Anime and Manga

Anime is commonly defined as animation originating in Japan.

Manga consist of comics and print cartoons, in the Japanese language and conforming to the style developed in Japan in the late 19th century.

It is characterized by distinctive characters and backgrounds, that visually and thematically set it apart from other forms of animation.

Anime and manga share many characteristics, exaggerated physical features such as large eyes, big hair and elongated limbs... and dramatically shaped speech bubbles, speed lines and onomatopoeic, exclamatory typography.

Disney and Ideology

An ideology is a set of ideas that constitutes one's goals, expectations, and actions.

Entertainment, including a child’s bedtime story, is never just entertainment. Cultural products always reinforce or resist (and sometimes both at once) a society’s collective social values and belief systems. A film’s ideological meanings refer to the ideas that the film conveys about its world’s social relations, economic structures, and political institutions. Disney classics are not as timeless as Walt Disney would have liked to think because they all carry the ideological baggage of their time.

Dumbo, for example, is an icon of the American dream; his story takes America’s capitalist sociopolitical system for granted. In a socialist context, realizing one’s dream to become a star would not be a positive story; like the horse in George Orwell’s Animal Farm, a socialist hero would sacrifice his or her life for the community without wanting glamour or financial benefit in return. Dumbo’s success is measured by a Hollywood contract and a cheering crowd.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MbhUeom-KD4

Technology's Influence on Art.

Technology allows artists to explore new mediums that were not previously available. Three dimensional modeling on computers and various other programs graphical effects provided on various programs allows artists to do things with theirart that were unavailable to previous generations of artists. However, the influence that computers in particular have had on art in general does not compare to the influence that an earlier, less advanced technological break-through had on the arts.

The Pixar shorts are a good example, that show an interesting short story which have developed over time along with the technology.

The Genre or Sci-Fi

Science fiction is a genre of fiction that relates to imagined innovations in science or technology, usualy in a futuristic setting, ideas could be from fantasy were its story and imaginary elements are very much possible within scientifically postulated laws of nature. The purpose of science fiction is to investigate the possibilitys and consiquences of such differences, thinking rashonaly about alternative ideas. The settings for science fiction can relate to well know reality yet push to a degree of disbalife due to scientific explinations. Such as settings in the future and outer space.

New Media

In early films such as American Fireman, the camera stays in one place for the action, with no camera cuts, and scenes are played twice from separate camera views. This technique refrains us from entering the action, there for does not engage the audience. As film developed cross cutting and close ups began to be used creating suspense, as well as being able to follow two different lines of action. It came to a stage were old film footage was used within game arcades, which created an experiment of finding a way of integrating narrative and game play through various possibility's of action, such as HeavyRain which allows you to take a different path every time you play depending on the choices you make. A way of telling stories and keeping busy of the game play. Yet games such as Dragons lair and space invaders have no replay value, once played you know the story.

Structuralism

This focus's on the opposites such as black and white, yet demonstrating the idea that there is more to just black and white, such as good and evil, it's not as determined to be just one or the other. Its how we make meaning of the word, Life and death, is there and in-between? hot and cold not everything is one or the other, what would we describe as hot? maybe as hot as the sun, or as cold as the north pole, warm is the in-between, the same with light and dark, when is a room completely dark or completely light, in reality complete light would be blinding and humans would not be able to function.

Intertextuality

Intertextuality is a case of using or borrowing and transforming a text to use in anouther, such as modern texts borrowing from earlier texts add weight to meaning. Tv shows such as Simpsons, Futurama, and Family Guy are very independent on intertextual references as a source of humour.

In-Jokes are also related as a joke within a group. Such as flush away, the reference towards Wallace and Gromit - produced by the same people, as well as the wolverine costume relating to the voice actor of that character.

Kids films feature a lot of Intertextuality such as Shrek and Toy Story mostly there to entertain the adults due to reference from older and famous films, were the can grasp a familiar concept.

Semiotics

I found this lecture quite interesting, as i i could relate to what what was being talked about,

Semiotics is about how we view things, for example we can automatically tell who is the hero and who is the villain.

If we see a character dressed in bright colour clothes with cheerful expressions we automaticly think that that character is the good guy, were as when we see a character in dark clothes with stern, angry features, its the opposite and we assume thats the bad guy. Our brains relate to the colours and appearance confirming how we identify the ch

aracters. Such as in spiderman he is dressed in bright red and blue when he is the hero, but his costume turns black when he becomes evil, creating an interesting switch to how we see the character.

Realism

A few interesting points were raised in this lecture, such as the 21st attitude towards realism, were over time it has come a lot more realistic, due to improvement in technology. I found it a bit strange that people would perchase these real life model babies paying extreme amounts of money, i saw a documentry about these were people took the babies out in public in prams, it all seems a bit odd.