Prehistoric animation
November 15, 2021 5:26 AM Subscribe
It turns out that prehistoric art included animation. All you need is bad enough lighting. For (hypothetical) prehistoric animation (disks set up to twirl between two images), see the Cass Neary books by Elizabeth Hand-- the last two books I think. All four are worth reading.
If you're into this you've gotta watch Werner Herzog's Cave of Forgotten Dreams!
posted by oulipian at 5:48 AM on November 15, 2021 [17 favorites]
posted by oulipian at 5:48 AM on November 15, 2021 [17 favorites]
Did prehistoric art have an equivalent of badly chroma-keyed floating Tik Tok heads?
Maybe someone who stands in the way bobbing up and down excitedly while saying "You have to see this!"
posted by RonButNotStupid at 6:12 AM on November 15, 2021 [1 favorite]
Maybe someone who stands in the way bobbing up and down excitedly while saying "You have to see this!"
posted by RonButNotStupid at 6:12 AM on November 15, 2021 [1 favorite]
If you're into this you've gotta watch Werner Herzog's Cave of Forgotten Dreams!
Does this movie actually have footage lit by fire light? I haven't seen that obvious lighting technique in any of the stories I've seen about this so I'm guessing it's prohibited for preservation reasons. If so I'm surprised someone hasn't made a totally self contained camp fire in a clear box to attempt to see this as originally intended.
posted by Mitheral at 6:59 AM on November 15, 2021 [2 favorites]
Does this movie actually have footage lit by fire light? I haven't seen that obvious lighting technique in any of the stories I've seen about this so I'm guessing it's prohibited for preservation reasons. If so I'm surprised someone hasn't made a totally self contained camp fire in a clear box to attempt to see this as originally intended.
posted by Mitheral at 6:59 AM on November 15, 2021 [2 favorites]
anything by Elizabeth Hand is worth reading!!!!
posted by supermedusa at 7:16 AM on November 15, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by supermedusa at 7:16 AM on November 15, 2021 [1 favorite]
Imagine these earliest times; an artist labouring on finely crafted animal illustrations at one end of a cave while at the other, a “conceptual” artist/shaman is using spray paint and inviting everyone to stencil outlines of their hands…I can bet the tension between these two artists was palpable.
posted by brachiopod at 7:21 AM on November 15, 2021 [13 favorites]
posted by brachiopod at 7:21 AM on November 15, 2021 [13 favorites]
The conquest of the dark spaces: An experimental approach to lighting systems in Paleolithic caves
Torches, lamps, and fireplaces were best suited for different art, often in the same cave.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 8:00 AM on November 15, 2021 [2 favorites]
Torches, lamps, and fireplaces were best suited for different art, often in the same cave.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 8:00 AM on November 15, 2021 [2 favorites]
For a lot more detail, I highly recommend this Twitter thread (I’d bet that the TikTok was cribbed from this, actually)
posted by AirExplosive at 8:05 AM on November 15, 2021 [6 favorites]
posted by AirExplosive at 8:05 AM on November 15, 2021 [6 favorites]
That's a very cool thing to learn.
posted by jacquilynne at 8:06 AM on November 15, 2021
posted by jacquilynne at 8:06 AM on November 15, 2021
I've read about this before but never seen an animation. This video linked from the TikTok shows them, albeit with line drawings instead of the actual paintings. And this video tries to show the effect on the actual paintings but it's not very good.
Does Cave of Forgotten Dreams include a really well filmed scene of the paintings themselves animating?
(This needs a MeFi post of its own, but I'm reading the new book The Dawn of Everything now and it's great. One of its main themes is that paleolithic and neolithic cultures were way more diverse and complex than we commonly understand. There's a lot of surprising artistic expressions and sophisticated techniques around the world that we know only the barest hints about.)
posted by Nelson at 8:33 AM on November 15, 2021 [4 favorites]
Does Cave of Forgotten Dreams include a really well filmed scene of the paintings themselves animating?
