Study Task 3 - Animation On A Physical Set Process

The Apple 2018 Christmas advert Share Your Gifts shares similar aspects the our group project as it shows examples of animation on top of a physical set. While this advert uses 3D animation and our groups uses 2D, the process is still relatively similar.

 The Making of Share Your Gift video shows the set for the advert being build and how they used 3D animation to create characters that could interact with the world. With the set, after building everything they filmed different scenes without the characters. This required careful planning as they had to have a strong understanding of how the characters will move in the frames and what they will interact with. This could be seen as a limitation of this type of animation as it can become difficult reshooting shots if the set is no longer standing or has been moved around.

However, a strength of this type of animation is that you can give the backgrounds a realistic and human built feel to them that can be difficult to accomplish with a digital set. It could also be argued that once the background scenes have been shot, there is a set lighting origin point so its easier to keep track of rather then having to remember where it would be in a digital set.

Animation Studied - Sharing Your Gift (2018) by Apple

Study Task 3 - 2D Animation Aesthetic

2D Animation offers an extensive range of aesthetics and styles that can be applied in various unique ways. In animations such as Afternoon Class this varied use of 2D animation can be seen at different points of the short film.

At the beginning of the animation, it uses a very artsy and lineless style that creates an interesting effect, The use of colour palettes is also creative and works well with this style to help highlight aspects of the shot such as the protagonist, who has a brighter colour scheme than the rest of the characters in shot. These types of aesthetics work well with the 2D animation medium and would not create the same effect with other mediums such as 3D.

The style then changes later in the short to a more intense colour palette with a line based style with limited colouring. This blend of styles is best used in 2D animation as it keeps costs down as well as allows the animator to stick with minimal amounts of software, instead of having the use multiple different software.

However, due to the use of perspective in different shots, using only 2D animation can have its limitations as it can become difficult to understand how things look from different perspectives in a 2D format. This is where using other mediums such as 3D animation would be beneficial.

Animation Studied - Afternoon Class (2014) by Osro