Through the courses DESIGN FOR ANIMATION, NARRATIVE STRUCTURES & FILM LANGUAGE, I have learned a lot of knowledge of animation theory, such as Visual Language and Cultural Contexts, Three-Part Story and Five-Act Structure, Golden Ratio, the rules of screen orientation and so on
After the course, I developed the ability to propose problems by myself, collect data and read literature, study the problem, and write a report, which helped me a lot.

Title: Adaptations of Chinese poetry in cross-cultural animated films — A case study of Disney’s animated film Mulan

Research Question:
→Chinese poetry is short, concise and graphic to reflect the life of the ancient Chinese people, and compared with other literary works, poetry reflects life in a more focused and typical way. As I have a strong interest in poetry and animation, I would like to explore:
1. American animation film themes adapted from Chinese poetry, in the animation of the traditional Chinese cultural understanding and output whether there is an error?
→We want to explore whether there is any difference, and we decided to look at the difference in the storytelling content and the character design (including character costume/character personality, etc.) in the story.

2. What are the differences between animated films in terms of storyline and character design?
3. Why are there errors/reasons for the errors?

4.What kind of impact will this kind of cross-cultural animation film have on the animation industry and humanities?
5. Attitudes towards cross-cultural animated films

Feedback:

1. it’s difficult to mix two topic together

2. If choose topic1, it is better to choose a niche independent animation to investigate its potential for psychological healing.

3. If I choose topic two, I need to be familiar with Chinese animation and have a deep understanding.

After Class Thinking: I’m thinking about comparing differences between the original and Disney’s animated film Mulan . The first part compares the story, character modeling, scene, music, and color composition, and the second part compares the cultural elements in the animation.

Reasons：

1. interested in Chinese poetry
2. also studied about the animated film Mulan to some extend in the blog of my previous course, so I hope to go deeper with my dissertation.

Topic1. Taking Pixar/Disney animated films as an example, this paper studies what kind of animated story content and character-shaping animated films can help improve interpersonal relationships and regulate mental health by comparing the healing value of animated films.

Keywords: animated film; Hypothetical; Psychological healing

Resources:

Levett A. Scripting therapeutic screen stories: animating the healing potential of film narratives[J]. 2013.

Gong Y. HEALINGA Brief Analysis on the Artistic Features and Functions of Animal Characters in Healing Animation[C]//SHS Web of Conferences. EDP Sciences, 2023, 159.

Topic2. Animation art is a form of artistic expression that integrates literary creation and audio-visual language, and artistic creation should be based on the corresponding cultural background. Take Chinese animation as an example to study the cultural output in animation.

Keywords: Chinese animation; Cultural background

Resources:

Giesen R. Chinese animation: a history and filmography, 1922-2012[M]. McFarland, 2014.

Lent J A, Ying X. Chinese animation: An historical and contemporary analysis[J]. Journal of Asian Pacific Communication, 2013, 23(1): 19-40.

Three-Part Story and Five-Act Structure

Protasis:

Prologue: In ancient China, there was a bright and kind-hearted girl named Hua Mulan (Mulan). As the eldest daughter of the Hua family, Hua Mulan, under the enlightened teachings of her parents, has always looked forward to bringing honour to the Hua family.

Epitasis:

Conflict: When the Huns were attacking in the north and the country was recruiting soldiers, Mulan’s aged father was even drafted to go to the battlefield. Fearing that her father would never return, the sad Hua Mulan took advantage of the midnight to disguise herself as a man and stole her father’s armor to go to the battlefield in her father’s place.In order to protect Hua Mulan, the ancestors of the Hua family send a kind-hearted Mushu dragon to accompany her, bringing her much laughter and assistance along the way.

Climax:After joining the army, Hua Mulan became an indispensable general in the army with her perseverance and patience. However, when she went to the north to fight, Hua Mulan’s daughter body was discovered by her colleagues in the army. Fearing that Mulan would be sentenced by the court officials for “deceiving the king”, the men of the family had to abandon her in the snowy and icy mountains and went to fight in the land of Xiong Nu on their own.

Catastrophe:

Falling action:Fortunately, Mushu was there to give her moral support and encouragement, and Hua Mulan’s belief in bringing glory to the Hua family supported her in not giving up

Denouement: Mulan ended up assisting the imperial army to fend off the incoming Huns and saved all of China

This lesson focuses on character placement and composition, with references to the Golden Ratio:

There’s a lot to be said for the angle of the shot, the length of the shot, the placement of the shot, and so on.

