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Magic Lantern
A book called the "Great Art of Light" describes a new invention called the Magic Lantern: A box with a light source that was a ble to project images -
Period: to
History of Animation
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Musschenbroek creates illusion of motion
Pieter Van Musschenbroek designed a revolving disk with images printed on it. This was the first form of creating the illusion of motion and an early form of animated entertainment -
Fantasmagorie show
A travelling show using a magic lantern opens in France. The show called "Fantasmagorie" used to project pictures of paranormal beings onto screens of smoke. -
Roget publishes "Persistence of vision with regard to moving objects"
Peter Mark Roget presented his paper on the persistence of vision to the British Royal Society. This explained how still images in sequence could create the appearance of motion. -
Thaumatrope invented
It is unknown who invented the thaumatrope. It used the persistence of vision to create the illusion that two images were being merged together. -
Phenakistoscope invented by Plateau
Joseph Plateau invented the phenakistoscope which was considered the earliest form of proper animation. It involved two disks that counter rotated with images printed on one and slits on the other. -
Praxinoscope invented
The praxinoscope was invented by Charles-Émile Reynaud in 1877. It used the same principles as the zoetrope, only with an inner circle of mirrors instead of slits -
Kinetiscope invented
Thomas Eddison creates the kinetiscope that allowed 50 ft length of tape to be viewed in 13 seconds. The kinetiscope then came to be a public attraction, although it was designed for individual viewing with only one window. -
First animated film
J. Stuart Blackton creates the first ever animated film in 1906 called "Humorous phases of funny faces". The film was shot by drawing on a chalk board and ran at 20 fps. -
Emile Cohl creates Fantasmagorie
To some it was considered being the first ever proper animation. Fantasmagorie was hand drawn frame by frame on paper then portrayed in negative film. Emile Cohl drew 700 pictures. -
Cohl creates "En Route"
Emile Cohl created "En Route" in 1910. This was the first animation to use cutout animation so that the all of the frames did not have to be redrawn -
Technique of cel animation
There were massive developments in celluloid and it was beginning to be used for animations. It meant that the animator can layer different components of the animation to improve the efficiency of their work. -
Gertie the dinosaur created
After about a year in creation, Gertie was finally created by Winsor McCay. This animation is known as the first popular animation and it consisted of over 10,000 different drawings. -
First feature length animation released
El Apostol was created by an argentinian animator called Quirino Cristiani on November 9th 1917. The film ran for a total of 70 minutes and contained 58,000 pictures running at 14fps. -
Felix The Cat becomes animated
Otto Messmer takes Pat Sullivan's already popular comic strip and creates an animated series named Felix the Cat. Felix the Cat was one of the most popular cartoon characters of all time. -
Alice's Wonderland
Walt Disney created Alice's Wonderland in 1923 and got distributed by Margaret Winkler in the same year. Walt and Roy later moved to Hollywood. Over its lifetime, the series achieved great success. -
Disney Brothers cartoon studio formed
Walt and Roy Disney combine together and move to Hollywood. Then they founded Disney Brothers Cartoon Studio. -
Steamboat Willie is released
The Disney Brothers release their most memorable animation up to date. It was the first animation to feature synchronised sound and starred a character called Mickey Mouse. -
Betty Boop makes her debut
Max Fleischer created the animated short "Dizzy Dishes" in 1930 that featured a female character named Betty Boop. Little did he know, Betty Boop was going to become one of his most famous characters -
Snow White released
Walt Disney released Snow White on christmas eve 1937 after being in production for 3 years. The film cost a total of 2 million but made a total of 8 million. -
Disney animators strike
One third of Disney's animators go on strike because they weren't paid for there overtime. The strike resulted in a lot of animators being fired due to a breach of contract. -
UPA is formed
After the animator strike at Disney, a lot of animators were left without jobs. Some of these animators joined together to form United Productions of America in 1944 -
Disney releases Cinderella
After appearing dormant for a while, Disney release the feature length animation "Cinderella" 8 years after their previous movie. -
Disneyland opens
The original disneyland opens on July 18th to to the public. The park cost 17 million dollars to construct and takes up a space of 160 acres. -
Debut of The Flintstones
The Flintstones were created by Hanna and Barbera. The bedrock family debuted on television on the 30th September 1960. The Flintstones were one of Hanna and Barbera's most famous characters. -
Designing animation software
In the year of 1964, Ken Knowlton with Bell Labs created a programming language called BEFLIX. It was designed for bitmap computer-produced movies -
Walt Disney's death
Walt Disney sadly dies of lung cancer on the 15th December 1966 aged 65. -
Animation scripting language created
In 1972. Edwin Catmull developed an animation scripting language for his PhD at university. The created test footage by animating his left hand with smooth shading. This was used in a Hollywood film 4 years later. Catmull moved on to become the president of Disney and Pixar. -
First computer facial animation
Fred Parke was the first person to create a facial animation that was computer generated. Fred Parke often worked alongside Edwin Catmull to produce his pieces. -
Tweening is created
Tweening is filling in the generation of images in between two keyframes. The program was created by Brutnik and Wein, who have recently been awarded as making a huge contribution to computer animation -
Tron is released
The movie "Tron" was created by Disney Studios and was one of the first very impressive CGI feature length films. The film cost 17 million to produce but made 33 million in box office. The film has recently been renovated with even more updated CGI -
Pixar is founded
The animation company Pixar was founded in 1986 as a computer division under the Lucas Film company. Pixar has been one of the quickest growing companies in the animation industry -
Wallace and Gromit debut
Wallace and Gromit make a debut in their first movie "A Grand Day Out" created by Nick Park in association with Aardman productions. Wallace and Gromit brought a breath of fresh air to claymation. -
Jurassic Park released
Jurassic Park was created by Steven Spielberg in 1993 and is praised for its use of CGI with realistic living creatures. However, this CGI came at a cost. The movie cost 63 million to create. -
Toy Story released
Not only was Toy Story Pixar's first animation, it was also the first ever feature length movie to be entirely animated using CGI. -
Chicken run released
Aardman Productions release their first feature length film called "Chicken Run". The movie was entirely claymation and cost 45 million dollars to make. It also took very long as well! -
Disney buys Pixar
Disney Studios bought out their main rivals Pixar for 7.4 billion dollars. The deal was finalised on May 5th 2006. Most of the executives kept their positions within the company. -
Avatar released
James Cameron created the film "Avatar" and it grew in popularity very quickly. Although it cost 237 million dollars to create, it made almost 3 billion dollars in box office. The film was highly praised for its CGI capabilities and the exceptional use of 3D animation. -
The future?
I think that we have a lot to look forward to in the near future. I predict that BluRay formats of movies will begin to become more popular than DVD formats. I also think that the majority of cinema releases will be featured in 3D. I think that animations will continue to become better quality just the way they have for the past 10 years. I think that motion capture software will become more detailed and allow for higher quality CGI.
