Abstract:This paper outlines the aims and objective of my Research which has undertaken as part of my own interest. My Master’s degree which was pursued at Leeds Metropolitan University had helped me. Through this module i would like to deliver my phase of interest on research of animation and its evolution‘s, thus i would like to share some of my works in this platform.
General Terms: Research, Documentation and Human Factors.
Key-Words: Books,Technology, Personal interaction and cohesion.
Tools: Autodesk Maya, Adobe Photoshop, Google Search Engine and Record able Media.
Overview: The project is completely based on the Research on animation and its evolution. In this process, i have decided to make all of my work completely based on Process of evolution of animation.
Aim: To Deliver Complete research on “evolution of animation” with references.
Research :
Animation: The illusion of motion of pictures/images in particular sequence is called Animation.
Developing Stage:
The animation was not developed by any particular body. It was evolved before the time of apprx. 40,000 years which was drawn on cave walls by the pre-historic people. But the complete sequence art of 5,200 year old was found in Iran which a goat trying to eat a leaves by jumping on a tree.
After that in Egypt, 4000years old painting which shows the position of young soldiers wrestling or combat positions in Khnumhotep and Niankhkhnum tower.
Inventing Machines to create an Illusion (animation):
In 180AD Chinese has invented Zoetrope-type device by Ting Huan which makes a rapid display of images creating the illusion of horse riding and circus feats.
Before the film era there are many devices which displayed the animation motion pictures which can be seen only by one person at a time. So they are called as toys in the time but students of filming and animation are still having those thoughts as basic principles.
Later in 1650, the magic lantern was invented which can display the illusion of the color images in the dark room by focusing any light object like candle, oil lamp or any other light source. This was just like present day Projectors.
In 1824, the object which is called as Thaumatrope was invented, which was used as a toy in Victorian times. 
This works when two different images were attached to a disk or coin and twirled quickly then two picture combines and displays as one with some gap in between the combining and separating.
The very basic invention of the modern day animation device was Phenakistoscope in 1831 by Belgian Joseph Plateau and Austrian Simon von Stampfer. 
This device contains the images with certain distance from each other. This makes an illusion when passes through the eyes of viewers through the mirror and spun.
The 1868 has to say the year of invention of modern animation when the first flip book was invented by John Barnes Linnet as a Kineograph.
This was a method which was drawn on the edge of the book which has to be in sequel to before image. While bending the book at the edge and releasing the pages one by one with some fast then the illusion will create to the viewer’s eyes.
The flip book process has given a chance to Herman Casler in 1894 to create Mutoscope.
This was not to project on the screen but to flip the images through the machine by rotating the gear. This is also can be seen only one person at a time.
Praxinoscope was the first animation projector which was invented by Charles Emile Reynaud in 1877 at France to show the series to his student.
This was just like zoetrope but displays on the screen by putting a lamp on the machine and placing a glass object to reflect the image sequences on the screen.
Types of Animations:
- Traditional Animation(TA)
- Stop Motion Animation(SMA)
- Computer Generated Imaginary(CGI)
Traditional Animation:
The method which was drawn by hand and placed in sequence to create illusion is called “Traditional Animation”. This process continued until CGI was introduced. After CGI, This became less popular but still continuing in different forms in animation films. This has a very long history as explained below.
In 1824, Peter Roget wrote “the scientific paper called as “The persistence of vision” which is a concept of the brain functionality about the individual images in continuous process of motion.
The only surviving example of Popularized Cinematograph motion picture was Reynaud’s three animation picture which was displayed on October 28 1892 at Paris which was a 500frames long.
J.stuart Blackton has created a first completely stop motion animated film called as “The Enchanted Drawing” in the year of 1900AD. Soon after first animated film he directed another film after six years i.e.1906 called as “Humorous phases of funny faces” within the decade of Thomas Edison’s first invented Kinetoscope and Lumiere brothers’ cinematograph Camera in 1893 and 1894 respectively. This entire film was a stop motion animation which was drew by stuart himself one after another by erasing after taking the picture and replaced with another. This was a thirty seconds film. This makes him “The Father of American Animation”.
