⌛🪶 Modern Animation: From Little Nemo to Star Wars
How animation evolved in the 20th century.
An announcement: Human Work History is now available in short video format too. Please support me on Instagram and YouTube. Thank you!
In our previous article we went on a beautiful journey and saw how humans were able to bring images to life through animation. We took a break on that journey after watching Pauvre Pierrot —the very first animated cartoon, which was created in 1892.
Let’s continue on the journey and see what the next 130 years of animation has been like. I bet you will learn more about at least one of your favorite cartoons by the end of this journey.
Celluloid Films
To make longer movies, humanity needed a “flexible” material for printing a continuous strip of images, which could be rapidly passed through a camera and projector. The glass-plate-based photography — where each image had to be captured individually and then transferred onto another medium, such as paper, to create a series of images, was not suitable for this requirement.
The first celluloid as a bulk material for forming objects was made in 1855 in Birmingham, England, by Alexander Parkes. In the 1860s, an American, John Wesley Hyatt, acquired Parkes's patent and began experimenting to manufacture billiard balls, which until that time were made from ivory.
Later, in 1889, Hannibal Goodwin discovered that celluloid could be coated with a light-sensitive emulsion, to a breakthrough in the animation industry. It led to the significant advancement of the “Traditional Animation” process by bringing the “Cel animation” method. Let’s see how.
Traditional Animation
Traditional Animation was the dominant form of animation till the advent of computer animation. We are talking about a technique that dominated throughout the 20th century. In simplest terms, the following steps constitute the essence of traditional animation.
Hand-drawing of each individual frame*
Taking a photograph of each of the frames
Projecting them
*A frame is one complete image. Play any YouTube video. Hit pause (spacebar or K). Then press “.” or “,” to move one frame forward/backward.
The human eye (and brain) requires around 12 frames per second (fps) or higher in order to be tricked into thinking they are seeing a smoothly moving object. The traditional animation used 15 fps for the cartoons. And each frame was drawn manually by hand.
So, this 3-minute Tom and Jerry cartoon was likely made at 15 fps requiring 15 x 60 = 900 drawings! Each of them was hand drawn.
The first animated film made using the hand-drawn traditional animation method is considered to be "Fantasmagorie" by French animator Emile Cohl.
The film was released in 1908 and consists of a series of sketches drawn by hand on white paper, which were then photographed on a black paper to create a dark background.
New Techniques with Dinosaur!
Winsor McCay, often called the father of American Animation gave the famous animated character Little Nemo in 1911. Next, he produced Gertie the dinosaur in 1914. Gertie was the first film to use animation techniques such as keyframes, registration marks, tracing paper, the Mutoscope action viewer, and animation loops.
Gertie and many other works of McCay influenced the next generation of animators such as the Fleischer brothers, Otto Messmer, Paul Terry, Walter Lantz, and Walt Disney.
You can watch the full cartoon here. (Do come back after watching it!)
Rotoscoping
The process of rotoscoping involves animators tracing over motion picture footage, frame by frame, to create animation with realistic movement. In the early days of rotoscoping, animators would project live-action movie footage onto a glass panel and draw over the image. The device used to project the footage was called a rotoscope and was invented by Max Fleischer, a Polish-American animator. The final product of this process is known as a rotograph.
Out of the Inkwell, a series of animated shorts created by Max Fleischer and released in 1918, is considered to be one of the earliest and most significant examples of rotoscope animation. In the series, Fleischer used live-action footage of his brother as a reference to create the movement of the cartoon character, Koko the Clown. The footage was traced and animated frame by frame, creating a more realistic and nuanced animation style than was previously possible.
Cel Animation
Cel stands for celluloid. The cel animation process was invented by Earl Hurd and John Bray in 1915. This process involves using multiple transparent celluloid films for different parts of a single frame. And the films can be reused again and again for different frames, saving time and labor.
Example: Consider a scene where 3 people are sitting at a table. One of them is talking and pouring a drink and the other two are just listening. So, in this scene, the background, table, chairs and the two people all can be put on the single cel as the base layer. And then it can be repeated throughout the scene with only the speaking and drink-pouring person needed to be drawn.
The first full-length animated film to be made using celluloid film was Disney's "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs" in 1937. The film was a groundbreaking achievement in animation, as it was the first animated feature film produced in the United States and the first to use cel animation extensively.
Stop-Motion Animation
In this animation technique objects are physically manipulated in small increments and then each instance is individually photographed to form the individual frames. They exhibit independent motion when the series of frames is played back.
