History of Animation

De Seversky

Wrote "Victory Through Air Power" which Disney adapted into a film, he then narrated

Carlo Lorenzini (Collodi)

Wrote Pinocchio comic;

Hoppity Goes to Town (1941)

another feature attempt that failed because it was released 3 days before Pearl Harbor; Jimmy Stewart parody

Deems Taylor

appointed to critique and edit music

Bambi 1942

based on book by Felix Salten; struggle between animating deer realistically but reaching human emotion; Less fantasy than before, more realism; met w/ generally good reviews, modest success;

Looney Tunes in the 1950s

begin to eclipse Disney and MGM, making cartoons at a fraction of the cost; multiple departments headed by Chuck Jones, Robert McKimson, and Friz Freleng; Schlesinger allowed them to do whatever they wanted

Tex Avery

best at MGM; introduced Droopy Dog in the 1940s, characters are often aware that they're in cartoons, pushing limits, creative and original gags; "Dumb Hounded"-contrasting energies for gags Leaves MGM in 1954, never won an Oscar

Frank Tashlin

brought in to WB along with Tex Avery to improve animation and Stalling for composing; introduced a more rapid style of cutting to energize cartoons

Three Little Pigs 1933

character movement breakthrough: though the pigs all looked basically the same, they each showed their distinct personality through their movement; changed things by making everything active; first completely storyboarded animated film

"Ocean Hop" 1927

craze of Lindberg flight, planes; Oswald cartoon; very Felix the Cat, nothing super original

Porky Pig

created by Freleng in 1930s, first WB character to stick

E.C Segar

creator of the Popeye comics

A Wild Hare 1940

first appearance of Bugs Bunny, who really came to life with Tex Avery; this is the first of the WB Looney Tunes we know and love; Bugs is very primitive though

"The Band Concert" 1935

first color Mickey cartoon; complex movements and gags; characters more rounded, fluid, use of circles and ovals

Flowers and trees 1932

first commercially released film to be produced in full-color three strip Technicolor; won the first Academy Award for animated short

Betty Boop 1930

first truly feminine cartoon with sex appeal; toned down as a result of the Hays code which makes her cartoons kind of boring

Popeye-A Dream Walking

gritty NYC feel to Fleischer cartoons

Rotoscope

helps animators copy or put animation in live action, patented by Max who became a pioneer of WWI military training films

McKimson

least recognized of the three; Introduced Foghorn Leghorn, lots of melodrama with his characters, lacks the subtlety of other animators; created Tazmanian Devil

Music land 1935

lots of energy, creating the seemingly impossible, very lively

Popeye the Sailor Meets Ali Baba's 40 Theives (1937)

makes use of the multiplane camera; feature that was the only competition for Disney's Snow White

"Alice Rattled by Rats" 1925

mice and rats are Mickey ancestors; smooth animation in dance sequences clearly the work of Iwerks (good comparison to future work in Anchors Aweigh)

Tex Avery

moves to MGM in 1942, makes "Blitz Wolf," a very slef aware cartoon with gags only he could get away with

Comic Calamities 1928

not a crude film-tells a full story; lots of imitators because Felix met such great success; Disney tried to get Mesmer to work for him but couldn't; after Sullivan died, rights were in limbo, Felix cartoons stop, Mesmer gets credit for him near his death

Snow White 1937

not the first animated film despite popular belief; realistic female character; difficult with timing and movement; Walt characterized the dwarves for story and humor; cost $1.5-2 million, made $8 million

Walter Lantz

obtained the rights to Oswald, begins making Oswald for Universal; less than $8000 to produce; just kinda creepy

What's Opera, Doc 1957

one of the greatest Looney Tunes ever; Jones experimenting with dancers on WB lot, spoofed Fantasia while still retaining it's own identity; humor holds up

The cookie carnival

overflowing with movement, another test for Snow White woman

Who killed Cock Robin? 1935

parodies well-known celebrities of the time

House Cleaning Blues 1937

post production code;

