James Baxter Interview

[tealin]

James Baxter talks about working on Enchanted

There's a significant absence of someone bursting in and shouting 'YOU GUYS ARE ALL AWESOME, WOOO!' Pitiful. Cos they are. So awesome. Especially James. It's a shame they didn't put the test animation on the DVD because it was even a little more amazing than the final product and I wanted to show everybody. Also some rough animation would have been keen. I shake my fist at you, Disney DVDs! At least now I can learn to draw Nathaniel ...

I wonder how long ago this interview was conducted ... omg you guys just wait and see...

Comments

[beckychan.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I drowned in Enchanted happy last night. ^_^♥ It was awesometastic. I love the animation for this movie.

>_> So, I've heard rumors of an Enchanted 2. Any info on that you're allowed to share?

[twirlynoodle.livejournal.com]

I know no more than anyone else, aside from that if they do make one the animation contract reverts to Disney, so that precludes an outside studio doing it (though James is at Dreamworks* now so he wouldn't be able to work on it anyway). Apparently the success of the film caught Disney by surprise and it was rumoured they'd catch up with merchandise for the DVD release, but I'd say, judging by there being no evidence of this actually happning, chances are slim to none in the near future at least. I would have bought a Nathaniel doll. Just sayin'. I'm not even really the merchandise type. I guess this will just have to be a use for all that Sculpey I have lying around... ought to look into getting some model sheets...

[beckychan.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I've got my eyes on some of the merch. Mostly based on the animation, though. I've found that animated Giselle has a striking resemblance to how I would draw Jade (see my dA gallery) if only I drew in a more American style, so she's physically quite appealing to me.

[noodledaddy.livejournal.com]

Great interview. They don't (and I suppose can't) get across just how wonderful a person James is. Chris ain't no slouch either.

[twirlynoodle.livejournal.com]

I miss that place.

[tony-cliff.livejournal.com]

Ask me about Enchanted some time. I watched it in HD last week. Oh my. That Art Nouveau styling was ___so well-executed__.

Plus, Sarah liked it so much she watched it almost four times in a row.

[tony-cliff.livejournal.com]

Whoa, holy typos, article!

[twirlynoodle.livejournal.com]

So, what do you think of Enchanted, Tony?

[tony-cliff.livejournal.com]

I need more space.

Abridged version: Delightful!

[bluepard.livejournal.com]

Hey, just letting you know that I was reading copperbadge's flist and your entries seemed awesome (and full of pretty drawings) so I friended you. Just so you know where the random person friending you came from. =D

[floramir.livejournal.com]

Everybody probably knows about this, but if you go here:

http://artofdisney.canalblog.com/

not only is there lots of other stuff, but if you scroll WAY down to the very bottom of the page, there are some Enchanted concept drawings; I had never seen any before so I was excited. 8)

Thanks for the article. I cant believe the amount of things I didn't know about this movie. I didn't even bother to look up the cast and see that Timothy Spall was in it before I saw it. But I guess it was nice to be so utterly overwhelmed with joy when I saw Nathaniel; my eyes got huge and I started furiously elbowing my sister. I always thought Timothy Spall would make a great cartoon character (and I'd totally buy a toy Nathaniel too).

[purlicue.livejournal.com]

I love the word animation, as the article points out. What a lovely, powerful term. Man.

Enchanted was gratuitous amounts of fun; Timothy Spall is most excellent, though the wide-eyed, charming idiocy of James Marsden is (in judiciously administered doses) fabulous in its own way.


I'm not quite sure how to phrase this question, or even if it is a question at all, but for Enchanted was there less, um . . . definition in the animation? Less compactness, maybe? I would have had some trouble recognizing the difference between Giselle and Nancy in their animated forms had they been placed side by side and their hair removed, but I don't know if this was because there were subtleties in the Art Nouveau-ish animation that I couldn't catch. Like Andalasia seemed very flat, unlike the round worlds of other Disney Movies. Um. Am I making any sense? Or is it just my eyes adjusting to (~*~*~*OMG!!!*~*~*~) 2-D animation after such a long dry spell?

[purlicue.livejournal.com]

(I suppose it would have made more sense if I had done "the word animation" instead.)

[twirlynoodle.livejournal.com]

I agree on the similarity of Giselle and Nancy. My theories are as follows:
1. Lack of time (They added the scene with Nancy fairly late in the game)
2. Disney princesses all look roughly the same anyway
3. If you caricature a woman's distinctive features to the point of distinguishability, you run the risk of making her, if not ugly, at least not glamourously beautiful ... and if Nancy ended up a cartoon princess she'd have to lose Idina Menzel's underbite.

The flatness could very well be the long absence of 2D. There's also the problem that most of the people working on it hadn't done any 2D animation for a few years and were, I've been told, extremely rusty. You don't want to be going for crazy perspective drawing when you're feeling shaky on your figurative feet. It also doesn't seem to be storyboarded with a lot of depth (something you get more in high action scenes). And the way the world was lit (again, a circumstance of the tone of the short animated sequence) also flattened things out a bit, with its cheerful warm light.

[purlicue.livejournal.com]

Okay, that all makes sense. :) I wasn't sure if the difference to my eyes was due to an intentional use of Art Nouveau styling or maybe had other factors? Either way, the animation is still lovely and makes me sigh dreamily. Oh, animation.