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THE MAKING OF A CARTOON

 “An animator is an actor with a pencil.” --Chuck Jones

 As with live action film production, animation requires much of the same preparation and story development, however, the ‘actors’ in an animated film differ greatly. Not that they can’t be human, but because they are drawn by hand, springing utterly from the imagination of the producers, directors and animators working on the film.

Since pre-history, artists of all stripes have tried to make their subjects move. From the cave drawings in Lascaux, France to the Egyptian artists of the great dynastic tombs, from early Renaissance paintings to the Impressionists, all have attempted but ultimately failed at creating actual movement. Not until the advent of the moving picture were artists capable of actually creating moving drawings.

STORY AND STORYBOARDS

The idea for a film could come from many different sources, a drawing, a slice of overheard conversation, a ‘directive’ from the producer such as “No bullfight cartoons, they’re not funny.” But the story almost always came first and it takes the form of storyboards, quickly done pencil sketches with lines of dialogue written below the action, then taped or pinned in sequence to a corkboard in the story room.

In the case of director Chuck Jones, along with his famed story man, Michael Maltese, they would create the storyboards and then call a “Yes” session, where the rest of the unit plus the musical director, background artists and others would flesh out the details.

A script of dialogue was then produced for the voice actors, completing the story phase of production.

DIRECTION AND LAYOUT

The director is responsible for all aspects of the film; timing of story, action, dialogue, color, sound and music. The scope of his job covers the entire production. Chuck Jones would contribute hundreds of layout drawings for each production, unlike many animation directors who would use layout artists specifically for this purpose. A layout drawing determines the staging and emotional movement of the characters across the screen.

BACKGROUND LAYOUTS AND BACKGROUNDS

Backgrounds would begin as layout drawings, these drawings would then be used by the background painters to create the stage upon which the animated characters would perform. Good backgrounds provide depth of field so that the characters have a three dimensional space within which to move.

EXPOSURE SHEET

This sheet is used by the animators and the director as the guide that combines dialogue with action, effects and backgrounds. Prepared after the voice actors have taped the dialogue for the film, it is a complex and technical adjunct to the creative process. On the exposure sheet the dialogue is spaced according to the number of drawings necessary to move the character through this particular scene. The animators then coordinate the movements of the character with the dialogue, making sure that it is timed and executed properly.

ANIMATION—DRAWINGS AND CELS

Working from Chuck Jones’ layout drawings, the animators in his unit would continue to map out the larger arcs of the story with individual drawings, but it was the assistant animators or in-betweeners that would carry the action forward. They were responsible for getting the character from Point A to Point B. Once the drawings were completed and approved, they went to the Ink & Paint department for transfer to ‘cels.’

CHARACTER DESIGN—MODEL SHEETS

Chuck Jones spent much time researching the movement of different animals so that the ‘actors’ he directed would move believably across the screen. Character design began oftentimes with actual drawings of seals, let’s say, and the anthropomorphization would occur gradually as the character of the seal developed from the story. Model sheets were created from the director’s drawings that best displayed the range of motion and emotion of the character in a particular film.

MUSIC

It is important to remember in the decades before the advent of television that entertainment at home was dominated by radio and its amalgam of music, both popular and classical. Chuck Jones was a lifelong devotee of all music, particularly 18 th and 19 th century opera. Arguably his most famous cartoon, “What’s Opera, Doc?”, which was the first short animated film to be inducted into the Smithsonian’s National Film Archives, contains what listeners around the world had long waited for, Wagner’s Ring Cycle, normally a three day affair, reduced to a very compact 8 minutes.

Warner Bros. Animation during those golden years so often referred to, were extremely fortunate to have as their musical director Carl Stalling, considered by many as a significant and underappreciated contributor to the major success of the studio’s animated cartoons. Combining music from the Warner Bros. play book with classical compositions so effortlessly, firmly places Stalling (and Milt Franklyn who followed him at WB) as one of the greatest composers and arrangers of the 20 th century.

• Warner Bros. bought their cartoons at first from Leon Schlesinger Productions. Releasing their first cartoon in 1930. The animators were Hugh Harman and Rudolph Ising. (Harman-Ising created for Leon Schlesinger)

• In May 1930, Bosko was introduced as an animated blob of ink resembling Mickey Mouse. At the end of this first cartoon, Bosko squiggled back into the inkwell, saying, "so long, folks!" beginning a Warner Bros. tradition.

• In 1934 Chuck Jones began his career as an animator with The Miller's Daughter and Those Beautiful Dames. His credits include 11 other cartoons between 1934-1937.

• Chuck Jones had his directorial debut in 1938 with The Night Watchman.

• By 1942, Warner Bros. animated short cartoons were the most popular cartoons being created. About this time, Chuck Jones is credited with changing the look of short animated films forever with his production of The Dover Boys. By stylizing movement and the backgrounds on which it played, Jones forsook the traditional approach favored by Disney Studios, where every little detail was drawn. By doing this, Jones was able to put the focus on the action, the atmosphere and the characters.

• In 1945, Bugs Bunny cartoons were nominated the #1 short subject film in the Motion Picture Herald's poll of exhibitors -- a title they held for the next 16 years!

