Digital Audiovisual Culture: Convergence of Art and Technology Research Paper

Introduction

Computer-based digital technologies have revolutionized the methods involved in the production of artworks on such mediums as film, television, video, and installations. This gave rise to the “new media,” in which art forms are distinguished from traditional artistic productions by their emphasis on personalized styles, performance, and improvised images and sensations. The limitless possibilities of software make all these possible. In effect, the new media artists produce their works with unprecedented freedom to experiment and create new art forms, even as they are assured of a wider audience. Because of the digital audiovisual culture engendered by computer technology, such artworks find popular acceptance although they depart from the traditional artistic productions that emphasize meaning, story, and realism. The production of films, which are both an art form and medium of popular entertainment, is among the artistic activities that have been transposed from their rigid analog existence to the digital era with its interactivity, customization, and multimedia configurations. Such transformation is most evident in animation films, which are produced with the extensive use of digital technologies because of their stop-motion characteristics. In producing an animation film, it is a challenge for the artist to work on vast amounts of drawings and computer-generated graphics and still let his personal style show in the end product. How an animation filmmaker uses the tools of digital technology to produce an artwork high in commercial and artistic value is the objective of this research, which settled on Tim Burton as a case study sample. Burton is an ideal subject for research of this kind because he has shot his 18 films to date by alternating between the traditional medium and digital formats. However, the famous filmmaker appears to have found his métier in the digital filmmaking of animation movies, as represented by his major works Vincent (1982), The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993), and Corpse Bride (2005), which showcased his unique sense of creativity and launched his successful filmmaking career.

New Media

New media refers to all art forms produced with digital technologies and are therefore easier to manipulate apart from such other qualities as density, compressibility, impartiality, and networkability. Before the digital era, media was represented by paintings, sculptures, and other art forms that were laborious to produce and transport for exhibition. In the same manner, media relied on analog broadcast models such as radio and television (Chun, 2005). The advent of computers through digital television and online publications transformed the old into the new media, in which new media practices range from the conceptual to visual arts, from performance to installation. Now the specimens of new media include digital artworks, computer graphics, computer animation, interactive art forms, computer robotics, and biotechnology presented as art.

In the same manner that the advent of photographic techniques in earlier times rendered obsolete all the traditional views on representation, so did computer-based electronic tools engendered new perspectives on art, affecting the way in which artists see, think and work and how their productions are communicated and distributed. Virtual reality is currently used in everything from military installations to the mounting of avant-garde artworks. Since digitization has become the wave of the future in artistic production, many art schools now offer a course in new media as a major field of study.

New media artwork is characterized by automation, variability, convertibility, and modularity, which are impossible to do without digital technologies. There is automation because the art objects can be created and modified automatically, even as they exist in multiple versions to achieve variability. New media artworks are also convertible and modular since they can be converted into another format even as there are different elements in them that can exist independently. There is a popular assumption that digitized media is poised to supplant the traditional methods of art production, which means that art as we know it will give way to technology. Many art scholars disagree with this view. What is believed happening is the interaction of the old and new in a complex relationship called “convergence culture,” which is more of a cultural shift based on interactivity or the active participation of consumers. This development was sensed in a study of the film The Matrix and the interactive television programs Survivor and American Idol, which use the participatory culture engendered by digital technology for increased exposure and popularity with audiences.

Digital Filmmaking

Digital films are motion pictures presented as a series of digital images instead of a film reel, which is done on tape, hard disk, flash memory, and other digital techniques. This is now mainstream Hollywood filmmaking, with an increasing number of films shot digitally. In fact, cameras for digital cinematography, which capture images through their CMO or CCD sensors, have surpassed the classic 16mm and 35mm cameras in sales. The more popular cinematography cameras include Sony’s HDCam series, Red’s One, Panavision’s SI-2K, and six other models and those produced by JVC, Canon, Arri, and Grass Valley. All these cinematography equipment highlight images and sound, which are the key features of a digital film.

Digital art is the culmination of the historic relationship between technology and art, in which technology depends on its effects on a clever substitution of illusion for a place.

Manovich & Kratky (2005) demonstrated how the old and new media can meld by producing three films on DVD format that used the traditional cinema genres but created through the digital process. The result showed how software can enhance old media films, namely, Mission to Earth, Absences, and Texas. The films, which have been exhibited in computer-driven installations in museums, galleries, media, and film festivals around the world, can run infinitely without repeating the same image sequences, screen layouts, or narratives.

