I want to ruminate a bit on the influence impacted by a piece’s form on its content. I’ve seen the assumption that any work can be reduced to its core concept/mechanic and still maintain any semblance of its worth, and that couldn’t be more off the mark. Any performer will tell you that what you say is usually not as important as how you say it. Even fact-based works (such as technical papers or statistical graphs), whose sole purpose is the delivery of content, can be interpreted extremely differently, depending on how they’re presented.

So what kinds of stories do stop motion films usually tell?  From my experience, they’re generally rather creepy, with a tendency for pretty bizarre situations .  Is that just because the people most inclined to do stop motion are also the people more inclined to be creepy?  Maybe, but the real reason is because of the inherent aesthetic of stop motion imagery.  Nobody that I know of makes stop motion dolls that are larger than life-size; they’re always smaller, usually much smaller.  The consequence of this is that you have to get extremely close to the dolls to get the appropriate shots, much closer than you’d need to get to a person.  And when you get that close, you start seeing all the ragged edges and bumpy textures that might normally appear smooth from farther away.  For that reason, stop motion dolls (no matter how life-like) always look much creepier than humans, and that style directs the mood of the story.

What about CGI films?  With maybe a few exceptions, they tend to rely heavily (if not completely) on humor to spice the story.  When was the last time you watched a CGI serious drama?  (I’m not talking about about motion-capped films like Beowulf; I mean fully CGI).  Certainly, the reliance on humor is partly because of the outdated stigma that CGI (being a kind of cartoon) needs to be directed to “kids”, but it’s also because the imagery feels upbeat.  It’s full of bright colors and completely smooth shapes, and the rendering usually makes it look plasticky and/or shiny.  CGI characters look more perfect than any real person ever could, and CGI stories reflect that.

Does this mean stop motion films can never be humorous or CGI films can never be serious?  Of course not!  Breaking the rules and going against the grain is part of what makes great art great.  But media creators need to be aware of what their chosen medium brings to the emotional table, so they don’t go in thinking their work will turn out the same regardless of how it’s presented.

And people wonder why video game stories are awkward.  If the form is unpredictable and sometimes random, then of course the content will be too.