Research Theme:
Character design and culture.
Research Topic:
Culturally-significant character design in positioning Mainland Chinese animation.
Hypothesis:
Mainland Chinese animations can achieve great popularity with culturally-significant character design.
Research Problem:
The challenge of creating culturally-significant characters in positioning Mainland Chinese animation.
Research Rationale:
It is an undeniable fact that character design is one of the most important elements in creating a great animation. But, how important is it? According to Marshall (2007), character design is important because “telling the story of a character visually is the starting premise of effective animation” (p. 3). Physical appearance, shapes, colours are some of the aspects in character design which help character designers to translate concepts in their minds into visual output on the cinema screen. Aside from that other elements such as the style chosen for the character, be it traditional or modern style, has a great influence towards the identity as well.
Without a strong sense of identity, a character won’t have a lasting memory in the audience’s mind. For instance, imagine Mulan without her Chinese traditional costume and sword, or Kampung Boy without his sarong. The viewers would find the characters not being as long-lasting in their memory as compared to when they first perceived them in their strong cultural characteristics. Therefore, the researcher hypothesizes that animated characters designed with traditional culture elements would attract more audiences as compared to the characters that are not culturally-significant.
In essence, the researcher believes that understanding character design in the making of Chinese animation would be a worthy topic to research because this can help the Chinese animation field to rise to greater heights.
Problem Statement:
According to Luo (2017), China is vigorously developing its film and television animation industry in recent years. “Although overseas animation products currently dominate the Chinese animation market, animation production in China has developed very rapidly in recent years'' (Li, 2011, p. 190). This is evident through a report which states that “in 2015, ‘Monkey King: Hero Is Back’ gained the box office of nearly RMB1 billion and became the highest-grossing animated film in the history of Chinese film. In 2016, Big Fish & Begonia recorded more than RMB500 million at the box office, and the Sino-foreign co-produced Kung Fu Panda 3 exceeded RMB1 billion” (Global and China Animation, 2017, para. 2). With that being said, animated character design, being part of animation, has gradually become an important subject too (Gao & Zhang, 2010). Character design is important because “telling the story of a character visually is the starting premise of effective animation” (Marshall, 2007, p. 3).
However, “facing the new trend in the development of global economic, foreign film and television animations have taken a great impact on Chinese market, which makes the images of the Chinese original animations look extremely uncompetitive” (Gao & Zhang, 2010, p. 235). “Although foreign companies have provided certain opportunities for China's domestic animation design to face the world, it also has brought weaker and weaker use of Chinese elements in animation design, which makes the current China’s domestic animation design development in trouble” (Zhou, 2017, p. 127).
In another article on China Daily, Song Lei, director of the consulting and planning department at the National Animation Creative Research and Development Center, also emphasizes on the importance of having a shared style for Chinese animation companies (Yang, 2019). By having a shared style, a country’s animation production can be recognized immediately (Yang, 2019). For instance, Japanese animation is known for its characters’ big eyes, while the United States’s animation is recognized for their strong art style (Yang, 2019). “In recent decades, China's animation industry has been chasing the pace of the national market, although there’s an increase in the number of domestic animations, they are not widely recognized by the audience” (Y. Liu & J. Liu, 2017, p. 671). This is because “it is difficult to attract the audience as a lot of cartoon characters are imitations of foreign products for the lack of domestic animation with Chinese characteristics” (Y. Liu & J. Liu, 2017, p. 672).
Moreover, it is “recognized that if there is no traditional culture in Chinese animation creation, whether it be grand, and then well-made, is only an imitation of other country’s animation” (Gao & Zhang, 2010, p. 237). Only when the essence of traditional culture is grasped, the animated character can have a distinctive art trait (Gao & Zhang, 2010). This is because “without identity, a character cannot be recognized or differentiated” (Khalis et al., 2016). In essence, “culture is the foundation and guarantee of the animation industry, if the animation industry does not have its own cultural characteristics, then the animation industry will lose its direction” (Y. Liu & J. Liu, 2017, p. 672).
In this case, integrating Chinese cultural elements in character design would be an ideal solution to solve this issue (Gao & Zhang, 2010). By establishing culturally-significant animated characters, not only can Chinese animated characters have a recognizable identity, it can also bring Chinese animation to greater highs in the animation field. Therefore, the researcher aims to identify the essential elements which make a Chinese animated character culturally-significant based on two Chinese animations: Big Fish and Begonia and White Snake. Aside from that, the researcher would also like to understand the influence of culturally-significant characters towards viewers’ animation preference to understand the importance of having culturally-significant characters in positioning Chinese animations.
Research Objectives:
Research Questions:
References
Gao, X., & Zhang, L. (2010). Discussing on the Traditional Chinese Elements and Animation Design. 2010 International Conference on Information Technology and Scientific Management, 235–237. Retrieved May 9, 2020, from https://file.scirp.org/pdf/20-1.69.pdf
Global and China Animation Industry Report, 2017-2021. (2017, April). Retrieved May 9, 2020, from https://www.researchandmarkets.com/reports/4224818/global-and-china-animation-industry-report-2017
Khalis, F. M., Mustaffa, N., & Ali, M. N. S. (2016). THE SENSE OF LOCAL IDENTITY CHARACTERISTIC IN MALAYSIAN ANIMATION. International Journal of Arts & Sciences, 9(3), 485–496. Retrieved May 9, 2020, from https://www.academia.edu/30734921/THE_SENSE_OF_LOCAL_IDENTITY_CHARACTERISTIC_IN_MALAYSIAN_ANIMATION
Li, L.-L. (2011). Understanding Chinese animation industry: The nexus of media, geography and policy. Creative Industries Journal, 3(3), 189–205. Retrieved May 9, 2020, from https://doi.org/10.1386/cij.3.3.189_1
Liu, Y., & Liu, J. (2017, July). Research on the cartoon culture and national image construction. 2017 3rd International Conference on Economics, Social Science, Arts, Education and Management Engineering (ESSAEME 2017), 671–675. Retrieved May 9, 2020, from https://doi.org/10.2991/essaeme-17.2017.135
Luo, J. (2017). Research on the Characteristics of Chinese Animation. 2017 4th International Conference on Literature, Linguistics and Arts (ICLLA 2017), 165–168. Retrieved May 9, 2020, from https://webofproceedings.org/proceedings_series/ESSP/ICLLA 2017/ICLLA_082538.pdf
Marshall, C. (2007). Character Design: An Analysis Guided by Semiotics. NSCAD University. Retrieved May 9, 2020, from https://books.google.com.my/books/about/Character_Design.html?id=AGwGngEACAAJ&redir_esc=y
Yang, H. (2019, June 13). ANIMATION INDUSTRY EYES GLOBAL MARKET. ChinaDaily.Com. Retrieved May 9, 2020, from http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/global/2019-06/13/content_37480193.htm
Zhou, Y. (2017). Application of Chinese National Culture Elements in Animation Design. 2017 International Conference on Manufacturing Construction and Energy Engineering (MCEE 2017), 126–133. doi: 10.12783/dtetr/mcee2017/15742 [Accessed date May 9, 2020]