Traditional animation

• 1. Origins Of The Hand-Drawn Frame

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  In 1914, Earl Hurd and John Bray invented the cel animation process that would dominate the twentieth century. Before this innovation, animators drew every single frame on a single sheet of paper, creating a jittery visual effect as backgrounds had to be redrawn for each movement. Gertie the Dinosaur from 1914 required artists to paint the entire scene anew for every frame containing motion. This labor-intensive method made complex storytelling nearly impossible due to the sheer volume of drawings needed. The invention of transparent celluloid sheets allowed static elements like backgrounds to remain fixed while only moving characters were redrawn. A simple example involves a character placing a plate on a table; once the plate rests, it stays on one cel while the character continues to move across multiple new cels. This efficiency saved immense amounts of time and money, allowing studios to produce longer films with greater detail. Early pioneers used painted glass panes in matte shots during the late nineteenth century to achieve similar layering effects. Norman Dawn utilized these techniques before the formalization of cel animation. Lotte Reiniger constructed a Tricktisch device in 1923 that allowed for overhead adjustment of stationary planes. Her film The Adventures of Prince Achmed demonstrated how separate layers could create depth without redrawing the entire background.

• 2. The Studio Assembly Line

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  Animation production begins when a story is converted into an animation film script by writers. From this script, storyboard artists derive shot-by-shot breakdowns of staging, acting, and camera moves. These images resemble comic book panels and allow teams to plan plot flow and imagery composition. Storyboard artists hold regular meetings with directors and may redraw sequences many times before final approval. Before animation starts, voice actors record a preliminary soundtrack or scratch track to synchronize movement precisely. Traditional animation almost always synchronizes to pre-existing soundtracks rather than recording dialogue after filming. Completed cartoons feature music, sound effects, and dialogue performed by voice actors. In Japanese animation and most pre-1930 sound animated cartoons, post-synchronization was common practice. Fleischer Studios continued post-synching through the 1930s, allowing for muttered ad-libs found in Popeye the Sailor and Betty Boop cartoons. Design departments receive storyboards to prepare model sheets for characters and props. Model sheets include turnarounds showing three-dimensional views along with standardized poses and expressions. Small statues known as maquettes help animators visualize characters in three dimensions. Background stylists work on settings while art directors determine color schemes. A timing director analyzes exactly what poses and lip movements are needed on specific frames. An exposure sheet breaks down action, dialogue, and sound frame-by-frame as a guide for animators. Layout begins after designs are approved, determining camera angles, paths, lighting, and shading. Character layout artists draw major poses for scenes, often handled directly by directors for short films.

• 3. Ink And Paint Mechanics

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  Once clean-up drawings are complete, they enter the ink-and-paint process where each drawing transfers from paper to thin clear plastic called a cel. The material cellulose nitrate was later replaced with stable cellulose acetate due to flammability concerns. Artists ink or photocopy outlines onto cels and use gouache, acrylic, or similar paints on reverse sides to add colors. Transparent quality allows characters on separate cels to be seen underneath one another against opaque backgrounds. Disney faced setbacks during World War II when equipment went to waste and economic solutions were sought. Ub Iwerks pioneered the xerography process to replace traditional hand-inking methods. Xerography allowed drawings to copy directly onto cels using electrostatic copying techniques applied at Walt Disney Studios in the late 1950s. This method saved time and money while enabling more details and size control over objects. First tested in Sleeping Beauty scenes, it fully appeared in the short film Goliath II. One Hundred and One Dalmatians became the first feature entirely using this process, strongly influencing its graphic style. Some hand inking remained necessary for distinct colored lines needed in subsequent films. Later, colored toners became available allowing multiple line colors simultaneously. White and blue toners created special effects like snow and water in films such as The Rescuers. Dave Spencer invented the APT process for The Black Cauldron in 1985, transferring art via high-contrast litho film exposed through negatives. Chemicals removed unexposed portions while small delicate details still required manual ink work. Spencer received an Academy Award for Technical Achievement for developing this transfer technique.

• 4. Specialized Visual Techniques

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  Rotoscoping emerged as a method invented by Max Fleischer in 1915 where animation traces actual film footage of actors frame-by-frame. Live-action prints register on paper while another sheet overlays them for tracing under lightboxes. Results look hand-drawn yet possess remarkably lifelike motion found in Waking Life and American Pop. Music videos for A-ha's Take On Me and Kanye West's Heartless also utilize rotoscoped animation. Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs used rotoscoping to aid realistic human rendering alongside Peter Pan and Sleeping Beauty. Solid inanimate objects like cars or boats were animated using related methods involving painted white models with black edges. These models filmed real-time or stop-motion then printed showing outlines before xerography transferred them to cels. Cruella de Vil's car in One Hundred and One Dalmatians exemplifies this object-based rotoscoping approach. Multiplane cameras provided depth by separating artwork onto transparent glass or plexiglass planes aligned at specific distances. William Garity designed the multiplane camera for Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in 1937 utilizing up to seven movable planes. The vertical top-down crane shot scenes painted on individually adjustable layers allowing changeable depth within single animated sequences. Limited animation shortcuts appeared extensively in lower-budget productions where only heads or mouths moved while bodies stayed static. United Productions of America popularized limited animation in theatrical cartoons while Hanna-Barbera adopted it for television. Shooting on twos shows one drawing per two film frames resulting in twelve drawings per second instead of twenty-four. Bill Plympton uses near-constant three-frame holds holding each drawing from one-third to one-quarter of a second. Animation loops create seamless repetition for walking cycles or breezes blowing through trees used sparingly by moderate budget productions.

• 5. The Digital Transition Era

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  Hanna-Barbera became the first American studio to implement computer ink-and-paint systems following a 1979 commitment to technology. Marc Levoy led the Hanna-Barbera Animation Laboratory from 1980 to 1983 developing systems used in roughly one-third of domestic production starting in 1984. Testing occurred in Pac-Man episodes Nighty Nightmares and The Pac-Mummy before replacement by third-party software in 1996. Cost savings reached five to one compared to traditional cel painting while enabling multiplane effects seen in A Pup Named Scooby-Doo released in 1988. Walt Disney Animation Studios began using digital ink and paint in 1989 for the final rainbow shot in The Little Mermaid. All subsequent traditional Disney features went digitally inked starting with The Rescuers Down Under, the first major feature entirely using digital processes. Disney's proprietary CAPS technology developed primarily by Pixar allowed colored ink-line techniques lost during xerography eras plus blended shading. Beauty and the Beast ballroom sequence integrated 3D CGI backgrounds seamlessly with traditional animation. Rival studios adapted digipaint processes using softwares like Animo, USAnimation, Toonz, and Pixibox throughout the 1990s. Many filmmakers resisted shifting because they felt digital coloring looked too synthetic losing aesthetic appeal of non-computerized cels. Fox's The Simpsons converted to digital animation in 2002 while King of the Hill followed suit in 2003. Cartoon Network's Ed, Edd n Eddy remained the last Western cartoon switching to digital animation only in 2004. The television adaptation Sazae-san abandoned cel animation finally on the 29th of September 2013 after retaining traditional cels until the 6th of October 2013. Bill Plympton's Hair High released in 2004 stands as the last animated film to use traditional cels before widespread adoption of software packages.