DC Comics
DC Comics, Inc. is an American comic book publisher. It is the publishing unit of DC Entertainment, a subsidiary of Warner Bros. since 1967. DC Comics is one of the largest and oldest American comic book companies, produces material featuring numerous culturally iconic heroic characters including: Superman, Wonder Woman, The Flash, Green Lantern,Aquaman,Martian Manhunter, Green Arrow, Hawkman and Supergirl. Most of their material takes place in the fictional DC Universe, which features teams such as the Justice League, the Justice Society of America, the Suicide Squad, the Teen Titans, well-known villains such as The Joker, Lex Luthor, Darkseid, Brainiac, Black Adam, Ra's al Ghul and Deathstroke; the company has published non-DC Universe-related material, including Watchmen, V for Vendetta, many titles under their alternative imprint Vertigo. The initials "DC" came from the company's popular series Detective Comics, which featured Batman's debut and subsequently became part of the company's name.
In Manhattan at 432 Fourth Avenue, the DC Comics offices have been located at 480 and 575 Lexington Avenue. DC had its headquarters at 1700 Broadway, Midtown Manhattan, New York City, but it was announced in October 2013 that DC Entertainment would relocate its headquarters from New York to Burbank, California in April 2015. Random House distributes DC Comics' books to the bookstore market, while Diamond Comic Distributors supplies the comics shop specialty market. DC Comics and its longtime major competitor Marvel Comics together shared 70% of the American comic book market in 2017. Entrepreneur Major Malcolm Wheeler-Nicholson founded National Allied Publications in autumn 1934; the company debuted with the tabloid-sized New Fun: The Big Comic Magazine #1 with a cover date of February 1935. The company's second title, New Comics #1, appeared in a size close to what would become comic books' standard during the period fans and historians call the Golden Age of Comic Books, with larger dimensions than today's.
That title evolved into Adventure Comics, which continued through issue #503 in 1983, becoming one of the longest-running comic-book series. In 2009 DC revived Adventure Comics with its original numbering. In 1935, Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, the future creators of Superman, created Doctor Occult, the earliest DC Comics character to still be in the DC Universe. Wheeler-Nicholson's third and final title, Detective Comics, advertised with a cover illustration dated December 1936 premiered three months late with a March 1937 cover date; the themed anthology series would become a sensation with the introduction of Batman in issue #27. By however, Wheeler-Nicholson had gone. In 1937, in debt to printing-plant owner and magazine distributor Harry Donenfeld—who published pulp magazines and operated as a principal in the magazine distributorship Independent News—Wheeler-Nicholson had to take Donenfeld on as a partner in order to publish Detective Comics #1. Detective Comics, Inc. was formed, with Wheeler-Nicholson and Jack S. Liebowitz, Donenfeld's accountant, listed as owners.
Major Wheeler-Nicholson remained for a year, but cash-flow problems continued, he was forced out. Shortly afterwards, Detective Comics, Inc. purchased the remains of National Allied known as Nicholson Publishing, at a bankruptcy auction. Detective Comics, Inc. soon launched a fourth title, Action Comics, the premiere of which introduced Superman. Action Comics #1, the first comic book to feature the new character archetype—soon known as "superheroes"—proved a sales hit; the company introduced such other popular characters as the Sandman and Batman. On February 22, 2010, a copy of Action Comics #1 sold at an auction from an anonymous seller to an anonymous buyer for $1 million, besting the $317,000 record for a comic book set by a different copy, in lesser condition, the previous year. National Allied Publications soon merged with Detective Comics, Inc. forming National Comics Publications on September 30, 1946. National Comics Publications absorbed an affiliated concern, Max Gaines' and Liebowitz' All-American Publications.
In the same year Gaines let Liebowitz buy him out, kept only Picture Stories from the Bible as the foundation of his own new company, EC Comics. At that point, "Liebowitz promptly orchestrated the merger of All-American and Detective Comics into National Comics... Next he took charge of organizing National Comics, Independent News, their affiliated firms into a single corporate entity, National Periodical Publications". National Periodical Publications became publicly traded on the stock market in 1961. Despite the official names "National Comics" and "National Periodical Publications", the company began branding itself as "Superman-DC" as early as 1940, the company became known colloquially as DC Comics for years before the official adoption of that name in 1977; the company began to move aggressively against what it saw as copyright-violating imitations from other companies, such as Fox Comics' Wonder Man, which Fox started as a copy of Superman. This extended to DC suing Fawcett Comics over Captain Marvel, at the time comics' top-selling character.
