Published between 1982 and 1995
When they were deciding on the type of film stock for the production Fuji was on the short list because it is a lot cheaper than Kodak film, but they decided Eastman stock gave a truer reproduction of the cartoon colours. “Fuji gave us a more pastel result. We have nothing against Fugi, the pastel … Read more
On a good day they would shoot 100 feet of film, or about one minute of screen time. Sometimes it was much less, depending on the complexity of the shot. They were working one frame at a time and, apart from a couple of feet run-off at the start of a roll to get into … Read more
“There were occasions where we needed to take a wall out to allow for the back bulk of the camera. If we were moving into a room and panning to the left, we would take the right hand wall out once it was out of camera range, so that we could move the back of … Read more
Internationally renowned animator Norman McLaren, who died on the 27th January 1987 at the age of 72, firmly believed in the efficacy of a limited budget to stimulate the imagination, writes Ken Clark. Norman McLaren scorned the big budgets of more conventional productions, preferring the stripped down simplistic style he so ably exploited in his … Read more
A period of development took place between l939 and 1941 during his lean years when working independently, and for the Museum of Non-Objective Art in New York, who commissioned five 200 foot camera-less films, these were Dots, Loops, Scherzo, Stars & Stripes and Boogie Doodle. The sound was drawn directly onto the sound track area … Read more
On April 1, the Canadian High Commission in London paid tribute to Norman McLaren, one of the world’s great animators, who died earlier this year, writes Brian Sibley. There was nothing surprising in this, since McLaren’s innovative work for the National Film Board of Canada not only received international acclaim, it achieved a far- reaching … Read more
April Spencer looks at the career of David Hand, an American who influenced a generation of British animators. David Hand’s animation career may be divided into two main phases. He held animator and directorial posts at the Walt Disney Studio in Los Angeles from 1930 to 1944. Then he came to England to set up … Read more
Ken Clark takes a detailed look at the animation studio where many top British animators got their start. The original concept of Gaumont British Animation, a studio of sufficient size and capacity with which to challenge Disney’s supremacy, sounded exciting enough to tempt anyone with an ounce of ambition. According to 1. Arthur Rank it … Read more
Pete Dards and Ken Gay worked alongside Ken Hardy, with Brian Salt close by. They worked on such subjects as Human Digestion, The History of the Port of London (one wonders how well that compared with Anson Dyer’s version made in the Thirties), Circulation of the Blood, The Magna Carta (for the British Council — … Read more
“Hand put me to work on a very different style of film because the entertainment cartoons were costing so much. He told me, ‘Make an animated film with very little animation in it, principally a succession of still pictures’. Then he ran the ‘Baby Weems’ sequence from a Disney feature, gave me a script titled … Read more
Robin Allan gives his reassessment of a rarely shown Disney feature length cartoon that is out on video. It is forty years since the release in 1946 of Disney’s animated feature Make Mine Music. Most of it is forgotten, or confused with material from Melody Time (1948). But it deserves reassessment; as David Rider said … Read more
The four shorts that make up Saludos Amigos (1943) do not reflect much of this new mood, though the freedom of styling in the Brazilian sequence Aquarela do Brasil hints at the imaginative use of animation in The Three Caballeros (1945). Victoiy Through Air Power (also 1943) is a piece of hard-sell propaganda whose message … Read more
Without You follows. This piece was the least popular item with critics. Virginia Wright in the Los Angeles Daily News called it “completely uninspired” and David Rider thought it “glutinous.” With music by Osvaldo Farres and English lyrics by Ray Gilbert it is subtitled “a Ballad in Blue” and is, at three and three quarter … Read more
Johnny Fedora and Alice Blue Bonnet must surely be one of the few Disney films with a violent urban background behind its story of two hats in love. It is a fascinating example of magazine art, opening on a moonlit city night with a track down to a shop window. We follow the misfortunes of … Read more
Animator. Spring 1987. Issue number 18. Front cover illustrations: Main picture: Telecine suite at Rushes Postproduction Ltd in London. Inset: A still from a Honywell commercial.
