Animation Research

The first ever animation machine was the Magic lantern, invented in the 1650s it works through a feeble lantern and thin paper. It was used for storytelling and eventually was used in carnivals and circuses.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The zoopraxiscope was invented by Eadweard Muybridge in 1878, the praxinoscope by Charles-Emile Reynauld in 1877 the Zoetrope by William Homer in 1833, and the Phenakitoscope was invented by Joseph Plateau in 1829. These devices were important because they progressed the technology behind moving pictures and lead the way for early films.

Emile Cohl was born in 1857 and he became an animator in the 1880s/90s prior to this he was a writer which is what allowed him to join the Gaumont film company, where he later became an animator, he made the first animation called Fantasmagorie in 1908. The process for making this animation involved taking individual photographs of each drawing, there were 700 individual photographs of the character moving in total. He also produced the animations ‘Musical Mews’ and ‘ Feline Follies’ introduced the famous character ‘Felix the Cat’ this character was revolutionary because it was the first character drawn this way. A full-bodied character that had distinct and unique features of this cat was the blueprint for several subsequent characters the most blatantly obvious being Mickey Mouse.

Georges Melies was born on the 8th December 1861 and is referred to as the father of Special Effects. It was his work that he did, during his career that lead to a more widespread use of special effects in cinema and animation. He used a special process in 1902 to make the film L’ouef du Sorcier.

Windsor Mccay was born in  1868 and released Little Nemo in 1911 it was important because it had many processes of animation in it such as squash and stretch. He used the process of Split which then became frame by frame animation and has been adopted by the industry.

George Eastman invented the Kodak camera in 1888 and in 1889 he commissioned a chemist called Henry Reichenbach to develop a type of loose film that would easily fit into a camera this improved picture quality and made it easier to use the camera

Thomas Edison and William Laurie-Dickson patented the kinetoscope in 1891 the kinetoscope is a machine that allowed for movies to be viewed through a small peephole, this is a very early version of a moving picture viewing machine, that exhibited moving pictures when used. This was an influence on the industry because you could see the movies.

Emile Reynaud was born in 1844 and invented the praxinoscope this differed from the kinetoscope because the former used mirrors and the latter used cameras.

‘La Sortie des Usines’ means ‘Workers leaving the factory’ and the director of this film was Louis Lumiere and this brother August. They used the cinemaphotography machine which they had invented themselves to exhibit this film. On the 28th December 1895, at Salon Indien du Grand Café in Paris, the brothers premiered 10 short films including ‘La Sortie des Usines’.

J.Stuart Blackton was born in 1875 and is famous for releasing the film; ‘The Enchanted Drawing’ this used stop-motion which was a big thing at the time. He is considered to be the father of American Animation despite being a British immigrant, he is largely responsible for bringing animated moving pictures to America in a time of silent films.

Walt Disney Studios was established in 1923 and in 1928 ‘Steamboat Willie’ was released which showcased Mickey and Minnie Mouse on a boat it was groundbreaking as it had synchronised sound and therefore blew silent animation out the way.  But in 1937 more ground was broken when Snow White was released in full colour, synchronised sound animation In the 1900s Disney was able to establish itself through these events and has now simultaneously tied the brand with animation forever.

Cel animation involves hand drawing hand inking and doing everything by hand in order to produce the frames needed to be filmed for animation. Now using modern technology these hand-drawn images can be scanned into a computer system and thus be manipulated digitally, therefore, the artist doesn’t have to draw as many frames and can even enhance the quality of the frames digitally. More developments in recent technology have allowed for the use of computer-based animation to take place, now all drawings, colourings and touch-ups can be done on a computer. This way of animation is not only cheaper but also a lot faster. Now animators have a lot more options when creating and they can even opt to do 3D animation as well.