DrJason Kennedy

Dr Jason Kennedy is a senior lecturer above the bar within the department of Animation, Visual Effects & Game Design at Auckland University of Technology. He is a professional animator and actor, and uses his combined experience to investigate the nature of performance within the contexts of animation and motion capture. He is also a collaborative member of Eco Astronomy, a multidisciplinary astronomical research institute. In this capacity, Dr Kennedy extends his research into the field of palaeontology and exobiology, creating 3D scientific visualisations and palaeoart.

Overview of Doctoral Thesis and Resulting Research:

Through interdisciplinary theory and practice, my doctoral thesis “Acting and Its Double: A Practice-Led Investigation of the Nature of Acting Within Performance Capture” (2021) examines how the constructed nature of animated performance challenges our understanding of acting, and suggests a paradigm revision for how performance is understood within motion capture and animation. This research is interrogated through a practice-led inquiry in the form of 3D animation experiments that seek to clarify the nature of acting within the contexts of animation and performance capture. I explore how a knowledge of acting affects the practice of animating (and vice-versa), as well as the role of the animator in interpreting an actor’s performance data – and how this affects our understanding of the authorship of a given performance.

This thesis transcends traditional disciplinary boundaries and sits at the intersection between theories of acting, animation, film, and psychology. Additionally, this thesis engages with phenomenology and autoethnography to explore acting in performance capture from the perspective of a single individual as the actor, performance capture (PeCap) artist, and animator. This type of first-person experience-based insight is often missing from purely theoretical discussions about acting in performance capture and animation, and helps to provide a clearer understanding of the contributions of each creative role to the final PeCap result. This research provides a strong basis for the necessity of a paradigm revision for how acting is produced and understood within a PeCap context.

This practice-led research resulted in several important published, peer-reviewed outcomes, including “Vactor Ontologies: Framing Acting Within a Motion Capture Context” (2022), which explores how acting and presence are framed within a virtual acting context. These ideas are grounded in examples of synthespian performances explored in “Critiquing the Screen Presence of Synthespian Counterparts” (2019), which updates language for articulating how such performances navigate the Uncanny Valley. This language is expanded in “Acting-Centred Definitions of Vactors, Synthespians, and Digital Doubles” (2019), which formalises existing language around virtual performance, including the creation of a taxonomy of performance modes among virtual actors to better understand their acting capabilities. Further, in “The Animator’s Sensorium: The Impact of Acting and Animation Experience on Creating Reference Performances” (2021), I examine the potential for acting experience to enhance animation reference performances, and specifically explore three different preconditions of experience when producing animation reference: actors with no animation experience; animators with no acting experience; and performers with both acting and animation experience.

Background:

Dr Kennedy entered the fine art world circuitously through his initial ambition to become a palaeontologist. He enrolled in Albion College’s geology programme (in Albion, Michigan, USA), only to discover that while he still loved dinosaurs, he liked the idea of animating them more than digging them up. He graduated from Albion in 2004 with a major in studio art (drawing) and minors in geology and mathematics. He completed a MFA in electronic art from the University of Cincinnati in 2007. His Masters research focused on the role of identity and immortality vis-à-vis digital representations of self. He completed his PhD through Auckland University of Technology in 2021.

Contact:

Dr Kennedy is available for media enquiries regarding matters of animation, motion/performance capture, digital performance/performers, and scientific visualisation. Contact can be made via email at jason.kennedy@aut.ac.nz

Click on the "Tapaetanga | Contribution" tab above to see a list of postgraduate theses Dr Kennedy has supervised.