Faced with declining sales and the prospect of bankruptcy if it lost, Fawcett capitulated in 1953 and ceased publishing comics. Years Fawcett sold the rights for Captain Marvel to DC—which in 1972 revived Captain Marvel in the new title Shazam
Americans
Americans are nationals and citizens of the United States of America. Although nationals and citizens make up the majority of Americans, some dual citizens and permanent residents may claim American nationality; the United States is home to people of many different ethnic origins. As a result, American culture and law does not equate nationality with race or ethnicity, but with citizenship and permanent allegiance. English-speakers, speakers of many other languages use the term "American" to mean people of the United States; the word "American" can refer to people from the Americas in general. The majority of Americans or their ancestors immigrated to America or are descended from people who were brought as slaves within the past five centuries, with the exception of the Native American population and people from Hawaii, Puerto Rico and the Philippine Islands, who became American through expansion of the country in the 19th century, additionally America expanded into American Samoa, the U. S. Virgin Islands and Northern Mariana Islands in the 20th century.
Despite its multi-ethnic composition, the culture of the United States held in common by most Americans can be referred to as mainstream American culture, a Western culture derived from the traditions of Northern and Western European colonists and immigrants. It includes influences of African-American culture. Westward expansion integrated the Creoles and Cajuns of Louisiana and the Hispanos of the Southwest and brought close contact with the culture of Mexico. Large-scale immigration in the late 19th and early 20th centuries from Southern and Eastern Europe introduced a variety of elements. Immigration from Asia and Latin America has had impact. A cultural melting pot, or pluralistic salad bowl, describes the way in which generations of Americans have celebrated and exchanged distinctive cultural characteristics. In addition to the United States and people of American descent can be found internationally; as many as seven million Americans are estimated to be living abroad, make up the American diaspora.
The United States of America is a diverse country and ethnically. Six races are recognized by the U. S. Census Bureau for statistical purposes: White, American Indian and Alaska Native, Black or African American, Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander, people of two or more races. "Some other race" is an option in the census and other surveys. The United States Census Bureau classifies Americans as "Hispanic or Latino" and "Not Hispanic or Latino", which identifies Hispanic and Latino Americans as a racially diverse ethnicity that comprises the largest minority group in the nation. People of European descent, or White Americans, constitute the majority of the 308 million people living in the United States, with 72.4% of the population in the 2010 United States Census. They are considered people who trace their ancestry to the original peoples of Europe, the Middle East, North Africa. Of those reporting to be White American, 7,487,133 reported to be Multiracial. Additionally, there are Latinos.
Non-Hispanic Whites are the majority in 46 states. There are four minority-majority states: California, New Mexico, Hawaii. In addition, the District of Columbia has a non-white majority; the state with the highest percentage of non-Hispanic White Americans is Maine. The largest continental ancestral group of Americans are that of Europeans who have origins in any of the original peoples of Europe; this includes people via African, North American, Central American or South American and Oceanian nations that have a large European descended population. The Spanish were some of the first Europeans to establish a continuous presence in what is now the United States in 1565. Martín de Argüelles born 1566, San Agustín, La Florida a part of New Spain, was the first person of European descent born in what is now the United States. Twenty-one years Virginia Dare born 1587 Roanoke Island in present-day North Carolina, was the first child born in the original Thirteen Colonies to English parents. In the 2017 American Community Survey, German Americans, Irish Americans, English Americans and Italian Americans were the four largest self-reported European ancestry groups in the United States forming 35.1% of the total population.
