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And Now, the Animated News
theodp writes "'You have a lot of missing images, in the TV, in the news reporting,' explains billionaire Jimmy Lai. It's a gap that Lai's Next Media intends to fill with its animated news service. Artists lift details from news photos while actors in motion sensor suits re-create action sequences of stories making headlines. Animators graft cartoon avatars to the live-motion action, and the stories hit the Web. When news agencies didn't have footage of scenes from the Tiger Woods car crash, Lai's team raced to put together animation dramatizing the incident that became a YouTube sensation. Thus far, Lai has been denied a television license, but with or without his own station, he thinks his animations are headed for televisions worldwide. His company is currently in talks with media organizations to churn out news animations on demand using Next Media's graphic artists and software tools."
Please
Can't you just see Elin as Miss Piggy? Haaaaayyyyaaaahhhh!
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I would definitely watch that
My first thought was that this is totally unnecessary and sensationalist use of technology. My second thought was that CNN is going to love this.
I can't wait to see what my favorite cartoon characters are doing day to day, when they're not starring in films/television.
http://www.beanleafpress.com
Enactors learn that the report couldn't be true. Slow news day makes up news. Enactors actually commit acts which they re-enact as news. Political assassinations, for example. Private company fakes moon landing... the works...
This is just... wrong.
Although from a technological point of view it is very interesting, a lot of details missing from the regular videos need to be 'made up' for the reconstruction. I think that's a dangerous move, as the viewer may base its opinion on video footage.
It's not news, it's news branded entertainment! ...not that we are aren't knee deep already... but, seriously?!
(or is that entertainment branded news?)
The basic idea isn't new.
The Evening Graphic's tabloid reality of the twenties was "staged, faked and mostly naked."
Radio's The March of Time used its resident company of actors to vividly recreate events that couldn't be broadcast live.
Thats what I'm waiting for!
(must remember to select 'Post Anonymously')
It's just a digital re-enactment. The only difference here is they are doing it for the nightly news. Faster software and computers that's the real change. There's talk of whether they should do it which is silly and pointless since it's been around for years and most networks do it in some form. The real line would be if the results were photo real and it wasn't referred to as a re-enactment. So long as it's never presented as the real thing I don't see a problem.
...Using state of the art technology...
This is what it would have looked like if the plane had crashed into a school building full of bunny rabbit!
If, for whatever reason, it will ever begins to matter to me, who delivers the news, rather than what the news is, I'll pick the Naked News over anything "animated", thank you very much.
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
If it's anything like the Conan O'Brien animation I look forward to getting 100% of my news this way.
Remember "A Current Affair?" Tabloid TV at its nadir. Apparently, this guy is trying to sink even lower. He didn't get the memo that this sort of thing was so "been there, done that" two decades ago.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Current_Affair_(U.S._TV_series)
There's a slightly better translation here.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Yrj35SHhZM&feature=related
But you really should watch them both since the 2nd one which is easier to listen to since it flows better and has less bad grammar and typos leaves out things like Leno being sad and Conan being happy about the shift (the original shift, not the shift back).
I think this video really works well. I think there's a market for this stuff.
http://lkml.org/lkml/2005/8/20/95
Malcom McDoohanigan, Director of the MiniTrue, and Big Brother and I approve of this technology. DoublePlusGood!
Welcome to the Panopticon. Used to be a prison, now it's your home.
News agencies should be reporting, not making up the news.
God spoke to me.
Fox News will be your first customer.
Individuals must choose, decide their "essential" nature rather than having it given from some transcendent source.
This should make fabricated news more believable!
Win/win? /facepalm
Remember to maintain your supply of
Number 10. Carmack and Romero fist fight
Number 9. Woz sex with Kathy Griffin
Number 8. A series of tubes, not a big truck
Number 7. Wesley Crusher sucked into a warp drive
Number 6. Ballmer doing Dancing with the Stars to the 'Developers Developers Developers Developers' remix
Number 5. Darl McBride being force fed into a wood chipper by the guys from Fargo
Number 4. Stallman and Schneier as banjo dueling Santas
Number 3. Cowboy Neal
Number 2. 10,000 Anonymous Cowards hacked to bits by the 300 Spartans yelling "This is Slashdot!"
And the Number one re-enactment wish for Slashdot: Duke Nukem Forever
The tiger woods thing was funny as hell, saw it a couple days after the "reports" were in, this will be great for trash tv and tabloid journalisim I suppose but I really think that the new legitimate news sources out there should really step away from this. It looks more like a way to really get into hot water as they seem to be created based on their interpretation of events rather than actual factual information. Initial opinion and actual findings tend to vary greatly.
When I first saw the headline, I thought to myself, y'know, if what they were doing was doing an animated news program as in making a series of hand-drawn cel animations for the various stories and anchorpeople, as well as reasonably well-drawn though still simplified and stylized backgrounds accurate to the locations in which the news takes place, AND keep it a relatively serious program, THAT would impress the hell out of me. Granted, this would partly be due to the sheer technical infeasibility of the ordeal, now that I think about it, unless you viciously sacrifice both the quality of the character models AND any semblance of fluidity in the animation to do the job.
