WEBVTT - TechStuff Classic: How Hand-drawn Animation Works 0:00:04.240 --> 0:00:07.240 Welcome to tech Stuff, a production of I Heart Radios 0:00:07.320 --> 0:00:13.680 How Stuff Works. Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff. 0:00:13.680 --> 0:00:16.639 I'm your host, Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer with 0:00:16.640 --> 0:00:18.520 How Stuff Works in my Heart Radio and I love 0:00:18.560 --> 0:00:22.279 all things tech and his time for another classic episode 0:00:22.440 --> 0:00:26.000 of tech Stuff. This episode is called How hand Drawn 0:00:26.200 --> 0:00:32.519 Animation Works, and it originally published on October two thousand twelve. 0:00:33.040 --> 0:00:37.680 And I'm a huge fan of animation. I love animation. 0:00:37.800 --> 0:00:40.479 I think when it's done well, it can be an 0:00:40.479 --> 0:00:44.479 incredible art form. One of my favorite films of the 0:00:44.520 --> 0:00:50.360 recent past is Into the Spider Verse, a truly gorgeous 0:00:50.440 --> 0:00:55.240 animated movie. Although not necessarily talking just about hand drawn 0:00:55.280 --> 0:00:58.480 animation in that respect, but I thought it would be 0:00:58.480 --> 0:01:00.440 good to look back on this and kind of get 0:01:00.520 --> 0:01:03.680 an appreciation on how this stuff works. So let's listen 0:01:03.720 --> 0:01:06.680 in as Chris and I go down the path to 0:01:06.880 --> 0:01:11.520 understanding hand drawn animation. Today, we wanted to talk about 0:01:11.600 --> 0:01:16.640 the traditional hand drawn animation process, what goes into it, 0:01:16.840 --> 0:01:19.800 why does it work, and how has it changed over 0:01:19.840 --> 0:01:23.000 the years. Uh. And we were specifically focusing on hand 0:01:23.080 --> 0:01:25.560 drawn animation because I think we may have I know 0:01:25.600 --> 0:01:27.960 we've talked about computer animation in previous podcasts. I don't 0:01:27.959 --> 0:01:30.840 think we've done a full episode on it, but but 0:01:30.920 --> 0:01:35.399 the two disciplines are different enough where I think it 0:01:35.440 --> 0:01:39.920 warrants two different podcasts. Yeah, the I have done some 0:01:39.959 --> 0:01:42.240 research on it, just by accident, just because I was 0:01:42.280 --> 0:01:44.600 interested in a topic from time to time, and I 0:01:45.000 --> 0:01:46.759 started thinking about it the other day when I saw 0:01:46.840 --> 0:01:51.640 something and suggested it. Um. It's uh, it's very different 0:01:51.880 --> 0:01:55.920 in quite a few ways from from computer animation, and 0:01:56.400 --> 0:02:00.200 Jonathan and I like to talk about how old styles 0:02:00.240 --> 0:02:02.600 of tech have affected us and uh, the kinds of 0:02:02.640 --> 0:02:05.440 things that people used to do. Um. You know, there 0:02:05.480 --> 0:02:08.000 are some very famous studios that have have gone computer 0:02:08.120 --> 0:02:11.239 only these days, but um, some of the very same 0:02:11.240 --> 0:02:14.720 studios were pioneers and some of the amazing tech that 0:02:14.760 --> 0:02:19.480 went into making a piece of hand drawn animation look 0:02:19.560 --> 0:02:22.200 very realistic. UM. And I thought, you know, it would 0:02:22.240 --> 0:02:25.200 be really fun to kind of touch on that. Um, 0:02:25.280 --> 0:02:28.079 which is which is why I think we decided to 0:02:28.080 --> 0:02:29.880 go ahead and make an episode of it. We should 0:02:29.880 --> 0:02:35.119 probably already attach this into our movie making tech series 0:02:35.200 --> 0:02:37.760 of stuff, just because we haven't done one in a while. 0:02:37.840 --> 0:02:39.760 And then now we can say we have. Yeah, I 0:02:39.760 --> 0:02:41.480 think it's been I think it's been like a year. 0:02:41.840 --> 0:02:44.760 Um yeah, okay, that that that's fun with me. This 0:02:44.919 --> 0:02:50.880 belongs in our movie Magic Technology series. It really does. 0:02:50.960 --> 0:02:52.760 It's just that I wasn't thinking of it that way. 0:02:53.000 --> 0:02:58.320 So before U, before we get into the actual process 0:02:58.480 --> 0:03:03.040 of making a hand drawn animated project, whether it's television 0:03:03.040 --> 0:03:06.640 for television or for film or whatever, um, we should 0:03:06.760 --> 0:03:10.960 kind of explain the whole concept behind animation. It's the 0:03:11.000 --> 0:03:14.720 idea is that it's an illusion, obviously, an illusion of movement. 