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Animation: fun facts and quiz
The essentials in 7 ideas, with fun facts, an illustrated story and a quiz to see how much you know.
The essentials
How Animation Works
Animation shows a series of drawings or models, each slightly different, fast enough to create movement. Traditional cartoons used up to 24 drawings per second.
Key fact
Flip books work on the same principle.
Disney’s Firsts
Walt Disney’s Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937) was the first full-length cel-animated feature. Mickey Mouse had made his debut in 1928.
Key fact
Critics called Snow White “Disney’s Folly” before it became a hit.
Stop-Motion
Stop-motion moves real models a tiny bit between each photo. Wallace & Gromit and Coraline were made this way.
Key fact
A minute of stop-motion can take a week or more to film.
Anime
Anime is Japanese animation, known for its varied styles and stories. Studio Ghibli’s Spirited Away won the Oscar for Best Animated Feature in 2003.
Key fact
Hayao Miyazaki co-founded Studio Ghibli.
Computer Animation
Pixar’s Toy Story (1995) was the first fully computer-animated feature film. Today most animated blockbusters are made with 3D computer graphics.
Key fact
Some Pixar frames have taken many hours each to render.
Voice Acting
Animated characters get their voices from actors, who usually record their lines before the animation is finished. Animators often film them for reference.
Key fact
Mel Blanc voiced Bugs Bunny and hundreds of other characters.
Animated TV
Animated series aren’t just for children. The Simpsons, running since 1989, is the longest-running American scripted primetime series.
Key fact
It has run for over 35 seasons.
Fun facts
Animators sometimes trace over filmed actors to copy real movement. It’s called rotoscoping.
Walt Disney himself was the first voice of Mickey Mouse.
King Kong, in the 1933 film, was a stop-motion model about 46 cm tall.
Studio Ghibli is named after an Italian word for a hot desert wind.
Toy Story 2 was nearly lost when its files were accidentally deleted. A copy on an employee’s home computer saved it.
Robin Williams improvised so much as the Genie in Aladdin (1992) that he recorded hours of extra material.
The Simpsons have yellow skin partly so they stand out when viewers flick through channels.
Story: A Mouse on the Train
A Mouse on the Train
1928. Walt Disney learns that his distributor owns his hit character, Oswald the Lucky Rabbit, and has hired away most of his animators.
On the train home from New York, so the story goes, he dreams up a new character: a mouse. His wife Lillian talks him out of calling it Mortimer.
That November, Mickey Mouse starred in Steamboat Willie, one of the first cartoons with synchronised sound.
True or false?
Tap your answer to see if you got it, and why.
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Question 1 of 10
Animation creates movement from many still images.
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True. Shown quickly one after another.
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Question 2 of 10
Snow White (1937) was a pioneering animated feature.
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True. The first full-length cel-animated one.
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Question 3 of 10
Stop-motion photographs models moved bit by bit.
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True. One frame at a time.
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Question 4 of 10
Spirited Away won an Oscar.
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True. Best Animated Feature, in 2003.
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Question 5 of 10
Most animated blockbusters today use 3D computer graphics.
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True. Following Toy Story’s lead.
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Question 6 of 10
Voices are often recorded before the animation is finished.
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True. Animators match the movement to the voice.
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Question 7 of 10
The Simpsons began in 1989.
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True. As a full series, after a run of shorts.
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Question 8 of 10
Animation uses a single drawing.
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False. It needs many drawings.
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Question 9 of 10
Critics predicted Snow White would be a huge hit.
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False. They called it “Disney’s Folly”.
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Question 10 of 10
Stop-motion is drawn entirely by computer.
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False. It uses real, physical models.
Keep going in the app
KnowSoda learns what you know and brings back what you’re about to forget. Animation has 6 more ideas at the Advanced and Expert levels.
Sources
- The Walt Disney Family Museum — Snow White and Mickey Mouse
- Pixar Animation Studios — Toy Story
- Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences — Spirited Away, Best Animated Feature (2003)
- Aardman Animations — Wallace & Gromit
- Encyclopaedia Britannica — animation, Mel Blanc, The Simpsons
- Thomas & Johnston (1981), The Illusion of Life: Disney Animation
- Encyclopaedia Britannica — rotoscope, Osamu Tezuka, Disney Renaissance
