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Animation is the method that encompasses myriad filmmaking techniques, by which still images are manipulated to create moving images. In traditional animation, images are drawn or painted by hand on transparent celluloid sheets (cels) to be photographed and exhibited on film. Animation has been recognized as an artistic medium, specifically within the entertainment industry. Many animations are computer animations made with computer-generated imagery (CGI). Stop motion animation, in particular claymation, has continued to exist alongside these other forms.
Animation is contrasted with live-action film, although the two do not exist in isolation. Many moviemakers have produced films that are a hybrid of the two. As CGI increasingly approximates photographic imagery, filmmakers can easily composite 3D animations into their film rather than using practical effects for showy visual effects (VFX).
Computer animation can be very detailed 3D animation, while 2D computer animation (which may have the look of traditional animation) can be used for stylistic reasons, low bandwidth, or faster real-time renderings. Other common animation methods apply a stop motion technique to two- and three-dimensional objects like paper cutouts, puppets, or clay figures.
Analog mechanical animation media that rely on the rapid display of sequential images include the phénakisticope, zoetrope, flip book, praxinoscope, and film. Television and video are popular electronic animation media that originally were analog and now operate digitally. For display on computers, technology such as the animated GIF and Flash animation were developed.
In addition to short films, feature films, television series, animated GIFs, and other media dedicated to the display of moving images, animation is also prevalent in video games, motion graphics, user interfaces, and visual effects.[1]
The word "animation" stems from the Latin "animātiōn", stem of "animātiō", meaning "a bestowing of life".[2] The earlier meaning of the English word is "liveliness" and has been in use much longer than the meaning of "moving image medium".
Hundreds of years before the introduction of true animation, people all over the world enjoyed shows with moving figures that were physically manipulated (manually, or sometimes mechanically) in puppetry, automata, shadow play, and the magic lantern (especially in phantasmagoria shows).[citation needed]
In 1833, the stroboscopic disc (better known as the phénakisticope) introduced the principle of modern animation, which would also be applied in the zoetrope (introduced in 1866), the flip book (1868), the praxinoscope (1877) and film.
When cinematography eventually broke through in the 1890s, the wonder of the realistic details in the new medium was seen as its biggest accomplishment. It took years before animation found its way to the cinemas. The successful short The Haunted Hotel (1907) by J. Stuart Blackton popularized stop-motion and reportedly inspired Émile Cohl to create Fantasmagorie (1908), regarded as the oldest known example of a complete traditional (hand-drawn) animation on standard cinematographic film. Other great artistic and very influential short films were created by Ladislas Starevich with his puppet animations since 1910 and by Winsor McCay with detailed hand-drawn animation in films such as Little Nemo (1911) and Gertie the Dinosaur (1914).[3]
During the 1910s, the production of animated "cartoons" became an industry in the US.[4] Successful producer John Randolph Bray and animator Earl Hurd, patented the cel animation process that dominated the animation industry for the rest of the century.[5][6] Felix the Cat, who debuted in 1919, became the first fully realized animal character in the history of American animation.[7]
In 1928, Steamboat Willie, featuring Mickey Mouse and Minnie Mouse, popularized film with synchronized sound and put Walt Disney's studio at the forefront of the animation industry. Although Disney Animation's actual output relative to total global animation output has always been very small, the studio has overwhelmingly dominated the "aesthetic norms" of animation ever since.[8]
After working on it for three years, Lotte Reiniger released the German feature-length silhouette animation Die Abenteuer des Prinzen Achmed in 1926, the oldest extant animated feature.[citation needed][11]
Although relatively few titles became as successful as Disney's features, other countries developed their own animation industries that produced both short and feature theatrical animations in a wide variety of styles, relatively often including stop motion and cutout animation techniques. Russia's Soyuzmultfilm animation studio, founded in 1936, produced 20 films (including shorts) per year on average and reached 1,582 titles in 2018. China, Czechoslovakia / Czech Republic, Italy, France, and Belgium were other countries that more than occasionally released feature films, while Japan became a true powerhouse of animation production, with its own recognizable and influential anime style of effective limited animation.[citation needed]
Computer animation was gradually developed since the 1940s. 3D wireframe animation started popping up in the mainstream in the 1970s, with an early (short) appearance in the sci-fi thriller Futureworld (1976).[14]
