then made a full body reference where I tried to use thinner lines, and made a number of colour variants. I tried to use warm or pleasant looking colours, to give the character a comforting feel. 

My work during this process was influenced by the semester we spent doing character design workshops. It’s something that I’d like to expand my practice towards, but I also want to avoid staying too much in my comfort zone. 

Thankfully, my last project involved drawing backgrounds – an area I definitely think I need more practice in. The issue was that the background I was drawing was meant to represent a limbo/empty space, so Pochara suggested I make it as minimalist as possible. I got a little carried away doing this part, but I really wanted to add some extra details, like a reflection or an atmospheric sky. 

Overall, I wish I just had more time to dedicate to this project. I always look forward to collaborating in a team, although it can bring its fair share of issues. There’s a lot of satisfaction that comes from helping realise someone’s vision – but at times, I also wish I had a bit more creative control, as well. 

In applying to this course, I didn’t have a lot of animation work in my portfolio, so I ended up using a lot of my character design work instead. I’d have said that my work was already ‘stylistically’ suited for animation, but as I’d always found it overwhelming to try, I had very little experience making these characters move. Doing so, I was bound to need a different approach designing characters, and I wanted to explore some of this process.

For the initial batch of exercises in the first term, we were asked to pick from a lineup of featureless designs – this was good to the extent that it helped me focus more on the movement and timing, which I’m sure was the intention. I was eager to try animating a fully designed character, though. 

While working on the bouncing ball exercise, I started work on a simple animation of one of my own characters sneezing, which I thought would’ve been fairly simple. I took a reference video from Shutterstock and used it to reference some keyframes.

View post on imgur.com

With more figure drawing experience under my belt now, I feel like I should have mapped out the basic shape of the body first, making it easier to animate a humanoid character. I also planned to have some follow-through with the hair, which I never finished.

A few weeks later, we began the character design project, which I was quite excited for. I found that making a character moodboard was surprisingly useful. I’ve always tried to come up with ideas in my head and cross-reference them using Google image references – but having all my thoughts and inspirations on one page was very helpful, and something I’ll try to make a habit of in the future.

For the body acting exercise, I had been thinking about doing a robot character with rubberhose-like limbs. This became a flashy, stylish robot girl. I gave the character long limbs, inspired by a character designer called Nelnal. 

Many people commented that this design looked complicated, but I wasn’t sure if the character would be readable if I removed too many details. I probably should have rethought my approach here.

Even after cleaning up my animation, there were a few things that continued to bother me. I didn’t like the hair bangs, as its shape didn’t make much sense in 3D, and I didn’t properly consider how it would work. If I had more time, I would’ve redrawn them

So what did I learn? First and foremost, that I have to swallow my pride when it comes to creating characters for animation! There are some things I just can’t feasibly do, considering my current skill level and the time I’m working with. With enough time, I can plan out a character sheet andcreate a moodboard, but if I don’t have time for those things, I should draw something that’s simple, and that I’m not likely to change my mind about.