手水 (a 16mm film)

Using 16mm clear leader film and a couple of sharpies, I attempted to do some drawn on film animation! The actual drawing was pretty fun, though my sharpies were too fat to do any serious detail. The filming portion was difficult and took a far longer than I thought it would…because I hadn’t left any space at the beginning and end of the film and had to splice more on top of it. (Well, a classmate did it for me, so I guess I’m deeply indebted to him and his nimble fingers.)

I captured the film with a digital camera as it was running through a projector. The camera was set on a tripod aimed up at the screen, so the original footage is warped. Also, I’m not entirely sure the film is in focus. I tried to fix the warped effect in post, but it looks a little glitchy. Ah, well.

I wanted to incorporate some recognizable figures/forms, just because the nature of this medium is so abstract, and I tried to augment the recognizability of these objects with sound. So the Chinese character 手 means “hand,” and the character 水 means “water.” I was sort of going for the idea of “stream of consciousness,” without doing a direct translation, but I just looked up if 手水 together meant anything in Chinese, and apparently it’s an archaic form of “latrine.” So that’s fun, and totally intentional.

Anyway! I had fun with this, and I may try to do a scratch test in the future. (Though, again, capturing it all digitally was kind of a hassle. We shall see!)

手水 (16mm film) from Marcie LaCerte on Vimeo.

drawn on film

For my very first assignment, I wanted to explore drawn-on-film animation. A peer gave me a bunch of 16mm film, both clear and black (don’t know the proper terms), and I’m going to have a go with it.

I was introduced to drawn-on-film animation through Norman McLaren. Though, at the time, I wasn’t aware of his technique.

Dots from National Film Board of Canada on Vimeo.

Serenal from National Film Board of Canada on Vimeo.

After researching Norman McLaren a bit, I came across a few contemporary animators who are using the same drawn-on-film technique. One of my favorites is Steven Woloshen’s “Crossing Victoria.”

Crossing Victoria from steven Woloshen on Vimeo.

I really love how, in both Woloshen and McLaren’s animation, the visuals are intrinsically tied with the music or sound, and both heighten the effect of the other. I particularly love how improvisational and playful they feel. And I’m excited to see what sorts of sound or music I can use in tandem with whatever the resulting animation looks like.

Another favorite is Koji Yamamura’s animation created with NFB’s Norman McLaren app. It’s not strictly drawn-on-film but rather drawn-on-iPad. I really love how there are recognizable objects rendered abstract, and I love how he used words (five/fire/fish) that looked visually similar but are meaningfully unrelated. I think he wanted to use something concrete, something recognizable as a jumping-point for more abstract animation. After all, it can be difficult for viewers to enjoy something that has absolutely no root in objective reality. (Or, at least, that’s something I’ve read in an essay, I think.)

Five Fire Fish by Koji Yamamura – McLaren’s Workshop App from National Film Board of Canada on Vimeo.

Finally, a contemporary example of drawn-on-film is this music video, first shot on 16mm then physically painted over. I really love all the colors in this film and how the animation enhances the original film.

Strange Babes – Come Back Around from Kristofski on Vimeo.

I’m still not sure what I’m gonna do with my animation, but I think I will start with the clear leader and see where it takes me!