American cinematographer (Jan-Dec 1959)

AIMIMATED FILM TECHIMIQLES PART VI Cleaning up and in-betweening the animator’s “extremes” precede the inking and painting steps FIG. 1 — ABOVE SERIES of drawings represent "cleaned-up" extremes and comprise 1 foot plus 12 frames of action for Walt Disney's “Bambi," expanded from the six roughs illustrated in Oc¬ tober. Drawing 49 was shot in “2s," hence the duplication. IN THIS CHAPTER we shall continue where we left off last month in de¬ scribing the function of the “in-betweener” in the long series of steps of preparing the art work for a typical animated cartoon — in this instance, Walt Disney’s “Bambi,” which has been chosen for reference because it is probably one of the best remembered of all Disney feature-length animated films. The first drawings that are cleaned up are the original extremes of the animator; so the key action poses be¬ come the key cleanups as well. This drawing chore is handled by the ani¬ mator’s assistant, for it is a very im¬ portant phase in the procedure of ani¬ mation. The assistant works closely with the animator at all times and is familiar with his way of working. It is the cleanup-man who puts the final “screen-drawing” into the character. After the extremes are cleaned up, the supplementary poses, or inbetweens, are taken care of by an “inbetweener”, who is the humblest in the long string of artists on the production line. But even the inbetweener must have better-than-average facility with a pencil and possess a good sense of action. Every inbetween is a complete draw¬ ing, just as finished as the extremes. It can be seen by examining tbe illus¬ trations on this page that these inbebetweens do not represent any import¬ ant phase in the course of the action, but simply carry one extreme to the next. The extremes are indicated with an ‘x’ over the drawing-number. It doesn’t make any difference how draw¬ ings are numbered, as long as they are in succession and the same number isn’t used for two drawings in the scene. An inbetween drawing is made in the following general fashion. Referring to the drawings in Fig. 1, it will be noted that drawings 71 and 73 are extremes. Number 72 is an inbetween. The inbe¬ tweener first places 71 and 73 on the pegs of his drawing board in super¬ position, snaps on the light under the glass in the board, puts a clean sheet of paper on top of the other drawings and numbers it 72. He then flips the two finished extremes back and forth to get an idea of the path of action. Unless otherwise indicated, the inbe¬ tween will be at a halfway position be¬ tween each extreme. For example, it will be noted that the spots on Bambi’s back are visible in drawing 73, where¬ as in 71 they are hidden by the posi¬ tion of his body. Hence, in 72, the in¬ betweener drew tbe character so that the spots are just beginning to come into view to the extent of half the amount that’s shown in 73. The inbetweener must be careful to draw everything that’s indicated in the cleaned up extremes. If he overlooks a wrinkle, a spot or a color indication, the lack of such will cause a momen¬ tary flicker on the screen. When a drawing reaches the stage of being traced onto celluloid, the inker will ink only such lines as are on the drawing. If something’s missing, if only for a 38 AMERICAN CINEMATOGRAPHER