The Rescuers Down Under was the first feature film to be completely created digitally without a camera.[15] It was produced in a style that's very similar to traditional cel animation on the Computer Animation Production System (CAPS), developed by The Walt Disney Company in collaboration with Pixar in the late 1980s.[citation needed]
The so-called 3D style, more often associated with computer animation, became the dominant technique following the success of Pixar's Toy Story (1995), the first computer-animated feature in this style.[citation needed]
Most of the cel animation studios switched to producing mostly computer-animated films around the 1990s, as it proved cheaper and more profitable. Not only the very popular 3D animation style was generated with computers, but also most of the films and series with a more traditional hand-crafted appearance, in which the charming characteristics of cel animation could be emulated with software, while new digital tools helped developing new styles and effects.[16][17][18][19][20][21]
In 2010, the animation market was estimated to be worth circa US$80 billion.[22] By 2020, the value had increased to an estimated US$270 billion.[23] Animated feature-length films returned the highest gross margins (around 52%) of all film genres between 2004 and 2013.[24] Animation as an art and industry continues to thrive as of the early 2020s.[25][26][27]
The clarity of animation makes it a powerful tool for instruction, while its total malleability also allows exaggeration that can be employed to convey strong emotions and to thwart reality. It has therefore been widely used for other purposes than mere entertainment.[citation needed]
During World War II, animation was widely exploited for propaganda. Many American studios, including Warner Bros. and Disney, lent their talents and their cartoon characters to convey to the public certain war values. Some countries, including China, Japan and the United Kingdom, produced their first feature-length animation for their war efforts.[citation needed]
Animation has traditionally been very closely related to comic books. While many comic book characters found their way to the screen (which is often the case in Japan, where many manga are adapted into anime), original animated characters also commonly appear in comic books and magazines. Somewhat similarly, characters and plots for video games (an interactive form of animation that became its own medium) have been derived from films and vice versa.[30]
While very many animation companies commercially exploit their creations outside moving image media, The Walt Disney Company is the best known and most extreme example. Since first being licensed for a children's writing tablet in 1929, their Mickey Mouse mascot has been depicted on an enormous amount of products, as have many other Disney characters. This may have influenced some pejorative use of Mickey's name, but licensed Disney products sell well, and the so-called Disneyana has many avid collectors, and even a dedicated Disneyana Fan Club (since 1984).[31]
Criticism of animation has been common in media and cinema since its inception. With its popularity, a large amount of criticism has arisen, especially animated feature-length films.[32] Criticisms regarding cultural representation and psychological effects on children have been raised around the animation industry, which some claim has remained politically unchanged and stagnant since its inception into mainstream culture.[33]
As with any other form of media, animation has instituted awards for excellence in the field. Many are part of general or regional film award programs, like the China's Golden Rooster Award for Best Animation (since 1981). Awards programs dedicated to animation, with many categories, include ASIFA-Hollywood's Annie Awards, the Emile Awards in Europe and the Anima Mundi awards in Brazil.[citation needed]
The creation of non-trivial animation works (i.e., longer than a few seconds) has developed as a form of filmmaking, with certain unique aspects.[35] Traits common to both live-action and animated feature-length films are labor intensity and high production costs.[36]
The most important difference is that once a film is in the production phase, the marginal cost of one more shot is higher for animated films than live-action films.[37] It is relatively easy for a director to ask for one more take during principal photography of a live-action film, but every take on an animated film must be manually rendered by animators (although the task of rendering slightly different takes has been made less tedious by modern computer animation).[38] It is pointless for a studio to pay the salaries of dozens of animators to spend weeks creating a visually dazzling five-minute scene if that scene fails to effectively advance the plot of the film.[39] Thus, animation studios starting with Disney began the practice in the 1930s of maintaining story departments where storyboard artists develop every single scene through storyboards, then handing the film over to the animators only after the production team is satisfied that all the scenes make sense as a whole.[40] While live-action films are now also storyboarded, they enjoy more latitude to depart from storyboards (i.e., real-time improvisation).[citation needed][41]
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