Scene Deconstruction: District B13's Intro

The theme of this movie is the explanation and examination of the different tiers of life within a city's organized crime group. This theme is achieved with the use an active method because the cinematic take the viewer through each group on a guided tour at the beginning. This gives an overview of what will be further broken down as the movie goes on and leaves this interpretation up to the viewer's mind.

To help make this use of theme more effective the use of “lines” and “movement” are greatly utilized. For starters, the use of movement is incredibly evident because the director and editors did their best to make it seem like one long continuous shot. In doing so, it makes it easy to direct the viewers awareness of where they should be looking while also creating less obvious meanings. With this specific use of movement it allowed the cinematic to move to higher floors of the building without any confusion, also helping to support the idea of the theme and the different tiers within the organization. All of this movement helps creates tension within the scene because it isn't common to have a shot going for such length of time and therefore adds to the sense of evil that is supposed to be portrayed. As if this use of movement wasn't efficient enough, the director continued to improve on the shots from there by using lines to guide the viewers eyes as well. Amongst each floor and area the camera explores there is a great deal of affinity and contrast throughout the objects. The use of contrast, however, is the key point. By putting objects such as a flaming oil drum/trashcan it draws instant attention to the area in question because the flames create such a contrast of lines in the shot. The use of affinity amongst the lines is important, as well. If it wasn't for the less subtle lines used along the walls of the shots to help move along the movement it would make the seamless shot seem less smooth and a lot harder on the eyes.

Animation Deconstruction

9 vs. $9.99

"9"

$9.99

For my comparing and contrasting animations I chose to use the movies "9" and "$9.99", 2 movies that used totally different styles of animation. To start I will discuss their uses of color. $9.99 took a bit of a bland approach on its hue using a lot more neutral colors causing them to almost blend together, whereas 9's colors were more defined and stuck out among the other colors in the scene. While it's not fully apparent through the screen shots above, “9” uses a darker brightness than “$9.99” due to the fact that the world in “9” is completely overthrown by robots and “$9.99” paints the picture of a 'normal' world. The saturation/intensity of colors are greater in “9” than in “$9.99” due to the fact that “$9.99” was created through the use of clay limiting the creators to less vibrant colors than the colors the CGI was capable of using.

Next the comparison of each film's lighting. The world portrayed in “9” lays mostly in shadows, whereas the world in “$9.99” had more variety by the creators trying to slightly exaggerate the lighting we see in our everyday world. While it is not exactly the same use of shadows, both methods create the same symbolic messages that there is evil afoot and causing trouble. The constant darkness in “9” creates a mood of suspense where the viewer expects there to always be some sort of physical and emotional action at almost all times. “$9.99”, on the other hand, has a mood with it's natural light that allows breaks in the action triggering the audience to have a neutral mood/mindset.

Lastly their differences/similarities in terms of movement. Since “$9.99” was created through claymation it had a lot more limitations in terms of its animation compared to “9”. Being computer generated “9's” animations were a lot more parallel and natural with their movements than those of “$9.99”. Even though “9's” foreground and background were more complex than that of “$9.99”, they both had a great deal of animations going on at all times, hence the use of overlapping movements in both films. Both films also successfully conveyed a realistic presentation of weight in their artificially created worlds.

Storyboard Imitation

Based on previous "It's All Gone Pete Tong" blog...

The Use of Correct Camera Perspectives

While filming the selected scene from “It's All Gone Pete Tong”, the director did a good job staying true to the rules. First, I'll address the rule of thirds, a rule the director utilized perfectly. To start off he tilts the angle of the girl's face and makes it so that her mouth (the focus point) is in the left third of the screen. This shot is followed up by a close-up shot of the man's eyes, his face is slightly off-centered and his eyes are looking to the left intentionally in order to line up his eyes both the left and right rule of thirds. After that is cuts to the restaurant scene where the band is located in the background on the left third and the dancer is moving around waving her dress excessively causing her to cross both of the thirds and keeping constant attention on her. The close-up of her shoes is also a bit off centered to the left and slowly zooming in causing her tap motions to cross the left rule of thirds more each movement. Secondly comes the 30 rule. The main character is sitting close to the girl whose lips are being focused on and therefore when the cut goes from her lips to his face it is approximately 30 degrees away. When it goes to the close-ups of her shoes it enlarges it more than 30 degrees, but because it is the focus of action it makes it an exception to the rule. Lastly, the 180 line rule. From the first perspective, the camera's line of 180 is taken in front of both of the characters and keeps the same orientation during the close-ups of their faces rather than a shot of the back of their heads. The same occurs once inside the restaurant. A line of 180 is drawn from the viewer's perspective, directly in front of the action, and when the camera zooms in to the dancer's heels the camera remains directly in front of them keeps the same orientation.