0:03:15.320 --> 0:03:17.760 And this is because the way our our brains and 0:03:17.800 --> 0:03:20.959 our eyes work, we have this uh, this sort of 0:03:21.760 --> 0:03:24.280 it's it's almost like a visual memory in a way, 0:03:24.320 --> 0:03:27.720 and we're able to fill in enough information where if 0:03:27.720 --> 0:03:32.000 you have a sequence of images of an object that 0:03:32.080 --> 0:03:38.640 appears to move because it has a different um orientation, 0:03:38.960 --> 0:03:42.240 or you've slightly changed the location of the object from 0:03:42.320 --> 0:03:46.320 one page of of a like a pad of paper 0:03:46.480 --> 0:03:49.280 to another, and then you move those at a fast 0:03:49.400 --> 0:03:52.520 enough clip, it gives the illusion that that that's actually 0:03:52.520 --> 0:03:56.080 an object that's physically moving through a space. Yeah, persistence 0:03:56.120 --> 0:03:58.840 of vision, Yes, you might call it. Yes, in fact, 0:03:58.960 --> 0:04:02.600 that's its name. That's and that is reason to call 0:04:02.640 --> 0:04:04.440 it that. And so I mean, anyone who has played 0:04:04.440 --> 0:04:07.160 with a little notepad or post it notes or whatever 0:04:07.200 --> 0:04:10.240 and have created their own little versions of this knows that. 0:04:10.320 --> 0:04:12.840 You know, you you get a uh, you know, you 0:04:12.920 --> 0:04:16.480 create this illusion of movement, You move the figures, you 0:04:16.480 --> 0:04:19.839 you draw the next figure a little bit further away 0:04:19.839 --> 0:04:22.440 from the first one, or you give it some other 0:04:22.560 --> 0:04:26.440 form of motion. Uh, And when you flip the book, 0:04:26.600 --> 0:04:29.360 then it looks like something's happening. I used to do 0:04:29.400 --> 0:04:31.440 this all the time with post it notes. I went 0:04:31.440 --> 0:04:34.039 through so many packs of post it notes, drawing my 0:04:34.080 --> 0:04:38.039 own little cartoons, which almost always ended in violent mayhem. 0:04:38.080 --> 0:04:42.080 They usually began innocently enough. Yeah, I'd be like, okay, 0:04:42.080 --> 0:04:44.800 and now he's jumping over hurdle, and now he's opening 0:04:44.839 --> 0:04:47.200 up a door, and now he's hit in the head 0:04:47.200 --> 0:04:50.239 with an ax, and now he's running away from a monster, 0:04:50.400 --> 0:04:53.720 and yeah, things fell apart pretty quickly for me. If 0:04:53.720 --> 0:04:58.120 you're if you've ever read the comic strip Calvin and Hobbs, 0:04:58.600 --> 0:05:02.840 where Calvin is uh, you know, coming up with these scenarios. 0:05:03.640 --> 0:05:06.719 And now look, the giant tanker truck full of acid 0:05:06.839 --> 0:05:10.840 is coming toward it and meteor from space? How can 0:05:10.880 --> 0:05:12.760 they avoid this? And this is the image I'm seeing 0:05:12.800 --> 0:05:17.240 of Jonathan doing this. Yeah, it wasn't pretty. So how 0:05:17.279 --> 0:05:20.279 do you take that and you transfer it over into 0:05:20.360 --> 0:05:24.080 making an animated show or film? Well it's been done 0:05:24.120 --> 0:05:27.400 for centuries now really in a way. In a way, 0:05:27.440 --> 0:05:31.240 but the the process that kind of defines the way 0:05:31.440 --> 0:05:37.359 modern animation worked throughout the twentieth century was really defined 0:05:37.720 --> 0:05:43.520 by Earl Heard, and Earl Heard actually patented the cell 0:05:43.680 --> 0:05:47.920 animation process, and we call it cell animation. The original 0:05:48.200 --> 0:05:52.279 material that people drew, the drawings of figures or whatever 0:05:52.360 --> 0:05:55.559 was being animated within a scene, they would draw draw 0:05:55.600 --> 0:06:01.599 that on celluloid. Eventually the end stream made a transition 0:06:01.720 --> 0:06:06.680 from celluloid to cellulos acetate. Part of that was because 0:06:06.680 --> 0:06:12.240 celluloid is um yeah, extremely flammable, very flat. It's both 0:06:12.240 --> 0:06:17.560 flammable and inflammable and also it uh, it could be 0:06:17.600 --> 0:06:22.920 prone to spontaneous decomposition, so you couldn't store it indefinitely. 