More about the artists, inventors, magicians and madmen who pioneered the art of animation
It’s amazing that, despite our great technological advances, the animators bringing Sgt. Stubby to the giant screen will be using techniques developed before Stubby’s own lifetime. Before Walt Disney and Ub Iwerks sketched their first mouse, comic strip artist and vaudeville performer Winsor McCay revolutionized the industry by giving life to hand drawn characters.
The history of animation IS the history of cinema, with magic lantern shows and zoetropes generating the illusion of movement well before the advent of still photography and serving as the inspiration for the motion pictures to follow.
As with so much of today’s daily technology, Gilded Age cartoons were a scientific marvel but presented to the general public as a fairground curiosity. They required an astounding amount of technical knowledge, but the end result was the projected equivalent of a flipbook.
In 1914, Winsor McCay set out to create a character that had genuine personality. His 1914 film GERTIE THE DINOSAUR was the first to feature “keyframe animation,” where McCay would draw the main scenes and have an assistant – later referred to as “inbetweeners” – fill out the motion and backgrounds. By utilizing basic industrial assembly techniques, he maximized his drawing output and allowed for far more complex interactions than had previously been attempted. All in all, over 10,000 drawings went into making Gertie dance!
Today, McCay is the namesake of the prestigious Winsor McCay Annie Award given for lifetime achievement in the animated cartoon industry.
For more, check out these articles from Public Domain Review, Artograph, The Richard Balzer Collection, and the Professor Joshua Mosley/University of Pennsylvania School of Design. Thanks to the Internet Archive for hosting the public domain video.
THE FILM
Sgt. Stubby: An American Hero is the incredible true story of a stray bull terrier mutt and the lasting bond he forged with the doughboys of the 26th “Yankee” Division at the onset of America’s entry into World War I. For his valorous actions, Stubby was the first dog promoted to the rank of Sergeant in U.S. Army history. The film has been selected as an official project of the United States World War I Centennial Commission and is the first animated feature for Fun Academy Motion Pictures and Labyrinth Media & Publishing, producers of motion pictures that entertain, innovate, and inspire audiences of all ages.
Starring Logan Lerman, Helena Bonham Carter, Gérard Depardieu
Music by Patrick Doyle
Animation by Mikros Image
The film is slated to theatrically debut in April 2018. For exclusive production updates, follow Stubby’s big screen adventures on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Google+ and Pinterest!
