The development of 2D and stop-motion techniques

The development of 2D and stop-motion techniques

Influential animators

Walt Disney was born on December 5^th 1901. He was the most famous of all animators from the golden age; He found ways to transform animation; he pioneered the field of animation and found new ways of creating them.  

He first made a silent cartoon entitled ‘plane crazy’ in 1928; However Walt Disney’s breakthrough came with the creation of Mickey Mouse. Mickey Mouse’, made his first appearance in Disney’s Steamboat Willie, the first ever synchronised sound cartoon, it premiered in Colony Theatre in New York in 1928.  In 1932, Walt Disney received an academy award for the creation of Mickey Mouse. After Steamboat Willie, Disney’s ideas for different animations were endless. Technicolor was being introduced and so the productions of his animations ‘silly symphonies’ were produced. Walt Disney also released a short film entitled ‘The Old Mill’. This was the first ever film to use the multi plane camera technique. The multi-plane camera was a camera that was designed to give an image a three dimensional effect. It was a special motion picture camera that Walt Disney used in the traditional animation process. Walt Disney then carried on to be the first ever person to produce the first full-length traditional animated feature ‘Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs’. This was released in 1937; he used realistic human movement so they could trace the real action.

Within the next five years of the release of ‘Snow White’, the Walt Disney Studios carried on to produce other traditional animation classics such as: Bambi, Fantasia, Pinocchio and Dumbo. Fantasia was the first stereophonic called Fanta sound for the film ‘Fantasia’. Disney’s last drawn animation was the princess and the frog in 2009. From then, technology is more up to date so now Disney uses CGI for the majority of their animations. Walt Disney is the most famous animator of all time, one of the reasons is because he was always the first to invent or creative anything. For example he was the first to invent the multi plane camera, the first animator to create the first full-length traditional animation feature, and also the first person to create films with sound and films with colour. This is why Walt Disney was an influential animator, and one of the most famous animators of the golden age.

The Warner Brothers were also influential animators as well as Walt Disney. Even know Disney created ideas to help animation improve; animators today still work for the Warner Brothers film company. The ‘Warner Brothers’ were founded by four brothers, Harry, Albert, Samuel and Jack Warner. Around 1913, they began producing their own films. During this time, World War One had broken out; this is when Warner produced their first film ‘My four years In Germany’ in 1918.  When World Two broke out Audiences were getting tired of war films. However despite what the audience thought, Jack Warner continued to produce them and lost money in the process. However the record attendance figures between the years 1918 and 1945 (When World War II, started and ended), made the warner brothers profit a lot of money. In 1923, the company officially became knows as the Warner Bros. They then went on to purchase Leon Schlesingers cartoon studio, Warner Brothers then became owners of all the Looney Tunes characters including: Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, etc.

They released their first motion picture with synchronised sound, The ‘Jazz Singer’ in 1927. Warner Communications Inc. merged with Time Inc. and became Time Warner Inc. and is now one of the worlds largest entertainment company’s.

In the early 1930s the company started to produce gangster films; some of the films including: The Public Enemy (1931), Little Caesar (1931) and Scarface (1932). Among the studio’s best-known films of the 1940s and 1950s were Casablanca (1942), (produced during world war 2) and A Streetcar Named Desire (1951). The studio’s later box-office successes included My Fair Lady (1964), Bonnie and Clyde (1967), The Exorcist (1973) and The Fugitive (1993). Even though Disney was the first too create the first multi plane camera and the other things that other animators use to produce films, Warner Brothers were the first studio to begin a television production. The Warner Brothers influenced animators today and because of this, the film company is still producing some of the best films and television programs in the world.

Hanna-Barbera Productions produced many successful shows and films as well as Walt Disney and The Warner Brother. Two MGM animation directors, William Hanna and Joseph Barbera, ran the company. Hanna was born the 14^th July 1910, in New Mexico and died on March 22^nd 2001 in Hollywood, California. Joseph Barbera died a little later than Hanna at the age of 95 years old in 2006.

Hanna-Barbera Productions was an American animation studio that lead television for almost 40 years in the mid to late 20^th century. Hanna barbera productions Inc. was formed in 1957 by MGM animation directors William Hanna and Joseph Barbera. Hanna and Barbera produced many academy award winning shows, some including: The Flinstones, The Jetsons, Scooby Doo and Yogi Bear. Most of the animations that Hanna and Barbera created, produced cartoons that had a special friendship; For example, Tom and Jerry, Yogi Bear and Boo-Boo, and Scooby and Shaggy. I think that the close friendship and partnership that Hanna and Barbera shared may have had a reflection on the idea when creating the characters.

However the most famous animation Hanna and Barbera produced was Tom and Jerry. Tom and Jerry made their first appearance in the film Puss Gets the Boot in 1940. Audiences around the world loved it and shortly after William Hanna and Joseph Barbera received an Academy Award nomination. After this, Hanna-Barbera produced many more Tom and Jerry short films including Academy Award-Winners.  Hanna-Barbera productions produced shows that many generations have grown up watching. They will be remembered for the incredible characters that they created and helped influence and develop the field of animation.