The Princess and the Frog Discussion - Part II

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Disney Live On
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Post by Disney Live On »

:D AMAZING!!!!
I agree it does give you a lot of story but how else would they do it. I will say though I wish we'd heard more of the original songs. But I suppose in further trailers we might get something more. But it is very swan princess with the magic water swirls. lol. :lol:
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Post by yukitora »

Based on the trailer, it's going to be difficult for the film to disappoint :lol:
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ColorsOfTheWind
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Post by ColorsOfTheWind »

Is it me, or does anyone else fall more in love with Naveen every time they watch the trailer? :)
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totallyminnie86
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Post by totallyminnie86 »

Sorry if I missed this somewhere along here.. but this image on the Apple site, is this the official poster art?


http://images.apple.com/moviesxml/s/dis ... 081541.jpg
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Mooky
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Post by Mooky »

Wow, great find, totallyminnie86! It looks beautiful!
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Jules
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Post by Jules »

I get the feeling TPatF is going to make up for BOLT's slightly anemic takings big-time.

Who knows? It might even out-gross Shrek 2! :P
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ColorsOfTheWind
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Post by ColorsOfTheWind »

Oh wow, that poster is beautiful! Everything I'm seeing of this movie just keeps making me more and more excited to see it.

Also, does anyone remember if there is a special opening for The Princess and the Frog earlier than the actual release date? I remember reading somewhere that in late November, special releases would take place in New York and LA. Can anyone confirm this?
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Post by Flanger-Hanger »

If the secondary characters were removed that poster would be perfect.
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Mooky
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Post by Mooky »

Here's a bigger version of the poster:

http://impawards.com/2009/princess_and_ ... g_xlg.html
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Disney Duster
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Disney and Rotoscoping

Post by Disney Duster »

DISNEY DIDN'T TRACE the live-action frames into the animation.

You need to know

THE TRUTH ABOUT DISNEY ROTOSCOPING.

I know there's another thread for it, but I am answering the people's comments in here directly. Especially sotiris, Divinity, and Flanger-Hanger. It's necessary. It's important.
sotiris2006 wrote:Disney from the beginning of animated features films has used extensive rotoscoping and i don't just mean live-action reference footage.

Rotoscoping

From Wikipedia:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rotoscoping

1) "Walt Disney and his animators employed it carefully and very effectively in Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in 1937. Rotoscoping was also used in many of Disney's subsequent animated feature films with human characters, such as Cinderella in 1950. Later, when Disney animation became more stylized (e.g. One Hundred and One Dalmatians, 1961), the rotoscope was used mainly for studying human and animal motion, rather than actual tracing"

2) "Peter Pan: Bobby Driscoll as Peter Pan, where his performance was filmed, and then rotoscoped for the animated character"

From the book "Hippo in a Tutu"

http://jimhillmedia.com/blogs/jim_hilll ... eview.aspx

1) "Of course, when it came to "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs," Disney did have a secret weapon: 14 year-old Majorie Belcher. Starting in 1934, this professionally trained dancer appeared in dozens of 16 mm films that the Studios artists then blew up into photostats. Which were then traced so that the movement of this film's title character would be that much more life-like, would come across as that much more believably human".

2) "Marge may been the first dancer to toil in secret for Disney (Says Belcher: 'I was sworn to secrecy about all that I did ... The words rotoscoping and tracing ... were forbidden')".
First off, you cited freakin' Wikipedia. It's untrue. Or rather, they are not using the correct word, and don't know what rotoscoping is.

Second, and more importantly, as it's from a book source, I saw that Jim Hill article a way back. I read all that. And here's what you did not think of:

They say they made photostats. That were traced. Guess what? That's it. They did not trace the pictures onto the animation paper they used for the characters. They may have traced the images onto some animation paper, to see how it moved, but they did not trace them onto the animation paper used for the final character animation. They instead looked at their tracings for reference.

From another book, not some quotes from a book on the internet, but from the book I own, "The Art of Walt Disney", it says: "Years earlier, Max Fleischer had devised a method of filming live actors and using the results as a guide for his animators. This system, known as rotoscoping, yielded gestures and mannerisms that could never be invented."

I beg to posit that you can imagine or invent anything, but Marc Davis did say live-action reference helped with things "you can't pull out of your head", like exactly how a real person would walk or move.

My book continues, "Now actors were brought to Hyperion Avenue (the performer cast as Snow White went on to achieve fame as the dancer Marge Champion), and they would act out a piece of "business" in front of the cameras - often under the direction of the animators themselves. This action would then be transferred to a series of photostats which the animator could use for reference. The artist could, in fact, have simply traced the figures from the photostats, but this was seldom done because the characters had to be adapted in order to be consistent with the remainder of the animation. Instead, a kind of gentle caricature was employed, so that gestures and poses became slightly exaggerated. This system served the animators well, and they continued to use it in later movies."