0:06:23.000 --> 0:06:25.599 Are you see those stack of drawings? They were right? 0:06:25.800 --> 0:06:29.560 They see that public goo over there? Yeah, that's snow white. 0:06:30.040 --> 0:06:33.840 Um yeah, they would they would. It seems problematic. Yeah, 0:06:33.920 --> 0:06:37.080 so you couldn't you know, you couldn't archive this stuff, 0:06:37.360 --> 0:06:40.120 which in the early days the industry wasn't a big concern. 0:06:40.520 --> 0:06:44.680 You know. The concern was to create this this product 0:06:44.760 --> 0:06:47.760 and then have it shown, usually in a movie theater 0:06:47.839 --> 0:06:49.840 in the early days. You know, this is this is 0:06:49.920 --> 0:06:53.640 before television. So this was something where you would go 0:06:53.680 --> 0:06:57.120 to a a like a theater and see it projected 0:06:57.160 --> 0:07:01.480 on a screen. But there wasn't weren't too concerned about 0:07:01.480 --> 0:07:07.200 storing stuff for for posterity, not prosperity. They wanted prosperity, posterity. 0:07:07.200 --> 0:07:11.080 They weren't so concerned about um. But yeah, so, so 0:07:11.160 --> 0:07:12.960 it wasn't a big deal. But then the move to 0:07:13.040 --> 0:07:17.400 cellulous estate, which is essentially kind of plastic, helped take 0:07:17.520 --> 0:07:20.840 that that problem out of the picture, so to speak. Yeah, 0:07:20.880 --> 0:07:25.280 the reason that now this this material um, the celluloid 0:07:25.480 --> 0:07:29.440 was was clear, yes, basically a clear sheet of plastic 0:07:29.520 --> 0:07:31.640 if you will, just just for the sake of the 0:07:31.680 --> 0:07:34.960 image in your head. Actually, most of you have probably 0:07:35.000 --> 0:07:38.760 seen somebody working on cells for animation. It's you know, 0:07:39.640 --> 0:07:42.040 we sort of know what this looks like. We haven't 0:07:42.080 --> 0:07:46.280 gotten so far out from that realm that it's foreign 0:07:46.320 --> 0:07:49.520 to us. Yeah, but this is this was a big 0:07:49.520 --> 0:07:53.680 improvement because before this, uh, there were some very early 0:07:53.760 --> 0:07:58.240 animation uh you know, moving pictures that were made with 0:07:58.360 --> 0:08:02.560 drawings on paper, and that is so much more time 0:08:02.600 --> 0:08:08.200 consuming because just as you know, um, there are several 0:08:08.400 --> 0:08:13.640 frames of film that pass. Each second is the standard. Yes, 0:08:14.240 --> 0:08:18.520 I couldn't remember per second of standard for film thirty 0:08:18.520 --> 0:08:22.880 for television. I was thinking television. If you're in the 0:08:22.960 --> 0:08:26.720 United States, I have to you have to make these 0:08:26.760 --> 0:08:32.080 qualifiers because other other countries have different standards. So imagine 0:08:32.120 --> 0:08:33.760 if you will, then you are one of the animators 0:08:33.760 --> 0:08:38.120 and you have to draw twenty four complete drawings for 0:08:38.160 --> 0:08:41.880 each second of film. This is very time consuming, where 0:08:42.000 --> 0:08:45.599 using the the cell method allows you allows the animator 0:08:45.640 --> 0:08:48.920 to make a subtle change to the original drawing and 0:08:48.920 --> 0:08:51.080 and just change make those subtle changes and you can 0:08:51.120 --> 0:08:53.959 see it because um again, if you watch a video 0:08:54.000 --> 0:08:58.360 of somebody making an animation with cells, they are able 0:08:58.400 --> 0:09:00.960 to overlay them on top of one another and they 0:09:01.000 --> 0:09:04.959 can make those subtle adjustments seeing where the differences are 0:09:05.000 --> 0:09:07.680 between the two drawings, which you you won't be able 0:09:07.679 --> 0:09:12.080 to do as well with paper because it's especially if 0:09:12.080 --> 0:09:14.960 you're using hand especially if you're