Janet Smith
In a cyber world, girls are not necessarily made of sugar and spice and all things nice, nor do virtual crocodiles necessarily eat them smeared in caramel. But Codi (see cover picture), with her Fifth Element bob and her hot-stuff lycra playwear, is as spunky as good girls from reality are sweet.
Born into 3D at the magical Johannesburg design company, Delapse, Codi is the most avant-garde South African TV player that ever there was. There’s no one who can quite match her savoir-faire, the cheeky way she flicks her wrist and her adorable brown eyes – and who else has an alien friend and a variety of blow-up distractions who don’t talk much but have a lot to say?
SABC2 has surprised its viewers with the arrival of Codi and Dub as the faces of Tube, the channel’s children’s brand. The Tube concept, nurtured on Silicon Graphics and brought to life by amazing mechanical devices which bond human actors to their sleek computer alter egos, has left M-Net’s KTV and SABC1’s YoTV in the pixellated shade. Its irresistible animation and clever chatter make us wonder why we need a cute real kid on a cute plastic set when we can have a weird little thing called Froy bobbing on the ocean wave or bouncing through the daisies.
Delapse (the company also responsible for SABC2’s great bumpers, which earned the Mail & Guardian Design of the Week last week) is one of a handful of design firms around the world to use virtual performance animation. Canal Plus in France, MTV and Nickelodeon in the United States and Cartoon Network in Britain are among the few broadcasters to screen programming developed with the technique, which puts the SABC in a select category of forward- thinking media.
Tube technical director Gustav Praekelt of Delapse says the Codi and Dub concept is created by highly-professional designers, and he’s satisfied that the ”multi- disciplinary” approach to Tube – which connects the talents and skills of computer scientists to artists – has helped introduce new ideas about animation to South African public television.
”We like to see how far we can push technology … Codi and Dub are not just presenters telling little stories.”
Yet neither are the characters coldly removed from the warm and fuzzy TV world of children like so many other traditional animated characters. Delapse has injected real personality into Codi, a ”human”, and alien flibbertigibbet Dub, blending the physical gestures of actors Thabang Motsekuoa and Brian Webber with state-of- the-art technology. The actors are strapped into special gear which allows their performances to bring the characters to life: whatever they do, Codi and Dub do the same. Scripted by Debbie Brown, the voices are pre-recorded and Motsekuoa and Webber act to voice under direction from Llewellyn Roderick.
First-class editing by Nicci Bothma blends the two worlds, creating a cyber-suspension of disbelief that makes children wish they could be Codi, playing games in a gentle world of floating blow-up rhinos and plump yellow jumping-castles.
Praekelt says there’s no reason why South African animators can’t create entire television series using traditional or virtual performance animation, but the cost is still too high without a sponsor. Extremely limited broadcast opportunities are another frustration. But, for the moment, Delapse is thrilled with its first major contract, which looks forward to renewal by the channel in April next year.