Abstract
The typology proposed in this article comprehensively illuminates the formal characteristics of live action/animation hybrid films. By reference to six film analytical categories, the interplay of animation and live action film is explored within single images as well as on the level of montage, and is illustrated by means of examples from a wide variety of films. The flexible and adaptable set of parameters comprises all animation techniques and is applicable to whole films as well as to longer or shorter sequences. A further goal is to disintegrate the boundary that is often drawn between so-called mélange films and digital hybrid films. The only requirement is that the disparity between animation and live action film must be discernible to the viewers. Ideally, the application of the proposed typology will lead to a new historical positioning of hybrid tendencies within film history.
Keywords
Introduction
Parameters for the mapping of live action/animation film hybrids should build an accurate conception of the studied objects without levelling the differences between the distinct kinds of film, which may diverge on a formal, narrative or stylistic level. Looking at longer formats, examples of hybrid films can be found not only in historical and contemporary blockbuster productions, such as Jason and the Argonauts (Don Chaffey, 1963) or Avatar (James Cameron, 2009). They are also traceable in series like Out of the Inkwell (Max Fleischer/Dave Fleischer, 1915–1924) or Meister Eder and His Pumuckl (Ulrich König, 1982–1989), as well as in documentary films, such as Walking with Dinosaurs (Tim Haines/Jasper James, 1999) and The Green Wave (Ali Samadi Ahadi, 2010). There are even more diverse variations when it comes to hybrid short films: highly visual and independent works, such as Trade Tattoo (Len Lye, 1937) or Virgil Widrich’s Fast Film (2003), encounter music videos like the band Aha’s Take on Me (Stevon Barron, 1985), and remarkable advertisements, such as Suzuki’s Rock the Road (Lino Russell/Daniel Fraas, 2007). Finally, there are innumerable examples in which animations in the form of title compositions, special effects or animated transitions are linked to live action elements. The outlined pluralism makes it difficult to accurately conceive of the category of hybrid film, without levelling its diversity.
Consequently, studies published on this topic (Schwebel, 2010; Telotte, 2010) often focus on a historical consideration of prominent hybrid feature films. Further investigations deal with the interplay of live action film and one particular animation technique, or with narratively motivated parameters. Nicola Glaubitz (2007: 42) examines cartoon film hybrids, 1 while Sebastian Richter (2008) focuses on the interplay of computer animation and live action. Dominik Schrey (2009), however, discusses various concepts and theoretical models of hybridity and intermediality with reference to heterogeneous examples, while Erwin Feyersinger (2007) determines a set of parameters for his investigation of metalepsis in animation films. In order to define differences and similarities of hybrid forms on a narrative level, he points at the ‘amalgamation of ontologically separated layers’ (p. 124) that is manifested in varying degrees.
Frederick S Litten’s (2011) typology constitutes a combination of content-related and aesthetical criteria. In what he refers to as type 1, separate animation and live action images are assembled in montage; in type 2, drawn characters move in live action environments; while in type 3, conversely, human characters act within a drawn environment. In so-called package features (type 4), type 2, type 3 and/or type 1 are combined, while Litten refers to combinations of two or more kinds of animation techniques with live action as type 0 (pp. 3–6). An additional content-related layer is added to the classification by questioning whether the animated or live action characters interact with their respective other within the diegetic world.
Litten’s classification, which was developed for an analysis of drawn animation/live action hybrids of the 1960s–1980s, can – with slight modifications – be applied to other (digital) animation techniques. However, in certain respects, this classification system lacks clarity, which is why it cannot as easily be extended to include other hybrid formats. 2 According to Litten, the term hybrid should be reserved, first and foremost, to whole films and episodes of television series; it should only be applied to single sequences if and when applicable (p. 11). Micro-level analysis reveals, however, that in many films, a combination of type 1, type 2 and type 3 is all too frequent, which means that a majority of the films analysed would have to be classified as ‘package features’, without the possibility of a more detailed distinction. A similar logic applies to the use of several animation techniques within one film, i.e. type 0. In addition, Litten’s coupling of the diegetic interactions between animation and live action to the combination of the two film types in image and montage makes it difficult to apply this classification to experimental hybrid films.
