Wednesday, 18 September 2013

Vertical Pixilation ft. Her Morning Elegance & Sorry I'm Late

It's time for another research and in-depth discussion on things that could potentially be a big part of my future. I recently looked in to the animation form pixilation, which consists of a stop-motion technique where live actors are used as a frame-by-frame subject in an animated film, by repeatedly posing while one or more frame is taken and changing pose slightly before the next frame. The full blog is available for viewing here: http://strictlysavage.blogspot.co.uk/2013/09/pixilation.html.

 Moving on from pixilation, we come to vertical pixilation. This is a slightly more advanced way of using different frames to make a production. Instead of the camera being in the original positioning of facing forwards, it is placed up above the floor facing downwards to create a birds eye view effect. Vertical pixilation creates a more dynamic and on-edge performance that intoxicates the audience to watch the film. There are two films in particular that I have researched in to whilst investigating vertical pixilation, and they are 'Sorry I'm Late' by Thomas Mankovsky and 'Her Morning Elegance' by Oren Lavie and Eyal Landesman. These two films are a prime example of professional, crisp vertical pixilation as they really create an effect. A simple production by moving people and items around underneath a camera can create such moving production.

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 Sorry I'm Late is a production produced by a Polish-born director called Thomas Mankovsky. He began his career in advertising as a creative at Ogilvy in Stockholm, then moved to London to work at Fallon for the next five years. Thomas then went on to bigger and better opportunities by winning awards in advertising for clients such as Diesel, Sony, Orange and Cadbury. After deciding he wanted to create something fro scratch for his own good will, Thomas designed and began production Sorry I'm Late, which is a short-film inspired by the effects of vertical pixilation.
Mankovsky planned basic footage in his flat, with the help of his friend

This production was originally planned in Mankovsky's flat with the help of his friend. These were just the basic shots and he would then later produce them on to something better when all the production was almost ready to film. There were a number of original techniques that Thomas used to create this film, especially within the planning stages as this was the most crucial stage to make the production a success. He stated on his website "the first animation tests were shot at home. Stine (friend) pulled the trigger while I was figuring out how much to move between each shot." 



To cast the production, Thomas Mankovsky auditioned many people to be a part of his film. He stated on his website "we met a bunch of people and asked them to try and mimic what was on our printed freeze frames." I think it was really good doing in this way as it lets the audience know that normal people can help directors and creators produce such a basic yet highly-skilled film. I really like the concept of this film as I think it's lovely how the frames influence each other for the next movement. I have shared this video on all social networking sites I own as I feel this film is totally underrated. I love it!

Behind the scenes shots and the making of Sorry I'm Late

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Her Morning Elegance is a production that is also inspired by vertical pixilation, directed by Oren Lavie, Yuval and Merav Nathan. Her Morning Elegance has become a pop-art phenomena and the most successful stop-motion ever. The whole production took a total of 2096 still photographs that were shot and sequenced to create the sense of movement, and 48 hours of shooting.


I really like the concept of this whole production, and in particular, the way the background moves more than the actual people. It gives it that originality and a cut above the rest to make it more interesting. The production was set in a bed representing the theory of Freud’s psychoanalysis of dreams behind this stop motion video. According to Freud, the dream is considered ‘the guardian of sleep and that dreams allows gratification of certain drives through a visual fantasy, or manifest content’. There is a lot of hidden messages in this video, and it's almost an indirect way of showing emotions and feelings that the lady is feeling. For example, When the female actress is falling slowly sideways holding onto the bed, this represents fear of loosing control of her mind during her dreams. 
My personal favourite shots/movements of the production

I really like this movie. I think it's been shot very well and considering there were only 6 people involved over the whole production - it's very professional and clean. My favourite idea of this production is that the background tends and the actors move on the spot. The indirect messages keep this movie different from the rest of the other vertical pixilation animations we have looked at, and as I said before, it does give it that edge and originality.


Cheerio. :o)

- Olivia.
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