The next stop motion animation film was developed in 1908 by E.smith and J.Stuart Blackton which was named as “humpty dumpty circus”. In this film they used all the real time objects in the movie to use a video technique by moving the objects with invisible forces. After this, many stop motion films were started using this video technique of realistic moving object. “Haunted Mansion” was the first appreciated and inspired film at that time.
“Fantasmagorie”, The first featured film by French director Emile Cohl which was screen on 17 August 1908at Theater Du Gymnase in Paris. He was the one who spread the animation technology in the America in 1912 at Fort Lee, NewJersy, when working for Studio Éclair.
With the inspiration of Cohl, Waldyslaw Starewicz (Ladislas Starevich) released “The Cameraman’s Revenge and Other Fantastic Tales” with the concept of violence, suicide and treason between several insects. He used the stop motion animation film technique by using all real dead insects with wire limbs. This was the pioneer work of Puppet animation which was an oldest dramatic with characters motivation, desire and complexity feelings.
In 1911, Winsor McCoy released “Little Nemo” Following 1914’s “Gertie the Dinosaur” and 1918”The Sinking of the Lusitania”. These are the first animated films with the combination of live action and hand drawing animations. He also acted in the film as an artist who draws the Gertie and trains him. He used more than 10,000 drawing images to this film.
Earl Hurd, one of the John Randolph Bray’s, John Bray Studios employee created the “cel technique” which made a revolution in animation industry for a decade. This cel technique was involved by animating the moving objects on transparent celluloid sheets and then placing on stationary background image and taking the photograph before making them into sequence. After this invention the studio produced”Col Heeza Liar”, the first animation series.
In 1915, “Rotoscoping”, invented by Max and Dave Fleischer which was the used a s a reference for the later directed of films like Ko-Ko the clawn, Popeye the sailor Man, Superman, Betty Boop etc.., latern in 1918 they release “The Sinking of the Lusitania” which was based on war propaganda. In this film they used all the new animation techniques like cel technique, but film was not release until the war was completed. This rotoscope was used in many film like Looney tunes, Merrie Melodies for Warner bros, the snow white and the seven dwarfs for Disney etc..,
In 1917, ‘El Apostol” which was directed by Quirino Cristiani in Argentina which was followed by “Peludopolis” in 1931, which was a full length feature film and also the synchronized sound which is continuing up to today.
In 1920, Paramount Studios released “Felix the cat” which was attracted very huge audience in those days and the studio gave all the credit to the Felix character in the movie. This is the first film which as merchandised and became as a household name.
In the same year German artists Walter Ruttman, Hans Richter, Oskar Fischinger and Viking Eggeling invented Abstract Animation which was prevented by Nazis.
In 1923, Laugh-O-Grams studio’s was shut down because of bankrupt who was owned by Walt Disney. After that he opened a new studio at Los Angeles and their first film was “Alice Comedies” which was a combination of live action and a cartoon characters performing roles at a time. After the success of this movie Walt Disney continued working on the series of Alice with changing the last word of the title for 4 years (until 1927).
In 1924, “Song Car-Tunes” was directed Walt Disney, followed Oh Mabel in 1924, Mother, Mother, Mother Pin a Rose on Me in 1924, Goodbye My Lady Love in 1924. All these are synchronized with recorded sound also the first animated recorded sound synchronization animated film.
In 1926, “The Adventures of Prince Achmed” was animated by German animator Lotte Reiniger and Austria-Hungarian (now part of Czech Republic) Berthold Bartosch, which was a first color-tinted film.
Again in 1928, The Walt Disney came with “Steamboat Willie” in 1928 which was the third of Mickey Mouse Series. This series was developed with advanced technology in those days like post-produced sound track, featuring voice and sound effects which are printed on film itself.
In 1930, another giant animated film production company after the Walt Disney was established with the name of Warner Brothers Cartoons. WB gave freedom for their animators which allowed them to develop more recognizable personal styles which were lack in WD which strictly controls WD himself. The first featured sound film was “Peludopolis” in 1931.
Later in 1932, the first three-color Technicolor method was used in “Flowers and Trees” by WD. This movie won the Academy Award. After that color animated series became the standard for the movie.
In 1934, WB released Honeymoon Hotel, of Merry Melodies series.