using paper, Like if 0:09:15.000 --> 0:09:20.000 there's a background image that's involved with paper, you have 0:09:20.040 --> 0:09:22.600 to draw the whole thing each time, right, So you're 0:09:22.679 --> 0:09:25.280 drawing that whole background because you know, again your paper 0:09:25.320 --> 0:09:27.480 is not transparent, so you're joining the whole background. Plus 0:09:27.480 --> 0:09:30.160 they're drawing whatever is in the foreground that's that's animated, 0:09:30.800 --> 0:09:32.959 and then the next frame you have to draw it 0:09:33.000 --> 0:09:35.160 all over again. Whereas with cells, what you could do 0:09:35.240 --> 0:09:40.280 is you could have a pre generated background image that 0:09:40.520 --> 0:09:43.880 is laid down in a frame, and then you could 0:09:43.920 --> 0:09:47.160 overlay these cells on top of it, one at a time, 0:09:47.640 --> 0:09:50.640 and because the cell itself is clear, anywhere that you 0:09:50.760 --> 0:09:54.680 have not drawn, you could see the background. And then 0:09:54.800 --> 0:09:57.200 you take that cell out, you put another cell in, 0:09:57.280 --> 0:10:02.000 you take another picture, which represents a frame of the film. 0:10:02.040 --> 0:10:04.319 You know, when you think about film, really is animation, 0:10:04.920 --> 0:10:08.920 Even live action film is technically animation because you're talking 0:10:08.960 --> 0:10:12.720 about looking at a series of photographs that are played 0:10:12.760 --> 0:10:16.880 at such a speed as to create the illusion of movement. Yes. Uh, Now, 0:10:16.880 --> 0:10:18.959 the granted this is we're talking about physical film here, 0:10:19.000 --> 0:10:22.280 because once we get into digital there's different things to 0:10:22.600 --> 0:10:26.640 you know, consider. But in the old film days, that's 0:10:26.640 --> 0:10:29.679 that's really what we're talking about. So with animation, each 0:10:29.679 --> 0:10:32.160 of those frames is essentially a photograph. You're using a 0:10:32.200 --> 0:10:36.280 camera to photograph this drawing, and with the cells, like 0:10:36.320 --> 0:10:38.120 I said, you take one cell out, you put another 0:10:38.120 --> 0:10:43.000 cell in the background remains static. Uh. Then you have 0:10:43.040 --> 0:10:46.000 a character that is appearing or object or whatever that 0:10:46.040 --> 0:10:49.000 it's appearing to move on top of this background. If 0:10:49.000 --> 0:10:53.560 it's a movement that is you know, easily repeatable, you 0:10:53.559 --> 0:10:55.840 don't even have to draw more than the number of 0:10:55.880 --> 0:10:59.240 cells it takes to complete one cycle of that action. 0:11:00.040 --> 0:11:03.400 So let's say that you wanna picture You've drawn a 0:11:03.679 --> 0:11:07.720 cartoon kangaroo and the kangaroos just jumping straight up and 0:11:07.800 --> 0:11:10.880 down five times. Well, you don't have to draw enough 0:11:10.960 --> 0:11:13.360 cells to do that five times. You draw it so 0:11:13.440 --> 0:11:17.600 it does one full cycle, one jump from start to finish, 0:11:17.720 --> 0:11:21.000 and then you you could photograph that sequence five times 0:11:21.080 --> 0:11:24.240 using those that same cells. So, in other words, you've 0:11:24.280 --> 0:11:25.960 just cut down on the amount of work you would 0:11:25.960 --> 0:11:28.360 have to do if this were all done on paper. Yes, 0:11:28.440 --> 0:11:31.400 and that's one of the important points to that that 0:11:31.600 --> 0:11:36.240 so many animators have used in the past. Um Uh. 0:11:36.520 --> 0:11:39.720 The the illusion of movement you've got your kangaroo hopping 0:11:39.800 --> 0:11:44.240 up and down. Now, if the background stays static, um, 0:11:44.480 --> 0:11:47.080 then it looks like the kangaroos hopping up and down 0:11:47.080 --> 0:11:50.800 in place. UM. This technique that Jonathan was just saying, 0:11:51.200 --> 0:11:56.320 um or just talking about uh is often used to 0:11:56.440 --> 0:12:01.240 create the illusion of movement across a linear surface from 0:12:01.280 --> 0:12:04.120 point A to point B. Let's say the characters are 