Felix the Cat

produced by Pat Sullivan studio; Otto Mesmer hired; realized that solid black shapes flowed well; 1922- redesigned to make him smoother; used lots of facial expressions, his own personality, walk; most sophisticated animation until Disney in the 1930s;

Balloonland (1935)

really trippy Iwerks cartoon; not great timing even though animation is very fluid; Iwerks ends contract in 1934; goes to Disney

The country cousin 1936

saw the pay-off of pre-editing; cost-efficient and well-planned jokes; pencil test: drawings filmed before putting them on cels, time and money to perfect everything

Flying Hoofs 1928

series of gags-no real plot or climax; variety of artists told to fill time slot, lacked continuity or distinct style

Pat Powers

shady guy who created a way of putting sound on film through Cinephone: sold product to Disney hoping for a one and done; after Steamboat Willie, Walt still needed a distributor, but insisted on keeping the rights; he stays with Powers; by 1930, his contract is up for renewal, he's earning 2-3x the production cost but not seeing all the money owed to him; Powers hires Iwerks to start new studio, Walt refuses to work with him any longer and moves to LA

Ising at MGM

takes Oscar from Disney for the first time w/ "The Milky Way;" characters are rubber stamped kittens; produced the same year as The Wild Hare (1940)

Goddess of Spring 1934

test run of feminine character for Snow White; really kind of a mess otherwise

"Red Hot Riding Hood"

very popular and extreme animation; Avery not very interested in making recurring characters though; animated by on of the guys who did the dancing hippos in Fantasia

Pinocchio

very touching, complex character; there is a subtlety to his animation; difficult to animate because of his unexpected movements and spontaneity; unlike some modern animated films, there is real fear/threat in the film

Brave Little Tailor 1938

weight, anatomy, expression and charm

The ugly duckling 1931/1939

1931: simple, rubbery and weightless; trying and failing to create sympathetic characters 1939: Last Silly Symphony produced, gorgeous complex and sophisticated

Margaret Winkler

After Laugh-o-grams, gives Disney contract which led to the creation of Disney Brothers Studios; only woman working in distribution; married to Mintz

George Pal

Animated "Tulips Shall Grow"

"Porky in Wackyland" 1938

Animated by Clampett, who animates very stretchy, zany, aggressive, sometimes obnoxious humor; reminds me a lot of the way the car moves in Who Framed Roger Rabbit

1930s Disney

Around this time, Disney recruits better artists, including Tytla, Natwick, and Graham, who all studied at Chouinard Arts Institute which would later become CalArts

King Size Canary (1947), "Bad Luck Blackie"

Avery's best known films; needed to do things in animation that just couldn't be done by humans; things should fall in 5 frames so the eye can just register that it's falling but not see it coming

The skeleton dance

Beginning of "Silly Symphonies;" Stalling suggested to Disney a film based around music; animation mostly done by Iwerk, who was told to use assistants but insisted he do it himself-->smooth animation/dancing; film was rejected for not having enough mice, but went on to a successful release

Fantasia

Begins late 1937, Mickey had been getting dull; Leopold Stokowski seen by Walt at a restaurant, said he wanted to conduct a Silly Symphony free of charge; Walt described it as an experiment, not meant to make people laugh necessarily but to push boundaries; Nutcracker suite is hugely popular, as well as Dance of the Hours and Night on Bald Mountain (Tytla)-Tchernobog is considered Tytla's greatest triumph

The Enchanted Drawing 1900

Blackton, a vaudeville sketch artist; stops camera between exposures and adds/removes objects

Mel Blanc

Came to WB in 1937, started doing Porky's voice, later voices almost every other character except Elmer Fudd

Swing Wedding 1937

Caricature of black jazz singers;

Freleng

Cartoons are frantic/sudden stillness; contrast sets up gags; almost exclusive use of Yosemite Sam, Speedy Gonzalez, Tweety and Sylvester as a pair; won Oscar for Birds Anonymous; "Showbiz Buzz"-Daffy is vain; smooth animation and tap sequence, more eloquent Bugs 1953: Hare Trimmed-Yosemite Sam, annoying Bugs

