Meat! // Walker

In the short film Meat!, we see a woman sitting at a table in a dark room, holding a fork and knife. She slices a bite of meat from the plate in front of her, but as she goes to eat it, one of the chunks of meat on her place begins to crawl away. When the woman notices the meat moving it growls at her and she cowers away from it in fear, before grabbing the knife again and stabbing into the living meat slice. Throughout these actions, the principle of exaggeration is used to create more dramatic reactions and tell a more engaging story. The woman's facial expressions while sniffing the meat are greatly exaggerated and create both a comedic and slightly unnerving effect. Following this, her expression of fear and movement away from the living meat is greatly exaggerated to emphasize her fear. Finally, after her slow, subtle movement to grab the knife, the act of stabbing the meat is greatly exaggerated. When the knife is drawn back to its peak there is a slight pause before she brings it down onto the meat, which adds even more to the exaggeration of the action. Overall, the exaggeration used creates a very distinct feeling for the film, which would have been much less entertaining and eye-catching without this principle.

Contrast is another principle seen in Meat! Looking at the full set/props in the film, the viewer's eye is drawn to the vibrant yellow plate and then to the red meat. The color of the meat also brings out the color of the red curtain on the left side of the scene. There is also a contrast between the lighter colors of the candle and the person's skin. These details greatly add to the aesthetic of the film.

In the second film, Walker, we see a slightly unsettling animation of a walking sequence created using a fertilized duck embryo known as balut. (likely with some form of wire inside as rigging). The contrast in this film is seen in the brightly colored pink flesh of the Balut, compared to the dark black background. The contrast of the light duck and dark background adds emphasis to the subject and feeds into the unsettling feeling of the film. The film would definitely have a different style and feeling if the duck didn't stand out as starkly against the background, which would be interesting to see, possibly creating a different sense of unease.

• Hope I didn't write too much for this assignment, I really enjoyed watching and breaking down both of those films :)