There are several forms of stop-motion animation depending on what type of objects are being used for the small increments like —
Puppet animation (Puppets with movable joints)
Clay animation (deformable clay objects/figures)
Cut-out animation (2D cutouts of paper/fabrics)
Pixilation (Live actors)
In the below video, Julienne Mathieu's hair appears to brush itself, one of the first uses of stop-motion animation in film.
You can watch this modern day stop-motion animation film, to understand how it is produced.
First Animated Film
The first known animated feature film (a film longer than 60 minutes) was El Apóstol by Quirino Cristiani, produced in 1917 in Argentina. It was a 70-minute satire created using the cutout animation technique, with 58,000 frames at 14 frames per second. This film is now considered lost, as no copies remain.
Synchronized sound
The complete story of how we humans learned to capture, record, store and reproduce “sound” will deserve a completely new article — just like how we discussed “capturing light” in a separate article of Human Work History. So, here we will move a few steps forward and discuss the problem of producing a sound that was in sync with the animated film.
Many of the earlier films had artists playing sound instruments live and sometimes even live dialog or narration was added. Sound-on-disc system was developed where the sounds were pre-recorded on a disc which was then attempted to be played in sync with the animated film. However, it posed a few problems.
Synchronization: unreliable interlock system resulting in sound out of sync
Editing: discs couldn't be directly edited, limiting the ability to make changes
Distribution: added expense and complication to film distribution
Wear and tear: discs degraded after about 20 screenings, requiring replacement
A much-improved sound-on-film technology was developed. In this, the sound was passed through a transducer to produce a varying electrical signal, which was used to produce a varying light signal, which was then recorded on the edges of the light-sensitive film and finally, it was then passed through a light source whose varying signal caused a varying electrical signal that finally reproduced the sound.
Sounds confusing?
Simple words: Sound > Varying Electric signal >Varying Light Signal > Record on a film > Pass constant light > Varying light signal > Varying electric signal > Sound
Ko-Ko Song Car-Tunes, a series of 47 short films of 3 minutes each, was produced by the Fleischer brothers in the 1930s. 16 of these short films used the sound-on-film technique to produce the synchronized sound. My Old Kentucky Home from 1926, also produced by the Fleischer brothers, was probably the first film to feature a bit of synchronized animated dialogue.
Walt Disney
A journey on history of animation can’t be complete without the discussion of Walt Disney!
Walt Disney, a pioneer of the American animation industry, didn’t have a glorious start in the animation industry. His first company Laugh-O-Gram Films produced Newman Laugh-O-gram in 1921 — a series of seven-minute modernized fairy tale cartoons inspired by Terry's Aesop's Fables. He had also completed designing a 12-minute film Alice's Wonderland…
But his company went bankrupt in 1923.
After a bit of struggle, Disney signed a contract with a New York film distributor Margaret J. Winkler for producing the Alice Comedy series. The series was successful enough to last 57 episodes. Next, he created another hit Oswald the Lucky Rabbit in 1927 but lost the rights to the Oswald character to the production house.
Mickey Mouse
Disney soon developed Mickey Mouse in 1928 to replace Oswald and launched the character with the animated film Steamboat Willie. It was a black-and-white film but what distinguished this was the brilliant usage of synchronized sound with all the sounds being provided by Disney himself. He strongly believed that cartoons with synchronized sound were the future. Steamboat Willie was one of the first cartoons with synchronized sound, as well as one of the first cartoons to feature a fully post-produced soundtrack.
Colors
After making a dent in the animation industry with synchronized sound, Disney partnered with Technicolor company to produce the first full-color animation Flowers and Trees, debuting the three-color technique which soon became a standard in the industry. It went on to win the inaugural Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film.
Good to note that, the Flowers and Trees was part of the Silly Symphony series, which also gave another famous character — the Donald Duck.
Walt Disney ruled the American animation industry for over 3 decades with the creation of several popular characters. His last animated feature film was The Jungle Book (1967) which was also a huge commercial success. Unfortunately, Disney died during the production in 1966.
Japanese Anime
While a great part of this journey had been centered toward the West, the animators in Japan were creating a revolution on their own!
Japanese Animation or anime employs a limited-animation technique that prioritizes aesthetics over motion, unlike American animation. Additionally, it employs a "cinematic" style that includes zooming, panning, intricate dynamic shots, and places a lot of emphasis on background details that contribute to establishing a specific atmosphere. Japanese anime also differentiated itself from its American counterparts, with large-eyed, big-mouthed, and large-headed characters.
Momotaro: Sacred Sailors was the first Japanese feature-length animated film. It was directed by Mitsuyo Seo, who was ordered by the Japanese Naval Ministry to make a propaganda film for World War II.
