Conference Presentations by Signe Kjaer Jensen
To animate literally means “to bring to life”, and it is my purpose in this paper to discuss anim... more To animate literally means “to bring to life”, and it is my purpose in this paper to discuss animation features and the way sound design contribute to animate onscreen characters as well as virtual soundscapes and holds an indexical function of linking the animation to a sensoric real-life world enabling the viewer to engage and identify with the narrative through a sense of “perceptual realism” (following Langkjær 2010).
Drawing on Murray Schafer’s soundscape terminology (Schafer 1993) and insights from William Gaver’s ecological approach to listening (Gaver 1993), I analyze the way sound can be seen as providing materiality to animated environments and as a tool for generating agency and intentionality to onscreen characters. By providing environments and objects with synchronized sounds, produced and recorded to make them live up to audience’s expectations of reality, virtual soundscapes are created to simulate everyday perceptual experiences. Furthermore, synchronized sounds provide information about the physical characteristics of their perceptual sources – that is, the sources from the animation that the audience couples with the sounds rather than the real Foley-sources – hereby providing the animation with materiality by defining e.g. weight, texture, movement and placement of objects in the virtual space. Characters are as a result given agency and intentionality. Through this perceptual realism, all sound in animation will to some extent function as an indexical reference to life outside the screen, but the use of sound signals familiar to the audience can be seen as an enhancement of these references that enables audiences to engage further with the narrative
Papers by Signe Kjaer Jensen
Journal of Comparative Literature and Aesthetics, 2024
In this essay, I use the song ‘Let It Go’ from Frozen as a steppingstone for addressing song and ... more In this essay, I use the song ‘Let It Go’ from Frozen as a steppingstone for addressing song and animated musical film as combined media, or rather integrations, and, based on the models put forward by Lars Elleström, propose a framework for discussing different kinds of synchronic intermediality. I propose that when analysing synchronic intermediality, we need to consider (at least) three types of combination: 1) combination of modalities (understood as formal structures framing the content), 2) combination of qualified aspects (understood as conventions of media products, herein those aspects tied to media representation), and 3) combination of semiotic content.
Routledge eBooks, Nov 17, 2021
Media products of all sorts form a complex web of different relationships. Media products involve... more Media products of all sorts form a complex web of different relationships. Media products involve transformations, integrations and combinations as well as transmedial aspects. When we look at media combinations in this chapter, all these different aspects are brought into play. Media combinations of different basic media types are always, literally, intermedial combinations that involve intermedial relations between different forms of communication. This chapter deals with different kinds of combinations of technical, basic and qualified media types in comics, films, radio drama, songs/singing and music videos. Some of them are more obvious in this aspect. The music video, for instance, integrates sound, words and (moving) images. The pages of comics display text and image, and these two basic media types communicate differently in the semiotic modality. In radio dramas or songs, the combination aspect is not as visually apparent. Still, the soundwaves of a song or a radio drama firmly integrate several auditory media types. With specific examples, we discuss how to understand the different intermedial aspects at play whenever different media types are brought together in a particular media product. Different perspectives are possible. Should one focus on the combination of different forms of meaning-making, or instead stress how deeply integrated these different media types are? Should one approach a song as the combination of different qualified media (poetry and music), or focus on the close integration of different auditory media types (words and organized sound)? When we approach media combinations with the four modalities, we can focus on both. When words, (moving) images, and organized sounds are brought together in media products, such as comics, songs and music videos, they form an integrated whole. We can focus on how different basic media types in the material and sensorial modality are firmly integrated. We can then explore how these integrations on pages, in soundwaves, on stages or in the studio enable an intricate combination of different forms of meaning-making that support and interact with each other in the spatiotemporal and semiotic modality. First, we will take a look at how words and images on pages convey a graphic narrative in comics. Then we will highlight the importance of sound effects in the complex combination of moving images and auditory media types
Intermedial Studies, 2021