All changed every viewing such that there is no single version of the films. In a study of a similar nature, Darley (2000) analyzed several digital audiovisual forms, including the animation film Toy Story and the online games Blade Runner and Quake, to see how these artworks break from the traditional emphasis of art production. The finding was that the artists behind these works now focus on style, image, performance, and sensation. In effect, they give less attention to the story, representation, meaning, and reading, which were the chief motivations of old media artists exhibited in computer-driven installations in museums, galleries, media, and film festivals around the world, can run infinitely without repeating the same image sequences, screen layouts or narratives.

All changed every viewing such that there is no single version of the films. In a study of a similar nature, Darley (2000) analyzed several digital audiovisual forms, including the animation film Toy Story and the online games Blade Runner and Quake, to see how these artworks break from the traditional emphasis of art production. The finding was that the artists behind these works now focus on style, image, performance, and sensation. In effect, they give less attention to the story, representation, meaning, and reading, which were the chief motivations of old media artists.

According to Manovich 2001, in filmmaking through computer graphics, realism is defined as the ability to simulate any object in such a way that its computer image is indistinguishable from its photograph. It is this ability to simulate photographic images of real or imagined objects that makes possible the use of 3-D computer graphics in military and medical simulators, in television commercials, in computer games as well as in such movies as Terminator 2 or Jurassic Park. Typical images produced with 3-D computer graphics still appear unnaturally clean, sharp, and geometric-looking. Their limitations especially stand out when juxtaposed with a normal photograph. Thus, one of the landmark achievements of Jurassic Park was the seamless integration of film footage of real scenes with the computer-simulated images of dinosaurs. To achieve this integration, computer-generated images had to be degraded; with their perfection deliberately diluted to match the imperfection and grainy qualities of the film (Manovich, 2001).

As the use of digital filmmaking becomes popular, so does the acquisition of the technology becomes easier such that it is now even used for touching up movies shot on traditional film reels. Digital technology has also replaced analog used in many other content creation and distribution markets. On the content creation side, digital photo cameras significantly outsell film photo cameras, digital videotape formats like MiniDV have superseded analog tape formats, digital audio workstations have almost entirely replaced multi-track tape recorders, digital non-linear editing systems have displaced Moviola/Steenbeck equipment as the standard means of editing movies, and page layout software running on desktop computers has come to dominate the graphic design industry. On the distribution side, CDs have largely replaced LPs, DVDs have largely replaced VHS tapes, and digital cable systems are displacing analog cable systems. It seems likely that despite current resistance on the part of some in the industry, digital technology will also become successful in the feature film acquisition and theatrical exhibition markets (Braudy & Cohen, 1999).

For over a century, practically all movies produced in Hollywood and other filmmaking centers have been shot on film while almost every filmmaking school teaches its students the basics of handling a 16mm or 35mm cinematographic camera. Most content for broadcast is being shot on digital formats since now digital acquisition accounts for the vast majority of moving image acquisition.

Although most movies destined for theater release are still shot on film, there are as many dramatic TV series and some high-budget commercials produced on digital technology. Since 1999 High-end digital cinematography cameras suitable for acquiring footage intended for theatrical release are on the market and have gained widespread adoption. Some notable high-profile directors that have shot with digital equipment include Robert Altman (A Prairie Home Companion), Jean-Jacques Annaud (Two Brothers), and Tim Burton (Corpse Bride)

Case Study

Award-winning filmmaker Tim Burton launched his career with various animation technologies that never lost sight of his artistic identity, which has to do with dark and gothic settings. His body of works is of particular interest because he started as an animator, first as a cell painter on Ralph Bakshi’s The Lord of the Rings and then as an apprentice on The Fox and the Hound of the Walt Disney Studios. Later, Burton produced such regular classics as Batman, Batman Returns, Edward Scissorhands, and Sweeney Todd. While at Disney, he wrote the poem and drew the illustrations that became the basis for his celebrated The Nightmare before Christmas (Woods, 2002). The Nightmare Before Christmas is a stop-motion short feature that came after Vincent, Burton’s first feature film that is of the same genre based on another poem that he had written. The film’s title alludes to actor Vincent Price who had starred in almost all horror movies produced in Hollywood since the post-war period and was considered the biggest influence in Burton’s rise to cinematic fame. Vincent is a 6-minute black and white stop-motion film portraying a young boy who fantasizes that he is his screen idol Vincent Price out to give everyone a scare. In both Vincent and The Nightmare Before Christmas, Burton set up himself as a filmmaker with imagination and style but since the initial works were not full-length films they fell short of establishing his reputation as a new media artist. This finally came after Corpse Bride (2005).