In an interview with Grim Natwick:
DJ: I know you've talked a lot in the past about how you didn't like to use the rotoscope, but didn't the rotoscope help with the timing, for instance?'

Grim Natwick: Well, we changed it often. We never went in and told Walt we were doing it.(Here he talks about the one hundred and one rotoscoped images of one particular scene from Snow White and how he used the first and last ones but everything in between was done free-hand, without the rotoscope [the scene, Snow White running down the stairs after hearing the pot boiling over, was partly cut in the final version.]. He never told this to Walt, who upon seeing it, is said to have stated: "That's just what I want!") And we took liberties. Walt never said, "Don't do this", but if it didn't work, you got the scene back and re-animated it.

That's from: http://www.animationartist.com/InsideAn ... twick3.htm

I swear I remember reading about one scene where Snow White walked up the stairs and the animator felt bad because he had to rotoscope it, but here's two things: rotoscoping could have just been what he called heavy live-action referencing, and the other thing is the interview at least proves that at least some of Snow White, even the very human title character, was free-handed, and not rotoscoped in any way at all.

You should probably read what merlinjones was told by animators about rotoscoping, how it was just live-action reference, tracing onto photstats, but not actually putting any of the tracings in the animation.

At: http://www.ultimatedisney.com/forum/vie ... 33810ae5eb

And I'll tell you why it is impossible for Disney to have literally directly traced the live-action into the animation paper and also drew them in the cartoony designs and movements you see in the film. You can't trace two things at once. In other words, pay careful attention to this, but you can't trace a new cartoony design over the next live-action film frame, because then the previous cartoony-designed tracing would not match up. Snow White's eyes or anything else would not be in the same exact place, it would look terrible, shaky, wrong, just bad, and you would also know something was up.

So you would need to either have the characters be extremely close to the live-action frames and look bad (probably how Gulliver and Anastasia were), or you merely make some tracings of key poses and look at them for reference.

Didn't Marc Davis say, on the Sleeping Beauty release, I forget which one, that he was always angry that people thought they traced the live-action right into the animation paper, and he tried whenever he could to let them know they never did?

FINALLY, I leave you with this from Marc Davis: "Cinderella's movements were never tracings of the live model because if you trace a photographic image with a flat line, the image becomes wide and gross. Live action is useful as a pattern to help you in the difficult things that you can't pull out of your head."

Yea. Your welcome, Disney animators, for me trying to prevent lies from being spread about your animation.
sotiris2006 wrote:
UmbrellaFish wrote:However, Anastasia is obviously HEAVILY rotoscopped. As far as I know, Snow White was rotoscopped in only one scene.
Actually they've used it in every scene that features a human character besides the dwarfs.
Uh, NO, as I just proved. Especially with what Grim Natwick said.
sotiris2006 wrote:[You could buy the book, I'm sure it will give you an insight on the subject. The reason that there is not so much info about Disney rotoscoping out there is because of Disney's efforts to disclose the matter.
OMG, you're wrong again? Wow! I actually own books that dispel the lies you're spreading? Wow! And as I said, people did believe Disney rotoscoped. Marc Davis, and other animators I'm sure, tried all they could to explain they never rotoscoped in the "tracing live-action into the animation" sense, and to explain what they really did. The reason there's not much info about is because they really never did rotoscope, and when they tried to say they didn't and explain what they really did, no one listened, or got it. You shouldn't be one of them, either.

If you think I'm being rude or using strong language, guess what, it's because I'm pissed at you spreading wrong, negative information!
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Post by Sotiris »

Mooky wrote:Here's a bigger version of the poster:

http://impawards.com/2009/princess_and_ ... g_xlg.html
Thanks for the link. :) It's a nice poster although Tiana looks off model here.
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Post by Elladorine »

Wow, I can't believe how uptight people are getting about the rotoscoping, as if it's some evil thing. :p There's been a link posted to a more appropriate thread to discuss it in.
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Re: Disney and Rotoscoping

Post by Disney Duster »

Disney Duster wrote:I know there's another thread for it, but I am answering the people's comments in here directly. Especially sotiris, Divinity, and Flanger-Hanger. It's necessary. It's important.
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Post by JDCB1986 »

Mooky wrote:Here's a bigger version of the poster:

http://impawards.com/2009/princess_and_ ... g_xlg.html
I wonder if Disney Movie Rewards will have this poster ?!
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Post by Sotiris »

Yes, Disney Duster you sound very rude and angry and i do not think this is acceptable. I thought that in this forum we express our opinions without attacking or mocking others and respect fellow members. You could have made your point without being so aggressive.