The Big Snooze

Clampett's last cartoon; shows the evolution of Elmer and Bugs

Fantasmagorie by Emile Cohl 1908

Cohl's films emphasize metamorphosis;

MGM and Quimby

Creates in-house animation unit headed by Quimby;

Newman Laugh-o-Grams: Puss in Boots and Alice's Wonderland

Disney and Iwerks productions, 1922 in Kansas City; very simple animation; studio goes bankrupt over Alice, Walt moves to LA with brother

"Plane Crazy" 1928

Disney and Iwerks; first Mickey Mouse; rough, crude version; very mischievous character; animation is getting smoother, more fluid, and trying new things like POV shots; Distributors were not impressed however, but were eventually convinced when sound came along

Art Babbitt

Disney animator who developed Goofy; predominantly an artist, not an animator, whose attention was caught thanks to the quality of Disney films

Carl Stalling

Disney's composer in the early films and later Silly Symphonies and Merry Melodies

Dancing on the Moon 1935 (same year as Cookie Carnival)

Doesn't have beauty or charm of Silly Symphonies, Fleischer's move to Florida after due to production tax break

Snow White (Betty Boop) 1933

Doesn't make any sense plot-wise, vital and dynamic; Mouth shapes don't match sounds; Cab Calloway sings

Der Fuhrer's Face

Donald Duck propagandistic cartoon; made American audiences uncomfortable to see beloved Donald Duck tortured; same animators as Pink Elephants on Parade; borrowed from assembly line sequence in Modern Times

Bimbo the Dog

During 1930s, Koko becomes old fashioned and associated with silent era, so they make Bimbo the dog; Betty Boop is modeled after his puppy face and becomes the more popular character

Fleischer brothers

Early studio who did a lot of films in the silent era, stranger films; Jewish Viennese family of 5 brothers, but Max and Dave are most important; During the 1930s, they were the one studio unaffected by Disney--continued rubber hose style animation to a new extreme

Out of the Inkwell Inc.

Films released by Paramount, used Rotoscope; use of Koko the Clown; mixed animation and live action; exceptional imagination, cartoony animation; later released an hour long film explaining Einstein's Theory of Relativity; later had Car-tunes, sing-a-longs in theaters with ball bouncing over lyrics

Sinkin in the Bathtub 1930

First Looney Tune, animated by Freleng, pretty rubber hose; similar in style to Steamboat Willie

Humorous Phases of Funny Faces 1906

First animated film,

Gulliver's Travels 1939

Fleischer feature in response to Snow White; more sophisticated story than previous fairy tales; not inspired or in the same league as Snow White; did reasonably well, but not a blockbuster

"You've Gotta Be In Pictures" 1940

Freleng; more slapstick, brash humor; beginning to establish a style of their own

1944-Schlesinger retires, replaced by Selzer

He becomes an enemy to the animators, refuses bull fight cartoon, so they make "Bully for Bugs"

War Time Disney Films

Includes "Bugs Bunny Nips the Nips," " Training Montage" "Cleanliness" "Winged Scourge" "The New Spirit"

Hugh Harmon/ Rudy Ising

Kansas City, collaborated w/ Disney;made Boski the Talk-Ink Kid; Schlesinger produces it and it's distributed by Warner Bros Audiences say Bosko is a small black boy, artists claim they don't know what he is, but he's relentlessly cheerful

Bed Time 1923

Koko The Clown cartoon; uses visual imagination but doesn't really tell a great story

Dumbo 1941

Last of prewar/first of wartime Disney films; displays genuine subtle emotion; Pink Elephants sequence (limitlessness of animation)

"Peace On Earth"

MGM's first Oscar nom, Christmas cartoon, very heavy handed

First Motion Picture Unit

Many top animators enlisted in war, joined FMPU in Culver City, ended up doing more animating that studios did at the time

