Animation Inspirations

Hello! Thank you for taking the time to read a little bit about what inspired me to create my animated short project, “Her World In Colors!” This idea has been in my head for a LONG TIME, but I am glad it is finally able to take shape! Let’s jump right into it!

The first HUGE inspiration for my project is this music video titled “Shelter” by EDM LEGENDS Porter Robinson and Madeon! I hope you can listen to the song and pay attention to the story being told in the music video!

Basically, the story follows a little girl who has the ability to create anything she wants. This comes with a cost though as she is completely alone in the world. She has gone over 2000 days without human contact. As the music video reaches its climax, we soon realize that this girl isn’t just some god, she’s actually human like you and me. The dark twist at the end of the video reveals that she has been sent into space while in “cold sleep” by her father after a celestial body destroyed the Earth.

Crazy right? But THAT ANIMATION THO! *Chef’s kiss*

This interview with Porter Robinson has stuck with me for MANY YEARS. For one, seeing the behind-the-scenes of ANY animation is always cool. It was awesome to hear about the vision behind the project and the themes Porter Robinson wanted to explore in his song.

I was moved that animation could convey SUCH deep emotions… and cause me to cry the first time I ever watched this video. I hope to maybe capture a FRACTION of that emotional appeal in my animated short project, “Her World In Colors!”

Another big inspiration for this project is the music video for “Acacia” by the J-Rock band Bump of Chicken. This music video released a few months ago and managed to BREAK THE INTERNET. Currently this music video has over 30 million views.

Aside from the amazing “sakuga animation” techniques used in this video, I was amazed at how much this music video made me cry my eyes out. (Crosses arms) I would like to think that I am calm, cool, and collected, but for some reason animation has the ability to really stab my heart out. IN A GOOD WAY OF COURSE!

The music video for “Acacia” was created in celebration of Pokemon’s 20th anniversary. The music video has literally like a million callback references to every mainstream Pokemon game that has ever been created. Decades of nostalgia managed to smack me across the face and made me remember the magic of feeling like a kid. As a grown adult, I was still brought to tears by the striking visuals and excitement created in the music video.

Even if you aren’t a fan of anime or the Pokemon video games, I hope you can check the music video out and experience the magic for yourself!

Moving onto the techniques used in my animated short project. The most noticeable one is going to be my trainsition from black and white to color. This transition is reminescent of the rainbow LGBTQIA+ flag. In my animation this will symbolize the main character’s world becoming a lot more freeing after finally transitioning from a man to a woman.

The first inspiration for this concept came to me after rewatching the Wizard of Oz. In the movie, while Dorothy is in the real world, her surroundings are sepia-toned. After entering the magical land of Oz, her world suddenly becomes a lot more colorful.

Another instance where I saw this technique used was in Halloweentown 2! In that movie, the magical Halloweentown has the magic literally sucked right out of it, making everything appear in black and white. Characters who were once fun and quirky were now stoic and dull.

I want color to play an important role in my animation. Typically we see blue being associated with baby boys and pink being associated with baby girls. We see greyscale colors as being more “boring” while highly saturated colors are more “fun.”

I want my animation to begin as a black and white story while the character, Z, is living a lie. Because this character is unsatisifed with the life they are living, their perspective on the world is dull and monotone.

As the character begins to realize who they really are and accept themselves for who they are, their world finally gets a whole lot bigger. This concept will be shown through a sudden burst of color, ultimately making the last few scenes depicted fully in color!

Finally the animation style I decided to go with for my animated short project is a blend between Mary Jaye Blanchard’s “Bullets for Breakfast” animation and traditional anime.

In the “Bullets for Breakfast” video, the body is emphasized to convey body positivity ideas. Body positivity often overlaps with intersectionality and gender equity work, so I thought incorporating some of her techniques would enhance my story’s depiction!

Specific scenes that take inspiration from Mary Jaye Blanchard’s work include the scene in “Her World In Colors” where the main character observes their two sisters changing clothes and putting on makeup.

I want to blur the line between objectifying/sexualizing the women that appear in my animated short film so viewer’s can feel the discomfort, but also beauty in what the main character sees. The main character isn’t eye oogling his sister’s for any malicious reasons, they are simply realizing that everything they have is what the main character inherently wants and needs to be happy in life.

Well, that’s going to wrap it up for the inspirations behind my animated short project! I hope you were able to enjoy the music videos and maybe even learn something. Above all, I hope you were inspired to go out and CREATE!

Until next time!

-Mike