While watching The Secret of Kells, I considered the juxtaposition of making a movie about ancient times and manuscripts through modern digital animation. The painstaking process of creating an illuminated manuscript and the creation of a digitally animated movie seem not to have very much in common. Illuminated manuscripts must go through many different steps and many different people with specific skills, like scribes and illuminators, to become a finished product. The process is long and arduous. While many people must collaborate to create an animated film, the actual process of animation itself can be done quickly and easily by pretty much anyone who has access to a computer. Anyone could potentially make their own animation today, though in ancient times it was nearly impossible to make your own illuminated manuscript from start to finish.
Though these two creative processes seem very different, the animated film The Secret of Kells combines them in an interesting and artful way. The animation style is reminiscent of the illuminated miniatures in ancient manuscripts. Just as all boarders and margins in illuminated manuscripts are covered in ornately detailed drawings, so is nearly every scene of the movie. I don’t think there is a single shot where the screen is not completely filled in with unique ornamentation. The characters are two-dimensional, just as the appear on the pages of manuscripts. Similarly, all the characters move within the same plane, which eliminates spatial perspective the same way looking at images on a piece of parchment would.
I found the film The Secret of Kells a very interesting and visually beautiful combination of the old and new styles of illustration and animation.
I agree with you that the film embodied the idea of illumination, the juxtaposition certainly evokes one to think that creating illuminated books was not an easy process compared to creating an animation film and draws an insightful comparison between the digital age and the age of illuminated manuscripts. The fact that books were regarded as works of art through which people could chronicle their visualizations of their beliefs and environment is stressed in the film which makes me think of the purpose of books in the current era, very few people still ask for relatively old techniques like letterpress, books are no longer regarded as sacred possessions. I think the digital age, despite all its advantages, puts most people at a great disadvantage as they disregard the little details that make them unique. I do not understand why most books do not have illuminated margins, not lavish ones like the medieval books but just a delightful detail, the pages look very grim compared to those with decorative details. I think the digital age has been missing the passion of owning books.