Robin Allan has been reading a newly published edition of Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. It contains previously unpublished illustrations from the Disney archives by David Hall, and has an Afterword by Brian Sibley. Brian Sibley, Methuen and Justin Knowles are to be congratulated on the publication of a newly illustrated Alice; as Brian … Read more
The animator will note in particular Hall’s ability to capture movement in the still drawing. Apart from the rabbit hole, there are many other examples – Alice’s changes of size, Bill going up like a sky-rocket, the cook’s tantrums and Alice’s escape with the baby. Surreal colour, animation of inanimate objects in the Queen’s garden, … Read more
Rushes specialise in video editing and computer animation. David Jefferson met Chairman, Godfrey Pye at their London premises. Rushes Postproduction Limited specialise in video and film editing, computer graphics and computer animation, for television commercials, pop promos, corporate and industrial work. They are probably best known for the Dire Straits pop video Money for Nothing … Read more
They have a double memory system giving a 160 second capacity, up to 4,030 frames can be prepared, all stored in Harry on video disc. The Harry system together with the Paint Box cost around £150,000. The first step in computer animation is to put the character or object to be animated into a form … Read more
Camera Effects Limited has been going for 21 years. it is an optical house dealing in special effects. David Jefferson went along to their Soho, London studio and met Director Gary Pearlman. Camera Effects create all sorts of optical illusions and camera tricks. Many animation techniques are used in the process, although it is not … Read more
A lot of preparation has to be done before they start to shoot animation over live-action. First of all the live action company shoot the background. This is then edited and Camera Effects are supplied with the negative. From that negative, an interpositive colour fine grain is made with negative perforations, so there are no … Read more
Each frame costs a minimum of £25 to produce the artwork, mainly because of the time involved and the artist’s experience. Even so, it would be much more expensive to re-shoot the live action when you consider the cost of the actor and crew. This is something they could not do on video with Paint … Read more
Sean Lenihan tells David Jefferson what is involved in preparing a sound- track and combining it with pictures to give a polished result. “The sound track is one of the most important things in an animated film,” says Sean Lenihan, a freelance film editor who heads his own London based post-production company. “The majority of … Read more
Lenihan has been editing animated film from the age of 17 when he got a job at the Wyatt Cattaneo Studio as a trainee in 1969. “We did a set-pattern type of work, there was a constant stream of animated commercials promoting Home Pride flour, Dunlop tyres, and Tetley teabags. An effects library was created … Read more
There are some video programmes that can be completed on U-matic without haying to go to one-inch. The finished result can be an off-line cutting copy. “Industrial promos and the like can be produced reasonably cheaply without going on to broadcast standard.” There are a lot of video houses specialising in this type of work, … Read more
John Halas talks about an exciting new series of programmes which form a world-wide survey of animation. Interview by David Jefferson. The idea for an animation show reel of the world-wide industry was first put forward at a board meeting of ASIFA about ten years ago. It was an enormous task for anyone to undertake … Read more
For the programme on his own country, Great Britain, Halas has chosen the themes ‘pioneering spirit’, ‘diversity of styles’ and ‘adult entertainment’. “I have been very much involved with the ‘adult’ spectrum of animation since the war, when we were working for the Ministry of Information to assist the war effort. That was a good … Read more
Ken Clark has been finding out about a puppet animation unit that followed in the footsteps of George Pal. When Britain went to war in 1939, Gerard Holdsworth had already joined the cloak-and-dagger brigade. His wartime exploits included the organisation of the Helston Flotilla and the Norwegian Resistance; groups operating from South Africa; finally the … Read more
Managing-Director Holdsworth relinquished his position as Time neared completion. Retaining a directorship on the board of Signal Films, Gerry left to take over the full-time running of live-action studio Wallace Productions. Robert G. Leffmgwell, an ex-Disney man, came in to take his place, with the inevitable result Gerry failed to get a mention on The … Read more
Brian Sibley reviews animated film versions of three modern classics, now released on video. “There are,” wrote A. A. Mime, “two well-known ways in which to make a play out of a book. You may insist on being faithful to the author, which means that the scene in the aeroplane on page 673 must be … Read more
No such criticism can be levelled against another Rankin-Bass production, The Last Unicorn (Channel 5 video, CFV 01862) which is one of the most pictorially evocative cartoons ever made; and certainly the most ornate piece of animation since Disney’s Sleeping Beauty (1959), to which this film owes a particular debt for the angular stylization of … Read more
My introduction to David Hand was about thirty years ago when I used to possess a Gingernut Annual, writes April Spencer. As far as I can remember the cover was m full colour, but I believe the inside illustrations were just in two colours, black and orange. The images were very strong and also the … Read more
Paul Thomas was interviewed in Animator Issue number 11 in 1984. At the time he was running the Tiger Trax animation studio, situated in a block of flats just off the Old Kent Road.
Paul began his animation career at Bob Godfrey’s studio and at the time of the interview, was doing sequences for Tony Hart’s BBC TV programme “Take Hart” and design work for the Kate Bush fan club magazine. He also contributed a regular cartoon strip to Animator mag under the pen name of Dr Scratch, featuring a rather droll dog called Scratch.
Paul recently discovered the Animator mag web site whilst searching the Internet and dropped me an email with his latest news.
He has left the concrete jungle of London for the green and pleasant land of Salisbury, Wiltshire. Paul is now the director and writer for a children’s puppet performance group called Tin Harlequin. He told me that forming the group “was a dream come true”.
Animator. Autumn 1986. Issue number 17. Front cover illustrations: Left: Wind in the willows, Cosgrove Hall Productions. Right: Dangermouse, Cosgrove Hall Productions.
The Studio In ten years Cosgrove Hall Productions has grown from a small studio to a major animation centre whose films are enjoyed by audiences around the World. The Cosgrove Hall animation studio is in a suburb of Manchester called Chorlton-cum-Hardy, writes David Jefferson. It is a smart looking building of red brick and brown … Read more
The Design Team prepare layouts and experiment with light, shade and colour. Ken Clark investigates. Layouts show the field of view and the movement of camera and characters, while exercising a strong measure of control, unifying the separate pieces of the picture and guiding the team towards a common goal. It could be said that … Read more
Andy Roper Andy Roper, Chief Storyboard artist/Layout artist talks with Ken Clark. KC: How long have you been working on The BFG? AR: We started pre-production work in 1984. There were four of us and our director, Brian Cosgrove, working in a Portakabin standing on a plot of land which is now the studio car … Read more
Maggie Riley, background colour designer Maggie Riley is a background colour designer who has been working at Cosgrove Hall Productions for three years. She designed and painted backgrounds for Alias the Jester and is now on Count Duckula. Interview by Ken Clark. KC: What does colour design entail? MR: While Paul Salmon is responsible for … Read more
Chris Randall, Senior Producer/Director on future drawn production series chats with Ken Clark. Roald Dahl’s books have tremendous appeal for children. They are different – very different indeed. Most good stories written for children are well-written, but sanitized. Not so the Dahl yarns and poems. He has a perceptive approach, freely explained in a recent … Read more
Dan Whitworth is currently working on development for the Count Duckula series at Cosgrove Hall. He talks with Ken Clark. KC: I understand you have changed Duckula’s personality from the one he had in his two Dangermouse films. DW: He was mad about show business but we are playing that down, he is more of … Read more