In 1935, the famous “Looney Tunes” was released by Tex Avery with Warner Brother which is still popular to this day. This brought the wider audience from all ages which WD directly releases for children.
In 1937, “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs” was release with the technology of Technicolor cel animation method, which gave a huge success for WD after some failures of their releases.
After the first color television released in American market in 1951, the Hanna-BarBera released “Huckleberry Hound” in 1958 which was a half n hour television animated program, Following this “Terrytoons” released by Tom Terrific in the same year. This process continued and decreased the audiences for the theaters to watch short featured animated films.
The Important videos which changed the trend are arranged in sequence from starting to improved technological traditional animation, step-by-step:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZbX-BeSY_18&list=PL4244D6AEC2ED291B
Stop Motion Animation:
Stop-Motion or Stop Frame animation is a technique of making a movement to the physically manipulated real-time object and photographing them frame by frame with single movement and continuing to the other movement of the object to create an illusion is called stop motion animation.
Types of Stop Motion Animation:
a) Puppet animation: Using of puppet characters with real-time constructed environment. 
Eg: The Tale of Fox, The Nightmare before Christmas, etc..,
b) Clay animation: creating of animation using clay or Plasticine or any other malleable material is called clay animation. 
Eg: The Trap Door, The Gumby Show, The Adventure of Mark Twain etc..,
c) Cutout animation: The animation using papers or clothes or any two dimensional moving objects is called cutout animation. 
Eg: Fantastic planet, Flying Circus, etc.,
d) Silhouette animation: This was a different type of cutout animation in which the entire film was on black lit and only visible as silhouettes. 
Eg: The Adventure of Prince Achmed
e) Model animation: merging of live footage and stop motion animation is called model animation. 
Eg: Mighty Joe Young (1949), The Black Scorpion (1957) etc..,
f) Go Motion: This was a variant of model animation that creates motion blur with various techniques between frames. 
Eg: Star Wars V: The Empire Strikes Back, etc..,
g) Object animation: The static objects like Toys, sheets, etc.., which doesn’t make sense like clay or any other objects are used to create the illusion is called object animation.
h) Graphic animation: the non-Drawn flat visual graphic materials like photographs, newspaper clippings etc.., which can be manipulated frame by frame. 
i) Brick film: The objects like Lego or similar brick toys to make animation are called brick animation. 
j) Pixilation: The live species involved in stop-motion animation is called Pixilation. 
Eg: angry kid etc..,
In this technology, we can use clay, papers, mud, sand, or any real-time object to make an animation. This technology is not only for the character animation but also for the titles or in any forms can be used. This process was used for many productions of animation movies. In the movies like “The California Raisins” and “Wallace and Gromit”, different types of clothes, rubbers, plastics resins, peaches etc.., were used.
This technology were used in many comedy and action movies in those days like “King Kong” in 1933, “The 7th Voyage of Sinbad”, comedy side news reader in many TV Channels etc..,
Computer Generated Imaginary Animation (CGI):
The process of generating digital graphic images in computer to create an illusion is called CGI animation. This animation was mostly focused on Animation but sometimes graphical films also. In this case we can completely depend on CGI characters or on the live characters.
It is divided into two different CGI animations: 2D and 3D animations
2D Animation Technology:
The 2D vector graphics or bitmap graphics which are created and edited by using computer and making an illusion is called 2D Animation. This includes the technique of onion skinning, rotoscoping, morphing etc..,it has many applications and software’s to create 2D animation. They are
Analog computer animation, Flash animation, Power point animation, ajax animator, KToon, Vectorian Giotto, Adobe after effects and flash, anime studio, Apple iAd Producer, Autodesk Animator, Digicel Flipbook, Dimp animator, Motion, Toon Boom, Toonz etc.., These are some of the main 2D animation application software’s.
3D Animation Technology: The process of digitally modeling, rigging, texturing, animating and rendering using 3D software’s/software applications is called 3D Animation Technology. The objects created in this structure were appears in the form of 3 Dimensional (i.e.., X, Y, Z). The structure which may contains many vertices which control the model/structure. This technology also contains the technique which creates fur/hair, fire, water, air, clothing etc.., called as Dynamics. 3D animation created revolution in the graphical world. This technology also spread to the other fields like life science, geographical science, social science, political science, etc.., Now a days each and every field uses this technology to execute their ideas more efficiently.
