Animating Ancient Warfare – New Publication

Panoply are delighted by the release of War as Spectacle: Ancient and Modern Perspectives on the Display of Armed Combat.

This new collection explores the ways in which the ancient world treated conflict as a show, a performance, and how that has impacted on ideas about combat in the modern world.

This brief trailer will give you a taste:



Panoply make animations for the modern world that are powered by ancient depictions of the ancient world; and of course, this has included plenty of scenes of warfare, in animations such as Amazon, Well-Wishers, Combat, and the monster Hoplites! Greeks at War. In my chapter for War as Spectacle, I talk about how we interpreted the ancient material and about the decision making process we went through in creating a ‘spectacle’ for modern audiences. You can hear me chatting about some of these themes in this interview with War as Spectacle editor, Dr Anastasia Bakogianni:



Anastasia has also contributed a chapter to War as Spectacle, on her research specialism, the reception (i.e. life after antiquity) of Greek tragedy. Anastasia’s chapter focuses on the films of Michael Cacoyannis, and how he used Greek tragedy to express anti-war ideas:



With a fascinating twist that is typical of War of Spectacle, another chapter show how – at the same time as Cacoyannis was protesting against war - other people were busy using spectacles of ancient warfare to prop up their militaristic agenda.

Other chapters include:
'What if We Had a War and Everybody Came?': War as Spectacle and the Duel of Iliad 3, by Tobias Myers

'The Clash of Weapons and the Sight of War': Spectatorship and Identification in Roman Epic, by Neil W. Bernstein.

'The Greatest Runway Show in History': Paul Violi's 'House of Xerxes' and the Herodotean Spectacle of War, by Emma Bridges.

Epic Parodies: Martial Extravaganzas on the Nineteenth-Century Stage, by Justine Mc Connell.

You can order the book or find out more about it at:
http://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/war-as-spectacle-9781472522290/
Students, you can request books through your university library.

There's also a review available by ancient warfare doctoral candidate Own Rees in Classics for All Reviews.

Hope you enjoy it!

We'll hear more from Anastasia soon, in an exclusive interview about the mythical heroine, Electra. Watch this space :)

Season’s Greetings

Season’s Greetings Panoply followers! We’re looking forward to getting properly stuck into our 2015 projects. Expect new animations in January, February, and in the summer. To keep track of what's happening, you can sign-up to the email list on this page and/or check out our brand new Facebook page: www.facebook.com/panoplyvaseanimation

Looking back at 2014, we’re pleased with the outcomes of the Every Soldier has a Story project. Over 12,000 people in 112 countries have seen Hoplites! Greeks at War already; making the Every Soldier photo-film was a lot of fun and we love all the other artwork that people made to go with it – check it out at the bottom of the project page if you haven’t seen it. A session-plan with activity sheet and PowerPoint slides is still on that page too if you fancy leading your own ancient warfare activities.

We’d like to give a big shout-out to CNET for including Panoply in their recent tech review; their positivity and enthusiasm for the animations was much appreciated. You can see the feature below (Panoply’s at 9.30 mins).



Wishing you a wonderful 2015!
Steve and Sonya x

Every Soldier Photo-Film

We’re delighted that the Every Soldier has a Story photo-film is now up online on the project page. Have you seen it yet? We hope you like it. Thanks to everyone who took part!

People have been very imaginative; there are ambitious hoplites, peace-loving hoplites, musician, farmer, athlete and mercenary hoplites. For grammar-lovers, there all sorts of approaches to expressing hoplite-ness too.

A big shout-out to Lifo for running a piece about the project: http://www.lifo.gr/team/evrymata/50764 We were really pleased to have hoplites arriving from Greece.

The animation itself is coming along well. The main story has been completed and it’s time for little details to be finalised. The music promises to be really special; composer John White of the Thiasos Theatre Company is putting his musical genius to work creating tracks especially for Every Soldier has a Story.

In just over a month (17th Oct) it will be time for the project’s launch event – an evening of live music, animation, and fun. This is the first music and vase-animation have been combined together for a live event – don’t miss it! See the project page for details.

Lifo: Panoply featured in Greek Media

We’re very proud that Panoply featured recently in an article in the Greek publication Lifo.gr. The article is in a column, written by Dr Vasiliki Pliatsika (ΒΑΣΙΛΙΚΗ ΠΛΙΑΤΣΙΚΑ), that celebrates ‘objects, people and stories from the world of antiquity’. Dr Pliatsika praises the Ure Discovery project as a fresh and inviting way to enjoy ancient vases. In less than a month, more than 20,000 people have watched the animations and the article has been picked up and re-posted by bloggers and news-sites around the world. So a big ‘hello’ if you’re a new visitor, and a μεγάλο ‘γεια σε’ to all our Greek visitors. You can read the article in Dr Pliatsika’s column at: http.www.lifo.gr/team/evrymata/42222

Panoply interviewed by Classics Confidential

Only a matter of days until the Ure Discovery launch! Visitors to the Ure Museum will be able to enjoy the animated museum trail from Monday (17th). Panoply will be posting a new animation from the trail each week for eight weeks, complete with extra info on the myths and ideas in them. We’ll be kicking things off next week with an animation of the Pandora myth – don’t miss it!

Meanwhile, Sonya’s interview for Classics Confidential has gone live! Classics Confidential (http://classicsconfidential.co.uk) is an outstanding project which posts interviews with classicists from all over the world – it’s a great site for hearing about research from people who love what they’re doing. You can hear Sonya talking about Panoply and animation in museums here:

Panoply at Open Circuit

May saw Panoply appearing at Open Circuit, the opening event of Short Circuit, 'a strategic action research project commissioned by Arts Council England, designed to put digital acumen and disability artistry together.' http://shortcircuit.org.uk/. Short Circuit is facilitating collaboration between digital technicians and disabled artists and investigating how the digital world can increase access to the arts. A range of excellent presentations and table discussions were on throughout the day, including a talk by artist Rachel Gadsden. Rachel paints, draws and makes digital animations; she had just returned from the Middle East, where her exhibition This Breathing World formed part of an Arts and Disability Festival in Qatar. There’s more about the participants here: http://shortcircuit.org.uk/panoply and check out the video of the day at: http://shortcircuit.org.uk/open-circuit/.

Sonya gave a brief presentation about Panoply’s vision for artefact animation and Steve led a table discussion detailing the Panoply approach. We spoke about the potential vase animations have for reaching across boundaries, particularly audio boundaries, and valuable feedback gave us lots to think about and build on. One idea was to explore the use of sign language in future animations. Look out for the artistic results of Short Circuit’s collaborative creation event coming up on the 8th-9th June.

Meanwhile, thanks very much to AWOL (ancient world online) for featuring Panoply on their excellent site: http://www.ancientworldonline.blogspot.co.uk/.


(an Open Circuit table discussion featuring Dolly Sen and Damian Toal)

Panoply Features in Russian Media

This week panoply.org.uk has featured in a news article for Russian news giant Polit. The article, written by Elena Chepel and appearing in the Pro-Science section, focuses on the teaching potential of the animations. Russia has a tremendous history of classical scholarship, and students study classical culture in schools and universities across the country - so hopefully the panoply animations will prompt some interesting discussions in Russian classrooms! You can see the article here: http://polit.ru/news/2013/04/14/ps_panoply/. If your Russian's not perfect, you can get a rough translation by running the text through a translator such as Google Translate or Bing Translator.