Parameters for hybrid forms
Expanding upon Litten’s (2011: 3) construct, the parameters developed in this article should thus illuminate various characteristics of hybrid forms without necessarily referring back to technical details or making-of. The focus is entirely on visual markers, as the interaction of animation and live action film within an image constitutes the common denominator among the various initially mentioned hybrid formats. This formal typology should be applicable to whole films as well as to longer sequences, short scenes, and even to only a few single frames. While live action, at this point, is taken as a constant – in full awareness of the fact that the most diverse film styles are made use of on this side of the spectrum as well – all animation techniques known to date should be included in the classification scheme.
A further goal is to disintegrate the boundary that is often drawn between so-called mélange films and digital hybrid films (Giesen, 2003; Richter, 2008). 3 This follows, on the one hand, from the inversion of a common argument within animation studies in which digital techniques are self-evidently taken to be animations as well. Even the definition of animation has been extended, from the process of single frame recording (Furniss, 1998: 76) to the ‘creation of moving images through the manipulation of all varieties of techniques apart from live action methods’ (ASIFA, 2008). So if CGI (computer generated images) are integrated into the canon of animation techniques, analogue amalgamations of live action and animation film should, conversely, be regarded as hybrids.
On the other hand, I follow Barbara Flückiger’s (2008: 195–199) argument regarding analogue and digital compositing: in spite of at times visible matte lines and possible quality loss, she does not subordinate optical composition processes to digital compositing techniques and, additionally, questions the fundamental seamlessness of digital effects. As Flückiger illustrates by example, computer generated hybrid films, film-historically speaking, do often succeed analogue practices, be it within the special effects tradition, as an intended mainstream variety or as an experiment in short films. At this point, however, these historical connections should not become the focus of attention. In fact, considering my film samples, I aim for a broad distribution in terms of animation technique, length, format and year of production, in order to demonstrate the applicability of this classification system for aesthetical analyses.
The only requirement for the determined parameters to be workable is that the disparity between animation and live action film has to be discernible; it has to be taken into consideration, however, that the ‘visibility of animation film intervention is closely tied to the recipients’ viewing habits’ (Schrey, 2009: 10). 4
Animation techniques – Which and how many animation techniques are used?
The first step towards a set of parameters is to define which animation technique is used (see Table 1).
5
This is often a first step in the analysis of entirely animated film as well, and in this case serves the purpose of indicating which kind of hybridization with live action film elements is essentially possible. Ultimately, apart from technical details, certain visual markers are inherent in different kinds of animation. In hybrid films in which flat drawings interact with live action film – primarily cel animation, cutout techniques, direct film or modified base animation – the animated images or image parts significantly differ from the photographic images of live action films. As Nicola Glaubitz (2007: 42) argues:
The wealth of detail in photographic images stands in opposition to the drawing’s reduction to not, or hardly, shaded (colour) fields and stark contours. Drawings make one’s perception oscillate not only due to the synchronicity of the seen image object and the seen style, but also due to the simultaneous visibility of image object and image material, the iconic difference.
6
Animation techniques.
In some stop-motion techniques that make use of photographic images as well, such as object animation or pixilation, the aesthetic disparity between animation and live action is created mainly by a visible difference in the movements of objects and humans, respectively. Puppet animation and claymation, on the other hand, work with a stylization within the mise-en-scène, so that differences between live action film and animated settings or image elements are discernible. A vivid example can be found in the artfully assembled underwater scenes in Karel Zeman’s Vynález Zkázy (1957). As seen in Figure 1, live action elements of a real aquarium are staged with cut-out fishes and an animated model of a submarine. Their intentionally naive composition is inspired by Jules Verne’s novel as well as by Georges Méliès’ early special effects.
