Behind the Scenes of an Animated Film
Feb. 25, 2007 — -- The Academy Award for best animated feature wasn't given out for the first time until 2001. But ever since, it has become a closely watched category as critics and fans realize that cartoons are no longer just kid stuff.
When "Flowers and Trees" premiered in 1932, audiences were wowed by the first cartoon in color. The animated film also earned its creator, Walt Disney, his first Academy Award win.
"The Disney cartoons were really so much more advanced over the ones being done at the other studios in Hollywood, that Walt Disney won the Academy Award every single year for the rest of that decade for best cartoon," said Dave Smith, chief archivist of the Walt Disney Archives.
But things have changed. Today, animated films are big business -- and not just for kids. They generate huge profits into the hundreds of millions of dollars.
Still, with great reward comes great risk and no one understands that more than the animators themselves. "Good Morning America Weekend Edition's" Marysol Castro was given a behind-the-scenes tour.
In Disney's animation nerve center, a team of artists and animators are working on their latest project "Meet the Robinsons." The film is about a boy who travels in a time machine to the future.
"This is our high-tech, super-high-tech method of making an animated movie: We draw pictures on paper," said storyboard artist Don Hall. "I know we're giving away our Disney secret. We draw pictures on paper."
According to Hall, one storyboard with many drawings represents about an eighth of a scene.
Dick Zondag is the animation wizard responsible for the wily, conniving bowler hat character in the film.
"He tends to have snaky type movements sometimes, which helps give him a slightly evil, evil-er look to him," Zondag said.
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