Harvie Krumpet

Harvie Krumpet By Adam Elliot

Adam Elliot was born on the 2nd January 1972 in South Australia. He grew up on a shrimp farm in South Australia with his two brothers, sister and parrot. He found his talent for art at an early age, and spent 5 years studying photography, painting, pottery, and other artistic areas. He has won 34 awards including oscars, and is a unique and succcessful animator.

What type of animation is it? Describe the use of sets/script/characters/storyline. The animation is a type of claymation full of characters with extremely large eyes and noses like the style of wallace and gromit. The big features are kind of like a trademark animative technique, as the other animations by Adam Elliot do. It has partial aspects of substitution and all the characters have distinctive similarities about them.

How would you describe the style? Why do you think Adam Elliot uses that style?
The style seems rather old fashioned and dull, with sepia affectively used. It has a pretty blank story line that seems quite basic, but its livened up by sarcastic and witty naration. The voiceover gives it a commical effect, as it narrates the life of Harvie. It involves some aspects of history in WW1 adding detail to what seems a blunt story.

What effect does it have on the audience?
The animation is really funny because of the tone the narrator uses when he's telling the story, but he also makes you feel sorry for Harvie. When his parents die you feel sentimental, but then the narrator says that "they were frozen, in the nude" which instantly makes you laugh.

Why do you think it won an oscar for best animated short in 2003?
I think that it won an oscar because its an animation thats original from others. Like Vincent, the animation is slightly twisted in a dark setting with a celebrity voiceover, but its also nothing alike to it. The animation really connects with the audience within the language it uses, and the way that its all set out. You could compare it to the likes of "wallace and gromit" or "creature comforts" because of the appearance of the characters, but as a story they are completely different

websites: http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0254178/ http://www.melodramapictures.com/

Metamorphis and Zoetrope Animation techniques

Above Left: Pictures for metemorphisis animation Right: Zoetrap animation strip

Metemorphis animation is a series of pictures put together to show an object expanding into another. It consists of drawing a beggining picture, and an ending picture then drawing all of the stages inbetween. The ways in which they merge can vary widely, from explosions on the page to shape shifting and size expansion or decreasing. The easiest way to merge the two is by finding shapes within both pictures that are similar in some way, and looking at the ways they can blend together. Zoetropes were first used in Roman times and are still used today as a form of entertainment. They consist of a series of drawings that change very slightly each time, and when spun inside a zoetrope give the illusion of a moving picture. The simpler the idea the more affective the outcome is, for example, using a ball is a simple idea but because its simple the effect can be played around with easily. Zoetropes are popular animations andare relatively simple to make.
On Friday 26th February, we went to the Norwich University of Creative Arts and had a go at making out own metemorphosis animations

We were taken there to have an insight of how they were made, and had the chance to make our own. We used shots of two to give a smooth running effect, without any blips to spoil it aswell as making the video in itself longer. The link posted below shows our final animation.


We started off by each taking a word out of an envelope and changing the word into a picture. Mine was a house so i drew a house trying to limit the detail to make transforming it easier. We then had to copy our partners drawing which in my case was a bicycle and then draw all the pictures inbetween. I managed to get the windows to turn into wheels, the chimney into a bike seat, and the roof into random parts of the bike, but it was hard work and isnt as easy as you'd think. We then went over to the A level students, and they took photos of our pictures on a rostrum and edited them all together on the computer. While they were doing this we started working on a zoetrope. The zoetropes were a lot easier than the metemorphisis animations, but were just as effective. Mine was a little creature sitting in a room and a box fell on his head then tumbled off. It sounds plain and boring, but thats all you need to make a good animation. You basically have to draw out the full animation twice however to make the running of it look smooth and not like a load of pictures just thrown together in a wheel. I found the experience really good because i didn't even know what metemorphisis animation was before going to the studio, so justlearning about them was something new to me. I found the day really good, and i learnt a lot of animation techniques including the use of lightboxes and rostrum use. I think the trip really benefited me, and i now have an insight of another 2 types of animation.