0:12:04.120 --> 0:12:08.240 walking down a street in the city. Man, I remember 0:12:08.240 --> 0:12:13.000 those old Marvel Comics heroes animations from the sixties and 0:12:13.040 --> 0:12:15.360 all the buildings. If if you watch a lot of 0:12:15.400 --> 0:12:18.480 these shows, um, Hanna Barbary did this kind of thing 0:12:18.520 --> 0:12:22.200 to all the time, where you're moving down the urban 0:12:22.280 --> 0:12:25.160 landscape and they've you've got your drawings of the city. 0:12:25.840 --> 0:12:28.400 And after a while to build, the buildings begin to 0:12:28.520 --> 0:12:33.400 look the same, which is because underneath what the characters 0:12:33.440 --> 0:12:36.240 are doing, the same images of the city. You know, 0:12:36.280 --> 0:12:40.319 once they've gotten uh you know, let's say twenty four 0:12:40.440 --> 0:12:43.760 for each frame, they probably had uh, you know, a 0:12:43.840 --> 0:12:45.599 certain number of those, and once they got to the 0:12:45.679 --> 0:12:47.600 end of that, then they started over at the beginning, 0:12:47.760 --> 0:12:50.760 and loops and loops and loops. So if you think 0:12:50.760 --> 0:12:52.640 of if you think of like a cell a cell 0:12:52.720 --> 0:12:56.520 is generally the size of whatever the the whole frame 0:12:56.559 --> 0:13:00.480 of that images, right, So so one cell has the 0:13:00.559 --> 0:13:04.679 character or object or whatever, or characters or objects or 0:13:04.920 --> 0:13:08.199 mix of whatever. Um it has those in the center 0:13:08.360 --> 0:13:11.559 or what has those on the on the center, it 0:13:11.559 --> 0:13:14.440 doesn't really matter it has on the cell. The rest 0:13:14.440 --> 0:13:17.400 of the cell is clear. That's what's showing you. The background. Generally, 0:13:17.400 --> 0:13:21.720 the backgrounds are much wider than the frame on sometimes 0:13:21.720 --> 0:13:24.280 taller as well than the frame that you are looking at. 0:13:25.080 --> 0:13:29.080 So when you take that picture and you remove the 0:13:29.120 --> 0:13:31.480 cell so you can put the next cell indicating the 0:13:31.520 --> 0:13:35.679 next movement of that character, you would also adjust the 0:13:35.720 --> 0:13:39.440 position of the background so that you would have that 0:13:39.480 --> 0:13:42.120 illusion of a character walking forward. So let's say the 0:13:42.160 --> 0:13:45.240 characters staying in the center of the frame, and the 0:13:45.280 --> 0:13:48.840 animation is the character is making a walking motion. Then 0:13:49.000 --> 0:13:51.520 what you would do is between the different shots you 0:13:51.520 --> 0:13:55.719 would move the background horizontally so that it would look 0:13:55.800 --> 0:13:59.600 like the characters making progress. Well, eventually you're gonna run 0:13:59.600 --> 0:14:02.040 out of back ground. You'll have to switch to a 0:14:02.040 --> 0:14:04.120 different background, or you have to reuse one, which is 0:14:04.160 --> 0:14:06.160 what Chris was talking about. You also notice in a 0:14:06.200 --> 0:14:09.760 lot of those old animations, characters have very limited movement. 0:14:09.880 --> 0:14:12.120 Sometimes it looks like a static character who's just kind 0:14:12.120 --> 0:14:14.520 of bouncing up and down a little bit as the 0:14:14.559 --> 0:14:17.720 background is moving. And again, that was a way of 0:14:17.760 --> 0:14:23.200 saving money by drawing fewer cells. You draw a character 0:14:23.240 --> 0:14:25.760 on a cell, and you're using that same static image 0:14:25.800 --> 0:14:28.800 of the character. You're just repositioning the cell slightly and 0:14:29.040 --> 0:14:33.920 adjusting the camera's frame so that there the character appears 0:14:33.920 --> 0:14:36.440 to be moving up and down as if they are walking, 0:14:37.040 --> 0:14:39.560 but in fact you're just using the same picture over 0:14:39.640 --> 0:14:42.600 and over and over again. Pretty get to the clutch 0:14:42.640 --> 0:14:45.600 cargo days, where you replace the cartoon character's mouth with 0:14:45.640 --> 0:14:49.120 a human mouth and generate a whole generation of nightmares. 