However, the English Americans and British Americans demography is considered a serious under-count as they tend to self-report and identify as "Americans" due to the length of time they have inhabited America. This is over-represented in the Upland South, a region, settled by the British. Overall, as the largest group, European Americans have the lowest poverty rate and the second highest educational attainment levels, median household income, median personal income of any racial demographic in the nation. According to the American Jewish Archives and the Arab American National Museum, some of the first Middle Easterners and North Africans arrived in the Americas between the late 15th and mid-16th centuries. Many were fleeing ethnic or ethnoreligious persecution during the Spanish Inquisition, a few were taken to the Americas as slaves. In 2014, The United States Census Bureau began finalizing the ethnic classification of MENA populations. According to the Arab American Institute, Arab
Comics artist
A comics artist is a person working within the comics medium on comic strips, comic books, or graphic novels. The term may refer to any number of artists who contribute to produce a work in the comics form, from those who oversee all aspects of the work to those who contribute only a part. Within the comic strip format, it is typical for one creator to produce the whole strip. However, it is not uncommon for the writing of the strip and the drawing of the art to be carried out by two different people, a writer and an artist. In some cases, one artist might draw key figures. Many strips were the work of two people. Shortly after Frank Willard began Moon Mullins in 1923, he hired Ferd Johnson as his assistant. For decades, Johnson received no credit. Willard and Johnson traveled about Florida, Los Angeles and Mexico, drawing the strip while living in hotels and farmhouses. At its peak of popularity during the 1940s and 1950s, the strip ran in 350 newspapers. According to Johnson, he had been doing the strip solo for at least a decade before Willard's death in 1958: "They put my name on it then.
I had been doing it about 10 years before that because Willard had heart attacks and strokes and all that stuff. The minute my name went on that his name went off, 25 papers dropped the strip; that shows you that, although I had been doing it ten years, the name means a lot." With regards to the comic book format, the work can be split in many different ways. The writing and the creation of the art can be split between two people, an example being From Hell, written by Alan Moore and drawn by Eddie Campbell; the writing of a comic book story can sometimes be shared between two people, with one person writing the plot and another the script. The artistic work is subdivided on work produced for the larger comic book publishers, with four people working on the art: a penciller, an inker, a colorist and a letterer. Sometimes this combination of four artists is augmented by a breakdown artist. However, this occurs only when an artist fails to meet a deadline or when a writer, sometimes referred to as a scripter, produces breakdown art.
Breakdown art is where the story has been laid out roughly in pencils to indicate panel layouts and character positions within panels but with no details. Such roughs are sometimes referred to as "layouts." The norm of four artists is sometimes reduced to three if the penciller inks his own work being credited within the book as a penciller/inker. John Byrne and Walt Simonson are artists; that these roles are interchangeable, many artists can fulfill different roles. Stan Sakai is a regarded letterer of comic books who creates his own series, Usagi Yojimbo. Producing his autobiographical works, Eddie Campbell has created both scripts and art, plus teaming with his daughter on the coloring. On Cerebus, for the majority of the run, Dave Sim created everything except the backgrounds, which were drawn by Gerhard. Glossary of comics terminology Daily comic strip Mangaka Sunday comics Sunday strip Comic Creators at Curlie
Fire and Ice (1983 film)
Fire and Ice is a 1983 American epic high fantasy adventure film directed by Ralph Bakshi. The film, a collaboration between Bakshi and Frank Frazetta, was distributed by 20th Century Fox, which distributed Bakshi's 1977 release, Wizards; the animated feature, based on characters co-created by Bakshi and Frazetta, was made using the process of rotoscoping, in which scenes were shot in live action and traced onto animation cels. The screenplay was written by Gerry Conway and Roy Thomas, both of whom had written Conan stories for Marvel Comics. Background painter was the author and artist of the Dinotopia illustrated novels. Thomas Kinkade worked on the backgrounds to various scenes. Peter Chung, of Aeon Flux fame, was a layout artist. From their citadel Icepeak, the evil Queen Juliana and her son Prince Nekron send forth a wave of glaciers. Nekron sends a delegation to Firekeep, the citadel of King Jarol. In truth, the Ice Queen has orchestrated it as a ruse so that her sub-human troops can abduct Jarol's beautiful daughter, Princess Teegra.
