Even before the emergence of traditional animation methods, people tried to visualize stories by moving images and tools. For example, shadow play and thaumatropes(a double-sided disc on a rope with different images on both sides, which creates the illusion of motion when rotating).
The “Dream Lantern” invented in 1659 is one of the earliest forms of visualization, similar to the animation we know today. In essence, it was an early image projector, originally used for entertainment, and used for educational purposes in the 19th century.
The invention of animation in movies
When modern animation was first invented, it was mainly used by independent artists. The feature film, including the first animation, was created in the United States in 1900 by the British artist J. Stewart Blackton.
This movie is called “The Charming Painting”. It’s just a man who occasionally changes his expression. An actor uses tools to produce effects.
Later, he produced another “Basic Expression” animation film. In 1906, he created the clip animation style, and in 1907, he stopped filming “Basic Expression”.
In 1908, the French artist Emile Cole created this animated film with traditional animation methods. Fantas(Fantasago, 1908) starred in “The Wooden Stick Character”. He walked around and encountered deformed objects. Cole later worked in the French studio in Eclair, New York, to help bring the French animation style to the United States.
In the 1910s, animation began to shift from an independent art field to today’s industry. Winsor MacKay(1866-1934) was one of the pioneers of film production studios.
McKay used hand drawn illustrations to make animation. His feature film “He”(1911) was also one of the first animated films featuring character development. At the beginning of the vaudeville show starring “Gatty”, McKay asked a series of questions, and the animated dinosaur answered them with gestures.
But when it was made into a feature film, MacKay combined live action and animation technology, which was the first time in film history. McKay later published how mosquitoes moved(1912) and the sinking of Lusitana(1918).
Animation technology optimization
Raul Barre, the founder of Barre Studio, invented the “pinning technology” in 1913, which can help reduce the time of jigsaw puzzles by nailing a slide together. His “slash and tear” technique can also simply cut the foreground in the background, helping to reduce the time spent in animation.
This allows him to repeat the background without redrawing the background on all slides. This also helps maintain continuity between slides and provides a “seamless” look.
In 1914, John Bray Studio invented and applied for the patent of “cell technology”. Barre continued to make efforts to simplify the animation production process. It simplifies Barr é’s “slash and tear” technology and uses clear cellulose paper to fix the animated foreground of the background.
They also combine the assembly line production method recently developed by the automobile manufacturer Henry Ford, so that they can make animation faster and easier.
As a result of this development, Bray Productions produced the first animation series, Heeza Colorel Liar. Bray Studio is the base of many famous animators, including Max Presa(Betty Buff, Popeye) and Walter Lantz(Woody Woodpecker).
“Rotoscoping ” technology was developed in 1915, and Max Fleischer applied for a patent(1917). This lesson involves using live action movies as reference points for sketching animation. This technology was also used by Bray Production Company and later promoted to Disney Studios.
More and more popular
From 1915 to 1916, The Cartoon film company, founded by the founders Buxton and Dyer, published 26 cartoons with the background of World War I. Among them, the German spacecraft bombed Scarborough. In 1916, Baxton and Dell merged with Kine Comedy Kartoons.
In 1919, the first commercial animation was produced in Paramount Studio. It has a huge fan base and is one of the most famous animations in the history of animation.
Voice introduction
Between 1919 and 1920, Phonofilm applied for a patent for “sound on film” technology, which allows music to be played in films. Prior to this, all films were soundlessly accompanied by live music and/or theater voice actors.
Since then, Prascher’s Inkwell Studio has used Sound On Film in the 19 episode animation Songka Tunes. This is the first time that Prescher used the “bouncing ball”. The dialogue was later introduced into the series of Aesop’s Fables in Porto.
The Change of Audience and the Rise of Disney
At present, most animated films are created for children, but the concept of children’s animation was not widely welcomed until the 1950s.
Before that, animated films were mainly aimed at adult audiences. Although some children may be attracted by bright colors and simple shapes, the content usually includes adult jokes and content difficult for children to understand.
Disney Studios is one of the first studios to produce animation for young audiences, but many people do not know that they are not always children’s animation studios.
At first, Walt Disney began to make satirical, advertising, news clips, but never really started. Finally, Disney Studios went bankrupt for the first time. Disney finally established relationships with Margaret J. Winkler, the first woman to move to Hollywood to make and distribute films, the publishers of Felix the Cat and Out of the Inkwell.
Many other famous animation experts have joined the team and produced the “Alice Comedy” series, which has reached 57 episodes of popularity.
although Disney briefly tried the Oswald The Lucky Rabbit(1927) series, it failed to negotiate the renewal and was replaced by Charles Mintz, the partner and Winkler’s husband. Disney lost most of its employees and roles in this dispute.
His success ultimately stemmed from Mickey Mouse. Mickey Mouse began to use melody. For example, the ship noise of the Willy(1928). When Donald Duck finally replaced Mickey in 1938, Mickey was redesigned. From 1938 to 1940, Mickey became the most popular animated character in history.
