Screen Arts 8/8

1970-1979 Games and Animation

France - Serge Danot made the pilot for The Magic Roundabout tv series which lasted for 500 episodes between 1963 and 1970. It was this year that Dougal and the Blue Cat was released.



UK - Kama Sutra Rides Again is a 1971 animation made by Bob Godfrey. This x-rated animation focused on a surreal/fantastic protrayal of a middle-aged couples sexual antics. Got nominated for an OSCAR



Pong! (Dear god) 1972, created by Nolan Bushnell and Al Alcorn from their company Atari.

The Fantastic Planet(1973) is a weird, drug trip movie about an alien society that keep humans as pets. Its based on a novel called Oms en Serie by Stefan Wul and created by Rene Laloux.



1973 was the release of 101 Basic Computer Games by David Ahl.

Renzo and Sayoko Kinoshita created Made in Japan in 1972. The subject was how the Japanese culture put the economy before anything else. Pica-don(1978) is a well made animation retelling the hiroshima bombing, particularly one scene where the camera spins around and up as the guy is watching a plane fly over is amazing to me.



France/Poland - Piotr Kamler made an experimental stop motion film in 1974 called Le Pas (The Step)



Before they created Studio Ghibli, Hayao Miyazaki and Isao Takahata created a tv series adaptation of Heidi in 1974. Howls Moving Castle from Studio Ghibli is a beautiful film, probably my favourite from these guys.



Also in 1974, Maze Wars was created using wire frame graphics.



Ivo Caprino from Norway is credited with perfecting the real time manipulation of characters in animatronics. Created The Pinchcliffe Grand Prix in 1975 after spending 3.5yrs working on it. Spent 28yrs being shown daily in some theatres.



1975 was when Atari released the home version of Pong, selling their units through Sears and Roebucks sporting goods.

In Hungary, William Feigenbaum and Jozsef Gemes created the film Hugo the Hippo in 1975 which although it was for children, it became a cult favourite with adults. This was the first feature length animation from Hungary to be released world wide.



Lillian F Schwartz was a resident artist and consultant at Bell Laboratories between 1969 and 2002. She was a developer of techniques to enable the use of computers by artists to create works. Newtonian I and II in 1978 as an example.




The origin of The Smurfs was in 1958 by Peyo as a comic strip for a belgian magazine. 10 black and white animated shorts were made for tv in the 1960's. The Smurfs and the Magic Flute was a feature length colour film made in 1976 by Peyo and Eddie Lateste. Hanna-Barbera released an animated tv series in 1981 which became a pre-cursor to the american release of The Smurfs and the Magic Flute in 1983.



1976 - Adventure is Don Woods attempt at a text based game inspired by D&D(1974). Reminds me of Discworld, a text based rpg based on Terry Pratchetts books.

Discworld


Italy's Bruno Bozzetto created Allegro Non Troppo in 1976 using a mixture of live action and animation to explore different aspects of life.
Also in 1976 Exidy releases Death Race, the first game to set off video games and violence debates.

Yoram Gross created Dot and the Kangaroo in 1977, layering animated characters over photographic backgrounds. It has 7 prequels.



Jeff Keen from the UK made The Cartoon Theatre of Dr Gaz in 1977. Another person that mixed animation with live action film, adding in bit of sci-fi movie sections that he stole and painting.

In 1977 Atari released the video computer system or Atari 2600. This early console came with a joystick, interchangeable cartridges and switches for difficulty levels and games.



Watership Down in 1978 was created by Martin Rosen. This was based on a dark/violent book by Richard Adams, and was labelled a family friendly film but I would definitely not recommend it for kids.



1978 was when Space Invaders was released in Japan. It was so popular there was a shortage of 100-yen coins. It took a year for 60,000 of these machines to pop up in US. As a side effect of this game, the more enemies you removed from the screen, the faster the remaining ones moved. This initially wasnt an intended game mechanic but has become commonplace today.



UK's Roger Mainwood directed the short Autobahn in 1979, using a computer at Imperial College in London, but sadly the images he produced werent used much in the final film, sticking mostly with traditional 2D techniques. Halas and Batchler was a pioneering studio using CG as early as 1969.

Mattel released the Intellivision in 1979, with better graphics and controls than the Atari 2600 and selling over 3 million units.



Zdenko Gasparovic from Croatia is another artist who worked for Zagreb Film and directed A Dog's Life in 1966. He also worked for Hanna-Barbera whilst in the USA before returning to Croatia and working on a series called Professor Balthazar.



Yuriy Norshteyn(Yuri Norstein)

He is a russian animator that was born in 1941. He uses layered glass panes to create a 3D animation, spreading them apart and moving individual planes to create his pieces. His first solo film was The Fox and the Rabbit in 1973, using his wife's art and animated using the Cutout technique.



1974 was The Heron and the Crane, depicting the never ending courtship between a male crane and female heron.



Hedgehog in the Fog(1975)



Tale of Tales in 1979 was described as the Citizen Cane of animation, it was a follow-up to Hedgehog in the Fog. "Experts: in 1984 declared it the best animated film ever made.



Tale of Tales was Yuri's last released film, he has been working on an adaptation of The Overcoat since 1981 and completed half of it so far. This is the longest production time of any animated film in history.

Homework: Watch one of Yuri's films and review on blog.