Animation

The annual gathering draws 28,000 people to its events—a hot ticket lost even on many locals in the nation’s capital

Amid Amidi of Cartoon Brew put up this animated GIF that compares two shots from the opening of The Simpsons: the first from the opening that was used from 1990 through most of the ’00s, and the second from the new opening that was created when the show switched to high-def. The new opening is one of the better parts of the current show, but the earlier version was better-animated. Not necessarily because of any inherent difference between traditional cel animation and digital, but just the amount of personality and acting that goes into it. Part of this is a directorial choice, since in the second version it was decided to have Marge not react to Maggie popping out of the bag. But it’s also just a question of animation style; the first version has more flair and “bounce” to all the movements — Marge’s, Maggie’s, even the bag — while the second version is pretty standardized even on the one bit of physical acting (Maggie shaking her fist at the one-eyebrowed baby). The older version has the obvious drawbacks of cel animation, particularly the fact that perspective is hard to do; the ceiling doesn’t exactly look like a ceiling. But Marge and Maggie have physical personalities in the 1990 version that they just don’t have in the later version.

For some reason I find it interesting that up until the late ’60s, many of the really hardball U.S. campaign advertising tactics now associated with Republicans were more associated with Democrats. (At the national level, at least.) The most famous example is LBJ’s “Daisy” ad, a manipulative, cheerfully unfair commercial designed to tell people that voting for the Republicans will literally destroy the world. Nixon adopted many of these tactics, as did his disciples, while the Democrats moved toward a more touchy-feely type of manipulation (vote for me because I believe in hope, and my opponent hates hope and puppies). In Canada, similarly we frequently hear Conservative ads attacked as being too hard-hitting while Liberal ads are accused of being too soft.

Via Mark Mayerson, there’s a good new piece at Flipanimation.net  called “I freely admit I worked at Filmation.” Three animators, including Disney/Dreamworks animator Tom Sito, recall their days working at Filmation, one of the two biggest producers of U.S. TV animation in from the ’60s through the ’80s. You’ve seen their stuff: He-Man, Fat Albert, and anything else where most scenes consist of people’s faces in extreme close-up, with only their mouths moving.