From Felix the Cat to Ani­me, the jour­ney of ani­ma­tion has seen incred­i­ble tech­no­log­i­cal advance­ments, shift­ing from ear­ly meth­ods like hand-drawn images to the sophis­ti­cat­ed com­put­er-gen­er­at­ed ani­ma­tions we see today. The first forms of ani­ma­tion began with sta­t­ic draw­ings pro­ject­ed using devices such as the “mag­ic lantern,” a pre­cur­sor to mod­ern film pro­jec­tors. The mag­ic lantern allowed artists to dis­play their paint­ings or draw­ings in a way that brought them to life, though in a very rudi­men­ta­ry form com­pared to today’s high-tech tech­niques. With time, ani­ma­tion tech­nol­o­gy evolved, and by the ear­ly 20th cen­tu­ry, the first tru­ly ani­mat­ed char­ac­ter, Felix the Cat, was cre­at­ed by Pat Sul­li­van and Otto Mess­mer in 1919. This mis­chie­vous cat became a sym­bol of ear­ly ani­ma­tion, appear­ing in numer­ous films, shorts, and TV shows, cement­ing the idea of ani­ma­tion as an enter­tain­ment medi­um.

Man­ga, a dis­tinct form of Japan­ese car­toon art, has its ori­gins in the late 1800s. Though it has sev­er­al gen­res, the ren­der­ing of human fig­ures in man­ga has remained strik­ing­ly sim­i­lar across dif­fer­ent artists and time peri­ods. Man­ga laid the foun­da­tion for what would become a glob­al ani­ma­tion cul­ture, even­tu­al­ly evolv­ing into what we now know as ani­me. This genre’s dis­tinc­tive style, with exag­ger­at­ed expres­sions and emo­tion­al sto­ry­telling, has made it one of the most influ­en­tial forms of ani­ma­tion world­wide. In 2016, it was report­ed that Japan­ese ani­me com­prised 60% of the world’s ani­mat­ed TV shows, demon­strat­ing its sig­nif­i­cant impact on glob­al ani­ma­tion trends. The pop­u­lar­i­ty of ani­me has con­tin­ued to grow, with icon­ic shows and films influ­enc­ing var­i­ous art forms and becom­ing an inte­gral part of mod­ern pop cul­ture.

The ear­ly meth­ods of ani­ma­tion relied heav­i­ly on man­u­al labor, such as cel ani­ma­tion, which required artists to draw each frame by hand on cel­lu­loid sheets. These sheets were then placed over sta­t­ic back­grounds and pro­ject­ed as a mov­ing image. Cel ani­ma­tion, while a ground­break­ing tech­nique, was incred­i­bly time-con­sum­ing and required thou­sands of frames for even short films. For instance, a sin­gle fea­ture film could require over 100,000 cels. This labor-inten­sive method began to give way to the use of com­put­er-gen­er­at­ed imagery (CGI) in the 1990s. CGI allowed for more flu­id motion and more intri­cate visu­als, chang­ing the way ani­ma­tions were cre­at­ed for­ev­er. The 1995 release of Toy Sto­ry, the first ful­ly CGI-ani­mat­ed fea­ture film, marked a turn­ing point in the ani­ma­tion indus­try, with CGI becom­ing the dom­i­nant tech­nique for ani­mat­ed films.

Not all ani­ma­tion tech­niques fol­lowed the same evo­lu­tion, though. Ear­ly ani­ma­tion pio­neers like Richard Tre­vithick, who invent­ed the first steam loco­mo­tive, used mechan­i­cal tech­nol­o­gy to make ani­ma­tion pos­si­ble. Like­wise, roto­scop­ing, devel­oped by Max Fleis­ch­er in the ear­ly 20th cen­tu­ry, was anoth­er break­through tech­nique that allowed for more life­like move­ment by trac­ing over live-action footage. Roto­scop­ing pro­vid­ed a new lay­er of real­ism to ani­mat­ed char­ac­ters and was wide­ly used in both films and TV shows. Though its use has dimin­ished over the years, it still occa­sion­al­ly makes an appear­ance in mod­ern ani­ma­tion, show­cas­ing the last­ing impact of ear­ly tech­no­log­i­cal inno­va­tions.

Through­out the 20th cen­tu­ry, ani­ma­tion expand­ed into tele­vi­sion, with icon­ic char­ac­ters like Scoo­by-Doo and Pop­eye becom­ing house­hold names. Iwao Takamoto’s cre­ation of Scoo­by-Doo in 1969, for exam­ple, was a unique blend of whim­sy and fun that attract­ed audi­ences of all ages. Takamoto’s deci­sion to make Scoo­by-Doo a Great Dane, despite being told to make him more men­ac­ing, high­lights the cre­ativ­i­ty behind ani­ma­tion that aimed to enter­tain as well as tell a sto­ry. At the same time, char­ac­ters like Pop­eye, cre­at­ed by E.C. Segar in 1929, became cul­tur­al icons, though the character’s exag­ger­at­ed mas­culin­i­ty and aggres­sive nature would be con­sid­ered out­dat­ed by mod­ern stan­dards. These icon­ic fig­ures helped to define the gold­en age of ani­ma­tion, blend­ing humor and social com­men­tary that res­onat­ed with audi­ences world­wide.

The influ­ence of ani­ma­tion also extend­ed beyond tra­di­tion­al car­toons into mod­ern inter­net cul­ture, with char­ac­ters like Pepe the Frog. Cre­at­ed by artist Matt Furie in 2005, Pepe became an inter­net meme in the 2010s, though its asso­ci­a­tion with extrem­ist groups has com­pli­cat­ed its lega­cy. Pepe’s evo­lu­tion demon­strates how ani­ma­tion can tran­scend its ori­gins to become part of glob­al dig­i­tal cul­ture. Mean­while, in the world of ani­me, films like Aki­ra (1988) set new stan­dards for sto­ry­telling and visu­al art, influ­enc­ing count­less oth­er films and TV shows. The cyber­punk aes­thet­ic and dystopi­an themes of Aki­ra had a pro­found impact on West­ern and East­ern cre­ators alike, solid­i­fy­ing ani­me as a genre capa­ble of tack­ling deep, com­plex themes.

The ani­ma­tion indus­try today con­tin­ues to build on the foun­da­tions laid by ear­ly pio­neers. From tra­di­tion­al hand-drawn car­toons to mod­ern CGI and ani­me, ani­ma­tion has evolved into one of the most influ­en­tial art forms glob­al­ly. The industry’s growth is reflect­ed in its reach, with ani­mat­ed TV shows and films cap­ti­vat­ing audi­ences of all ages. The suc­cess of The Lion King (2019) and oth­er ani­mat­ed films at the box office fur­ther demon­strates the pow­er of ani­ma­tion as an enter­tain­ment medi­um. As tech­nol­o­gy con­tin­ues to advance, the pos­si­bil­i­ties for ani­ma­tion are lim­it­less, allow­ing cre­ators to push the bound­aries of sto­ry­telling, art, and cul­ture. From Felix the Cat to ani­me, the evo­lu­tion of ani­ma­tion has been a tes­ta­ment to the cre­ativ­i­ty and inno­va­tion of count­less artists, tech­ni­cians, and sto­ry­tellers.