Vynález Zkázy (The Fabulous World of Jules Verne, Karel Zeman, 1957). © Ceskoslovenský Státní Film/Filmové Studio Gottwaldov/Ostalgica Film.
The broadest aesthetic spectrum is inherent in three-dimensional CGI, which is realized through a combination of keyframe animation, performance capture and live action film recordings edited in postproduction. A prominent example would be Tim Burton’s screen adaption of Alice in Wonderland (2010). From intentional visual disparities to seamless, invisible transitions, CGI comes up with all gradual nuances. Other digital techniques – above all, computer-aided cel animation and digital cutout animation – developed step by step from their analogue pendants and thus share a similar aesthetic. Therefore, the focus in this classification is exclusively on stylistic criteria, regardless of whether the animation techniques are implemented analogously or digitally.
It is equally possible that more than one (visually distinguishable) animation techniques are used in one film, e.g. in the science fiction film Tron (Steven Lisberger, 1989), in which CGI, analogously produced backlit animations, drawn effect animations and live action film meet (Litten, 2011: 6). These cases should also be taken into consideration.
Hybrid images: Image plane – On which layers are animation and live action elements located within a single image?
Essentially, all the previously mentioned animation techniques can be combined with live action sequences by means of hybridization through montage (see Table 2): in this case, single frames would constitute either animation or live action; the amalgamation occurs only in editing. While the techniques labelled above as other are hardly ever combined with live action elements within the same frame, hybridization within a single image, or spatial montage (Flückiger, 2008: 199) 7 does occur when it comes to categories A1–A5.
Hybrid images: Image plane.
Considering this relation between animation and live action within single images from a film analytical perspective, 8 without further knowledge about technical details, 9 a significant question to answer is on which image layer the animated elements are located: in some films they – objects, figures, signs – are located in the fore- or middle ground of the image, in front of a live action background. Similarly, there are live action elements in front of animated backgrounds; both forms are exemplified by the stop motion special effects in Jason and the Argonauts (Don Chaffey, 1963). The two animated, flying harpies who tyrannize the blind fortune-teller Phineas, for instance, act in front of a live action setting. Conversely, during the fight against the colossal Telos, the animated statue is located in the filmic background, while the live action humans interact predominantly in the foreground of the image. In other hybrid films, a hierarchy of fore- and background is not unambiguously discernible: either the animated and live action elements are located on the same image layer, separated, for instance, by split or multi screen, 10 or the hybridization occurs simultaneously on all image layers. The latter can be observed in the experimental music video We Got More (Cyriak, 2010) for the band Eskmo, in which a live action street scene becomes increasingly looped, mirrored and edited digitally. In Figure 2, you can see that not only is the zebra-crossing fold out on the left side of the screen, but also some giant creatures with live action legs and a cyclopean head – consisting of a television set an close up of one eye – crowd the streets.
We Got More (Cyriak, 2010). © Ninja Tune, 2010.
Eventually, there is a certain type of hybrid films and sequences that occupies a special position: while it appears to be entirely animated, the movements are visualized by rotoscopy, motion or performance capture. Because these procedures can be used in various animation techniques, they cannot be classified as a stand-alone animation style;
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however, they can be classified as amalgamations of animated and live action elements:
That way, it is less the film itself that becomes a hybrid, but rather only the rotoscoped body of the female protagonist, which constitutes a fluid boundary between the two media. Again, a disparity, or structural incongruence, is discernible, in which the media differential of animation and live action film can be located. (Schrey, 2009: 18)
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In terms of technique, the animation is actually placed on top of the live action image and is thus situated in the foreground; in terms of image plane analysis, however, it affects all image layers.
