Writing anime and cartoons

[kellz5460]

I know everybody here is animating stuff or wanting to animate their own cartoons but I havent seen much on writing what you're gonna animate. I supposed you can just go out of the blue on a piece of paper for something and animate what you get

lots of people- besides the random works, are making short cartoons or something funny and I find...maybe its just my personality. But I can't write funny. Everything I do is serious and kinda dark stuff and so I animate- serious and kinda dark stuff unless I just animate a sound clip

does anybody have or know of any writing resources or anything? Or has anybody thought of this?

I know I've seen posts from alot of people that want to do anime or the like and - its one thing to draw- its another thing to write a story, which is what anime really is. a specific method of story telling

I dunno- maybe I'm just out of ideas....

[AmigaMan]

There are several books on writing for animation specifically. If you search Amazon you won't be disappointed.

[jahnocli]

The best book on writing I have is "The Art of Dramatic Writing" by Lajos Egri. It's kind of difficult to get into, but it repays serious study, and it's a book I often return to for ideas and to refresh my memory.

[GCharb]

There are several books on writing, as there are several guru's.

I like 'Save the Cat' by the departed Blake Snyder, also have the books and videos from Sid Fields and Michael Hauge, both are excellent.

I wrote two screen plays lately.

One of 9 pages for a 5 minutes short and one of 94 pages for a 75 minutes movie.

It all should start with a written story.

http://www.blakesnyder.com

http://storymastery.com

http://www.sydfield.com

[kellz5460]

Thanks-

When I was in High school I used to write alot of short stories and what not but now that I'm making cartoons and whatnot its a bit different to do.

[slowtiger]

I think it's a mistake to think of preparing animation by "writing". IMO it should be done primarly in storyboarding. Sketch a lot, do thumbnails, do storyboard drawings, shift them around until it fits. After all animation is a visual medium - it's not radio. Try to tell your story without any word of dialogue first.

There are books about storyboarding, but I don't think they're really necessary. Have a look at the images in "The Illusion of Liife", that's all you need, or any other book featuring some real life example. A simple Google image search with "Storyboard" gives you enough examples. Even better are the examples on Michael Sporn's animation blog: http://www.michaelspornanimation.com/splog/?cat=2 (be sure to watch all pages) because there you can see that it's not necessary to have a clean template or finished drawings. Just some thumbnail sketches are good enough.

[dueyftw]

If your going to write notes down before you start story boarding just remember that you cant draw anything that is not visual.

Example: A man thinking about going home for the first time.

Ok, how do you draw that?

Change to:

A tall man looking a an open letter on a train platform, Letter says "Come home we miss you"

Dale

[barryem]

I realize this isn't exactly an answer to the question that was posed but I think it might be worth saying.

I've only been playing around with AS, creating little moving things on the screen and trying to think about what I actually might want to do with it. It's been fun and I don't have an actual goal but a few things have come to mind as possibilities.

One that seems likely is to get old time radio shows from archive.org and other places and animate them. These are nearly all in the public domain so there shouldn't be any issues there, and they come in various lengths. I'd probably start with something like a 15 minute show, or maybe a 5 minute mystery.

Another idea, the idea that actually made me start playing with AS, is to create semi-abstract visual worlds to accompany classical music, as was done in Fantasia and Allegro Non Troppo.

I don't have anything like the kinds of skills to do a serious job of this and I'm not sure I could even do anything someone would enjoy watching. And maybe I'll never get past the thinking about it stage. But maybe I will and whatever the result it'll be fun to do it.

I'm probably better equipped as a writer than as an animator but to write I don't really need animation. That's something else. But making a cartoon from some existing sound file might just be a nice way to express myself visually.

Barry

[Rhoel]

I think it's a mistake to think of preparing animation by "writing". IMO it should be done primarly in storyboarding. .

Based on doing this as the day job for three years and with respect to ST, I have to disagree with this for one simple reason: Frequently a key piece of dialogue will change locations in the story: Classic example in Oswald and Sykes was a conversation which originally took place in the local pub at lunch-time. Due to another plot change, the conversation was changed to night, in a funeral home, and tagged onto the end of a phone call where it actually worked better.

In the script, it took me about ten minutes to cut and paste and change the EXT - DAY to INT-NIGHT ... none of the actual dialogue changed.

Had we boarded first, it would have wasted weeks of work as the pub interior/supporting cast layout was complex.

The relationship between script and board is critical and close but the freedom of script enables you to go crazy without worrying too much about staging. There is nothing to stop you making thumbs as you go, to remind you how something might work, a visual sight gag needs to be set-up.

Personally, I prefer the work by Sid Field as he has a good take on characterization, plot and theme.