Toei Animation and Mushi Production were founded and produced the first color anime feature film in 1958, Hakujaden (The Tale of the White Serpent, 1958). Toei animation pioneered the money-shot technique of animation that focuses on cost-cutting. Here significant shots were to be highlighted by adding more intricate details to their animation, while the rest of the work could be with limited animation.
In addition to Western influence, one of the significant influences on Japanese Anime is manga, or Japanese comics. Manga has been a popular medium in Japan for decades, and many anime series are adaptations of popular manga series. The close relationship between manga and anime has allowed for the translation of many popular manga series into anime, providing a wider audience for the stories.
Toonami
Toonami was a programming block that aired on Cartoon Network in the United States, which primarily featured anime series. Toonami played a significant role in popularizing anime in the Western world during the late 1990s and early 2000s. It aired many popular anime series, including Pokémon, Yu-Gi-Oh!, Digimon, Doraemon, Bakugan, Beyblade, Sonic X, Dragon Ball Z, Sailor Moon, Naruto, Cardcaptor Sakura and One Piece, which helped to introduce these series to a wider audience popularizing Anime worldwide.
Computer Animation
Computers had entered the world of animation right in the 1940s but it was not until the 1970s that they got popular. It was the rise of the video games that popularized computer-based animation.
One of the first significant milestones in computer animation was the release of Star Wars in 1977. The film featured groundbreaking computer-generated special effects that pushed the boundaries of what was possible in the film industry. Then the release of "Tron" in 1982 was another major milestone, as it was the first feature-length film to use extensive computer-generated effects.
The 1990s saw an explosion of computer animation in film and television, with many studios developing their own in-house animation departments. The success of films like "Toy Story" in 1995 by Pixar-Disney, the first feature-length film entirely animated with computer-generated imagery (CGI), paved the way for a new era of computer animation in the film industry. What Disney did to the traditional animation, Pixar seems to be doing to the computer-generated animation in current times.
Computers have made it possible to bring 3D animation, providing valuable “time” to animators to think more creatively about the depth and complexity of animated films instead of spending time in drawing every frame (although frames are still drawn today, just digitally).
New technologies like cloud rendering, AI-assisted animation, Real-time animation are ensuring that the field of animation is going to evolve and keep entertaining us in new and exciting ways.
A bit on some famous cartoons
Tom and Jerry: When creating Tom and Jerry, the animators (William Hanna and Joseph Barbera) originally planned to use a fox and a dog instead of a cat and a mouse. However, they found it difficult to make the characters look sympathetic, and eventually decided to switch to a cat and a mouse instead.
Popeye: Designed by Elzie Crisler Segar, the character of Popeye was based on a real person named Frank "Rocky" Fiegel, who was known for his tough-guy personality and his love of spinach.
The Road Runner: The Road Runner character was created by Chuck Jones and Michael Maltese as a response to the popularity of the Wile E. Coyote character, who had been introduced in an earlier cartoon. The animators wanted to create a character that would be faster and more agile than the coyote, and thus the Road Runner was born.
The Pink Panther: The Pink Panther character was originally created for the opening credits of the 1963 film of the same name, but became so popular that he was given his own series of cartoons.
The Powerpuff Girls: The idea for The Powerpuff Girls came to creator Craig McCracken while he was attending the California Institute of the Arts. He was inspired by a drawing he had done of three girls with big eyes, and decided to create a series around them.
Cinderella: Walt Disney had been trying to adapt the story of Cinderella into a film for over a decade, but had been unable to find the right approach. It wasn't until after the success of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs that he decided to take another crack at it.
Ed, Edd and Eddy: The characters of Ed, Edd and Eddy were based on real people that creator Danny Antonucci knew from his childhood. He even used their real names for the characters.
Dragon Ball Z: Creator Akira Toriyama originally planned to end the Dragon Ball series after the conclusion of the first storyline, but the series' popularity convinced him to continue it with the introduction of new characters and storylines.
Naruto: The character of Naruto was inspired by a real-life class clown that creator Masashi Kishimoto knew in school. He also drew inspiration from other manga and anime series that he enjoyed, such as Dragon Ball and Akira.
Cardcaptor Sakura: The original manga series for Cardcaptor Sakura was serialized in a monthly magazine for girls, but the anime adaptation was broadcast in a prime-time slot on Japanese television, attracting a wider audience of both children and adults.
Although I have tried to include cartoons from multiple genres, I would be lying if I said there were no personal biases in the selection of the cartoons above :-p
Feel free to ask any questions or share your thoughts on this article or any feedback you have. This publication is for made for you!
I really love the factoid about Popeye