Animation Guild | We are 839 Digital Magazine
Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1434261
WINTER 2021 35 LIVE-ACTION LEGACY LIVE-ACTION LEGACY LIVE-ACTION LEGACY LIVE-ACTION LEGACY LIVE-ACTION LEGACY LIVE-ACTION LEGACY In the early days of animation, artists kept mirrors at their desks so they could observe their own facial expressions. Then, as stu- dios started moving into theatrical features, there was a push to step things up. "How do we make the audience not just look at the technique but actually engage with the characters?" says Fox Carney, Manager of Research at Disney Animation Research. Pivotal to this was Snow White and the Seven Dwarves, where a young dancer named Marge Champion donned a Snow White costume (above) and danced while being filmed. Then her various poses were traced from printed frames to be used as starting points. As time passed, though, these interim tracings became too much effort, especially since animators weren't going for accuracy but rather believability by capturing the spirit of a pose or the timing of a movement. In this way, the swoosh of actress Helene Stanley's skirt influ- enced the gracefulness of Aurora in Sleeping Beauty; Louis Prima's big band set the festive mood for "I Wanna Be Like You" in The Jungle Book; and actress Sherri Stoner's dancing in front of a grid helped shape the liquid movements of Ariel in The Little Mermaid. These days there are rooms where animators can film them- selves without having to set up a stage with lights, camera people, and models. "They can say, okay, I'm going to jump, I'm going to run, I'm going to collapse," explains Carney, "and so you've got the spontaneous ability of the artist to capture themselves, which is almost like back to the days of the original mirror." Technology can do a lot, Carney says, but it can't replace the intuitive nature of a human in motion, not to mention the kind of impromptu gestures—the sudden flick of a wrist, the unanticipated tilt of a head—that bring beloved animation characters to life. WINTER 2021 35