Video + Audio
Video essays and recordings
Video Essays
Video demonstrations of analyses from Figure and Force in Animation Aesthetics:
Soft Edges: Night on Bald Mountain
Analysis of soft-edged figures changing shape in Night on Bald Mountain (Alexander Alexeieff and Claire Parker, 1933).
From chapter one, p. 30.
Perspectival movement: The Metamorphosis of Mr. Samsa
Analysis of a camera movement in The Metamorphosis of Mr. Samsa (Leaf, 1977).
From chapter three, pp. 107-108.
Walk Cycles: Canon
Analysis of walk cycles in Canon (Norman McLaren and Grant Munro, 1964).
From chapter two, pp. 67-69.
Rotoscoping: Going Home Sketchbook
Analysis of rotoscoping in Going Home Sketchbook (Beams, 1975).
From chapter four, pp. 134-135.
Student Video Work
Final projects from The Audiovisual Essay, taught Fall 2018 (password protected):
Visualizing Masculinity
A study of toxic masculinity in Whiplash (Damien Chazelle, 2014).
Cities and Cinema: Questions and Catharsis
A video that asks what significance urban settings have for science fiction film.
Present Darkness: Space in Cowboy Bebop
A study of negative space in the sci-fi/noir environment of Cowboy Bebop (1997-1998).
Gaze in Film: Fifty Shades of Grey vs. Magic Mike XXL
A comparison of male and female gazes.
Audiobook Chapter
“Soft Edges”
A study of the ways soft-edged forms expose us to the world of forces beneath us, told through a history of clouds in animation.
Audio recording of chapter 1 of Figure and Force in Animation Aesthetics.
Presentations
“Cycle Space”
An examination of the ways that animated camera movements can create enclosed spaces, as well as overcome them, through a study of experimental animator Adam Beckett’s Dear Janice (1972).
Presented at Seeing Movement, Being Moved: An Exploration of the Moving Camera, at the University of Chicago, October 29, 2016.
“The Frankish Frame”
A tribute to the work of animation scholar Hannah Frank.
Co-presented with Alla Gadassik at the Society for Cinema and Media Studies conference, March 24, 2018, Toronto.