This process still continues the same 12 principles to create animation which are following basic laws of physics.
12 Principles of Animation:
- Squash and stretch: giving the sense of weight and the flexibility of an object.
- Anticipation: The action appearing before performing the main action is called anticipation.
- Staging: Highlighting and focusing on particular scene by avoiding the unnecessary activities which are mainly based on lightning, camera angle etc..,
- Straight ahead action and Pose to pose: completing sequence of frame by frame is called Straight ahead and setting key for first and last frame, and filling interval keys for frames later is called pose to pose.
- Follow through and overlapping action: The actions performed after stopping the main action of the character like hair, clothes, etc.., This technique gives the character more realistic action.
- Slow in and slow out: Every object need some time to pickup and pick down or accelerate and decelerate. This also improves the realistic nature of animation.
- Arcs: Every object/character’s body parts moves in arc direction to improve the capability of the animation skills. This doesn’t apply for the mechanical objects which can move in straight line.
- Secondary action: The action which follows the primary action and which will not be noticed but plays an important role to make a scene more realistic.
- Timing: The time length between two frames which depends on the action makes more relevant action of the role. The time varies may vary the character irrelevant action sequences.
- Exaggeration: The external effects which imitates the reality for the character and balancing various elements according to the storyboard. Helps to execute more realistically and avoids the confusions of audiences.
- Solid drawing: Understanding the basics of the 3D shapes, weight, light, balance, shadows etc., to draw but now a day’s software provides all which works more easier way to the animator.
- Appeal: The charisma of a character which makes them to appeal more relevantly to the audience and make them to connect better with the character.
The difference between traditional animation and virtual animation was the replacement of drawing with 3Dmodels. In this technology mostly the other than human characters appears like monster’s, animals, fiction characters, machines etc.., but as the technology improves the animators also attempted to create a realistic looking human characters in 3D movies like Beowulf, The polar express, Resident Evil Degeneration etc.., because of complexity of human body for emotions and interaction the attempts is much lesser than the other characters comparatively. Hair, clothing is some other difficult aspects while creating human. Only few movies like “Avatar” are the combine of human and animation factors with live action to create humanoid creatures. Animation technology were widely used in Movies, Architecture, Aerospace, Biotechnology, Games, Advertisements, Automobile industry, Life science, etc.., The Pipeline of animation has been divided in to three different parts to complete the project. They are
- Pre-Production
- Production
- Post-production
Pre-Production: The first process of a pipeline which has different aspects which has to do before starting production and helps to complete the project successfully according to the story line. It contains Story-Board, Layouts, Model Sheets, Animatics, etc..,
- Storyboard:- The very basic stage of storyline in the form of comic diagrams frame by frame which can be useful to remember the story for the entire movie, also helps to visualize the concept and also improving the textures, backgrounds and about any changes of story.
- Layouts: The second stage of preproduction continues after completing the storyboard. This helps to improve cosmetics, costumes, locations, sets etc.., which can improve the production quality which completing the movie.
- Model Sheets: The third stage of pre-production which is for finalizing the characters and their expressions. In this stage director has to finalize the model expression, camera angle for that exact scenes, etc.., so that the blue print can be sent to the modeling department to develop the character.
- Animatics: This was a final stage in preproduction pipeline which make to think about the betterment of visual effects, motion of the characters, animation sequences timings etc…, so that the changes can be done for the final shot.
Production: The Second process of pipeline which has a major/actual work will perform, once only after finalizing and confirmed by the director. It has different aspects to complete the process. They are layouts, modeling, texturing, rigging, animation, lighting, dynamics, camera and rendering
1. Layout: The process of rough work on the storyboard with low resolution models and background settings, camera angle etc.., is called production layout. This process will be a guide for the 3D modeling department under the layout artist. In this stage the director will finalize and approves the camera angles, models, depth of field, background settings, etc.., before going to the modeling department for the final models. 