Juliana feels. However, the Ice Prince is incensed. Teegra escapes from Icepeak and meets a young warrior, the only survivor of a village razed by Nekron's glaciers. Larn agrees to escort the Fire Princess back to her home. En route, Teegra is recaptured by the Ice Soldiers and Larn joins up with the mysterious Darkwolf to save her. Darkwolf and Larn travel to Icepeak. Darkwolf slays Nekron in a duel, as Icepeak is destroyed by lava released at the command of King Jarol. Larn is about to kill an already-defeated Ice Minion. "It's over," she says, embraces him. From atop a cliff, Darkwolf watches the pair briefly. Larn and Teegra kiss. By 1982, fantasy films had proven to be successful at the box office, including The Beastmaster and Conan the Barbarian, Bakshi had a desire to work with long-time friend and fantasy illustrator Frank Frazetta. Bakshi received $1.2 million to finance Fire and Ice from some of the same investors as American Pop, 20th Century Fox agreed to distribute the film based upon the financial longevity of Wizards.
Because Fire and Ice was the most action-oriented story Bakshi had directed up until that point, rotoscoping was again used, the realism of the animation and design replicated Frazetta's artwork. Bakshi and Frazetta were involved in the production of the live-action sequences, from casting sessions to the final shoot; the film's crew included background artists James Gurney and Thomas Kinkade, layout artist Peter Chung, established Bakshi Productions artists Sparey, Steven E. Gordon and Banks. Chung admired Bakshi and Frazetta's work, animated his sequences on the film while working for The Walt Disney Company. Janet Maslin of The New York Times wrote, "If you love comic books but can't bear the unnecessary bother of turning pages,'Fire and Ice,' which opened yesterday at the National theater, may be for you, it would help if you were a sex-obsessed 12-year old boy, but it isn't essential." Gene Siskel of the Chicago Tribune gave the film two stars out of four and called it "attractive to look at, but its slow-moving, predictable story makes viewing it much like reading a comic book with pages made of lead."
He added that "the constant rhythm of Teegra being captured and rescued and captured and rescued is, after a while, more than a bit tiring." Sheila Benson of the Los Angeles Times wrote that "in spite of all the glorious washes in the background, which do indeed have the Frazetta look,'Fire and Ice' is as unintentionally funny a fantasy as you could hope for." Donald Greig of The Monthly Film Bulletin called the action sequences "impressive enough" but stated that "the animators' fetishistic fascination with the human form... underlines the two-dimensionality of the script, for the artwork is the only fleshing-out that characters receive."Andrew Leal wrote, "The plot is standard recalling nothing so much as a more graphic episode of Filmation's He-Man series. Fire and Ice stands as a footnote to the spate of barbarian films that followed in the wake of Arnold Schwarzenegger's appearance as Conan."In 2003, the Online Film Critics Society ranked the film as the 99th greatest animated film of all time.
The film was released on VHS, Betamax, CED, LaserDisc by RCA/Columbia Pictures Home Video in 1983. GoodTimes Home Video re-released the film on VHS in 1988. In 2005, it was released on DVD by Blue Underground Entertainment on a limited edition two-disc set, paired with the documentary Frazetta: Painting With Fire, about the film's co-creator and producer, Frank Frazetta; the company released the film on Blu-ray in 2008 with Remastered 1080p video and a 7.1 surround sound remix in both Dolby TrueHD and DTS HD Master Audio In 2010, Robert Rodriguez announced that he would direct a live-action remake of the film. Bakshi stated that he did not want any involvement with the film, but he agreed to license the rights to Rodriguez; the deal closed shortly after Frazetta's death. On December 18, 2014, Sony Pictures Entertainment acquired the filming rights to the live-action remake version of the 1983 animated film Fire and Ice that will be directed by Robert Rodriguez. Fire and Ice on IMDb Fire and Ice at AllMovie Fire and Ice at Rotten Tomatoes Fire and Ice at Box Office Mojo Fire and Ice at Ralph Baks
Penciller
A penciller is a collaboration artist who works in creation of comic books, graphic novels, similar visual art forms, with focus on primary pencil illustrations, hence the term "penciller". In the American comic book industry, the penciller is the first step in rendering the story in visual form, may require several steps of feedback with the writer; these artists are concerned with layout to showcase steps in the plot. A penciller works in pencil. Beyond this basic description, different artists choose to use a wide variety of different tools. While many artists use traditional wood pencils, others prefer mechanical drafting leads. Pencillers may use any lead hardness they wish, although many artists use a harder lead to make light lines for initial sketches turn to a softer lead for finishing phases of the drawing. Still other artists do their initial layouts using a light-blue colored pencil because that color tends to disappear during photocopying. Most US comic book pages are drawn oversized on large sheets of paper Bristol board.