The layout of the animation is designed taking into account the style of the film, the design of the characters. Also the rules of screen orientation need to be considered to avoid confusing the viewer during camera tracks and panning.

Content:

This animation film tells the story of a bird leading a group of beasts to overthrow the violent and capricious rule of a king. The film originated in France and reflected the era background of the French Revolution when people were miserable under the French absolute monarchy.

Racial equality and class equality: The love between the black guy and the shepherdess in the animation was not recognized by the elders because of their different skin color and race, and the two chose to escape and finally achieved a happy ending. This is also in line with the “liberty, equality, fraternity” and human liberation advocated by the French Revolution.

Social injustice – anti-power willfulness and anti-authority: In the animation, the king treats his subjects at will and makes evil laws according to his own will. Finally, under the instigation and organization of the birds, the subjects finally rose up to overthrow the rule of the king, and the hegemony also tasted the due consequences.

Through the form of animation, we can better understand and remember history, and at the same time make people aware of issues such as racial differences, class inequality and social injustice, which has far-reaching educational significance.

The animation director and his works are inseparable, because the animation director is the leader of the entire animation production group. The director is the key to the production of the whole work, he must grasp the overall situation, and make clear instructions and requirements for the work of role setting, painting supervision, voice actor and sound supervision. Therefore, the level of animation director directly affects the quality of animation presentation. And Tony as an animation director in 1988 to make the quality animation Mulan shows his ability.

Content:

The film is adapted from the Chinese folk Yue-fu poem Mulan Ci, which tells the story of Hua Mulan, who joins the army in place of her father to fend off the invasion of the Huns.

The work reflected the status of women in society at that time, but Mulan in the work as an independent and strong woman changed and led the world.Through his works, he conveys the strength and ability of women as well as men.

Theme:

What impressed me most was that tony, as an animation director, made the theme of female independence partly because he had three lovely daughters, and this work was exactly what he wanted to convey to his daughters that they could do whatever they set their minds to. At the same time, such works encouraged many women to pursue their own dreams bravely.

Scene:

Due to the Chinese theme of his works, Tony has a deep understanding of Chinese ink painting and architecture, and his painting style is also influenced by the creation of ancient and contemporary Chinese painters.

Character:

He applied a lot of references to his works, tried different styles of painting, and integrated Chinese freehand brushwork and cartoons to make his works more vivid.As a director, he needs to strictly control the animation style. From Mulan, we can see that he has very well integrated Disney’s style and Chinese elements.

To sum up, it can be seen that the Mulan animation produced by Tony as an animation director reflects his success as an animation director in terms of themes, roles and scenes. At the same time, the animation of Mulan also inspired me and gave me strength. I believe that a good animation can move people and give them power at the same time.

This short animated film is directed by Stig Bergquist, Jonas Odell, Martti Ekstrand & Lars Ohlson. Produced in 1994, digitally restored by the Swedish Film Institute in 2018.

Categorisation: 2D animation, Experimental animation.

Form and Function: The consciousness translated from this short film is a merry-go-round, in which a large number of short clips of repetition are used, and then suddenly stop with time. The carousel is a loop, like going to an amusement park and going round and round, but it ends at a certain point in time. The constant repetition and sudden stop in the animation are like the endless pressure and powerlessness of life, and the sudden stop and switch will give people a new cycle to start. Over and over again.

Content: ‘People struggling in the water, dry land fish struggling on the shore, this is 1798…
Human-faced sea creature body embryos are sorted by a seemingly evil person in a “thing” that appears to be harvested or produced on an assembly line. Monkey-like creatures operating underwater machines It’s 1837…’—Just one piece

Formal Elements: This work uses black and white colors throughout the whole process, without using bright colors, to create a serious atmosphere for the audience, forming an invisible pressure. Coupled with the loop in the animation, it gives a sense of powerlessness. The background music is a single beat, which forms a good echo with the picture and content.

Personal feelings: What he presents is a sense of familiarity, the anxiety that we have experienced in our lives and have not experienced premonitions is embodied in the form of animation, so there is a sense of familiarity, people can continue to live, not only have these negative emotions, but also many happy moments, so they have been alive.

The abstraction in the animation gives the audience infinite imagination space, different people will have different feelings to watch, the above is only my personal opinion, welcome to comment.