• From 1945 until the WB Animation Studio closed in 1963 is considered the "Golden Years" of the short animated film. Many of the most famous Warner Bros. characters were created then by not only Chuck Jones (Pepe le Pew, Road Runner & Wile E. Coyote, Marvin the Martian, Gossamer, Ralph Phillips, Marc Anthony and Kitty, Junyer Bear, Henery Hawk, Ralph Wolf, Sam Sheepdog, Hugo the Abominable Snowman, Frisky Puppy and Charlie Dog) but also Friz Freleng (Sylvester the Cat and most notably, Yosemite Sam) and Robert McKimson (the Tasmanian Devil and Foghorn Leghorn).

• From the early 1940s until 1949 there were at least 4 animation units working at the Warner Bros. Studios. After 1949, there were just the Jones, Freleng and McKimson units creating 10 - 6 minute cartoons each per year.

• Chuck Jones is noted for his philosophical and intellectual approach to character. He was the major influence in the development of Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Porky Pig and Elmer Fudd in the "Golden Years".

• The three cartoons that helped define the character of Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck and Elmer Fudd were directed by Jones beginning in 1951 with Rabbit Fire, 1952's Rabbit Seasoning and Duck! Rabbit! Duck! of 1953.

• The genius of Chuck Jones is apparent in his 1953 film, Duck Amuck. It is viewed as a twentieth century parable of man's alienation from his environment.

• In 1955's One Froggy Evening, Chuck Jones told the story of one man's greed and dissolution. A construction worker finds a singing and dancing frog, but sadly, the frog will only sing for him. As soon as the frog is put in front of anyone else (theatrical producers, live audiences, policemen) he clams up. Ruination results for the man, the frog lives on!

• What's Opera, Doc? of 1957 is arguably the most celebrated short film of this century. Honored with inclusion in the Smithsonian's National Film Registry of the 100 most important films of this century (the only short animated film included), it is without a doubt one of the true treasures of the art of the cinema. Jones and his artistic director, Maurice Noble, designed one of the most memorable of the Bugs Bunny and Elmer Fudd films ever conceived. Imagine, over 150 different backgrounds! To meet the budget demands, Chuck Jones 'borrowed' money from other films being made at the same time.

• Chuck Jones' Warner Bros. films won 2 Academy Awards, For Scent-i-mental Reasons, 1949 (best animated short subject) and So Much for So Little 1950 (best documentary short subject). In 1965, while working under the MGM banner, Jones' independently produced short animated film The Dot and The Line garnered his 3rd Academy Award. In 1996 Jones received an Academy Award for Lifetime Achievement. Jones also won Peabody Awards for both Dr. Seuss films he directed, Dr. Seuss' How the Grinch Stole Christmas 1966 and Horton Hears A Who 1970. Other awards, honorary doctorates, film tributes and lifetime achievement awards are too numerous to list here, please refer to his Fact Sheet.

• Friz Freleng won 3 Academy Awards while at Warner Bros. They were for Speedy Gonzales 1955, Birds Anonymous 1957 and Knighty Knight Bugs 1958.

• Bowing to the pressure of television and reduced budgets for animated films, Warner Bros. closed their longtime animation studio in 1963. Friz Freleng went on to help create and direct the Pink Panther cartoons. McKimson stayed at Warner Bros. and Chuck Jones went to MGM where he directed several short cartoons for theatrical release starring Hanna-Barbera's characters Tom & Jerry.

• Warner Bros. briefly resuscitated their animation department between 1967-1969 introducing Merlin the Magic Mouse and Cool Cat alongside old favorites like Speedy Gonzales and Daffy Duck.

• In 1985 the Museum of Modern Art, New York, hosted a film retrospective of Warner Bros. short animated films directed by Chuck Jones and Friz Freleng. During the 4 month long exhibition, more people visited the museum than had in the previous year!

• During the 1970s and 1980s Chuck Jones worked on eight television specials for Warner Bros. Utilizing previously created cartoons, these specials were created by developing a story line that tied the cartoons together.

• After nearly 60 years in the film industry Chuck Jones was given a lifetime contract with Warner Bros. Forming Chuck Jones Film Productions in 1994, along with his daughter, Linda Jones, as his producer, he began with a group of young animators creating in the next 3 years 6 new Warner Bros. cartoons. The first to be released, Chariots of Fur, debuted in 1994 with the WB theatrical film, "Richie Rich". Although the movie it was paired with didn't fare too well the reviews for the animated film were resoundingly positive.

• Chariots of Fur paired the Road Runner and Wile E. Coyote in their first theatrical film together in over 30 years. 5 other short films were produced at Chuck Jones Film Productions in the next 3 years, they were: Superior Duck starring Daffy Duck and a host of other WB characters; One Froggy Evening the prequel/sequel to the 1955 film One Froggy Evening; a tribute to Friz Freleng, From Hare to Eternity starring Bugs Bunny and Yosemite Sam; Pullet Surprise with Foghorn Leghorn and Pete Puma (who was voiced by the original voice actor of Pete Puma, Stan Freberg) and Father of the Bird starring Sylvester and a new character, a sweet little bird named Cornbread.

• With the closing of CJFP, Chuck Jones moved on to a more relaxed life. Mr. Jones divided his time between gallery exhibitions, film retrospectives, a inveterate love of travel, his beautiful wife, Marian and of course, painting, drawing and creating limited editions of the characters we've all grown to love and admire.