With this definition, they distinguish social media from both traditional mediawhich is not inter... more With this definition, they distinguish social media from both traditional mediawhich is not interactive or internet-basedand other new media, such as email and messaging apps that are not sufficiently social. Indeed, what is social about social media is the 'multi-directionality of communication flow' or a phenomenon formulated as 'masspersonal communication' by O'Sullivan and Carr in another article (O'Sullivan and Carr 2018, p. 1161). The notion of masspersonal communication refers to the way in which communication is in a one-to-one, one-to-many, many-to-many and many-to-one form on social media. The idea behind this concept is that we should dismiss the dichotomy between mass communication as a one-to-many communication performed by mass media as opposed to interpersonal communication defined as a two-way, one-to-one form of communication. Instead, we should understand communication in social media as consisting of people simultaneously engaging in mass and interpersonal communication. Rather than being either interpersonal or mass communication, masspersonal communication differentiates across a scale and is determined by its level of 'accessibility' and 'personalization': a public post on Facebook with no specified audience is more accessible and impersonalized, while a personal tweet in a private Twitter account which directly addresses the account-holders' followers is less accessible and more personalized; however, neither of the two can be categorized as solely mass or solely interpersonal communication. This also links to the importance of (a perception of) interaction on social media. Our interactions on social media are shaped and determined by
European Review
Animation and live-action are two closely related media, which are foremost distinguished by the ... more Animation and live-action are two closely related media, which are foremost distinguished by the ideas and conventions surrounding them. The diverging discourses around animation and live action have tended to focus on animation as something constructed to represent characters and settings and on live action as something capturing actors and sets representing characters and settings. This difference between constructing and capturing, along with the perceived indexicality of the photo, is what seems to suggest live action as the preferred medium for documenting real events. Sound effects, in the form of recorded and edited sounds of objects, actions and environments, are of particular interest here, as they can be considered to balance somewhere between these poles of construction and capture, between the non-indexical and indexical, and ultimately between representation and reproduction. In this article, I will focus on aspects of ‘truth’ (understood as corresponding to some extern...
This thesis is an audience reception study of film music and animation film. It focuses on the mu... more This thesis is an audience reception study of film music and animation film. It focuses on the musical construction of characters, looking at how music becomes meaningful in film and how this meaning becomes part of child audiences' interpretation of filmic characters. To examine these questions, the thesis combines an interdisciplinary theoretical framework based on audience studies, multimodality, and film music studies with an empirical enquiry into child audiences' reception. Drawing on this theoretical and empirical synthesis, the thesis proposes two models of relevance to our understanding of reception and film music: A new model for conceptualising film music as a multimodal system that combines with other semiotic systems to construct a multimodal dimension – the way this multimodal dimension is constructed affects the film's interpretive openness. A general model for understanding reception as an active encounter between a multimodal text and an active audience....
Intermedial Studies, 2021
Media products of all sorts form a complex web of different relationships. Media products involve... more Media products of all sorts form a complex web of different relationships. Media products involve transformations, integrations and combinations as well as transmedial aspects. When we look at media combinations in this chapter, all these different aspects are brought into play. Media combinations of different basic media types are always, literally, intermedial combinations that involve intermedial relations between different forms of communication. This chapter deals with different kinds of combinations of technical, basic and qualified media types in comics, films, radio drama, songs/singing and music videos. Some of them are more obvious in this aspect. The music video, for instance, integrates sound, words and (moving) images. The pages of comics display text and image, and these two basic media types communicate differently in the semiotic modality. In radio dramas or songs, the combination aspect is not as visually apparent. Still, the soundwaves of a song or a radio drama firmly integrate several auditory media types. With specific examples, we discuss how to understand the different intermedial aspects at play whenever different media types are brought together in a particular media product. Different perspectives are possible. Should one focus on the combination of different forms of meaning-making, or instead stress how deeply integrated these different media types are? Should one approach a song as the combination of different qualified media (poetry and music), or focus on the close integration of different auditory media types (words and organized sound)? When we approach media combinations with the four modalities, we can focus on both. When words, (moving) images, and organized sounds are brought together in media products, such as comics, songs and music videos, they form an integrated whole. We can focus on how different basic media types in the material and sensorial modality are firmly integrated. We can then explore how these integrations on pages, in soundwaves, on stages or in the studio enable an intricate combination of different forms of meaning-making that support and interact with each other in the spatiotemporal and semiotic modality. First, we will take a look at how words and images on pages convey a graphic narrative in comics. Then we will highlight the importance of sound effects in the complex combination of moving images and auditory media types
This paper will present a specific problematic of a broader PhD project on children’s reception o... more This paper will present a specific problematic of a broader PhD project on children’s reception of music and characters in animated features which, along with textual analyses, aims to gather and a ...