Corpse Bride is considered the spiritual successor of The Nightmare Before Christmas (Woods, 2002). It was the first stop-motion animated movie to use the new gear-and-paddle technique for the maquette’s heads. This new system involved the maquettes being built with a complex gear system inside the main character’s heads (Altman, 1992). The various gears were attached to external paddles and a soft skin-like material made of silicone and foam was placed over these paddles to create the head and then painted. By adjusting the gears, done by inserting a wrench into a series of small holes located on the Marquette head and ears, wrench into small holes located on the maquette’s head and ears, the paddles would move to cause a change in the characters’ facial expressions. This technique made way for a smoother system of emotion change and lip sync than the old style of replacing heads. The soft skin also gave the characters a much more realistic look (Page, 2006). The puppets were made in England by leading puppet manufacturers Mackinnon & Saunders, which was also responsible for a major contribution to another Tim Burton film, the space fantasy Mars Attacks! (1999).

Digital technology enabled Burton to stamp his own style and perspectives on Corpse Bride, whose projection of his preoccupation with the complex interaction between light and darkness and of being caught between two irreconcilable worlds would show in all his other films. The film used the appropriate digital techniques to portray life as boring and gray while death is more fun, as shown by the use of bright colors and lively background music. The scenes that depict the underworld and its zombie-like creatures make Corpse Bride comparable to The Nightmare Before Christmas and Bettlejuice (1988). In fact, the studio that produced the film called attention to this affinity by promoting it through commercials that carried the theme music from The Nightmare Before Christmas, specifically a song titled “What’s This.”

The Corpse Bride Emily was also compared in an issue of the magazine Disney Adventures to the character of Sally in The Nightmare Before Christmas although the former is outspoken and free-spirited while the latter is portrayed as quiet and timid.

The following are some of Burton’s filmography:

Vincent (1982), Frankenweenie (1984), Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure (1985), Bettlejuice (1988), Batman (1989), Edward Scissorhands (1990), Batman Returns (1992), The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993), Ed Wood (1994), Mars Attacks! (1996), Sleepy Hollow (1999), Planet of the Apes (2001), Big Fish (2003), Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (2005), Corpse Bride (2005), Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (2007) and the forthcoming remake of Alice in Wonderland (2010).

In this body of works, Burton has managed to maintain his distinctive artistic style throughout, which could have been difficult to do without the magic of digital technology. For example, he wants to use bleak and dismal backdrops for his films in keeping with his gothic style. In the traditional analog format, Burton would have to wait for sunless days to shoot an outdoor scene that reflects doom and decay. Even then, there must be a spear of light that would juxtapose the darkness of that sunless day for him to achieve the interplay of light and darkness that he wants so much. Burton has been able to do this with digital technologies, which make it possible to supply and control any setting at one flick of a button. For this achievement, Burton has gained a reputation as an astounding and original visual artist.

Conclusion

The research has shown that Tim Burton is a child of the new media, in which art forms are distinguished from traditional artistic productions by their emphasis on personalized styles, performance, and improvised images and sensations, which has been made possible by digital technology.

For his liberal use of digital technology, Burton has been compared to James Cameron (Titanic) who works within genres that are yet to be accepted as art. The reason is that the works of Burton, Cameron, and other filmmakers who exhibit the same inclination are sometimes faulted for their weakness in story-telling, giving rise to suspicions that they use digitization to compensate for their lack of story-telling ability. Thus, Burton has been described as one with a weak story-telling ability but a very strong visual sense. For example, he had a beautiful vision of a dark and mordant Gotham City in Batman, but the story itself was weak and there were even gaps in the telling. The story-telling in Beetlejuice is believed to be worse, with the characters floating around the room or singing the calypso one moment and forgetting all about it the next. Nonetheless, Burton as a director has made an impact on both the industry and cinema-goers for his childlike reverie and a cathartic blend of horror and black humor, which earned him a place in the pantheon of great visual filmmakers past and present. He has also distinguished himself as an auteur, which is defined as the ability of an artist to consistently express his personal outlooks on life through the genius of the system.

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