Whilst the open-ended and anonymous nature of the questions did give the respondents the freedom to reply as they wished and potentially volunteer new and unexpected reactions, the disadvantages were that replying required a measure of time, confidence and commitment on the part of the respondent. As a result, a smaller number of respondents was expected, and their answers had to be processed and analysed on a response by response basis, with the emphasis on qualitative analysis.
While the overall recorded reaction was of interest, it is likely that those who found the artifact boring or uninteresting might have left part way through the animation, and not filled in the survey. Vimeo documented 142 plays while the survey recorded only 35 responses. Even assuming that some viewers may have viewed more than once, it would seem that a large but otherwise unknown quantity viewed without participating in feedback. Reasons might include: lack of time, lack of convenient hardware to fill in the survey (respondents replying via their mobile phones might struggle to type out complicated responses), finding the survey too confusing, intimidating or demanding, or disinterest in the piece as a whole.
For a detailed overview of the data obtained from the feedback questionnaire, please refer to Appendix F.2 for a full copy of the responses and 8.5.3 for the analysis of the results.
6.3 Discussion: Common threads that emerged
Generally, the hand animated dinosaur was more popular and “easier” for viewers to understand. The Sari scene in particular, was presented in more of a traditional “expected” manner, with jokes, colour and a narrative, and an amusing (non-serious) character. “Cute” whimsical” “pretty” “evocative” “flamboyant” “enjoyable” “expressive” “imaginative” “hilarious” were terms given in the feedback and all terms one might expect (or at least hope for) from a more traditional and entertaining animation.
The expression of OEB was also made more obvious through the use of exaggerated body language (the dinosaur’s eyes bulging in shock, her mouth falling open) the stripping away of information and leaving only the core, (such as the shivering father) and symbols (tear drops, the ground rising up to interact and “speak” with the dinosaur) - all of which are classic
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animation techniques that a viewer will have experienced and seen in mainstream animation shown on television or film.
Generally the motion captured sections were the most unpopular, with respondents complaining of the stiffness and restricted movement of the 3D dinosaur and its lack of facial expression. Some respondents found the motion captured dinosaur more engaging when it was moving more expansively, possibly because the wilder movements were more distracting, or that the restrained, lack of movement (from the grieving scenes) only heightened the artificial, uncanny aspect of the character, even though in the case of the restricted movement and stiffness, the dinosaur was behaving in line with the real human motions of the interviewee. The choice of a split screen of live action and motion capture proved too distracting for some viewers. As discussed by MacGillivray (2007) it became clear that the pure transition of motion capture data to the character, though accurate, lacked the “life quality” of motion captured data that is tweaked and supplemented by the hand of the animator (for example, adding
anticipation and exaggeration on top of the base motion captured movements). Viewers perceive exaggeration as more convincing (Johnson and Thomas, 1981). To be convincing, actors must exaggerate to be believable, and 3D avatars may require tweaking from animators to refine the motions further, tweaking which, in this instance, had deliberately not been applied (Serkis, 2003).
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More of a surprise was the reaction to the rotoscoped animation. The hand drawn
animations appeared to provide one extreme, that of emotion purely generated and expressed through the eye of the animator, evocation, evoking concepts difficult to visualise or express with live action (Honess Roe, 2011). While the motion capture was the other extreme of mimetic
substitution, aiming to be as realistic (reproducing the body movements exactly) as technology
allows (Honess Roe, 2011). The rotoscoping seemed to be the halfway point of, as Honess Roe describes it, non-mimetic substitution, the use of real footage stylised (2011). As previously discussed in chapter 4, Honess Roe has written about how this approach can work well in documentary animation and my hope was to explore this from the direction of articulating and comprehending OEB in animation. In this, the style of the rotoscoping, following closely the real life facial expressions whilst simultaneously heightening and crystallising them, appeared to work well in commanding the attention of the viewers, provoking interest and focus (as opposed to simple amusement from the hand drawn Sari for a dinosaur scenes.)
Fig 6.2: Composite frame showing the rotoscoped lines over the live action footage
Reasons for this are many and may be guessed at. It might be that this sort of animation is less common to what viewers are used to, and thus becomes interesting through novelty. The stripped down nature of the linework combined with the voiceover left viewers with no alternative but to focus and see the expressions. Such experimental animation has been approached before with Sabiston’s work (1998).
It seemed noticeable too that the majority of respondents preferred to focus their attention on facial expressions rather than body motions. The stripped down rotoscopes could still be
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considered successful and understandable in spite of having no body, (and missing the top of their heads) while the 3D animation, having body motion but no facial expression came across as hard to understand or uncanny (Mori, 1970). I had hoped to use the motion capture animation as a way to get viewers to focus more on the body than the face, but while some respondents were fascinated by the body motion, most were distracted and disconcerted by the limited facial expressions of the CG dinosaur.
For the most part, the sadness and distress of the situation stood out for people, seven respondents found the expression of sadness and distress (and subject matter) upsetting or “difficult to watch,” without connecting the upset to any specific rendering of the animation. In some part, this might be due to the tone of voice as much as the visuals of the sad scenes. Eight respondents were not upset, though three acknowledged the execution was moving or heartfelt. Two respondents (of thirty-five) felt that the subject matter and the voice were most effective, in once case “I started to ignore the images and concentrate on the spoken word” so it is possible those respondents who could not articulate an animation style that stood out for them were more struck by the tone of voice, and in one case, appeared to try and block out the visuals in order to concentrate more fully on the voice (this is discussed further in 6.5). However, a majority were able to point to a specific animated section that stood out for them.
In this, the abstract quality of the hand drawn “sad” animation helped articulate emotion, possibly by elaborating on the vocal narrative, whereas the rotoscoping had a more direct connection to the facial expressions, with the line-work helping to draw attention to the expressions on the interviewee.
Reaction to the mo-cap was split, with some finding the change in body posture from happy to sad interesting but all finding the limited facial animation on the 3D avatar lacking in expressing the depth of sadness being vocally expressed.
For four respondents, a more holistic, thought provoking mood was generated from seeing the variety of emotion displayed in animated form. Quoting from the feedback “it opened my thoughts to maybe having to experience something similar one day” and “it has made me think how complex and fast changing our emotional expression is” and “it made me think about talking about difficult subjects, and how well animation can help not only conveying the emotion, but make it a bit easier in some ways.”