Film is an inherently multimodal medium. Despite this, film studies and film musicology alike hav... more Film is an inherently multimodal medium. Despite this, film studies and film musicology alike have a tradition of approaching the discussion of formal interaction in film as a question of how well ...
Films are inherently multimodal and intermedial media products, bearing on representation of (int... more Films are inherently multimodal and intermedial media products, bearing on representation of (intermedial relations) and through (multimodal integration) a range of different media. In this present ...
The aim of this presentation is to present a full framework for understanding characters in child... more The aim of this presentation is to present a full framework for understanding characters in children’s animation from a theoretical and empirical perspective.Filmic characters are paradoxical figur ...
To animate literally means “to bring to life”, and it is my purpose in this paper to discuss anim... more To animate literally means “to bring to life”, and it is my purpose in this paper to discuss animation features and the way sound design contribute to animate onscreen characters as well as virtual ...
Animated films are complex, multimodal works which capture children and adults alike. While the m... more Animated films are complex, multimodal works which capture children and adults alike. While the main aim of many of the popular films is to tell a fantastical story, they also provide an aesthetic ...
Nordlit, 2020
Aurora – Connecting Senses is a multimodal, interactive art installation which explores the ideas... more Aurora – Connecting Senses is a multimodal, interactive art installation which explores the ideas of the Northern Lights through sound, light, colour, and interaction. The installation creates a space where the colours, magic, and mystique of the aurora are brought down to earth and into people’s everyday lives. It is inspired by popular and scientific representations of the real aurora and invites audiences to create yet another interpretation of the natural wonder. In doing so, audiences are also invited to reflect upon the nature of the aurora and on the act of interpretation and exploration. In this article, we provide a thorough description of the ideas and development of the installation, along with photo and video documentation, and offer a critical discussion of the installation as a performative art piece with certain affordances for interaction, performativity, and active reflection. Our discussion is grounded in our observations of audiences engaging with the installation...
Intermedial Studies, 2021
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Conference Presentations by Signe Kjaer Jensen
Drawing on Murray Schafer’s soundscape terminology (Schafer 1993) and insights from William Gaver’s ecological approach to listening (Gaver 1993), I analyze the way sound can be seen as providing materiality to animated environments and as a tool for generating agency and intentionality to onscreen characters. By providing environments and objects with synchronized sounds, produced and recorded to make them live up to audience’s expectations of reality, virtual soundscapes are created to simulate everyday perceptual experiences. Furthermore, synchronized sounds provide information about the physical characteristics of their perceptual sources – that is, the sources from the animation that the audience couples with the sounds rather than the real Foley-sources – hereby providing the animation with materiality by defining e.g. weight, texture, movement and placement of objects in the virtual space. Characters are as a result given agency and intentionality. Through this perceptual realism, all sound in animation will to some extent function as an indexical reference to life outside the screen, but the use of sound signals familiar to the audience can be seen as an enhancement of these references that enables audiences to engage further with the narrative
Papers by Signe Kjaer Jensen
Drawing on Murray Schafer’s soundscape terminology (Schafer 1993) and insights from William Gaver’s ecological approach to listening (Gaver 1993), I analyze the way sound can be seen as providing materiality to animated environments and as a tool for generating agency and intentionality to onscreen characters. By providing environments and objects with synchronized sounds, produced and recorded to make them live up to audience’s expectations of reality, virtual soundscapes are created to simulate everyday perceptual experiences. Furthermore, synchronized sounds provide information about the physical characteristics of their perceptual sources – that is, the sources from the animation that the audience couples with the sounds rather than the real Foley-sources – hereby providing the animation with materiality by defining e.g. weight, texture, movement and placement of objects in the virtual space. Characters are as a result given agency and intentionality. Through this perceptual realism, all sound in animation will to some extent function as an indexical reference to life outside the screen, but the use of sound signals familiar to the audience can be seen as an enhancement of these references that enables audiences to engage further with the narrative