The customary size of comic book pages in the mainstream American comics industry is 11 by 17 inches. The inker works directly over the penciller's pencil marks, though pages are inked on translucent paper, such as drafting vellum, preserving the original pencils; the artwork is photographically reduced in size during the printing process. With the advent of digital illustration programs such as Photoshop and more artwork is produced digitally, either in part or entirely. Jack KirbyFrom 1949 until his retirement, Jack Kirby worked out of a ten-foot-wide basement studio dubbed "The Dungeon" by his family; when starting with clean piece of Bristol board, he would first draw his panel lines with a T-square. Arthur AdamsArthur Adams begins drawing thumbnail layouts from the script he's given, either at home or in a public place; the thumbnails range in size from 2 inches x 3 inches to half the size of the printed comic book. He or an assistant will enlarge the thumbnails and trace them onto illustration board with a non-photo blue pencil, sometimes using a Prismacolor light-blue pencil, because it is not too waxy, erases easily.
When working on the final illustration board, he does so on a large drawing board when in his basement studio, a lapboard when sitting on his living room couch. After tracing the thumbnails, he will clarify details with another light-blue pencil, finalize the details with a Number 2 pencil, he drew the first three chapters of "Jonni Future" at twice the printed comic size, drew the fifth chapter, "The Garden of the Sklin", at a size larger than standard, in order to render more detail than usual in those stories. For a large poster image with a multitude of characters, he will go over the figure outlines with a marker in order to emphasize them, he will use photographic reference when appropriate, as when he draws things that he is not accustomed to. Because a significant portion of his income is derived from selling his original artwork, he is reluctant to learn how to produce his work digitally. Jim LeeArtist Jim Lee is known to use F lead for his pencil work. J. Scott CampbellArtist J. Scott Campbell does his pencil with a lead holder, Sanford Turquoise H lead, which he uses for its softness and darkness, for its ability to provide a "sketchy" feel, with a minimal amount of powdery lead smearing.
He uses this lead because it strikes a balance between too hard, therefore not dark enough on the page, too soft, therefore prone to smearing and crumbling. Campbell avoids its closest competitor. Campbell has used HB lead and F lead, he maintains sharpness of the lead with a Berol Turquoise sharpener, changing them every four to six months, which he finds is the duration of their grinding ability. Campbell uses a combination of Magic Rub erasers, eraser sticks, since he began to ink his work digitally, a Sakura electric eraser, he sharpens the eraser to a cornered edge in order to render fine detailed work. Travis CharestArtist Travis Charest uses 2H lead to avoid smearing, sometimes HB lead, he illustrated on regular illustration board provided by publishers, though he disliked the non-photo blue lines printed on them. By 2000, he switched to Crescent board for all his work, because it does not warp when wet, produces sharper illustrations, are more suitable for framing because they lack the non-photo blue lines.
Charest prefers not to employ preliminary sketching practices, such as layouts, thumbnails or lightboxing, in part due to impatience, in part because he enjoys the serendipitous nature in which artwork develops when produced with greater spontaneity. He prefers to use reference only when rendering objects that require a degree of real-life accuracy, such as guns, vehicles or characters of licensed properties that must resemble actors with whom they are identified, as when he illustrated the cover to Star Trek: The Next Generation: Embrace the Wolf in 2000. Adam HughesThe penciling process that artist Adam Hughes employs for his cover work is the same he uses when doing sketches for fans at conventions, with the main difference being that he does cover work in his sketchbook, before transferring the drawing to virgin art board with a lightbox, whereas he does convention drawings on 11 x 14 Strathmore bristol, as he prefers penciling on the rougher, vellum surface rather than smooth paper, preferring smoother paper only for brush inking.
