“I have a way of filming things and staging them and designing sets. There were times when I thought I should change my approach, but in fact, this is what I like to do. It’s sort of like my handwriting as a movie director. And somewhere along the way, I think I’ve made the decision: I’m going to write in my own handwriting.” – Wes Anderson

In honor of Wes Anderson’s second feature length animated film and cinematic masterpiece ‘Isle of Dogs,’ we at Digistars Make-A-Movie Workshop would love to share some formal techniques and hallmarks of Wes Anderson’s Films that make them so amazing! His work is easily distinguished by its aesthetic, particularly his use of framing, color, and music.

Wes Anderson’s Staging and Framing Techniques

First, he often uses planimetric staging and symmetrical framing. Planimetric staging is when the camera is placed 90 degrees perpendicular, or at a right angel, to the subject. Symmetry is the balance of similar forms on both sides of the frame, in other words, it is when one side of the frame nearly mirrors the other side. Here is a video from cinema essayist Kogonada that shows symmetrical framing as well planimetric staging in Wes Anderson’s films.

Wes Anderson’s Use of Color

Secondly, Wes Anderson’s use of color is highly developed. One of the first things I learned in art school that I find to be true is that many novice artists use bright colors, which is certainly not the case for Wes Anderson. You can see from the following video that his pallet is wide ranging, but his frame is often comprised of tints, shades, and tones of various hues arranged in color blocks of complementary, complementary and analogues, and warm and cool color combinations.

Wes Anderson’s Use of Music

Lastly, to choose the music in his films Wes Anderson works with his music supervisor Randall Poster. They search for music that conveys the emotion of a scene and that they want to bring to a film’s audience. The hardest part of that process is having to get the rights from the artists and publishers to use the music. In his earlier films such as Rushmore and Bottle Rocket he used music from popular culture such as Elliot Smith, Nico, and David Bowie, but in his more recent films he has used mostly scores by Alexandre Desplat. You can listen to almost all the songs (approximately 196)  ever used in Wes Anderson’s films here: Music In Wes Anderson’s Movies

Kids can start learning to animate like Wes Anderson does in our claymation program! Attend a summer camp or suggest bringing Digistars Workshop into your school, and maybe one day you will be working on your own animations, or perhaps even helping make a Wes Anderson movie!

‘Isle of Dogs’ is in theaters now: Go see it and prepare to be awed by how beautiful and life-like animation can be when it’s done at 24 frames per second and at such high level of precision. Try to identify where the elements discussed here appear in the film, and notice how they add to the viewing experience. Then incorporate them into your own movie productions!

Have a great week!

C Diamond
Program Director
Digistars Make-A-Movie Workshop