What Is A Cel? Describe The Development And Importance Of Cel Animation.

Transparent canvas used in animation

A cel, curt for celluloid, is a transparent canvas on which objects are drawn or painted for traditional, manus-fatigued animation. Bodily celluloid (consisting of cellulose nitrate and camphor) was used during the first half of the 20th century, only since information technology was flammable and dimensionally unstable information technology was largely replaced by cellulose acetate. With the appearance of computer-assisted animation production, the use of cels has been all simply abandoned in major productions. Disney studios stopped using cels in 1990 when Computer Animation Production System (CAPS) replaced this chemical element in their blitheness procedure,^[1] and in the next decade and a half, the other major blitheness studios phased cels out also.

Technique [edit]

Painting with acrylic paint on the reverse side of an already inked cel.

By and large, the characters are fatigued on cels and laid over a static background cartoon. This reduces the number of times an epitome has to be redrawn and enables studios to divide the production process to dissimilar specialised teams. Using this associates line way to animate has made it possible to produce films much more toll-finer. The invention of the technique is generally attributed to Earl Hurd, who patented the process in 1914.

The outline of the images are drawn on the front end of the cel while colors are painted on the dorsum to eliminate brushstrokes. Traditionally, the outlines were hand-inked, but since the 1960s they are nigh exclusively xerographed on. Another of import breakthrough in cel animation was the development of the Animation Photograph Transfer Procedure, first seen in The Black Cauldron, released in 1985.^[ii]

Typically, an animated feature would require over 100,000 manus-painted cels.^[3]

Collector'south items [edit]

Production cels were sometimes sold subsequently the blitheness process was completed. More pop shows and movies demanded higher prices for the cels, with some selling for thousands of dollars.

Some cels are not used for actual production work, but may be a "special" or "limited edition" version of the artwork, sometimes even printed ("lithographed") instead of paw-painted. These normally practise not fetch as high a toll every bit original "under-the-camera" cels, which are true collector'south items. Some unique cels accept fetched record prices at art auctions. For instance, a large "pan" cel depicting numerous characters from the finale of Who Framed Roger Rabbit sold for $fifty,600 at Sotheby's in 1989, including its original background.^[iv] ^[5]

Disney Stores sold production cels from The Little Mermaid (their last picture show to employ cels) at prices from $2,500 to $three,500, without the original backgrounds. Lithographed "sericels" from the same film were $250, with edition sizes of 2,500–5,000 pieces.^[6]

References [edit]

^ Coulson, William R. (January 1995). "The Art of Disney and Sotheby's". Animation Magazine. 8 (2): 72. ISSN 1041-617X. Retrieved March 19, 2017. Disney's next animation boom was The Footling Mermaid - the terminal Disney feature to utilize manus-painted acetate cels...Beauty and the Animal, Disney's next hit animation characteristic, was the start to use, instead of hand-painted cels, Disney's "CAPS" computer-generated characters.
^ McCall, Douglas Fifty. (1998). "The Black Cauldron". Film Cartoons: A Guide to 20th Century American Blithe Features and Shorts: fifteen. [The Black Cauldron was] The first movie to utilize Disney'south revolutionary Animation Photo Transfer Process, which transfers drawings to cells with greater speed and resolution than the usual Xeroxing Method;
^ Coulson, William R. (Jan 1995). "The Art of Disney and Sotheby's". Animation Magazine. 8 (2): 72. ISSN 1041-617X. Retrieved March 19, 2017. A cel-animated feature requires over 100,000 manus-painted cels, and then from Beauty there was plainly far less production artwork.
^ Coulson, William R. (January 1995). "The Art of Disney and Sotheby'south". Animation Magazine. viii (2): 72. ISSN 1041-617X. Retrieved March 19, 2017. Prices at the Roger Rabbit sale went through the roof. One cel, depicting a large group of characters, sold for $fifty,600!
^ O'Brian, Dave (January one, 1990). "The Daffy Demand for Cels". The Washington Post . Retrieved March 19, 2017.
^ Disney Store Itemize, June 1993