How you ever thought about the digital movies that are in the movie screen? Did you wonder of how they were being done? Before, it was just drawings and sketches of characters and they were filed into slides. Then, they were flashed in a fast manner creating a motion. Well, that's another story but not what I'm gonna tell you. Anyway, after some years, technology got upgraded and so as the cartoon movies. Now, it is more realistic. Some of this movies were Shrek, Toy Story, Ice Age, etc. It was said that there are persons who are the basis of the characters mood, movement, and facial expression. Like for example in the movie Toy Story, Tom Hanks' voice and facial expression were used to make the character of Woody, the cowboy. His face and head movements were also used for the Woody even they didn't have the same shape and image. This was made very realistic especially because they both were males so they complement each other.
However, is it really important that the basis is similar with the character?
How about having a woman as a basis for Woody? Would she give justice to this character?
An interesting study was done by scientists, H. Hill and A. Johnston, because they found out that there is a gender difference on how people make facial expressions and movements. This was done using a term in perception called Biological motion. It is the unique phenomenon of movement done by animate objects. Here, dots were used to show the moving joints of an organism called as Point light display.
Hill and Johnson's (2001) experiment in biological motion went like this. They focused on detecting sex and identity from the biological motion of faces. Two components were involved in this experiment: (1) the rigid head motion, which is the movement of the head, and (2) the nonrigid motion, which only just focus on the expression of the face. The observers categorized first these stimuli if it is just head movement, facial expression, or combined. Results showed that they identified them correctly. Then, afterwards, the researchers asked the participants/observers to identify the stimuli according to its sex. Results showed that there were difference in how people moved their head and made their facial expression; and these were useful in detecting the sex and identity of the stimulus. The rigid head movements particularly give clues to the identity of the stimuli while nonrigid head movements tells about the sex of the person.
In this process of getting cues on how a woman or a man moves, it is very crucial especially to people who makes digital cartoon videos. Somehow if the movement is not appropriate for a character's role, then it is not that realistic because there are movements that people perceived only to specific sex. Perception is very important in appreciating the movie. If the movie goers couldn't perceive what they know is right, then they would be very disturbed. So, it is better to give in to the beliefs of the majority when you're target is them.
Reference:
Hill, H., Johnston, A. (2001). Categorizing sex and identity from the biological motion of faces. Current Biology, 11(11), 880-885.
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