Animation scripts are different from live action, mainly in the way they are set up (written). For a first rate animation script, see Madagascar 1 - it's a master class of what a script writer should be doing (or not doing in the Penguin in Antarctica sequence).

At the end of the day, writing is just about cutting yourself off everything around you and getting stuff down on paper. It's only when you have your characters in situation that things really "happen". That can be as planned or a total surprise, the "wow" moment which will take you and the film in a new direction.

Rhoel

[kellz5460]

I find that I write pretty descriptively enough, so it's easy to come away with enough to make a scene or story board.

It's just the content really of my stories are always so serious and dark. I can't write funny jokes or comedic puns or even bizarre stuff like Ren and Stimpy...

I used to...when I was like 10

[shannock]

I'm like you, I much prefer the darker stuff - first trial animation was of vampire bats fluttering in front of a moon with scudding clouds!

I'm thinking of going down the film noir route - might even work in greyscale. Just working on my first storyboard - no words so I don't have to worry about a script and lip-sync.

My advise is - if you like the dark stuff stick to what you like.

[Danimal]

I think it's a mistake to think of preparing animation by "writing"

Completely agreed. If it's nothing more than scrawls on a napkin, you need to create the scene visually.

I also find it to be a huge mistake to run out and buy a bunch of books about how to write better. If you want to get better at writing, then write. Often. It'd be like wanting to build muscle by watching Pumping Iron.

If you're stuck on the idea of buying a book though, I'll whip one together for you. I have no credentials and you can't teach creativity but hey, that puts me even with all the other books out there AND I'll sell it to you for less!

[kellz5460]

Completely agreed. If it's nothing more than scrawls on a napkin, you need to create the scene visually.

I also find it to be a huge mistake to run out and buy a bunch of books about how to write better. If you want to get better at writing, then write. Often. It'd be like wanting to build muscle by watching Pumping Iron.

If you're stuck on the idea of buying a book though, I'll whip one together for you. I have no credentials and you can't teach creativity but hey, that puts me even with all the other books out there AND I'll sell it to you for less!

yah I'm not really a fan of books- I didnt read the Anime studio book.

I'm just basically talking about outlining- not writing a novel. Actually I dont really know what I'm talking about.

I think I have animators block and don't know what I want to animate

[GCharb]

I disagree with those saying that writing the story is no good, that you should go in storyboarding right away.

Many studios develop most of their visual jokes by storyboarding them, but all the stories get accepted on scripts first.

A producer needs to accept the story before it goes into production, do you really think that a studio would go through the process of making a storyboard to get their story accepted, or that they put it on paper?

Whether you are named HB or Pixar, it all starts with a written story and as Rohel said, it is much much easier to modify a script then it is to modify a storyboard.

Storyboarding only start when the written script is set in stone, because storyboarding is a very lengthy and costly process.

Because animation is more of a visual media, scripts for animation are usually longer then the 1 page per minute found in live action scripts since you need more scripting to describe the scenes.

My 9 pages script is for a 5 minutes short, because I describe each scenes in a very visual and detail way.

For small (30 seconds or less) animations made by a one person team, going to storyboard first may do the trick, but you may end up loosing the point of the story you want to tell. It is also much easier to tweak a story on paper then to tweak it at the storyboard stage.

Storyboarding is a lengthy but fun process, but I advise you to put it on paper yet, it is much easier and you usually get better structure that way, and yes, structure can be a good thing!

My two cents, well, maybe 3 or 4

[slowtiger]

I disagree with those saying that writing the story is no good, that you should go in storyboarding right away.

This is not a rule carved in stone. I just wanted to point out that there are more ways of planning a film than just scripting, especially because most programs nowadays are nothing but an illustrated script - which is not what animation should be, IMO.

Of course you're free to do it the way you are most comfortable with. And of course it depends on how many people work on that film, or wether you need to sell the idea first, and on how long the film is going to be.

There are filmmakers who start with a story, there are those who start with actors and dialogue, and there are those who start with images. Hitchcock is famous for having started films from some odd visual idea and developing the whole story around it. (He also storyboarded.) Miyazaki built some of his films around one central image (like Totoro waiting at the bus stop in the rain) and storyboards more than he writes. Bill Plympton storyboards everything, as well as Joanna Quinn.

And I prefer their way because animation is a visual medium, and because I draw directly from my imagination. What's the use in describing an image or action if a simple drawing tells it much more precisely and faster? I say: Start with images. Do thumbnails, do character studies. Build the visuals first. You can always add text to that later, for whatever purpose: pitch your project, write dialogue for your voce actors, have a script for production.