Object animation is a type of animation which only uses objects. The technical process involves taking a series of images of any object, such as a shoe and moving the shoe slightly and taking a photograph at every movement. These are then linked together by uploading the images onto final cut pro and then adjusting their frames per second to create a sequence of film. This type of animation is currently used in adverts and children's animation films.
Object animation is the oldest stop motion technique and was first used at the turn of the 20th Century. "The Humpty Dumpty Circus" (1898) by Albert E. Smith and J. Stuart Blackton is a first example.
A current example of object animation is used in the TV advert: EDF Energy Blue to attact members of the UK public to switch over to EDF Energy. This is a good example of the application of comtempory object animation and is acheived by a using a 'morph' type character as the main focus who is shown moving from two levels of emotion - from dull and gloomy to bright and joyful once the background music changes from sad piano to the famous upbeat Hawaii Five O soundtrack.
An influence of it's production seems to have come from a past childhood character 'Morph' who was formed using clay. This advert's character has no features apart from a large pair of eyes. This would make the viewer have empathy with the character. The voiceover in the advert also encourages viewer reaction.
The animation is very simplistic but effective in a sense because the actual character does not move very much but it doesn't really need to as the soundtrack and voiceover helps to generate audience reaction and emotion.
This is a sucessful example of how object animation has been used in current adverting because it is memoriable due to the soundtrack and use of the little character. Reviews on Youtube suggest that most people who have seen the advert have found it catchy because it has been influenced by music from the past.
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