Animation Essentials

The Basics to Traditional Hand-Drawn Animation Process (Pre-Computer Era)

• Script : A written screenplay providing dialogue, structure, and narrative direction.

• Storyboards (Visual Script): Hand-drawn panels translating the script into visual form, establishing composition, pacing, camera angles, and emotional tone. Used by all departments to understand the director’s vision.

• Scene Layouts & Planning: Determination of framing, scale, and movement within each scene, aligning characters and backgrounds.

• Rough Animation: Initial, loose drawings that block out motion, timing, and action on a scene-by-scene basis.

• Key Drawings (Key Frames): Primary poses and actions within a scene that define character movement, expression, and storytelling. These drawings are reviewed and approved before refinement begins.

• Clean-Up Drawings: Refined versions of the key drawings with final line quality and clarity, preparing them for production.

• In-Between Drawings: Additional drawings created between key frames to produce smooth, fluid motion. The greater the number of drawings, the more fluid the movement.

• Completed Animation Drawings: Fully approved sequences of drawings that establish the final motion of a scene.

• Ink Department: Each animation drawing is hand-inked onto transparent acetate sheets, known as cels.

• Paint Department: Cels are hand-painted on the reverse side in multiple layers, ensuring consistent color and avoiding visible brushstrokes.

• Background Art: Hand-painted backgrounds created separately, designed to support mood, atmosphere, and spatial depth.

• Camera Department: Finished cels are photographed frame-by-frame over the painted backgrounds using animation cameras.

• Final Animated Scene: The photographed frames are assembled into a completed sequence, bringing together drawing, painting, movement, and storytelling.

a young Bakshi at Terrytoons with Leo Giouliani