Animation

Two major forms of animation

• Stop-motion animation– Model– Puppet– Claymation– Pixelation– Cut-out animation

• Cartoon or created animation– Cartoons– CGI

Animation has a long history

• Early visual toys• Development of animation in early days of

film– Gertie the Dinosaur

• Animated shorts– Felix the Cat– Mickey Mouse– Merrie Melodies

Disney

• During the 1930s Walt Disney’s animation studios came to dominate the commercial animation scene– Turned to feature-length films after Snow White– Naturalism

• Shorts were often produced by Warner Bros, Fleischer, others– More abstract

UPA

• Very abstract• Limited animation– Cheaper

Cartoon animation

• At first, all pictures were hand-drawn completely

• Cel process– Portion of the picture that moves is drawn on

plastic sheet, background remains steady– As animation progressed, multiple cel layers were

developed

Cartoon animation

• Developed a system (Disney perfected) where main animators would produce “key frames” or pictures that occurred at most important moments of action, then “tweeners” would produce the pictures that occurred between the key frames

Rotoscoping

• To improve the naturalness of the motion, the device projected actual photos onto a light table where they were traced and the outline was then filled in with cartoon character– Used in Snow White to make her movements

more realistic

Abstract animation

• Many animators do not want to present animation as though it were real—want the art of the visual and the audio to be retained– Fantasia– Abstract independent animation

Stop motion

• Take picture, move object, take picture– Painstaking process– Can look jerky– Models can have mechanical problems• May need multiple models/puppets, etc.

Stop motion

• Melies• King Kong• Gumby• Wallace and Gromit