0:14:51.560 --> 0:14:53.960 I'm pretty sure though, that this this method is exactly 0:14:53.960 --> 0:14:56.640 why he Man always appeared to be moon walking everywhere 0:14:56.680 --> 0:15:00.160 he went, Right. Yeah, The match matching the h the 0:15:00.880 --> 0:15:06.320 background movement with the animated character movement is an art 0:15:06.360 --> 0:15:08.400 form of it's in and of itself, and if you 0:15:08.480 --> 0:15:11.120 don't do it carefully, then you get this weird glide 0:15:11.160 --> 0:15:16.000 e motion where the character either seems to be uh 0:15:16.000 --> 0:15:20.040 walking too quickly but not making enough progress, or walking 0:15:20.040 --> 0:15:24.040 slowly but moving really fast. And um, yeah, it's it's 0:15:24.040 --> 0:15:26.320 a it's a form of art really. To get that 0:15:26.440 --> 0:15:28.800 just right, we're kind of getting a little too far 0:15:28.880 --> 0:15:30.880 into this though. I want to talk kind of about 0:15:30.880 --> 0:15:35.040 the whole process of building an animated feature. But before 0:15:35.040 --> 0:15:36.800 I jump into it, one other thing I need to 0:15:36.800 --> 0:15:40.080 say is that this traditional form of animation we're talking about, 0:15:40.080 --> 0:15:43.720 where you're drawing pictures on cells, Uh, it takes up 0:15:43.720 --> 0:15:46.520 a lot of space. Yes, it does. The equipment takes 0:15:46.600 --> 0:15:48.320 up a lot of space because you usually have to 0:15:48.360 --> 0:15:52.640 have a table on which you are photographing all this 0:15:52.720 --> 0:15:56.520 stuff and you're not using like a hand camera, No, 0:15:56.640 --> 0:16:01.400 this is professional, huge camera. And generally speaking, uh, this 0:16:01.520 --> 0:16:03.720 kind of helps cut down on the amount of materials 0:16:03.760 --> 0:16:07.960 you need. But generally speaking, for film, most animation is 0:16:08.040 --> 0:16:12.080 done where they call it animating on two's, which means 0:16:12.080 --> 0:16:18.760 they take two pictures per h position, which means that well, 0:16:18.800 --> 0:16:21.920 the playback is twenty four frames per second, the positions 0:16:21.960 --> 0:16:27.240 are more like twelve frames per second. So uh, that way, 0:16:27.480 --> 0:16:29.960 you've just cut the number of cells you need to 0:16:30.040 --> 0:16:32.960 create in half. Also, the number of times you need 0:16:33.000 --> 0:16:36.480 to adjust the background, You've cut that in half. Uh, 0:16:36.880 --> 0:16:40.040 which makes a big difference. Now for things that are 0:16:40.080 --> 0:16:42.240 like action that's moving really really quickly where you want 0:16:42.240 --> 0:16:45.800 to really smooth, you might be animating on ones, which 0:16:45.840 --> 0:16:49.400 means every single time you take a picture you have 0:16:49.520 --> 0:16:52.480 to change it whatever you know, either the background or 0:16:52.520 --> 0:16:57.280 the foreground or both between each picture. So you've just 0:16:57.360 --> 0:17:01.640 added twice as much work. You know, sometimes even more 0:17:01.680 --> 0:17:03.360 than twice as much because you think about all the 0:17:03.360 --> 0:17:07.760 departments that are involved in this. But uh, it creates 0:17:07.880 --> 0:17:10.119 a lot more work that way. It also means you 0:17:10.160 --> 0:17:13.879 have to have storage space for all this stuff because 0:17:13.880 --> 0:17:18.160 cells take up room, backgrounds take up room, the equipment 0:17:18.160 --> 0:17:21.439 takes up room, and film itself takes up room. So 0:17:21.480 --> 0:17:25.280 you know, you talk about film footage, well that really does. 0:17:26.200 --> 0:17:28.879 That really does refer back to how many feet of 0:17:29.000 --> 0:17:32.920 film you've shot? Right footage. I mean when you think about, oh, yeah, 0:17:32.920 --> 0:17:35.320 I've got some great footage, but you don't think of 0:17:35.359 --> 0:17:37.000 what that really means. Well, in the film days, that 0:17:37.119 --> 0:17:41.400 actually meant how many feet of film you had exposed, 0:17:41.400 --> 0:17:43.920 how many you had you had shot of whatever seen. 0:17:44.760 --> 0:17:48.119 If you want to know how much film animated, an 0:17:48.119 --> 0:17:55.639 animated picture takes about sixteen frames is a foot okay, 0:17:56.280 --> 0:18:00.200 one second of film is twenty four frames. So one 0:18:00.520 --> 0:18:05.159 second of film is a foot and a half. Okay, 0:18:05.560 --> 0:18:10.640 most about half. Most cartoons are longer than a second. 