The first striped color animation was a part of(1930) and was also used for(Fiddlesticks).
But the “two streets” are as short as the “flowers and trees” sold by Disney and Technicolu in 1932. This is the first full-color animated feature film released using Disney’s new “tricolor tape” technology.
Disney and Technicoor negotiate; disney will have the exclusive right to use Technicoor’s “three” color technologies only for a limited period of time. The agreement expired in 1935. Not long ago, debt conversion became the standard of animation.
Introduction depth: create three-dimensional illusion
Multi plane camera
Disney’s early cartoons later used something called a “multi plane camera”. This is a large camera placed on several glass slides, which can be moved to produce zoom effect and depth illusion. This also helps the animation flow more smoothly. The character moves between floors, giving a feeling of “closer” or “farther”.
Rear camera
The rear camera invented by Plesa in 1933 works in a similar way, but it is not painted on the glass window, but based on a layered three-dimensional scene. The cellulose layer with characters will move between the set layers, making the text appear to move in the image.
Global Animation
It is generally mistaken that the first animated feature was Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in 1930. But the first animated film was The Adventures of Prince Ahmed, which was shot by German Roddy Lesinger in 1926.
although it is unclear whether this fact has been erased by history due to Disney’s success, the conflict or aversion between World War I and World War II, American Disney has a high influence and dominates most animation markets.
Until World War II, most of the largest animation studios were located in the United States or France. But with the beginning of the Second World War, the United States faced more conflicts and difficulties in overseas trade. Therefore, in the early 1940s, animation in China and Japan made significant progress.
In 1941, China’s first animated film was the Man Brothers. Lai Ming, Gao Xuan, and Di Huan were initially diagnosed.
The film is labor-intensive. Use rotation technology to save money and create realistic sports, and use 237 artists to create within 3 years. It was very popular and quickly exported to Japan, where it was also very popular.
In 1944, shortly after that, Japan published its own full-length animated film “White Deer Plain”. This film is deeply influenced by World War II. It depicts Japanese paratroopers in the form of animals, fighting to seize the rule of Celebes Island in Britain.
It ends with a picture of the United States painted on the ground by a camouflaged parachute. Due to its high political nature, this film was once considered to have been destroyed by the US military, but a copy was found in 1983 and reissued in 1984. In 1960, Japanese cartoons were first broadcast on domestic television.
In 1963, he released the animated film Astro Boy, which is based on the cartoons of the writer Osamu Tezuka. This is a blockbuster and one of the most famous cartoons so far, which has been exported to the world.
In the 1980s, American animation developed slowly and lacked imagination. Japanese animation has been influenced by the influential Japanese animation writer Hayao Miyazaki(Wind Valley, my neighbor cat) and is becoming more and more popular.
Russia has also successfully established its own film industry. Souz Multifilm employs 700 animation writers and produces 20 feature films every year.
These films mainly focus on children. During the war, they focused on anti fascism, but after World War II, they changed to a pro Soviet way. Alliance films initially used the cel animation technology similar to Disney’s. However, as the United States and Russia began to conflict after World War II, the Russian film industry began to form its own style instead of using Disney’s animation technology.
The first cartoon in Africa was created in Cairo by Jewish brothers David and Slomo Frankel in 1927. But it was destroyed in the fire. Their first successful film, Mafish Fayda, was released in 1936 and starred in the first Arab central cartoon character.
In terms of social politics, economy and colonial issues, many African animation studios are limited due to lack of funds, but these studios have started to develop rapidly in recent years. Wyatt, South Africa, has produced a large number of animated films. South Africa has 29 production studios, including Clockwork Zoo animation, Triggerfish and Sunrise Productions.
Reduce and simplify costs
Many changes have taken place between the 1950s and 1960s, making animation easier and cost-effective.
First, the development of limited animation technology in the 1950s allowed animators to reuse parts of frames instead of redrawing them. Second, the introduction of xerography in the 1960s got rid of the process of writing all pictures in ink.
The first movie using computer animation was the “Mermaid” in 1989, which was jointly produced by Disney and Pixar’s Computer and Animation Production System(CAPS). This movie broke the box office record, which helped Disney regain the box office ranking after several ordinary movies.
CAPS system allows animation to be colored digitally rather than manually, greatly reducing production time. However, it was not until 1995 that it became Pixar’s “Toy Story” that a movie was made entirely by computer animation.
At the beginning of the 21st century, 3D CGI has become the animation film with the highest box office in history with the box office of films such as Contradiction(2010) and Icebound(2013). Although 3D and computer aided animation are very popular, the decline of traditional hand painting style proves the rise of 3D and computer animation. Disney tried to make a splash with Princess and Frog, but the production of 2D concept was interrupted because the film was not popular.
Where does animation go now?
The similar style and repetitive content of Disney’s “fairy tale” movies may become monotonous. Recently, cartoons from countries other than the United States have become increasingly popular. Especially Japan, India, France
With the increase of remote work in the past few years, it will be interesting to know whether animation is easy to enter the global market and what style and cultural impact it has had on this field.
