The first proposal

This is my first proposal which I sent to London Metropolitan University:

The design of the characters has been changed in the western world the last 10 years of animation.
How the East European countries (Russia, Yugoslavia and Bulgaria) originated
in animation while the West was influenced and progressed from the Japanese design?
The origins of image and distinctively the motion on an image can be found from the early days of the caveman where he captures motion of his normality by drawing his activities. Moving on at the ancient times, people expressed themselves with stories as the traditional Aesop’s fables in order to entertain children and themselves. Consequently as the early moving image is known as cartoon, which originally was found in the production of the Italian frescoes, in modern terms of print media a cartoon is an illustration, usually humorous in context.
However not until the Nineteenth Century with the invention of the camera and following the invention of cinematography we can only begin to talk about moving image and moving characters, so as to express new ideas and explore technical innovations. The main concern at those times was to analyse the movement by scientific perspective as movement itself has physical factor. All the experiments were made to describe graphically the physical or the organic movement. Yet all the new inventions were made to experiment with either optics or cinematography then the pictures were considered as playthings as in comparison as in thousands of years ago with early Egyptians that developed the form of children’s toys. Therefore the act, the process the result of imparting life and motion is what is known as animation today.
From the other hand the analysis of the movement had fascinated philosophers as well. Subsequently animation has a history that contains a number of factors, ideas and growth throughout the history. From the early days of animation at the beginning of the Nineteen century as the French Emile Cohl can be considered the first animated cartoonist and the British James Stuart Blackton the first animator to bridge the gap between the animated cartoon and the live-action film. Following them it was the American Winsor McCay who achieved the earliest success in character animation by introducing the Little Nemo and the polish born Ladislas Starevich who made the first animated puppet film in Russian animation. Animation became universally accepted and developed in the studios of Western and Eastern Europe.
Under the influence of European animation Yugoslavia and Bulgaria are two countries that can be considered as leading influences as well. Original designs, humorous animated cartoons, traditional folk tales, political figures presented as puppets an allegory and a narrative with a moral outcome. We could view that the rise of animation in West covered the entity of Europe and moved to United States of America. As Europe and the rest of the world were suffering from the First and the Second World War it was what made animation to be a pleasant occupation for both artists and the audience. The U.S.A. could offer a prosperous environment for the new medium to grow. Meanwhile it was when the American Walt Disney made cartoon animation to the general public as vast as the development of the film. Subsequently it was why the Eastern European beliefs walked pararel with Disney’s realism. The style that carried on was in two-dimensional environment until the creation of digital computers where the three dimensions in animation aroused. It was then in 1995 when the first ever movie generated in three-dimensional computer environment under the name of Toy Story.
However what I am investigating for the research I am willing to undertake is the development of animation process from the traditional animation to the computer animation and specifically into the character animation:


• How the potential of animation as a new form of graphic expression has so far developed.
• How the animation progressed from social, historical, political, contemporary philosophical and artistic perspective.
• Questioning the origins of animation that established in the West while artists were inspired from the East.

Although the West developed the growth of animation, the situation today is different. With the invention of television and computers and while Japan is the top nation of consumption, animation influenced vice versa: The East inspires the West. The Japanese have a tradition in design (Manga animation) and the West could not engage to the big studios that the Japanese animation industry had created. They could only afford character animation to be the number one export on the global media market. The legend of the Japanese involves with the concept of yin and yan. This made things flexible as the Japanese stories were similar to the Hollywood dream of good and bad. As well the expansion of three dimensional games has grown as they have become so much popular to the west as the world market is trading them from Japan.
Foreseeing these influences in animation and specifically on the design of character animation, we can sense how things have differentiated in three dimensional modeling in Films as well: the broad examples of Animatrix, the I-robot, the Final Fantasy. Cinematography is a complex of ideas and mediums borrowing terms of the global market and the world of consumption we are living. What is the art of Animation today with the simplicity of the characters (Southpark, The Simpson’s) that can be viewed almost everywhere? While it is where I place myself in this Research Degree in order to explore Animation and it is influences and directions.
All these concepts are what I am willing to address within the research I will be offered form your university. My investigation will be to research and experiment in order to investigate in terms of educational platform. At this particular time my reason for applying for this Research Degree is to gain knowledge so as in the future to follow an academic career and be able to teach. As well I will gain the opportunity for more knowledge within the fields of Arts and education by experimenting and researching. The research will be based in reading and practice following the same direction similar to my Postgraduate Degrees. In conclusion I believe I am willing to win your respect and knowledge in order to be selected for the Research Degree you are offering.













Resources

Bibliography
Arnheim, R. (1969), Visual Thinking, Berkeley: University of California Press.
Barrier, M. (1974), Of mice rabbits, ducks and men: the Hollywood cartoon, New York: American Film Institute Report.
Ceram, C.W. (1965) The Archaeology of the Cinema, New York: Harcourt, Brace and World.
Crafton, D. (1993), Before Mickey, The Animated Film, Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.
Connect Series, Virtual Reality, (2000), Radio Programme, Radio, BBC
Furniss, M. (1998) Art in motion: Animation Aesthetics, London: John Libbey and Co Ltd
Green B. (1919), The making of Animated cartoons, Motion Picture Magazine XVII, No 4, pp 51ff
Hallas J. (1987), Masters of animation, London: BBC books.
Hoffman, d. (2000), Visual Intelligence: how we create what we see, New York/London: W. W. Norton and Co
Kitson, C. (1972), Fifty Years of American animation, Program Notes Washington, D.C.: American Film Institute.
Lord P. and Sibley B. (1998), Cracking Animation, London: Thames and Hudson
Ways of Seeing (1972), London, BBC, Bergen J., VHS
Scenkel T. (1977), Exploring the cinema of figurative animation, PhD dissertation, New York University.
Solomon, Ch. (1994), The History of Animation: Enchanted Drawings. New York: Wings Books

World Wide Web:
Llewellyn R. (1998-2005) Chronology of Animation
http://www.public.iastate.edu/~rllew/chronst.html
Selected pages from Wikipedia
http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/history_of_animation
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/history_of_russian_animation
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/anime#_note-comercialally_succesful
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/manga
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ladislas_Starevich
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%89mile_Cohl
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aesop#Aesop.27s_Fables

McLaughlin D. (2001), A Brief History
http://animation.filmtv.ucla.edu/program/anihist.html
Russian Animation
http://store.russiananimation.com
Leonard S. (2003), Massachusetts Institute of Technology Progress Against the Law:
Fan Distribution, Copyright, and the Explosive Growth of Japanese Animation
http://swiss.ai.mit.edu/6805/student-papers/fall03-papers/Progress_Against_the_Law.html
Science Museum in U. K. London
http://www.pixar.com/featurefilms/ts/
Van Eaton Galleries, A Brief Biography of McCay Winsor
http://www.vegalleries.com/winsorbio.html


From thetitle to the stracture it definately needs inprovement.