ABSTRACT
The potential for non-fiction storytelling as a basis for an independent animation project is explored, evaluating the cultural value of documentary and how it has become entwined with animation through Peter Lord and Nick Park’s game-changing Aardman Animations projects, most notably Creature Comforts. Anecdotal Value focuses on the work of Tom Schroeder and his gift for turning anecdotal storytelling into effective and successful animated short films including Bike Ride, Bike Race and Marcel: King of Tervuren. Introspection turns our attention toward Harvard Animation Professor Ruth Lingford’s own personal research into the nature of orgasm and subsequent animated documentary Little Deaths, while Self Reflection addresses the potential for personal memoir to be the basis for non-fiction animation, as with Melissa Johnson’s short Love in the Time of March Madness (adapted from her https://Salon.com" xmlns:xlink="https://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">Salon.com memoir The tallest woman in the room tells all) and Signe Baumane’s docuseries Teat Beat of Sex. In Sticking Points, independent documentarian Jeff Chiba Stearns breaks down the development and working processes of his project Yellow Sticky Notes, while the value of what animation as a medium brings to the documentary format is elaborated on in the concluding segment The Animation Advantage.