0:18:11.960 --> 0:18:14.640 So you have lots and lots of film that you're 0:18:14.680 --> 0:18:18.000 dealing with. All right, So that's that's the space issue, 0:18:18.080 --> 0:18:20.439 and we'll talk more about how we've kind of worked 0:18:20.440 --> 0:18:24.359 around that, uh and move beyond the cell based animation 0:18:24.440 --> 0:18:28.640 these days while still staying hand drawn. Um So, if 0:18:28.680 --> 0:18:33.440 you wanted to make an animated film, Uh, the way 0:18:33.480 --> 0:18:36.639 you would generally approach this is you come up with 0:18:36.680 --> 0:18:41.080 an idea for a story. That's the best thing. That 0:18:41.400 --> 0:18:43.480 the best way to start, in my opinion, I just 0:18:43.560 --> 0:18:45.919 drew some stuff bouncing around. Is that all right? You 0:18:45.960 --> 0:18:51.360 could do that. It's not terribly you know interesting, Um 0:18:51.480 --> 0:18:54.280 beyond maybe a certain group of friends who are amused 0:18:54.320 --> 0:18:59.520 by anything you My friends know who they are. Um, hey, 0:18:59.560 --> 0:19:04.240 they like my stuff anyway. So you create a story, 0:19:04.480 --> 0:19:06.919 and then you think of how you want to visualize 0:19:06.960 --> 0:19:10.760 this story. This is where you create a storyboard. Now, 0:19:10.880 --> 0:19:13.080 storyboard is kind of like a comic strip or a 0:19:13.080 --> 0:19:17.639 graphic novel. It tells the story in a series of frames, 0:19:18.160 --> 0:19:20.879 and uh, it all depends on how detailed you want 0:19:20.920 --> 0:19:24.919 to get. Sometimes you just show a uh, you know, 0:19:24.960 --> 0:19:27.440 a frame, and then you might make a note about 0:19:27.480 --> 0:19:30.280 what is happening as far as the action goes, because 0:19:30.320 --> 0:19:32.359 of course a frame is a still image. We don't 0:19:32.440 --> 0:19:36.400 see movement in a frame. We can see the implication 0:19:36.800 --> 0:19:40.879 like that it's implying movement perhaps, but it doesn't actually move. 0:19:41.000 --> 0:19:43.520 So you might say, you know, like I have a 0:19:43.600 --> 0:19:46.840 have a picture of a character who is holding an 0:19:46.880 --> 0:19:51.400 American football, and is, uh, that's for my friends in 0:19:51.400 --> 0:19:53.560 in places other than the United States. But holding an 0:19:53.560 --> 0:19:55.520 American football is if they're going to throw a pass, 0:19:55.600 --> 0:19:57.920 so their arm is cocked back they're holding the football, 0:19:58.320 --> 0:20:00.800 and then you might draw some arrows showing that this 0:20:00.880 --> 0:20:03.000 is the forward motion that the character is going to 0:20:03.080 --> 0:20:05.040 throw the ball. And then the next shot might be 0:20:05.119 --> 0:20:07.840 the football in the air, and then the next shot 0:20:07.920 --> 0:20:10.399 might be a character with arms wide open trying to 0:20:10.440 --> 0:20:12.679 catch this ball, and the next shot might be the 0:20:12.720 --> 0:20:15.719 ball passing right between the character's arms. That would be 0:20:15.800 --> 0:20:19.760 several frames within a storyboard. You fill out the entire 0:20:19.840 --> 0:20:23.040 story this way, so you end up with a huge, 0:20:23.440 --> 0:20:26.399 depending upon the length of your project, a huge comic 0:20:26.480 --> 0:20:30.959 strip that is your story and it's told in this 0:20:31.040 --> 0:20:35.080 visual format. UM. Once you've got an idea of what 0:20:35.200 --> 0:20:37.560 it looks like and the mood you're trying to get 0:20:37.600 --> 0:20:41.320 across in various parts of the story, the next step 0:20:41.920 --> 0:20:44.399 UH and and not every project takes these steps in 0:20:44.400 --> 0:20:47.120 this exact order, but in general, the next step would 0:20:47.119 --> 0:20:51.080 be you get your cast together and you record all 0:20:51.240 --> 0:20:56.840 the voice work. So it all depends on the project 0:20:56.960 --> 0:21:00.680 of how you do that. Some some UH and Asian companies, 0:21:00.720 --> 0:21:02.240 what they would do is they would bring in the 0:21:02.320 --> 0:21:07.879 voice actors UH individually and they would just deliver their lines. 