Published between 1982 and 1995
Films made during the war years helped sharpen the intellect. In order to explain, to educate or to inform it was necessary to acquire in the short term a degree of knowledgeable expertise concerning the subject on the drawing board. From naval manoeuvres, fighting fires, growing your own vegetables, war on waste, post-war explanations re. … Read more
This project is the commencement of a life-long ambition for John Halas, and he is to be congratulated on the successful integration of conventional animation, diagrammatic stylisation, and computer generated visuals. My only criticism is of the scriptwriters. Faced with the monumental task of presenting a large part of the Bible in just half-an-hour while … 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
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
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