FILM

THE REVOLUTION IS THE SPIDER-VERSE

or the key poses of the new animation

By Pedro Diaz

Leap, Spidey, leap!

Since Toy Story was released in 1999 by Pixar in Collaboration with Disney, 3D has been a great platform for the development of animated feature films. Software programs like Maya and Blender have revolutionized the industry. Where animators used to have to focus on Key Poses; here, the program figures out what is happening during the “in-between” frames and gets rid of a lot of drudge work. This allows producers to both reduce budget and length of the production, which allows for more radical approaches in storytelling. Unfortunately, like all revolutions, these advances got lost once the big production companies found “the” formula of speedier production and lower costs.

This is not the case of Spiderman-into the Spider-Verse, which takes full advantage of what the software can do and combines it with hand-drawn techniques of a couple of generations ago. Producers Bob Persichetti, Peter Ramsey and Rodney Rothman, pay imaginative tribute to the rough and tumble style of comic books, foregoing the standard of clean visuals of contemporary animated films. It took a year and one artist to develop the visual aesthetic the producers wanted to achieve; they then employed an army of 170+ animators to produce the film. That’s a lot of people working to get the feel of a comic book which is often the work of one Illustrator and one writer.

beauty and style

You can see the comic book aesthetic throughout the movie, most prominently with bubble texts and Kirby dots or crackles. The latter effect comes from using circular shapes to create negative space and seeing it employed in an animated film is rather stunning. As is the way the film uses false 3D, a blurred image that helps guide the viewer’s eye through multiple frames. It’s important to point out that it’s not a motion blur, but the juxtaposition of the same image, slightly shifted to create the illusion of depth and guide the viewer's eye. I was amazed to discover that the visual effects team did this on purpose, to convey the misprints that happen in producing comic books. Lastly, they added line work into the characters facial expressions, which is not common at all when working on 3D animation since the models actually occupy a virtual dimensional space where lightning and shades build depth.

Notice in the following image how the producers use the “missprint” technique to focus on the main character, Miles’ expressions; notice how his face is clearly focused, though the edges blur from left to right. It conveys a feeling of false 3D, because of the way the animators use magenta and cyan. It’s highly effective and mimics how comic books were printed, since they predominantly used Cyan, Magenta, Yellow and Black or the CMYK format. Moreover, this does not just apply to Miles, but all of his surroundings, from the layout and architecture to the students in the hallway. All this unfocused imagery makes the viewers’ eyes draw into Miles' face, which is the aim of the shot. In addition, notice how the lines on Miles's face to accentuate his emotions, especially on the bridge of his nose, the eye lids, and the pupils. With the texture made out of toned dots and lines, you get an incredible facsimile of classic comic books aesthetics.

You've got a nice smile

A great aspect of the film’s production is that they called everything into question about what we’ve come to expect from animated films, even something as basic as the hand-drawn technique of animating in twos. This simply means that the same drawing is used on two different frames and as a result it makes the motion less smooth, but saves lots of time and money. In 3D mediums this is not necessary: the software can determine the exact position where a character is going to be in every single frame after two key poses are set. The producers found out that by doing this there is a hold on the most dynamic poses, thus giving the eye more time to catch those classic spider-man stances. Moreover, the producers decided not to use Motion Blur, which would have smoothed the action movements, but erased the comic book feel they were going for.

Watch some genius

Note that the next video was slowed down to dig frame by frame what is happening with spiderman poses as he jumps over a desk, and pay attention to how the pose is the exact same as the one before. There is no change other than the camera’s movement from key pose to key pose; The animators do this throughout the film, giving the film a jumpy aesthetic that adds depth and character to the story.

It is this commitment to not just using software, but making sure that it serves an aesthetic purpose that separates The Spider-Verse from most mainstream, animated films. You can see this in the way that the film combines characters from different universes, or putting it another way, how the film manages to balance multiple techniques into one coherent aesthetic vision. Penny Parker’s look comes from anime; Spider man noir’s look comes from the hard-boiled crimes thrillers of 1940’s Hollywood; Peter Porker’s comes from Loony tunes. And yet here they are all in one film, as if it were the most natural thing in the world.

So many styles, so beautifully integrated

Notice in this shot all the main characters are standing in a room next to each. Starting from left to right, we have Penny Parker drawn in an almost flat anime aesthetic, next to Gwen Stacy’s smooth 3D rendered realism, next to Peter Porker, tiny in size with a cartoony feel and poppy colors, next to Miles Morales who combines the line work of 2D and 3D rendering, next to Peter B. Parker (the Mentor) again with a similar 3D aesthetic, and finally, Spider man Noir, also 3D, but completely black and white with a high contrast of its values.

Overall, there is a reason why this movie, on its year of release, won almost every single Award that is out there, and in my opinion is because they stepped out of the industry standards, and really worked hard to find that voice that many of us were missing. A film full of innovative approaches to develop beautiful imagery.

©Pedro Diaz and the CCA Arts Review