Besides the interplay of the two film types on the different image layers, it can also be determined whether animation or live action techniques are dominant or whether they are equally present within the image. Because the distribution within the image varies heavily depending on field size and movement, this characteristic is not established as a stable parameter. This aspect does prove useful, however, when the increasing usurpation of a live action image by animation begins to dominate the diegetic world. In the short film Pixels (Patrick Jean, 2010), for instance, a live action New York transforms into animated pixels on being attacked by objects from Donkey Kong, Space Invaders, Tetris, etc. until the whole world eventually mutates into a black cube.
If one example includes more than one animation techniques, further analysis may be necessary, in order to figure out whether one technique is predominant or whether all of them are used approximately equally.
Hybrid images: Disparities/transitions within images – To what degree is hybridity visible within single frames?
As mentioned above, the efficiency of the established typology is dependent on the disparity between animation and live action film remaining visible to the viewers (see Table 3). While for some kinds of animation, the designation of the applied animation technique already predetermines the in/visibility of the visual disparities, other techniques, like stop-motion or CGI, require additional parameters in order to determine how seamless the transition between the single image elements actually is. Sebastian Richter (2009) juxtaposes optical combination images and mélange films – in which the animation layer is visibly distinct from the live action layer – with digital compositing, where ‘the computer generated as well as the live action parts of the image merge indistinguishably into hybrid movement-images’ (p. 80). However, Richter does not take into consideration that – in spite of the technical possibilities of contemporary digital animation – a visual disparity is often forced by filmmakers. To quote Barbara Flückiger (2008: 195): ‘Just as little as film montage generates dissonances a priori, digital compositing exclusively produces seamless images.’ 13
Hybrid images: Disparities/transitions within images.
Synthesizing the visual component from Erwin Feyersinger’s (2007: 124) narratively motivated scheme of nuances, one has to separate figures that are intended to be very differentiated – aesthetically as well as regarding recording technique, and thus make the difference between animation and live action film clearly perceivable – from films in which the hybrid character is veiled by various representation strategies and recording techniques. 14 The resulting classification spectrum includes, on the one side, clearly visible boundaries between animated and live action elements within the image, e.g. in the short film series De Monsters by Volstok Telefunken (2009), in which digital, two-dimensional figures – like in Figure 3 – interact with humans in everyday situations. On the other side, it also includes concealed or seamless transitions between animated and live action elements within a single image, whereas the fundamental difference between animation and live action is still apparent. 15 A representative example would be the short film Madame Tutli-Putli (2007): a surrealist train journey is staged by means of puppet animation, but the protagonists’ eyes are live action recordings.
De Monsters, 080 Busstop Marcel (Volstok Telefunken, 2009). © Volstok Telefunken, 2008 (homepage http://www.demonsters.be).
Eventually, there are hybrid movement-images in Richter’s sense, in which the visual effects are not recognizable as such due to a perfectly staged digital realism; the viewers, however, are able to identify image manipulations because they know that the on-screen images would not be physically realizable in live action recordings. One example would be Gaspar Noé’s Enter the Void (2009), in which inconceivable tracking shots through rooms, along walls and in staggering heights hint at the blending of live action and CGI. 16
Hybrid montage: Combination of image types – In which ways are animated, live action or hybrid images combined in montage?
As soon as the spatial montage, i.e. the relation between animation and live action in a single frame is determined, the interplay of various image forms within a hybrid temporal montage may be discussed. A first step is to find out which previously defined image types are combined in editing (see Table 4). Nicola Glaubitz (2007: 42) differentiates between ‘animatic “elements” (single figures, objects), which appear synchronously in live action contexts (or live action elements in animatic contexts), from animatic “sequences”, which alternate with live action segments’. 17 However, Glaubitz does not mention the possibility that hybrid images can be combined in montage as well. Frederick S Litten (2011) subsumes the combination of several hybrid images in his type 4, i.e. in package features, but he does not differentiate between the various kinds of interaction.
Hybrid Montage: Combination of image types.
