Animation today is no longer limited to kids. In quite a few of the developed economies adult audiences lap up animated fare with as much enthusiasm as kids do. However, Kids still are and probably shall remain to be the primary audience for a majority of the animated fare created.
Animation production, especially that which is created for television has distinct audience groups to which it is targeted. There are shows for pre schoolers, shows for kids, shows for tweens, shows for teens, and finally shows which are laced with adult humor and themes.
In India, animation is generally percieved as something for kids. If Kids are the primary audience for animation in India, it would be an interesting thing to enter their worlds, create characters which they identify with. Characters that are probably created by someone amongst them.
When BFA’s and MFA’s who are more into commercial art or probably design or realism, come into animation, they get along with them a whole lot of design senibility and art sensibility which goes a long way in creating great set design, backgrounds and environments. However even trained and qualified artists would have to shake up from some of the rigidity and unlearn a few things before they can learn character designs. The reason being most animated characters have got be appealing and simple.
Schoolkids however are very apt for such things… they are simpler and don’t have to unlearn much and if trained properly they can come up with amazing characters and concepts….
Would it boost the Indian animation industry if the art were to be taught right since school?
That was the question and the thought with which the entire excerise began. The channel Animax recently had completed its ‘Bring Irfan to School’ contests and was looking at other promotional options to connect with consumers. It could have done a festival, a roadshow, a cricket with the anime characters but for reasons best known to the channel they opted for taking an initiative which would generate some goodwill with the Indian animation industry, while at the same time be a great PR excercise and help the channel get some good media coverage.
It got plenty good of all of that, which augurs very well for the industry too, because even animation got the coverage. And animation needs media attention in India, (though not of the sensationalist kinds).
The Excercise
500 schools across 5 cities in India (100 schools each in Mumbai, Bangalore, Delhi, Hyderabad and Kolkata) were asked to send in 2 students and an art teacher to attend the Animax introduction to animation workshops. Animation experts Shrirang Sathaye, Shilpa Ranade, Prince Paikattu, Dennis Deegan and Atish Tripathi volunteered their time and expertise generously. Most of the experts got in their bright students too, so as to assist them .
The workshops were held in 2 phases, 11 & 12 February in Delhi & Bangalore and 18 & 19 February in Mumbai, Hyderabad and Kolkata.
Initially the organisers were apprehensive about how many students would actually turn up for an animation workshop but the response was overwhelming…
The 4 hour workshops were meant to introduce animation concepts to kids, nothing more nothing less. The workshop included awareness and activities like Flip Books, Story Sessions, Walk Cycles, Acting in Animation, explaining persistince of vision and Character Drawing.
Not only children but even some of the parents were enraptured by what they saw. They were surprised to know about the amount of effort and hardwork that goes into creating a single second of animation.