2. Modeling: The process of creating 3D objects/characters by using surfaces of polygons, NURBS, Subdivision surfaces which are mastery in modeling tools. By using this process we can built/create character and set in most efficient way to get the realistic look. Before creating the character or set the modeling artist definitely need some references with the depths of the model. The image must have all references like front shade, back shade, left/right shade (neither one which can make duplicate for opposite side), neck, Arms, foot etc.., which can be either drawn by story board artist or original photo pics of the charcter. 
3. Texturing: The process of adding detail surface texture to a model is called texturing. Surface of a polygon will be applied by the texture map. This is key component in production of animation. It alerts the surface appearances in unique way. We may apply illustrations as texturing maps which is also a most shading material like transparency, color, reflective etc.., In every 3D software, definitely there will be a texturing tools/painting tools to apply the texture/shades for background more efficiently and effectively with their artisan brushes. These brush tools have different types of applications which make the texture artist to modify the attribute values directly according to the model shading also improves the speed of workflow. Texturing can be done according to the storyboard or else it can be modified by the director later. 
4. Rigging: Accompanying joints and skeletons to the 3D models for animation is called rigging. Rigging depends on the models and its movements which have to animate. This can be done by using two methods. They are Forward Kinematics (FK) and Inverse Kinematics (IK). The important task was binding the skeleton and character which makes to move the character together, also it defines the movement of characters joints, skin surface which bulge to simulate muscles. Cluster is another process of grouping the surface components as CV’s. This cluster has to animate more detail than the normal level. 
5. Animation: The displaying of 2D/3D images or model positions in particular sequence to make an illusion with their movement is called Animation. In this process all the rigged parts has to make move according to the storyboard which was finalized by the director earlier. The facial expressions were one of the difficult tasks mostly for the human character. But some software’s provides some key divers to overcome this difficulty. The mixing of an expression for same attribute with different technique is an impossible. 
6. Lighting: Providing the source of light to the animation body according to the scene of a story is called lighting. This plays an important role in animation/movie process where the entire project may fail in case of applying unnecessary lights or not providing sufficient light or also shadings of light which makes the animation more relevant to the realistic look. This has to be work under the special supervision of team leader or director who can visualize the lightings according to the scene. The software provides some of the inner tools for lighting. The artists are responsible for bringing individual lighting scenes and also other elements from other departments. 
7. Dynamics: The movement of a physical body according to the applied natural forces on them by following the physical rules is called Dynamics. Some of the dynamics are fire, water, clothes, hairs, fireworks, etc.., the software provides some tools to create the dynamics and some has the external application. This will be done by creating the particles in the tools and providing them the movement according to their form like water, fire, etc.., which simulates the real-world physical interaction. 
8.Camera: Setting camera (s) internally to show the sequences in different direction and in different angles according to the storyboard is called camera work. This can be edit according to the situation at any time before rendering. 
9. Rendering: The execution of the final product after confirming all the aspects of production work is called rendering. It has some more advanced techniques like scan line rendering, ray tracing, radiosity etc.., the time varies from seconds to days and week for a single frame. It has two types of methods. They are
- Real-Time Rendering: Rendering for interactive media which displays in real-time frames from apprx. 20 to 120 frames per second
- Photo-Realistic Rendering: Rendering for non-interactive media such as movies, which renders much slower than real-time rendering to create illusion with speed of 20-30 frames/second is called Photo-Realistic or Non Real-Time Rendering.
Post-Production: The final stage of pipeline of movie making/creating which refers to the tasks that has to perform after completion of production. Editing the scenes by adding or removing the footages, Voice preparations, Voice dubbings, adding sounds etc.., are some of the works in post-production. The work which has to done after completion of production is called Post-Production. The major works were Compositing, Audio-Editing and Video-Editing.
1. Compositing: Adding all the rendered elements/images which was done by the previous departments and arranging them according to the story-line/board to execute in particular sequence to complete the movie is called Compositing. The lighting also has some work while compositing the movie for the final stage. 
