Oscar No Post

I failed to post yesterday partly because my real life got in the way and partly because it took a while to get over Happy Feet winning an Oscar. I recognize it was a weak field that was made short by the exclusion of Arthur and the Invisibles due to too much live action.

My beef is that motion capture, like what was used in the making of Happy Feet and Monster House, is not animation. I understand that technically it is as it is a collection of non-live images that change slightly from frame to frame to create the illusion of motion. That said it is only animation in the way that a paper air plane is the same as a commercial jet liner. Both have wings that create lift, but you won't put your money in PaperCo Airlines. (If you will let me know, I can help you invest.) The relative ease of creating with computers versus hand drawn animation has led to an outpouring of poorly executed movies with bad plots. This leaves us with the question of where does Happy Feet's Oscar take us. Sadly Disney has already answered that question by announcing the creation of a motion capture "animation" division.

Walt Disney along with Ub Iwerks and the Nine Old Men gave us animation as we know it today. Sure it was built on by the boys of Termite Terrace and the likes of Walter Lantz and the Fleischers, but if it weren't for Disney the rest would not have known what to do. Now Walt's dream has been totally perverted. With the closure of all the Disney hand drawn units and the creation of a motion capture unit the steward of the Walt Disney company should hang their heads. Sure Walt was about making a buck, but he also had a vision of animation and what it could do. Would he like computer animation? Most likely, but I don't think he'd turn his back on hand drawn. What about motion capture? I'd like to think he'd turn his nose up at it.

Don't spin too fast Walt.