(This needs a MeFi post of its own, but I'm reading the new book The Dawn of Everything now and it's great. One of its main themes is that paleolithic and neolithic cultures were way more diverse and complex than we commonly understand. There's a lot of surprising artistic expressions and sophisticated techniques around the world that we know only the barest hints about.)
posted by Nelson at 8:33 AM on November 15, 2021 [4 favorites]
This effect sounds very cool, quite amazing and I'm now a bit fascinated that despite all the analogies to film that in the 78 subsequent years no one has filmed it. All of the examples are either simplified line drawings or a movement of exposure around an existing two dimensional image.
I want to see more.
posted by meinvt at 8:40 AM on November 15, 2021
I want to see more.
posted by meinvt at 8:40 AM on November 15, 2021
Does Cave of Forgotten Dreams include a really well filmed scene of the paintings themselves animating?
One of the reasons The Cave of Forgotten Dreams was shot in 3D was to be able to show the way the pictures were taking advantage of the underlying wall and ceiling formations. The crew is carrying their own lighting, so you get a sense of liveliness the images would gain under flickering light and the parallax of a sight line moving past the raised shapes but I REEEEEEEEEEALLY think it's a stretch to say these are “animating” in the modern sense of the word.
I think the multi-images have more in common with the dynamism here
posted by brachiopod at 8:42 AM on November 15, 2021 [5 favorites]
One of the reasons The Cave of Forgotten Dreams was shot in 3D was to be able to show the way the pictures were taking advantage of the underlying wall and ceiling formations. The crew is carrying their own lighting, so you get a sense of liveliness the images would gain under flickering light and the parallax of a sight line moving past the raised shapes but I REEEEEEEEEEALLY think it's a stretch to say these are “animating” in the modern sense of the word.
I think the multi-images have more in common with the dynamism here
posted by brachiopod at 8:42 AM on November 15, 2021 [5 favorites]
Thanks brachiopod. Is the 3d effect in the film visible without a 3d display, ie on a regular TV?
The line drawing animation I linked above shows actual modern animation techniques. Like the 8 legged bovine has 8 legs because it's actually the superposition of two images of 4 legged bovines and you flip between them and it looks like it's running. The part I haven't been able to see on screen is the actual painting animating that way as the light flickers. I understand how you could do this by using the 3d features of the cave surface, I just want to see it happening on screen!
posted by Nelson at 8:49 AM on November 15, 2021
The line drawing animation I linked above shows actual modern animation techniques. Like the 8 legged bovine has 8 legs because it's actually the superposition of two images of 4 legged bovines and you flip between them and it looks like it's running. The part I haven't been able to see on screen is the actual painting animating that way as the light flickers. I understand how you could do this by using the 3d features of the cave surface, I just want to see it happening on screen!
posted by Nelson at 8:49 AM on November 15, 2021
For a lot more detail, I highly recommend this Twitter thread (I’d bet that the TikTok was cribbed from this, actually)
I'd say the TikTok video was more than "cribbed" from that Twitter thread. Looks like it was lifted wholesale from the thread and then passed off as his own work.
posted by touchstone033 at 8:49 AM on November 15, 2021 [3 favorites]
I'm guessing this would be very difficult to film properly given the low light levels needed for the effect. I wonder if it's something you'd have to see in person to get the proper effect.
posted by clawsoon at 8:54 AM on November 15, 2021
posted by clawsoon at 8:54 AM on November 15, 2021
I hope contemporary artists explore these techniques.
posted by Nancy Lebovitz at 8:58 AM on November 15, 2021 [2 favorites]
posted by Nancy Lebovitz at 8:58 AM on November 15, 2021 [2 favorites]
Nelson: no, I found seeing the 3D version to be much cooler (though headache inducing). I have to say again that I think the animation angle on this is hype. Your first clip looks like image still photos with an animating shadow matte put over it in something like AfterEffects. The second is sequencing certain instances of the multiple head or legs to give a sense of animation but I think the intent of original artwork has more in common with the Giacometti Balla dog painting I linked or Duchamp's Nude Descending a Staircase. I think the idea of representing dynamism with multiple images is plenty cool enough - claiming that a flickering light serves as almost a type of mechanical sequencer seems to be pushing it too far and I dunno- taking a sense of “ownership” over this art? I'm in the humbug camp on this.
posted by brachiopod at 9:14 AM on November 15, 2021 [3 favorites]
posted by brachiopod at 9:14 AM on November 15, 2021 [3 favorites]
I'm guessing this would be very difficult to film properly given the low light levels needed for the effect. I wonder if it's something you'd have to see in person to get the proper effect.
