Sketch Comedy in “Man Stroke Woman”
I came across some clips from this British Series on Youtube. I haven’t had a chance to actually watch an episode, so I don’t know how consistent the show is as far as acting and humor. Never-the-less, the following sketches are pretty fantastic (despite the odd title of the program). Some great timing and subtle acting, really good stuff for animation reference.
[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/_Eng-pRT9uA" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]
I find it very difficult to explain how to make acting decisions. All I can muster here is that there is some quality the actor possesses in this clip that I find very appealing and believable. In animation, I often feel as if I am witnessing some really lazy acting- For instance, when an animated character twitters his fingers before picking something up (an overwhelmingly overused action) I almost wonder why the animator even bothered. Why not just have the character look at the audience and say “Anticipate my next action!”.
To be fair, I struggle with acting decisions a whole lot; And I am sure there are some very good uses of the “finger twitter”. I guess it just seems sometimes that many animators do not even consider making acting decisions. Do we really want to just be movers? I would much rather be a performer someday as well…
In any case, enjoy a few more clips from Man Stroke Woman:
[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/jThcc5lbfOs" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]
and here is a particularly silly one:
[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/PlGHLWuYDR0" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]
-tom