The parameters for hybrid temporal montage should account for hybrid images alternating with live action or animated film as well as for entirely animated and live action images being combined in montage. Equally conceivable is the interaction of all three image types, e.g. in the fairy-tale film Enchanted (Kevin Lima, 2007), in which sequences animated in a classical Disney universe are combined with live action scenes staged in contemporary New York which, in some cases, are linked by CGI. In other films, hybrid images are combined throughout film, e.g. in Virgil Widrich’s film historically motivated stop motion hybrid Fast Film (2003), in which sequences of selected live action films, which have been printed image by image, are folded into origami figures and backgrounds. Subsequently, they are animated into a ‘chase of cinematic chases’ (Tscherkassky, 2003) 18 , often turning the historical film heroes and antagonists into chasing machines like trains themselves, as seen in Figure 5.
Fast Film (Virgil Widrich, AT 2003). © Virgil Widrich Film- und Multimediaproduktions G.m.b.H. und Minotaurus Film Luxembourg, 2003.
Neighbours (Norman McLaren, 1952). © Norman McLaren/National Film Board of Canada.
Based on the typology of hybrid images that has been established previously, the category of montage combinations can be subdivided even further. At times, it can be observed that a single hybrid image type either dominates a film entirely, or is combined with animated and/or live action images. It is equally possible, however, that several different hybrid image types interact, which vary either regarding their technical make-up, their distribution within the image or their visibility.
Hybrid montage: Duration and frequency – With which frequency do live action, animated or hybrid images/elements alternate?
Now that the image types have been analysed in terms of their hybrid temporal montage, the next step is to determine the length of the single segments as well as the frequency with which they alternate (see Table 5). Additionally, it can be specified whether a micro- or a macro-analysis is intended.
Hybrid montage: Duration and frequency.
Long, entirely detached and stylistically separated sequences are possible in all variations mentioned in section (D). They often appear as title sequences, dreams or narrations depicted in the diegetic world, or as virtual, parallel worlds and metaphysical realities (Schmidt, 2013: 122). In the analysis of longer sequences it has to be determined, what the temporal relation between the individual image types is like within the film. It does constitute a significant difference whether shorter sequences of an animated film and/or hybrid images are embedded in a live action film, or whether short live action sequences frame an animated film.
A change of image types can, however, also occur within a sequence or scene in the sense of a decoupage: either over the entire duration of a film, or within one hybrid scene, e.g. in Terminator II: Judgment Day (James Cameron, 1991). In this sequence, T-1000 – who is comprised of fluid metal – first duplicates a policeman and subsequently kills him. Hybrid images, CGI and live action alternate on almost every shot. In CGI or stop motion animation, images alternate several times within one single take 19 and often without visible cuts, e.g. in Norman McLaren’s Neighbours (1952), in which live action recordings and sequences animated through pixilation alternate repeatedly in the neighbourly fight for a particularly desirable flower. However in Figure 5, the animation is clearly evident when the protagonists are defying gravity because of their excitement and are jumping through the setting without ever touching the ground.
At times, the shift between image types happens repeatedly within a few frames, which results in the highest possible alteration frequency.
Hybrid transitions – Which kinds of transition between the different image types are chosen in editing?
In a final step, the transitions between the individual image types are analysed (see Table 6). As in live action film (and animated film) editing, the most frequent form of transition in live action/animation hybrids is the straight cut, followed by simple fade ins, fade outs and dissolves. For a hybrid perspective, the latter are especially interesting because, for the duration of a dissolve – for instance from a fully animated to a live action image – hybrid images emerge that, theoretically speaking, are constantly changing, ‘because animated and live action elements are present “within the same image”’ (Schrey, 2009: 18). 20
Hybrid transitions.
Particular attention should also be drawn to animated dissolves, e.g. the ones created for the series Batman (William Dozier, 1966–1968), which consist of coloured batman signs, such as the pink one seen in Figure 6. Together with live action footage, these dissolves create hybrid images, similar to many digital dissolve effects, which today are often already included in simple editing programs.