Also a possibility though modern digital cameras have astonishing low light level abilities. It should be possible today to at least make a decent attempt. Cave of Forgotten dreams was released eleven years ago though. Probably though the actual effect isn't capturable because of the differences in the ways our eyes perceive things vs analogue or digital capture.
posted by Mitheral at 9:29 AM on November 15, 2021 [1 favorite]
Also a possibility though modern digital cameras have astonishing low light level abilities. It should be possible today to at least make a decent attempt. Cave of Forgotten dreams was released eleven years ago though. Probably though the actual effect isn't capturable because of the differences in the ways our eyes perceive things vs analogue or digital capture.
posted by Mitheral at 9:29 AM on November 15, 2021 [1 favorite]
the speed at which some of us find this to be completely enchanting, others find reason to poke fun/snark at the delivery attempt, and still others question provenance and the extent to which someone seems to have simply ripped off others' observations is all Very Internet, isn't it?
posted by elkevelvet at 10:24 AM on November 15, 2021 [3 favorites]
posted by elkevelvet at 10:24 AM on November 15, 2021 [3 favorites]
Cave of Forgotten Dreams has an absolutely hilarious scene where a scientist is trying to demonstrate using a spear thrower and totally whiffing it each time. Then he’s thrusting the spear directly at the camera for a nice call-back to early cheesy 3D movies. I laughed out loud. Of course with Herzog you just never know if it was an intentional gag or somehow in earnest. My TV supposedly supports 3D movies and I even have the polarized glasses, used exactly zero times. I’m going to have to give this another watch.
posted by sjswitzer at 12:21 PM on November 15, 2021 [3 favorites]
posted by sjswitzer at 12:21 PM on November 15, 2021 [3 favorites]
This could work if you'd taken enough/the right kind of drugs.
Given what we know of humans, I'm pretty sure special mushrooms were an integral part of the process.
posted by jrochest at 1:28 PM on November 15, 2021 [1 favorite]
Given what we know of humans, I'm pretty sure special mushrooms were an integral part of the process.
posted by jrochest at 1:28 PM on November 15, 2021 [1 favorite]
Mitheral: Also a possibility though modern digital cameras have astonishing low light level abilities. It should be possible today to at least make a decent attempt.
I haven't kept up with the latest technology, though I'm thinking the combination of high dynamic range and high speed needed at low light levels would still offer the cinematographer a challenge.
posted by clawsoon at 2:01 PM on November 15, 2021
I haven't kept up with the latest technology, though I'm thinking the combination of high dynamic range and high speed needed at low light levels would still offer the cinematographer a challenge.
posted by clawsoon at 2:01 PM on November 15, 2021
My TV supposedly supports 3D movies and I even have the polarized glasses, used exactly zero times.
I don't know if it's available, but one of the few movies I've seen to use 3D effectively is Pina, a film about a choreographer, a great amount of which places the dancers on a stage and you get to watch them move amongst each other like in real life.
(The other movies that I think are great are Gravity and U23D. Gravity used 3D like with a cinematographer's eye, and U23D also has the "people on a stage in real life" feeling.)
posted by hippybear at 8:36 PM on November 15, 2021
I don't know if it's available, but one of the few movies I've seen to use 3D effectively is Pina, a film about a choreographer, a great amount of which places the dancers on a stage and you get to watch them move amongst each other like in real life.
