Celebration Animation.

Do you want to generate more excitement in your art class? Would you like to see your students more involved and self-directed? If so, animation is the key to blowing your students out of the water.

Cel animation is a not-so-lost art. While it is true that achieving a full-length movie is very expensive and time-consuming, even with time and resources tight, students can accomplish the foundation to support a greater appreciation for the feature-length animated films of the past.

To open the lesson, we spend two class periods exploring cartoons from the past including political cartoons, animated film, and newspaper comic strips. We discuss some animated films that have made animation history, such as Walt Disney's Snow White, the first full-length feature cartoon; Fantasia, the first cartoon to incorporate classical music in an artistic fashion; and Toy Story, a computer-generated digital animation feature. I also include American Pop, the first full-length rock-and-roll fully animated feature, and A Charlie Brown Christmas, the first cartoon made for TV with jazz music.

Preparation work for animation is assigned for homework. The students explore movement through a series of stick gesture drawings on two or three pages of their sketchbooks. In class, I demonstrate how to use the skeleton foundation to build an animated figure. While many of the students are drawn toward the human figures in comic-book character animation, I restrict them to animating insects because most students do not have sufficient skill in drawing human anatomy.

With sketches in hand, the students work on a piece of smooth tag or Bristol board. The drawings are completed in pencil. All line work and shading are as they appear in the final version. Each bug should be in an action pose. A nice touch to add to the cartoon is an action word like "BANG!", "WOSH!", or "PLOP!" Avoid background detail, as the cel we are creating will be placed over a background scene.

Students can use either pen and ink, as was the custom in traditional animation, or felt-tip pens. I find that a quill pen offers more flexibility to create an expressive line. Unfortunately, students need to practice using the pens through different shading techniques. Felt-tip pens are the quickest and easiest way to achieve a nice black line. Erase all pencil lines.

Once the ink part is complete and dry, photocopy each penned cartoon onto a piece of clear acetate to create your black-line transparent cel.

Apply areas of flat acrylic color to the reverse side of the black outlines. Mix each color completely. Start with the highlights and details first. Then apply the secondary layer of color and finally the last layer.

The backgrounds can be either a magazine example or a single sheet of construction paper. The look of the final animated insect should resemble images that you see sold in stores.

The work needs to be assembled into a mat to hold the elements together. Assembly includes a two-inch border followed by the animated cel and backing sheet. Each element needs to be secured to the mat for presentation.

Working out the entire drawing in pencil and then adding ink not only assists in the organization of the cel animation process, but also introduces the students to the unique careers available in the comic-book industry. In addition, background painter, layout artist, and story writer are all careers in the comic-book field. "THAT'S ALL FOLKS!"

NATIONAL STANDARD

Students apply subjects, symbols, and ideas in their artworks and use the skills gained to solve visual problems.

Steve Lappe is an art teacher at East Leyden High School in Franklin Park, Illinois.