Batman (William Dozier, 1966–1968). © 20th Century Fox Television/Warner Home Video.
A special form of digital, animated montage is created by using a morphing effect, which – for example, in Michael Jackson’s music video Black or White (John Landis, 1991) – makes live action recordings of people merge seamlessly with each other, which, according to Barbara Flückiger (2010: 24), essentially constitutes a keyframe animation transferred into the photographic domain.
Some invisible transitions overlap in their definition at least partly with the already presented category E3; however, whereas in section (E) the frequency within a single shot is the main priority, the present category subsumes all invisible transitions, be it between two shots, scenes or whole sequences, e.g. at the beginning of Fight Club (David Fincher, 1999) when ‘a computer generated tracking shot through brain structures without any visible cuts is combined with filmed footage showing a human face’ (Richter, 2008: 14). 21
Hybrid analyses
The classification scheme proposed in this article is by no means intended to squeeze the individual examples into a rigid grid; it is much rather designed to be flexible and adaptable to the inherent characteristics of the respective films. As needed, individual parameters can be excluded, focused on or variably combined. In order to illustrate a possible application of this classification scheme, three selected, stylistically heterogeneous short films are briefly analysed by reference to the categories outlined above.
Hybrid ghosts
Vormittagsspuk (Ghosts Before Breakfast, Hans Richter, 1928) is a Dadaist avant-garde film classic. After several abstract animations, this is Richter’s first piece of work that includes figurative and narrative elements. In this film, objects rebel against humans, carry out mischief in the house and garden, while the human protagonists are flabbergasted and helpless. The largest parts of the film as well as some special effects are created from live action recordings, while a smaller portion was realized through object animation, pixilation, and analogue cutout as well as silhouette animation. In terms of a macro-analysis, one can speak of animated sequences that are embedded in an experimental live action film.
The animations themselves impress, in spite of their simple forms, with an incredibly diverse style. Some stop motion scenes – e.g. when pistols dance on the table, a plant grows leaves or mugs fill themselves up with coffee – reveal their animated character due to their clearly modified, sometimes jumpy movement patterns or due to the simple impossibility of the on-screen image being a live action representation. Other animated images differ more markedly from live action footage, particularly when it comes to a target that is shown several times. In Figure 7, body parts are made to rotate by means of a particular kind of cutout animation and the target’s circles act independently as abstract signs in front of various photographs. At no point, however, is there a hybridization of animated and live action elements within a single image.
Vormittagsspuk (Ghosts Before Breakfast, Hans Richter, 1928). © Courtesy Hans Richter Estate.
In the hybrid montage, the different image types are usually combined by straight cuts, whereas a clustering of animated images is clearly noticeable at the beginning and towards the end of the film. In the first and last sequences, animations regularly alternate with live action shots. Towards the middle of the film, the effects – with only one exception – are implemented through live action methods such as long dissolves, tilted camera angles or duplicated movement patterns. The cutting frequency in these duplications is at times so high that one could almost refer to them as animated single images as well. A special effect that is repeatedly applied to live action as well as animated sequences is the use of negative copies of the respective film material.
An interesting aspect in terms of hybrid transitions is noticeable right at the beginning of the film: the protagonist’s collar and bow tie start to move on their own. In this case, there is a repeated alteration between animated and live action film within one shot and the transitions are so seamless that their montage is hardly recognizable.
Hybrid love
In Jonas Odell’s Aldrig som första gången! (Never Like the First Time!, 2006) four men and women of different ages talk about their first sexual experiences. The interviews featured in this short animated documentary were taken in 2002 and are visualized in four episodes of equal length, whereas the different sections work with various animation styles and techniques.