He does preliminary undersketches with a lead holder, because he feels regular pencils get worn down to the nub too quickly. As he explained during a sketch demonstration at a comic book
Spider-Man
Spider-Man is a fictional superhero created by writer-editor Stan Lee and writer-artist Steve Ditko. He first appeared in the anthology comic book Amazing Fantasy #15 in the Silver Age of Comic Books, he appears in American comic books published by Marvel Comics, as well as in a number of movies, television shows, video game adaptations set in the Marvel Universe. In the stories, Spider-Man is the alias of Peter Parker, an orphan raised by his Aunt May and Uncle Ben in New York City after his parents Richard and Mary Parker were killed in a plane crash. Lee and Ditko had the character deal with the struggles of adolescence and financial issues, accompanied him with many supporting characters, such as J. Jonah Jameson, Flash Thompson, Harry Osborn, romantic interests Gwen Stacy and Mary Jane Watson, foes such as Doctor Octopus, Green Goblin and Venom, his origin story has him acquiring spider-related abilities after a bite from a radioactive spider. When Spider-Man first appeared in the early 1960s, teenagers in superhero comic books were relegated to the role of sidekick to the protagonist.
The Spider-Man series broke ground by featuring Peter Parker, a high school student from Queens behind Spider-Man's secret identity and with whose "self-obsessions with rejection and loneliness" young readers could relate. While Spider-Man had all the makings of a sidekick, unlike previous teen heroes such as Bucky and Robin, Spider-Man had no superhero mentor like Captain America and Batman. Marvel has featured Spider-Man in several comic book series, the first and longest-lasting of, The Amazing Spider-Man. Over the years, the Peter Parker character developed from a shy, nerdy New York City high school student to troubled but outgoing college student, to married high school teacher to, in the late 2000s, a single freelance photographer. In the 2010s, he joins Marvel's flagship superhero team. Spider-Man's nemesis Doctor Octopus took on the identity for a story arc spanning 2012–2014, following a body swap plot in which Peter appears to die. Marvel has published books featuring alternate versions of Spider-Man, including Spider-Man 2099, which features the adventures of Miguel O'Hara, the Spider-Man of the future.
Miles is brought into mainstream continuity, where he works alongside Peter. Spider-Man is one of the commercially successful superheroes; as Marvel's flagship character and company mascot, he has appeared in countless forms of media, including several animated and live action television series, syndicated newspaper comic strips, in a series of films. The character was first portrayed in live action by Danny Seagren in Spidey Super Stories, a The Electric Company skit which ran from 1974 to 1977. In films, Spider-Man has been portrayed by actors Tobey Maguire, Andrew Garfield, Tom Holland. Reeve Carney starred as Spider-Man in the 2010 Broadway musical Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark. Spider-Man has been well received as a superhero and comic book character, he is ranked as one of the most popular and iconic comic book characters of all time. In 1962, with the success of the Fantastic Four, Marvel Comics editor and head writer Stan Lee was casting about for a new superhero idea, he said the idea for Spider-Man arose from a surge in teenage demand for comic books, the desire to create a character with whom teens could identify.
In his autobiography, Lee cites the non-superhuman pulp magazine crime fighter the Spider as a great influence, in a multitude of print and video interviews, Lee stated he was further inspired by seeing a spider climb up a wall—adding in his autobiography that he has told that story so he has become unsure of whether or not this is true. Although at the time teenage superheroes were given names ending with "boy", Lee says he chose "Spider-Man" because he wanted the character to age as the series progressed, moreover felt the name "Spider-Boy" would have made the character sound inferior to other superheroes. At that time Lee had to get only the consent of Marvel publisher Martin Goodman for the character's approval. In a 1986 interview, Lee described in detail his arguments to overcome Goodman's objections. Goodman agreed to a Spider-Man tryout in what Lee in numerous interviews recalled as what would be the final issue of the science-fiction and supernatural anthology series Amazing Adult Fantasy, renamed Amazing Fantasy for that single issue, #15.