(The other movies that I think are great are Gravity and U23D. Gravity used 3D like with a cinematographer's eye, and U23D also has the "people on a stage in real life" feeling.)
posted by hippybear at 8:36 PM on November 15, 2021
> I think the animation angle on this is hype
I don't know exactly how the promoters of this idea describe it, but it strikes me as being fairly similar to the type of illusion where a single image contains two different images (young woman/old woman is a typical example) and your visual system tends to flip between the two. A person could see both at once, sort of, but the more usual experience is to be able to switch perception back and forth between the two in a rather discrete way.
So that is a sort of "animation" your visual system creates, between two different frames that can both be perceived within one single image or drawing. But usually we don't use the word 'animation' to describe this effect.
Maybe "illusion of movement or change" instead?
Anyway, it strikes me as the varying lighting and shape of the walls and the cave could create a situation like that, where the figure has several options drawn simultaneously but the shape the rock, direction of lighting, flickering, etc could various emphasize and de-emphasize the various options so that you get more of an effect of flipping among them in a discrete way rather than just seeing a bunch of different poses all at once as one does with Nude Descending a Staircase and similar, which are on a flat surface and intended to be viewed in full flat light.
The effect is somewhat subtle and definitely not "animation" per se but just something that leans a bit in that direction. It makes the result a little more vivid and alive than one would normally expect with a flat painting.
It's different than simply seeing several different poses at once, which is an interesting idea of its own, but rather flat. This has a fair bit more dimensionality to it.
Additionally, I believe among the best ideas archaeologists have about why places like this are made and then re-visited again and again over time, has to do with the idea that they are places inducing - or even designed to produce - awe.
Not very far-fetched when you consider that many of the places we still build - and still visit - have much the same purpose. That includes everything from cathedrals and other religious buildings to national capitols to tall buildings like the Burj Khalifa or those going in a more artistic direction like the Sidney Opera House. Or the Superdome or Disneyland, for that matter.
The idea that these flickery drawings down deep in the bowels of the earth even slightly suggest movement and being something more than "just lines" seems to fit right into that model.
Herzog's documentary captures reaction of one of the original discoverers of those drawing:
posted by flug at 9:48 PM on November 15, 2021 [4 favorites]
I don't know exactly how the promoters of this idea describe it, but it strikes me as being fairly similar to the type of illusion where a single image contains two different images (young woman/old woman is a typical example) and your visual system tends to flip between the two. A person could see both at once, sort of, but the more usual experience is to be able to switch perception back and forth between the two in a rather discrete way.
So that is a sort of "animation" your visual system creates, between two different frames that can both be perceived within one single image or drawing. But usually we don't use the word 'animation' to describe this effect.
Maybe "illusion of movement or change" instead?
Anyway, it strikes me as the varying lighting and shape of the walls and the cave could create a situation like that, where the figure has several options drawn simultaneously but the shape the rock, direction of lighting, flickering, etc could various emphasize and de-emphasize the various options so that you get more of an effect of flipping among them in a discrete way rather than just seeing a bunch of different poses all at once as one does with Nude Descending a Staircase and similar, which are on a flat surface and intended to be viewed in full flat light.
The effect is somewhat subtle and definitely not "animation" per se but just something that leans a bit in that direction. It makes the result a little more vivid and alive than one would normally expect with a flat painting.
It's different than simply seeing several different poses at once, which is an interesting idea of its own, but rather flat. This has a fair bit more dimensionality to it.
Additionally, I believe among the best ideas archaeologists have about why places like this are made and then re-visited again and again over time, has to do with the idea that they are places inducing - or even designed to produce - awe.
Not very far-fetched when you consider that many of the places we still build - and still visit - have much the same purpose. That includes everything from cathedrals and other religious buildings to national capitols to tall buildings like the Burj Khalifa or those going in a more artistic direction like the Sidney Opera House. Or the Superdome or Disneyland, for that matter.
The idea that these flickery drawings down deep in the bowels of the earth even slightly suggest movement and being something more than "just lines" seems to fit right into that model.
Herzog's documentary captures reaction of one of the original discoverers of those drawing:
The first time I entered the cave it was so powerful, I was dreaming of lions.Yeah. Those aren't just lines. Maybe not an "animation" or a "movie" per se, either - but w-a-y more than just lines.
