Bradford Animation Festival - 21st Nov

Michel Ocelot in conversation with Paul Wells

French Animator Ocelot both writes and animates fairytale stories using mainly traditional methods alone. The methods of animation that Ocelot uses are typically stop-frame silhouetting and cut-out as he feels these are much richer in terms of visual attraction. He has always and still does research into different artists whom have practised traditional techniques such as pen and ink drawing and that of Japanese printing. He says that his work isn’t inspired from any particular artists as he is inspired not by a few artists, but everything he sees and so his work is a reflection upon the work and techniques he is fond of. However, his journey as a freelance animator took time to become profitable and so his film “The Three Inventors” in 1979 was a project created while working on a very tight budget and required a lot of patience. It was not until his film “Kirikou and the Sorceress” was produced in 1998, that his work became appreciated.

The 3 Inventors - The Locomobile
 © Ocelot · Studio O

For his film “The Three Inventors” he had seen some cakes that were sat on doilies, it was these doilies that inspired his intricate design and stylising. This worked well with the French Renaissance feel to the piece due to the high level of ornate decoration featured within the Renaissance period. Ocelot decided he would purposely use paper cut-out alone and chose to use white paper as to make obvious the method used. This was partly to show those within the industry who had criticised him for using such methods, what he could achieve by using such.

The piece of music set to the animation has a relaxed but sometimes energetic feel due to the tempo and choice of string instruments used. The composer to the music Christian Maire, set up the microphone inside the instruments as to allow the mechanical structure of the sounds to be heard. The decision to do so has been aptly chosen as the film itself is about the invention of mechanical machines, while being constructed itself with a very non-mechanical medium of paper.