But just motion capping people doing reenactments? That... not so impressive or interesting. Especially if you've ever seen a live mocap job without post-production, which would most likely need to be done to allow the news to stay any bit current.
Demanding constant attention will only lead to attention.
I remember when this guy's magazine, Next Magazine, was introduced in Taiwan. It was basically a sensationalist tabloid style rag. The magazine's big thing was shock. They ran stories which graphic photos of dramatic accidents, high-profile murders and sex scandals. Or at least they went as far as they could get away with, which was pretty far. They were also notorious for running stories which turned out to be untrue. If I remember correctly they were one of the originals to run the story of people in China supposedly eating unborn fetuses. It turned out it was all staged as a statement by some artist.
This new concept seems designed to skirt the sensors. However, I'm curious to know if this guy has been inspired by others. A couple of years ago I found Taiwanese magazines publishing illustrations of crimes to depict what had happened. Except that they get comically gratuitous with what they depict. It was so absurd I had to clip a few of these to show some friends in the states. In one case a girl was about to get raped and instead offers to perform fellatio on the rapist instead. When he's done his business and leaves, she takes the "evidence", spits it out in a napkin, and takes it to the police. This was all conveniently illustrated in detail, the girl on her knees with the guy standing in front her, and the girl spitting out the stuff. While this technique has been applied to many kinds of stories, predictably, the majority involve sex crimes of one sort or another.
I think news networks have already been running similar cartoons and the Taiwanese government has gotten involved to deal with this. It's pretty much a blatant violation of broadcast rules, but it's pretty easy to dance around the rules there. I'm sure many will argue free speech, but the think here is that this is not driven by desire to inform the public. It's driven by a desire to shock and titillate to boost ratings. People will definitely complain about how indecent it is, but they're all going to happily tune in anyway. It wont be long, however, until this guy no longer has a monopoly on this sort of thing. Everyone will be quick to copy this, at least until the government puts a final stop to this.
I had heard about the accident, but had no idea what really happened. Having now watched that thing I totally know what went down. Not that it makes it any more meaningful.
How is this philosophically different from courtroom sketch artists?
Space game using normal deck of cards: http://BattleCards.org
How long will it take before someone is convicted because of one of these reenactments?
Mr. Burns, you are hereby sentenced to 10 years in prison for selling Homer to the North Koreans.
Who would win this election: Andrew Weiner vs Andrew Weiner's weiner.
...like this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TM-uLjXQaMo
I'm surprised this never made it on the news.
Authority questions you. Return the favor.
LOL the xtranormal.com bits on Red Eye are better
After the Cunard ocean liner Lusitania was torpedoed by the German U-Boat U-20 in May, 1915, the great Winsor McCay was asked to animate the disaster. This was not a minor film; McCay was not only the best animator alive, he had invented the medium himself. It was released in 1918 and used as part of the ongoing anti-German propaganda effort.
Curiously, even this 92-year-old pioneering classic demonstrates the dangers of using animation based on incomplete, mistaken or biased reportage and presenting it as fact. The film depicts the liner being hit by two torpedoes, when in fact the second explosion was internal. The Lusitania was described as an innocent passenger liner, but the Germans contend to this day that she was transporting far more munitions than were recorded in her manifest, and was thus a legitimate target. The English have not helped their cause any in the intervening years: they did their best to destroy the wreck with depth charges in the 1950s. More recently, millions of rounds of unrecorded ammunition have been found by divers at the site, lending credence to the German claims.
On a mildly related note, around this time the Hearst papers (and others, but Hearst was notorious for it) routinely used artists and retouched photos to "reenact" extremely lurid depictions of crimes, with helpful arrows and labels presenting their suppositions as fact. This practice was continued for several decades, and Lord knows how many innocent people were sent to prison or executed because of the bias these "reconstructions" introduced into society.
It was bad then. It's bad now. This is a dangerous path to tread.
"No matter where you go, there you probably are." -- Buckaroo Heisenberg
when it was called "The Running Man."
...aaaaand activate traveling matte.
You never expect irony, do you?
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@iyfwrestling
"Perhaps stupid people like to be spoonfed news from a source that caters to their prejudices? Perhaps smarter people are more eclectic and much more likely to get their news from many different sources?"
Said with all the irony from a forum that traditionally doesn't read the stories.
I start reading them when I was 10 years old in Hong Kong, and that was 1995. Little bit too "colorful", but more or less expose stories that are "hard to discover". Now here in the U.S. I still shell out $8 per issue to buy the Next Magazine (HK version). And don't forget they come out once per WEEK.
New Economic Perspectives
Jon Stewart is not physically capable of doing the Daily News 24x7.
Even the fine ladies at Naked News (NSFW, indeed) can only manage a few hours per week.
You need something else to laugh at.
Thank you, Fox.
Thank you CNN. Double thanks for no "Naked Wolf News".
Hey, now, I sure wasn't laughing when Sanjay Gupta was the only damn doctor in Haiti, operating on some poor infant, outside, with no equipment.
But yeah, most of the time CNN is kinda funny.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton