Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1921-08-02
Ho,c Those Cartoon
Characters Are Made
to MOue on Screens

to MOUe on Screens
| uOW do they make those funny
IL animated" cartoons you see in
the movies? The question Is often
asked. but very little in the way of ex
PLANTATION has found its way into print.
When you watch the grotesque, vet as
tonishingly life like. action in the best
OF them it seems incredible that such
results can be accomplished simply by
drawing q series of pictures, photo
graphing them separately in sequence
and projecting them on the picture
screen.
What an enormous number of draw
ings must be made, so many of them
apparently identical, yet necessarily
different in some detail in order to pro-
duce the effect of life and movement
in the figures. What extraordinary
patience on the part of the animated"
cartoonist,
Yes, that's the answer. When you
we're a child, and your Sunday school
teacher put the question, ''Who was
the most patient man. sure of your
ground, You answered. "Job." Nova
days, if you should put that question
to an animated cartoonist the
NAohNNS ult lHdl Ht. NOuIu uuSNtI
promptly, II am
"VOU can't get any more out Of
L animated cartoons than you put
into them" declares Bert Green, n rec
ognized master of the art. who 'ani-
mates maps and charts and otherwise
dry statistical tables and diagrams in
Pathe News. The job demands the
patience Of job"
But the job is important enough for
Pathe News to maintain Il complete
mechanical plant for turning out this
special product-including the photo
graphing apparatus, with the notion
picture camera standing on its head and
shooting straight down at the sep
arate drawings-one click of the shut
ter-%hen the operator touches the
electrical button controlling the
mechanism.
This is another Job" part of the
job. Remove the photographed draw
ing-substitute the next one-press the
button; and do this several thousand
times to make a picture that will run
on the screen for eight or ten
minutes.
A Nd these "Job jobs" are steadily
n increasing in the motion picture
industry. In the eight or ten years
since Windsor Mckay completed n
series of some 10000 separate drawings
and moved them in procession before
the lens of a motion picture camera TO
illuminate upon the screen IN amazing
day in the life of "Gertic." the dino
saur, the creations of most Of the ccle-
brated comic artists have been sub
jected to the same treatment. Ami
mated cartoons have become to the
screen what ''comiC strips are to the
daily and Sunday papers, and they are
the product of the same type of pic
torial genius.
There is sufficient reason for this
growing popularity of animated car
toons. The principle involved Is funda-
mentally sound. Whatever the artist
is able to create with his pen appears
on the screen in all its original perfec-
ton. with the tremendous added effect
Of apparent life and motion. Trans
ference to film being almost entirely
mechanical, that part of the process il
mathematically accurate.
TIIE making of an animated cartoon
l. has remained practically n "one-
man job" All that enters into the
creative part of the picture-its scenes
and characters and incidents must be
done by the same hand. Details of aC-
tion, hOwever-such as movements Of
mans legs in running-arc supplied
by the CartOOnist's assistants, called
"animatOrs." Formerly the entire fig
ure, and also the scene represented,
was copied along with each change of
dctail--with apparent necessity, for
how else would complete negative re-
suit? Not long ago. however, this i'm
mcnse labor was obviatcd by the in
yention Of the "celluloid sheet" which
is sufficiently transparent to enable
photographing through IL changing de-
tails Of n figure. Thus, If through a
sequence Of score or more of draw
ings there is movement only of the
characters head, or arm, or leg, the
"animntors' have only to redraw the
part that moves, the main part of the
figure and the whole set remaining
under the camera lens on the trans
parent sheet.
This device, Of course. demands that
all the detail drawings register per-
fectly with the outlines OF the fixed
main scene and figures on the cellu-
loid sheet-but that is simple matter
Of mechanical efficiency at the "ani-
mator's" drawing board.
out of the art Of making animated
~ cartoons have developed many de.
vices and so-called camera tricks"
that are exceedingly effective, especially
in a decorative way. You see pen
with no hand guiding it writing words
across the screen, or drawing a pic
ture; you see a monkey frisking across
the screen and leaving in the trail OF
his long tail the autograph signature
of the author-as in the main title Of
Paul Terry's "Aesop's Film Fables" /;
you see lots of other seemingly mirac-
ulous occurrences most of which ac-
companied the development of this
screen specially whose chief ingredie9
"a T. L !