In particular, Lee stated that the fact that it had been decided that Amazing Fantasy would be cancelled after issue #15 was the only reason Goodman allowed him to use Spider-Man. While this was indeed the final issue, its editorial page anticipated the comic continuing and that "The Spiderman... will appear every month in Amazing."Regardless, Lee received Goodman's approval for the name Spider-Man and the "ordinary teen" concept and approached artist Jack Kirby. As comics historian Greg Theakston recounts, Kirby told Lee about an unpublished character on which he had collaborated with Joe Simon in the 1950s, in which an orphaned boy living with an old couple finds a
Animator
An animator is an artist who creates multiple images, known as frames, which give an illusion of movement called animation when displayed in rapid sequence. Animators can work in a variety of fields including film and video games. Animation is related to filmmaking and like filmmaking is labor-intensive, which means that most significant works require the collaboration of several animators; the methods of creating the images or frames for an animation piece depend on the animators' artistic styles and their field. Other artists who contribute to animated cartoons, but who are not animators, include layout artists, storyboard artists, background artists. Animated films share some film crew positions with regular live action films, such as director, sound engineer, editor, but differ radically in that for most of the history of animation, they did not need most of the crew positions seen on a physical set. In hand-drawn Japanese animation productions, such as in Hayao Miyazaki's films, the key animator handles both layout and key animation.
Some animators in Japan such as Mitsuo Iso take full responsibility for their scenes, making them become more than just the key animator. Animators specialize. One important distinction is between special effects animators. In large-scale productions by major studios, each animator has one or more assistants, "inbetweeners" and "clean-up artists", who make drawings between the "key poses" drawn by the animator, re-draw any sketches that are too made to be used as such. A young artist seeking to break into animation is hired for the first time in one of these categories, can advance to the rank of full animator; the creation of animation was a long and arduous process. Each frame of a given scene was hand-drawn transposed onto celluloid, where it would be traced and painted; these finished "cels" were placed together in sequence over painted backgrounds and filmed, one frame at a time. Animation methods have become far more varied in recent years. Today's cartoons could be created using any number of methods using computers to make the animation process cheaper and faster.
These more efficient animation procedures have made the animator's job less tedious and more creative. Audiences find animation to be much more interesting with sound. Voice actors and musicians, among other talent, may contribute vocal or music tracks; some early animated films asked the vocal and music talent to synchronize their recordings to already-extant animation. For the majority of animated films today, the soundtrack is recorded first in the language of the film's primary target market and the animators are required to synchronize their work to the soundtrack. Animation is the art of creating moving images; this line of work is all about creating a series of individual ‘frames’, which make images come to life when they are flicked through in rapid succession. Animation was done manually, with animators drawing multiple frames to depict a single action, i.e. the kind of animation that you witnessed during a typical scene from the Hanna-Barbera cartoon and Jerry. Today, computer-generated imagery has replaced manual animation, but a significant amount of artistic talent is still required.
Animators are employed in various segments of the entertainment industry,including film and video games. As a result of the ongoing transition from traditional 2D to 3D computer animation, the animator's traditional task of redrawing and repainting the same character 24 times a second has now been superseded by the modern task of developing dozens of movements of different parts of a character in a virtual scene; because of the transition to computer animation, many additional support positions have become essential, with the result that the animator has become but one component of a long and specialized production pipeline. Nowadays, visual development artists will design a character as a 2D drawing or painting hand it off to modelers who build the character as a collection of digital polygons. Texture artists "paint" the character with colorful or complex textures, technical directors set up rigging so that the character can be moved and posed. For each scene, layout artists set up rough blocking.
When a character's bugs have been worked out and its scenes have been blocked, it is handed off to an animator who can start developing the exact movements of the character's virtual limbs and facial expressions in each specific scene. At that point, the role of the modern computer animator overlaps in some respects with that of his or her predecessors in traditional animation: namely, trying to create scenes storyboarded in rough form by a team of story artists, synchronizing lip or mouth movements to dialogue prepared by a screenwriter and recorded by vocal talent. Despite those constraints, the animator is still capable of exercising significant artistic skill and discretion in developing the character's movements to accomplish the objective of each scene. There is an obvious analogy here between the art of animation and the art of acting
