5 - Motion and Emotion in Anime

Summary

This chapter focuses on how the multiplane camera was used in Japan and what it signified to Japanese animators. Some creators attempted to bypass its aesthetics by interrelating mimetic and allusive representation, or motion and emotion, in their storytelling through a synthesis of cinematic techniques derived from live-action film and drawing conventions derived from comics. Anime movement shares some principles with character animation, but it prioritizes the assemblage of different visual properties. It engages viewers through emotional movements, where it draws upon elements other than the visible and mimetically represented physical motion. Emotion-eliciting movements often rely on abstract, exaggerated, and stylized forms, in which the manner of representation itself becomes the center of attention. Using Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba as an example, this chapter demonstrates how the series’ visuality shifts on a spectrum, responding to existing anime norms, film forms, technologies, platforms, funding patterns, and the cross-pollination of practices among creators and audiences that do not necessarily demand the simulation of photorealism.