0:21:08.280 --> 0:21:11.159 And they might deliver a line five six different ways 0:21:11.240 --> 0:21:14.240 so that the director has the choice of which line 0:21:14.359 --> 0:21:19.960 to use, which which delivery to use. Right, So the 0:21:20.040 --> 0:21:22.760 line might be, Chris, I need you to say this line, 0:21:23.440 --> 0:21:26.480 don't go in there. Don't go in there now. I 0:21:26.480 --> 0:21:29.439 need you to say it like you're scared. Don't go 0:21:29.520 --> 0:21:31.520 in there now. I need you to say it like 0:21:31.880 --> 0:21:34.400 there's a big surprise and you just you can't let 0:21:34.400 --> 0:21:38.080 this person see the surprise yet, don't go in there. See. 0:21:38.359 --> 0:21:40.880 So that's exactly what the voice actors would be doing. 0:21:41.040 --> 0:21:43.919 And it sounds ridiculous, but that's truly the way a 0:21:43.960 --> 0:21:47.639 lot of these studios work, unless they're casting Robin Williams, 0:21:47.680 --> 0:21:52.160 in which case they give them a microphone like like, 0:21:52.440 --> 0:21:55.119 here's here's your stuff, here's your queue line, here's the 0:21:55.160 --> 0:21:57.480 line you need to give so that the next actor's 0:21:57.520 --> 0:22:01.840 line makes sense. Go at it. Yeah, the stuff that 0:22:01.960 --> 0:22:06.080 ended up on the cutting room floor for Aladdin is phenomenal. 0:22:06.960 --> 0:22:08.600 I mean, the stuff that made it in was great. 0:22:08.920 --> 0:22:10.879 The stuff that made it on that was cut was 0:22:10.920 --> 0:22:16.240 pretty amazing too. Anyway, that's that's one way of doing it. 0:22:16.280 --> 0:22:19.640 Another way, sometimes studios will bring in groups of actors 0:22:19.680 --> 0:22:22.840 and they will all have headphones on. They'll be uh 0:22:22.880 --> 0:22:25.600 in the studio and they will they will read outlines 0:22:25.680 --> 0:22:29.480 together and you will actually have actors acting off of 0:22:29.560 --> 0:22:33.320 one another's delivery like a group read, which which is great. 0:22:33.480 --> 0:22:35.880 And usually there's also a group read before they even 0:22:35.880 --> 0:22:38.160 go into the recording process so that they can kind 0:22:38.200 --> 0:22:41.520 of get that feel. This is particularly true for television animation, 0:22:41.520 --> 0:22:45.080 where they'll get a table read so that the actors 0:22:45.200 --> 0:22:47.720 kind of know where they need to go with their 0:22:47.720 --> 0:22:50.959 performance before they go into the studio. But if they're together, 0:22:51.000 --> 0:22:53.920 it makes it easier at least, and I have done 0:22:53.960 --> 0:22:56.159 this for me, it makes it easier for me to 0:22:56.240 --> 0:22:59.880 act when I have someone to act opposite of. That way, 0:22:59.880 --> 0:23:03.640 we can we can judge how to deliver the next 0:23:03.680 --> 0:23:06.760 line based upon what the other person has said. It's 0:23:06.800 --> 0:23:08.560 a lot more challenging when you're doing it in a 0:23:08.640 --> 0:23:10.960 void and you just hope that the way you deliver 0:23:11.040 --> 0:23:14.080 a line matches up with the way they delivered their line. 0:23:14.720 --> 0:23:19.040 But both approaches are used, and there are some phenomenal 0:23:19.160 --> 0:23:22.879 animated works out there where every single actor never ever 0:23:23.200 --> 0:23:26.320 encountered any of the other actors, which to me blows 0:23:26.359 --> 0:23:29.360 my mind. Um, so they record this thing and then 0:23:29.400 --> 0:23:33.040 you have what is called a scratch track. This is 0:23:33.040 --> 0:23:36.760 the audio track of the film that includes all the 0:23:36.840 --> 0:23:40.240