In the first part, Odell combines photographed and drawn elements of markedly different material structure through cutout animation. Chapter 4 works with similar digital cutouts; however, the aesthetic of the image material – corresponding to the spirit of the 1920s evoked by the narrator – is matched to old postcards, fashion illustrations and paper dolls. Additionally, the cutouts are combined with 3D tracking shots. In the second and third chapter, hybrid images are created, especially due to the fact that, in these two parts, the protagonists’ movements are generated through rotoscopy. Jonas Odell (see Bowers, 2013) confirms this observation in an interview with Vice Magazine: ‘We used a mix of live action and animation in a couple of the stories where we felt the motion of real people rather than animated ones would provide the right feeling for what we wanted.’
On the level of macro-analysis, it can be said that in Never Like the First Time!, different hybrid and animated images are combined in the form of long, separated sequences.
On the level of micro-analysis, it makes sense to examine one of the two sections categorized as hybrid in more detail: in chapter 2, a young woman relates how, together with her boyfriend, they slowly approached their first time during weekly visits over a longer period of time. Visually, this is conveyed through digital, contoured animations in front of colourful, photographic backgrounds such as underground stations, dull suburbs and sparse teenage bedrooms. One may assume that the foreground was animated and the background live action. But this is not the case here: while the background is either explored through digital camera movements, or remains static, Odell creates the movements of the contoured protagonists through rotoscopy. As seen in Figure 8, the bodies in the foreground could be classified as hybrid, acting in front of an animated background, whereas the transitions within the image are clearly perceivable.
Aldrig som första gången! (Never Like the First Time!, Jonas Odell, 2006). © Filmtecknarna F. Animation, 2006.
Regarding the temporal montage, it can be argued that a hybrid image type almost continuously dominates the sequence and only sporadically alternates with fully animated images in alternating shots; almost exclusively, straight cuts are used, except for two short fades-to-black. The beginning and the end of this sequence are marked by animated transitions, which simulate a view through the windows of a passing underground train.
Hybrid experiment
In the short film Camera Obscura (Matthieu Buchalski/Jean-Michel Drechsler/Thierry Onillon, 2007), a novel invention – reminiscent of an analogue film projector – transfers moving images directly into the head of a blind man. Animated figures descend from the screen, inhabit the clinical room in which the experimental arrangement is set up and frighten him.
Animated and live action elements are combined in various image types. The beginning of the film, for instance, consists of live action footage of the protagonist sitting down on a chair in the middle of the empty room. The memory sequences, which eventually still the protagonist’s fear of the projected figures, are also entirely comprised of live action footage. As soon as the projection begins, however, faceless animated puppets made of wood, musical instruments and an elephant – all realized through CGI – conquer the room.
Within the empty room, there may be no identifiable background that could be referred to as either animated or live action, but because the field sizes and camera angles vary greatly, animated and live action elements also meet in hybrid images: sometimes it is the animated figure that is in the foreground, while at other times it is the live action protagonist, and in certain shots the animation as well as the live action figures are located in the image. The boundaries between animated and live action elements within the single images are, however, clearly discernible, as evident in Figure 9.
Camera Obscura (Matthieu Buchalski/Jean-Michel Drechsler/Thierry Onillon, 2007). © Supinfocom Valenciennes, 2007.
In a hybrid montage, all the described image types are combined. The various hybrid images as well as animated and live action elements alternate for the duration of the whole film in a classical decoupage. In terms of editing, cuts and dissolves are used for the most part; only at the end of the film, the animated figures – portrayed as silhouettes – increasingly cover the image and cause a fade out.
Conclusion
The outlined typology, which is strictly oriented towards visual criteria, is intended to illuminate formal aspects of the respective examples and should be understood as a first step in tracing and understanding animation/live action hybrids. In comparison to Frederik S. Litten’s classification system, which initiated the thought process that lead to the establishment of the parameters outlined in this article, the immense diversity of the various forms of hybrid films can now better be accounted for due to the separation of formal and content-related concerns. Instead of pushing the selected film samples into prefabricated categories, the proposed typology is intended to open up the individual hybrid perspectives within the images and in their temporal montage to a flexible adjustment.