Now that I'm done with 'forum ethics', let me get to what you are saying.

You have said "The artist could, in fact, have simply traced the figures from the photostats, but this was seldom done because the characters had to be adapted in order to be consistent with the remainder of the animation. Instead, a kind of gentle caricature was employed, so that gestures and poses became slightly exaggerated. This system served the animators well, and they continued to use it in later movies."

That's what I mean when referring to disney rotoscoping. No one suggested that it's the same type of rotoscoping (but is still a type) with the Fleischer films or the contemporary "A Scanner Darkly" or "Waking Life".

I'm quoting Flanger-Hanger here: "Compare Waking Life for example with Anastasia and you'll see a big difference in direct rotoscoping and the technique which Don Bluth uses which involves exaggerating the actor's features and appearance plus smoothing out the action so that it doesn't appear "shaky" like direct tracing of live action footage and clean up artists who do the same job as they do with regular animation, making sure the characters are on model, and in between animators to finalize the movements of the characters".

This is the same thing that the quote from your book says.

Also, I don't think that rotoscoping is an "evil technique" that taints the art of those who use it when is used creatively and effectively. I don't understand why you feel i 'accused' or 'offended' the disney artists by suggesting they used some type of rotoscoping. I still think they were great masters of the craft and using rotoscoping for some sequences was a wise choice that helped make their films better.
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Post by Disney's Divinity »

Thanks, Disney Duster for going through the effort of defending Disney. I really don't know about Disney's past with rotoscoping myself, so I enjoy reading information about it.

Mooky wrote:Here's a bigger version of the poster:

http://impawards.com/2009/princess_and_ ... g_xlg.html
That poster is gorgeous! I guess Facilier doesn't have any sidekicks--he definitely looks to be a strong villain so far (with Keith David!). Mama Odie is also interesting to me, particularly the fact that her friend is a snake. Usually snakes are malevolent in Disney films. But I know that many cultures revere the snake for its wisdom. I'm glad they're trying to not be so stereotypical about what is portrayed as evil.

I still think this film might offend the Christian crowd because of the use of voodoo (especially by the "good" Mama Odie), and that snake isn't going to help. But they'll be determined to hate this film anyway, so why worry?

To begin with, I was slightly worried about this film, and it might still have flaws when it finally hits theaters, but the more I see, the more excited I get. But I'll have to remember to enter the theater with no expectations, otherwise I will be disappointed.
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Ariana Grande ~ "we can't be friends (wait for your love)"
Ariana Grande ~ "imperfect for you"
Kacey Musgraves ~ "The Architect"
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Post by Escapay »

Every time an animator rotoscopes, Animated Jesus cries.

albert
WIST #60:
AwallaceUNC: Would you prefer Substi-Blu-tiary Locomotion? :p

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Post by Sotiris »

Escapay wrote:Every time an animator rotoscopes, Animated Jesus cries.
:lol: :lol:

Crazy Ol' Escapay! :wink:
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Post by Flanger-Hanger »

Escapay wrote:Every time an animator rotoscopes, Animated Jesus cries.

albert
He must have crucified himself by the time Titan A.E. was released.
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Post by Escapay »

sotiris2006 wrote:
Escapay wrote:Every time an animator rotoscopes, Animated Jesus cries.
:lol: :lol:

Crazy Ol' Escapay! :wink:
sotiris2006:
Crazy ol' Escapay!

Disney's Divinity:
He's always good for a laugh.

Gaston:
Crazy ol' Escapay, hmm? Crazy ol' Escapay, hmm...
(begins singing)

LeFou, I'm afraid I've been thinking

Lefou:
A dangerous pastime

Gaston:
I know.
But that wacky young coot is UD's poster
And his sanity's only "so-so"

Now the wheels in my head have been turning
Since I looked at that loony young man
See, I've promised myself I'd be as funny as him
And right now I'm evolving a plan

(suddenly Escapay appears and the music stops. A cricket chirps. The camera cuts from Gaston, to Escapay, to Gaston again, who smile weakly, to Escapay again, who is not amused.)

Gaston:
Sorry...

(Escapay walks away, and Gaston sticks his tongue out and makes a face.)

Escapay:
(without turning around)
I saw that.

albert
WIST #60:
AwallaceUNC: Would you prefer Substi-Blu-tiary Locomotion? :p

WIST #61:
TheSequelOfDisney: Damn, did Lin-Manuel Miranda go and murder all your families?
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