2. Audio-Editing: The process of assembling the selected sound recordings for the final Audio mix, Lip synchronizing, audio effects etc.., are called audio editing. They are responsible for the audio clarity, unusual sound tracks, audio lip synchronize etc.., 
3.Video-Editing: The process of handling and reassembling to create seamless final product is called Video Editing. The unwanted footage’s and scenes will be removed and adds any individual clips to arrange the video which has to flow in particular sequence according to the storyboard which was the initial and final goal of a director. After all these editing they will add the Title/name of the video like Movie name, actors, Advertisers etc.., 
Other Types of Animations:
Cel Shaded Animation: The process of copying traditional animation to remake it by using software with less blending colors is called Cel Shaded animation.
Machinima: the process of creating films which are captured from virtual world or video games etc..,
Motion Capture: Capturing movements of live actors by wearing special suit or markers or marker less (advanced technology). Note: For more briefly, you can read in my previous work “Existence technology of Motion Capture” which has all about motion capture technologies and types.
Photo-realistic Animation: the process of creating animation to resemble real life by using advanced rendering which is a copy to be a copy of Kung-fu panda, Ice age etc..
Mechanical animation or Animatronics: The creation of mechanical objects by using mechatronics which can animate the objects rather than robotics.
Chuckimation: The process of animation which is created by the cartoon markers is caleed Chuckimation.
Drawn Animation: creation of images directly on film stock by using a technique where footage is produced is called Drawn Animation.
Glass paint animation: The images which are drawn on sheets of glass materials with slow drying oil paint which can be manipulated to make an illusion are called Glass Paint Animation.
Sand Animation: the technique by using sand which is moving around Back or front lighted part of glass is called sand animation. The light contrast on a glass makes little bit more interesting.
Flip Book: Drawing the series of sequence images on the paper edges on a book which can be created an illusion by moving all the pages one after another rapidly.
3D animation software’s list:
Autodesk Maya, Autodesk 3DS Max, Art of Illusion, Autodesk Softimage, Blender, Cinema 4D, Autodesk Auto CAD (for Architecture, planning, designing etc..,), Google Sketch up, Houdini, I Clone, Light wave 3D, Z-brush, Flux, etc.., are some of the important 3D software’s.
Little Bit Important Information After Completing the Product and Before Releasing the Movie:
Censor Board: The group of social reformers appointed by government of the country(s) who provides the certificate according to the related categories of the movie and advice’s about the censors to the production company about the certifications is called Censor board. Their duties are
- After completion of the final execution the censor board will watch the movie because they are responsible for providing the certificate for the movie which will appear at first before starting the movie.
- Certificate will have symbols like U, U/A, A. Some cases S
- Universal (U): Which represents everyone without any restrictions to any group/age people can watch the movie including the children.
- Universal Under Adults Guidance(U/A): All ages can watch movie but below 12/14 years children must have the adult guidance because movie may have violence, sexual reference, infrequent languages etc..,
- Adults (A): Strictly restricted to Adults only. Because it may contain crude language, brutal violence, strong sex scenes, drug usages which are not suitable for minors.
- The special (S): This was specialized only for the special class of audiences like doctors, scientists, etc..,
- Before the certification even single name has not be displayed on the screen, which was a major crime according to the movie certification law.
- Symbols has to be named even on the posters or any movie related articles like promos etc.,
- In promos before censor certification they have to mention as “Film has yet to be certified”.
References:
- http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=X0hVEH4se-0
- http://www.slideshare.net/ksumatarted/history-of-animation
- http://atec.utdallas.edu/midori/Handouts/history.htm
- http://news.discovery.com/tech/the-history-of-animation-gotta-see-video-120824.htm
- http://movies.about.com/od/animatedmovies/a/history-animated-films.htm
- http://www.personal.psu.edu/hqh5011/art002/assignment7.html
- http://olafurandri.com/nyti/papers2009/AnimatedCartoons.pdf
- http://www.ehow.com/about_6616063_history-animation-technology.html
- http://www.arena-multimedia.com/blog/index.php/animation-techniques/
- http://www1.chapman.edu/ftvtutorials/3dAnimationProductionWorkflow.pdf
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Animation
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_animation
- http://cg.tutsplus.com/articles/step-by-step-how-to-make-an-animated-movie/
- https://kalyankrishna4886.wordpress.com/2010/11/01/autodesk-maya/
- https://www.google.co.in/imghp?hl=en&tab=wi
Kalyan C Archakam 