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By that logic, movies should just use existing props or set designs rather than creating any new artifacts. Conlanging isn't just gibberish, it's a legitimate
by DanAndersen 8y ago
By that logic, movies should just use existing props or set designs rather than creating any new artifacts.
Conlanging isn't just gibberish, it's a legitimate artform like anything else.
However, I don't have any issue with using real-world languages to give the desired exotic flair for certain settings. I actually think that was one of the things that was great about, for example, the Avatar: The Last Airbender cartoon, because it took the time to use real Chinese calligraphy as part of the worldbuilding (one of the many flaws with the film adaptation was that it tried to deemphasize the explicitly Chinese influences and ended up with pretty uninspired chicken-scratch fake-ideograms for the writing).
Similarly, the video game Riven: The Sequel to Myst had some cutscenes where the fantasy native population were actually speaking Tok Pisin, which is a creole language from Papua New Guinea. This was only fragmentary, though, and much of the Myst games have a quite well constructed language "D'ni."
- da_chicken 8y agoI mean, filming on location as opposed to on a studio sound stage or lot has often been favored by audiences and directors for greater authenticity, even when it's Vancouver masquerading as another city or Tunisia masquerading as Tattoine. And I don't think anybody is suggesting that conlanging isn't "a legitimate artform like anything else," just that it's duplicating effort. Remember "don't repeat yourself"?
- wool_gather 8y ago> Riven: The Sequel to Myst had some cutscenes where the fantasy native population were actually speaking Tok Pisin, which is a creole language from Papua New Guinea Interesting tidbit! I had thought they were all artificial.
- yumaikas 8y agoCan you provide a source for this? I'm very curious, as I grew up speaking Tok Pisin, and played some Riven, and looking up cutscenes online I can't make sense of any of the Rivenese (well, the foreign language bits, I don't know if it's Rivenese or not), at least not in https://youtu.be/-rjfyfuijrc https://youtu.be/-rjfyfuijrc or https://youtu.be/smOzKs1hauM https://youtu.be/smOzKs1hauM.