Superman (1940s)

Max received huge budget; "Mechanical Monsters"-homaged in Kill Bill; most sophisticated cartoon produced by their studio

The Sinking of the Lusitania 1918

McCay much darker than Gertie; use of cel animation

Little Nemo by Winsor McCay

McCay=greatest early animator, good w/ perspective; film was made in 1911, 4000 drawings on rice paper; seems to be the beginning of using animatin to do things that humans can't do. The characters stretch, things fall from nowhere, they cant sit comfortably in the mouth of a dragon

"Playful Pluto" 1934

Mickey becoming a HUGE success; in this cartoon, we really begin to see acting in animation; particularly in the flypaper sequence, we see Pluto thinking and considering his options

Chuck Jones

Most eager to experiment with graphics, characters, etc. "One Froggy Evening"-hilarious without dialogue; "Duck Amuck"-highly analyzed, Daffy can exist alone and still be great, very intelligent humor; Rabbit Season trilogy; Roadrunner and Coyote; discovers precise timing of frames to make falling funny

Woody Woodpecker, 1940s

Most popular character of Lantz; torments people for no reason

Poor Cinderella 1934

Only color Betty Boop; first in "Color Classics"-an attempt from Fleischers to be more like Disney at Paramount's request; 2-strip color process is weird looking, acidic, not rich like Disney

"I Haven't Got a Hat"

Porky Pig, same year as Cookie Carnival but not as good quality, but better than Bathtub and Buffalo

Flip the Frog (ended in 1933)

Powers and MGM hoping to challenge Mickey; animated by Iwerks; didn't catch on; Iwerks was very innovative, but didn't have Disney's humor or charm

Leon Schlesinger

Producer who brought Bosko to WB; had no creative input

Hanna and Barbera

Quimby pressured in 1939 to make more films, hires them but didn't want to invest in cat and mouse cartoons; was told that Tom and Jerry were too popular to pass up; they're very successful and parodied today; Jerry featured in Anchors Aweigh dancing with Gene Kelly

Shuffle off to Buffalo, early 30s

Racial stereotypes; nowhere near as advanced as 3 little pigs; story doesn't make a lot of sense; Merrie Melodies cartoon

"Steamboat Willie" 1928

Synchronized sound; fresh, new concept; concrete story; more stylized Mickey

The Old Mill 1937

Test of the 3D effect before using it for Snow White; camera movement up and down, lots of zooming further in; characters have solidity

Harman and Ising Part 2

They get a deal with MGM since Quimby was there and not running things well; made Happy Harmonies there; had a bigger budget but didn't make much better cartoons; redesigned Bosko, just made it more racist;

Colonel Heeza Liar at Bat 1915

Though made in 1915, after Little Nemo, it is much more crude, lacks movement and is not as interesting to watch

Clampitt's Russian Rhapsody

Took Gremlin stories, animated them as caricatures of WB animators as well as Stalin/Hitler

Charles Mintz

Took over Winkler productions after marrying Margaret, convinced Disney to create Oswald the Rabbit

1941 Disney Strike

Walt's inner circle had turned into arbitrary promotions and raises; Art Babbitt discovers how little his assistant makes, Walt told him to mind his own business, Tytla and Babbitt join strike; Babbitt and Disney never speak again; Tytla failed as a peacemaker, leaves and never works successfully again

The Thrifty Pig

War time cartoon reusing Little Pig animation but with wolf in Nazi uniform, bricks made of war bonds

Gertie the Dinosaur 1914

Winsor McCay; character with appealing personality rather than trick films; used in vaudeville acts; nothing would surpass this for 25 years

Ub Iwerks

Worked with Disney early on; Kansas City Ad Company-made ads for theaters; self-taught animators

Friz Freleng

Worked with Disney, then Harmon/Ising on Bosko; discovered by Schlesinger and went on to do Looney Tunes; hired when Harmon and Ising leave and Schlesinger needs animators;