The fundamental goal is to eventually integrate all kinds of hybrid films, no matter what form they take in terms of technique (analogue/digital), length, format or production date. The established categories serve as guidelines on the way to realize this goal and can be modified and supplemented as needed. 22 Additionally, some parameters will be more frequently met than others: the question regarding the visibility of hybridization within an image, for instance, is at times answered ex ante when animation techniques like cel animation or direct film are concerned. The category of hybrid transitions may, in certain films, also be disregarded if only straight cuts are used that do not reveal any salient features.
Like most typologies, this one is at times stretched to its limits as well, especially when it comes to experimental films. However, this is the point where particularly interesting questions arise, e.g. regarding the fundamental status of an image. In close readings of hybrid examples, a repeatedly emerging category is, for instance, non-animation in the sense of stills, black-screens, photos or drawings. They can neither be categorized as live action images, nor can they be attributed to a certain animation technique, because no movement is inherent in these images. Nonetheless, they are part of the film. These observations overlap, in certain ways, with the debate about hybrid photo films (Lydia Nsiah, 2011), 23 in which movement and non-movement do play a central role, but the images in question are still almost exclusively of a photographic nature.
A similarly interesting paradox arises when films do illustrate the outlined hybrid criteria on a visual level, but technologically they are entirely animated. In the animated documentary Magnetic Movie by the artistic duo Semiconductor (Ruth Jarman, Joe Gerhardt, 2007), the audio track conveys NASA and Berkeley scientists talking about their discoveries. These discoveries are represented visually through abstract CGI computer animations projected into photographic images of empty laboratories that have seemingly been taken by a simple hand camera. In Figure 10, what appears, at first sight, to be a hybridization of animated and live action film turns out to be a CGI animation in front of equally animated photographs that give the impression of live action footage.
Magnetic Movie (Semiconductor, Ruth Jarman, Joe Gerhardt, 2007). © Semiconductor MMVII.
This raises the question of whether, or to what degree, the digitally reproduced intention of live action can be equated to an actual live action recording, and essentially establishes a connection to the initially outlined content-related interrogations of Feyersinger and Litten.
Out of what intention are the two film types amalgamated? How are interactions linked within the diegesis? Do hybridization tendencies ensue even outside their technological realization within the film, e.g. when it comes to film genres or intercultural aspects? All these questions initially do not feature prominently in a formal film analysis along the proposed parameters, but they should be taken into consideration in a second step.
Another advantage of the established classification scheme is its applicability on a macro-level – for the quick incorporation into a hybrid film corpus – as well as on a micro-level, as illustrated by the examples above.
Even more precise results may be obtained by means of a shot log adapted according to the hybrid parameters. Eventually, macro- as well as micro-analytical applications of this typology may, as initially outlined, lead to a new historical positioning of hybrid tendencies within film history. Ideally, the application of the outlined parameters will open up the field to films that have not yet been classified as hybrid, but do adopt various techniques of animated and live action films.
Footnotes
Acknowledgements
This article was written in close dialogue with Dr. Erwin Feyersinger and translated by Birgit Haberpeunter. Some of the ideas were developed and/or re-evaluated in discussions with the students on my course ‘Media transitions – Hybrids of animation and live action’ at the Department of Theatre, Film and Media Studies at the University of Vienna 2011–2013. An earlier version of this text was published in German under the title ‘Hybrides Bild, Hybride Montage’ in montage AV: Journal for Theory and History of Audio-Visual Communication. Issue Animation, 22/2/2013. I would like to thank the editorial board for the re-publishing rights: Christine N Brinckmann, Evelyn Echle, Erwin Feyersinger, Britta Hartmann, Frank Kessler, Guido Kirsten, Kristina Köhler, Stephen Lowry, Maike Sarah Reinerth, Jörg Schweinitz, Patrick Vonderau, Hans J. Wulff and Julia Zutavern.
Funding
This article was supported by a University of Vienna research fellowship (2013). The author declares that there is no conflict of interests.