Head Bob: Difference between revisions
Rescuing 1 sources and tagging 0 as dead.) #IABot (v2.0.8.6
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(Rescuing 1 sources and tagging 0 as dead.) #IABot (v2.0.8.6) |
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{{trope}}
{{quote|'''Sarge:''' What are they saying?
'''Simmons:''' I have no idea. I can't find the volume on this monitor. And without any sound it just looks like a bunch of helmets bobbing up and down.
'''Sarge:''' Is that how they talk? [[Lampshade Hanging|They look ridiculous!]]|''[[Red vs. Blue]]''}}
In any work where the character's mouth will never move, such as with [[Puppet Shows]], masked characters, mouthless animation and [[Machinima]], in order to simulate speech, the "puppeteer" will aim up and down in time with the dialogue. This produces a bobbing motion for the character's head. If a mid-1990s 3D [[Video Game]] went to a [[Cutscene]], quite often it was stuck with this too (''[[Metal Gear Solid]]'' was regarded as a technical breakthrough, but its characters didn't have eyes, let alone movable lips).
Probably the [[Trope Maker
This is not just an [[Animation Tropes|Animation Trope]]. In some live-action TV, especially [[Sentai]] shows, the helmeted characters will exaggerate their head movements to suggest that they are actually speaking.
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== Films -- Live Action ==
* Darth Vader in ''[[Star Wars]]'' is also a head-bobbing, arm-waving example of this trope. Many actors in heavy makeup or costume will resort to exaggerated movement reminiscent of the theater in order to get their emoting across to the audience.
* Doctor Doom in the disastrous [[Roger Corman]]-produced ''[[The Fantastic Four (
** The apotheosis of this is a video transmission opening with "'''HELLO,''' Richards! Good to '''SEEEEEE''' you again!" Translation: "'''[Queen Elizabeth wave]''' Richards, good to '''[points ''directly'' at eyes]''' you again!" ("[https://web.archive.org/web/20140312181049/http://www.agonybooth.com/recaps/The_Fantastic_Four_1993.aspx?Page=7 I mean, this guy is just a few short gestures away from inventing Latverian Sign Language.]")
* Averted in ''[[V for Vendetta]]''. V gestures and moves around a lot while speaking, but he doesn't bob his head or do anything beyond the realms of the normal. Makes sense, since he's never in the same scene with anyone else in a mask.
== Live Action TV ==
* Suited ''[[Power Rangers]]'' use the
** Though not to the titanic degree of [[Mighty Morphin Power Rangers]], [[Toku]] in general (including [[Super Sentai]], [[Kamen Rider]], [[Metal Heroes]], [[Ultraman]], etc.) does this.
*** While it's true that there is some exaggeration to their movements, helmets worn by Power Rangers and Super Sentai actors are actually ''designed'' to move when the actor talks. Their chin pushes down on the bottom of the helmet and the whole thing shifts forward slightly giving the illusion of a
== Puppet Shows ==
* In ''[[The Sooty Show]]'', with [[Hand Puppet
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* In fact, the first ''Half-Life'' was one of the first games to avert this by having at least semi-realistic [[Mouth Flaps]]. Then in ''[[Half-Life]] 2'', the aversion became even more spectacular as the technology used is actually capable of moving elements of the character's faces for realistic lip-syncing and expressions.
* Since the leader of a given party in ''[[Guild Wars]]'' can be of any class and either gender, wearing any of the available armor sets, this is how in-game cutscenes are handled.
* The first three ''[[Tomb Raider]]'' games always used gratuitous head bobbing to signify characters' speech. In [[
* In ''[[Okami]]'', character's heads will stretch like putty every time any character talks, since people don't have mouths in the game's calligraphic art style. This is especially odd as there's no voice acting, just ''[[Banjo-Kazooie]]''[[Speaking Simlish|-style grunting]].
* Similar head-bobbing occurs during dialog in ''[[Neverwinter Nights]]''. It's doubly strange because all parties will be bobbing at once (and only spoken dialog for key NPCs).
* The original ''[[Metal Gear Solid]]'' on the first [[
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** Note that when Sarge hangs a lampshade on it with the page quote, his own head movements are exaggerated.
** A bug in the game ''Halo'' allowed a character to appear to be looking forward when in fact he was aiming at the ground. This allowed machinima artists to make it look like the characters had lowered their weapons. In ''Halo 2'', this bug was fixed, but the game producers included a control to lower the character's weapon anyway.
** ''[[Gothic]]'' allows one to make your character actually move their mouth and [[Going Through the Motions|do gestures while doing it]], but it's quite complicated,<ref>typically requiring you to spawn an invisible NPC and have the character talk to them</ref>
* The old ''[[Bionicle]]'' animations combined this with [[Noisy Robots]].
* Strong Bad from ''
* In [[
** In one main page, as seen from behind the Main Page set, we see that Strong Bad bobs his head when not facing the viewer ''even when he thinks he's facing the viewer'', and doesn't bob his head (much) when he is facing the viewer but thinks he isn't.
** Coach Z also moves his head around when he speaks, because he lacks a mouth. Pom-Pom and the Cheat shake their entire ''bodies'' a bit when they... um, [[The Unintelligible|"speak"]].
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