Primary Exploration On The Visual Language Of Animated Films Produced By Dreamworks

In highly developed economic society where science and technology areincreasingly improving and people enjoy a colorful and diversified entertainment life,film has become an indispensible part in people’s daily life and it is especiallypopular with young people. As a special form of film that is based on graph drawing,animated film is the combined product of drawing art and motion picture technique.Based on the visual language of live action films, animated films highlight artisticexpressiveness and gradually form a visual language system guiding creators toconvey the film content in a more standard lens language. Animated film is no longerjust a tool for amusing and entertaining people but a work of art elaborately carved byartists. The visual language of animated films is purer, simpler, and more beautifuland has larger visual impact compared with that of regular films and television shows.The artistic value and creation rules of animated films’ visual language do not simplylie in a summary of Chinese and Western animations, instead, we need to study themby developing further and correct understanding of them and referring to abundantdata. As one of the largest film bases in the world, DreamWorks has producednumerous high quality animated films which is obvious to all. However, analyses andresearches on the visual language of animated films are most commonly based on thevisual language of general animated films, and currently there has not been anycomplete and systematical theoretical research on movie and TV animations createdby DreamWorks home or abroad. Nevertheless, with the constant development ofanimated films, the artistic characteristics of movie and TV animations become moreand more obvious, and animated films, especially those produced by DreamWorks,have gradually formed a unique audio-visual language system. The paper mainlyanalyzes elements that constitute the visual language of animated films made byDreamWorks and conducts further discussion and study on its artistic characteristicsand functions.With The Croods, an animated film made by DreamWorks, as the case, the paperaims to conduct a vivid, further and specific analysis of the visual language system ofanimated films produced by DreamWorks and tries to establish a theoretical framework with the DreamWorks features for it by studying its elements andfunctions, hoping to provide certain reference significance to domestic explorationsinto the visual language of animated films which are still at the initial stage.With research methods like literature review, comparative study, case study ofanimated films, summarizing etc. applied, the paper carries out a detailed analysis ofcomposition, montage, color, scene, light and shadow etc. of the visual language ofanimated films made by DreamWorks and specifically explores how creators inheritand courageously innovate the visual language of animated films made byDreamWorks with the case study of The Croods, DreamWorks’ latest box-office hit,combined. Based on the research results, the author tries to establish a visuallanguage system with the DreamWorks characteristics, hoping it could provide someenlightenment to domestic animation production industry.