Max Fleischer's rotoscope patent.

Hey guys, good to be back after a short trip! I see a lot of things have happened in the meantime, like the biggest auction sale of classic original animation art (more on that in the next post). First, let's pick up were we left it, Okay?

So, in my previous post I was talking about Max Fleischer's early Superman cartoons from the 1940's and how his studio used a process called 'Rotoscoping' to come up with correct phyical human behaviour to make sure all animations would look good. Remember, Superman and his pals were supposed to look accurately, like they were designed by Siegel and Shuster, which means their proportions matched the human body as nature intended it, instead of the many, funny and cartoony characters the animators at Fleischer's studio were familiar with, who could stretch and squeeze into any form (like their 'Koko the clown' character).

Fleischer had a great interest in mechanics and a knack for drawing machinery. He also worked as an editor for 'Popular Science Monthly' while working as a cartoonist for the newspapers. So it's not that strange that Max came up with his own invention, The rotoscope, which enabled his artists to 'trace' footage of live action actors, who were filmed beforehand.  Though to think of it as purely tracing live action would not do justice to the talented artists, who created all these beloved classic cartoons and features, the rotoscope would often be used as a way of having reference footage that the artist would use to build his own artwork upon.

Above: Fleischer used russian wrestler Karol Krauser (originally named Karol Piwoworczyk) to stand model for their Superman and act out all the spectacular movements that make Superman a true hero, well... beside flying of course! Krauser was part of the popular Kalmikoff brothers wrestling group in the 1950's and '60's.


Patent No. 1242674A

Fleischer had patented his invention in 1915 and used it heavily for his 'Out of the inkwell' animated shorts in 1918-1919 and his later feature film 'Gulliver's travels' from 1939. Rotoscoping was used later by many studios (including Disney) to help them overcome the same problems and draw anatomically correct animations, in fact, it was stil in use in 2000, when Don Bluth produced his feature 'Titan A.E.' Now of course, with 3D computer animation, the artists use motion-capture which can be seen as a digital equivalent of the rotoscoping process I guess.

Check out Max Fleischer's original patent No. 1242674A below, dated  and signed October 9, 1917, which  was applied for as early as December 6, 1915. Well, at least bureaucracy hasn't changed much in all those time! Classic stuff! (Click to enlarge, to actually read this amazing stuff, click it again after it has opened up).