Jacqueline Ristola – Realist Film Theory and Flowers of Evil: Exploring the Philosophical Possibilities of Rotoscoped Animation (winner)

Film theorization, particularly classical film theory, has been obsessed with the concept of indexi-cality, the idea that cinema can capture the real world. From this concept has emerged theories that position realism as the essence of cinema. Film scholar Noël Carroll sees these arguments as based around a “medium specificity thesis,” in that classic film […]

Jason Douglass – Artist, Author, and Pioneering Motion Picture Animator: The Career of Helena Smith Dayton (runner-up)

Roughly one hundred years ago, Billboard announced a one-week run of “the latest novelty in motion pictures,” a collection of shorts entitled “Animated Sculpture,” debuting at New York’s Strand Theater on March 25, 1917.[1] On the day of the premiere, Detroit Free Press ran an anonymous review in commendation of these short comic films, explaining […]