After five days [visiting the cave], I decided not to go back in the cave because it was an emotional shock.
posted by flug at 9:48 PM on November 15, 2021 [4 favorites]
Nice, they finally found that cave Socrates was going on and on about :)
posted by nikoniko at 11:58 PM on November 15, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by nikoniko at 11:58 PM on November 15, 2021 [1 favorite]
The examples they showed reminded me of animation cycles - not a full animation, but three or four frames showing a motion that you'd reuse a bunch of times in a full animation.
posted by clawsoon at 3:44 AM on November 16, 2021 [1 favorite]
posted by clawsoon at 3:44 AM on November 16, 2021 [1 favorite]
I have seen this live. I have visited the major caves in Europe - lascaux and Altamira - which are amazing (both reproductions) but the most fascinating caves with prehistoric art I've visited are the smaller ones. One of my all time favorites was when we were traveling in north central Spain, where there are many smaller caves where one can visit caves with the original art. In one of these we toured there were just six tourists and an incredible guide. This cave was a narrow and short with a few small side chambers and no where near the abundance of paintings found in Lascaux or Altamira but....
At one point, the guide stopped at one of the paintings of a bison that was wrapped around one of the areas of the cave that had a small bit of rock jutting out about where the middle of the animal was. She had us watch as she moved her small flashlight in a way that mimicked a flickering candle. The animal came alive.
posted by bluesky43 at 2:18 PM on November 16, 2021 [3 favorites]
At one point, the guide stopped at one of the paintings of a bison that was wrapped around one of the areas of the cave that had a small bit of rock jutting out about where the middle of the animal was. She had us watch as she moved her small flashlight in a way that mimicked a flickering candle. The animal came alive.
posted by bluesky43 at 2:18 PM on November 16, 2021 [3 favorites]
I had that experience visiting Lascaux II as well, it really does look marvelous in flickering light. But while my memory is not entirely clear I think I just saw general motion, not deliberate animation frames.
posted by Nelson at 3:49 PM on November 16, 2021
posted by Nelson at 3:49 PM on November 16, 2021
Thank you for this post! I have been working on a project of repainting cave art and worked my way through Lascaux and am moving on to Altamira. It is really wonderful to trace the lines of someone chiseling and painting almost 20K years ago...you feel connected by the choices they made and get a chance to feel in your body, as you draw the lines, the intelligence, and artistry of the person who made the cave art.
A bunch of them are here: https://www.pinterest.com/anthrophony/amateur-art-therapy/
posted by Word_Salad at 12:59 PM on November 17, 2021
A bunch of them are here: https://www.pinterest.com/anthrophony/amateur-art-therapy/
posted by Word_Salad at 12:59 PM on November 17, 2021
*repost with live link* Sorry!
Thank you for this post! I have been working on a project of repainting cave art and worked my way through Lascaux and am moving on to Altamira. It is really wonderful to trace the lines of someone chiseling and painting almost 20K years ago...you feel connected by the choices they made and get a chance to feel in your body, as you draw the lines, the intelligence, and artistry of the person who made the cave art.
A bunch of them are here: https://www.pinterest.com/anthrophony/amateur-art-therapy/
posted by Word_Salad at 1:08 PM on November 17, 2021 [1 favorite]
Thank you for this post! I have been working on a project of repainting cave art and worked my way through Lascaux and am moving on to Altamira. It is really wonderful to trace the lines of someone chiseling and painting almost 20K years ago...you feel connected by the choices they made and get a chance to feel in your body, as you draw the lines, the intelligence, and artistry of the person who made the cave art.
A bunch of them are here: https://www.pinterest.com/anthrophony/amateur-art-therapy/
posted by Word_Salad at 1:08 PM on November 17, 2021 [1 favorite]
« Older "Most of us weren’t ready for it. Some of us still... | Channeling Chansley Newer »
This thread has been archived and is closed to new comments
posted by ejs at 5:45 AM on November 15, 2021 [4 favorites]