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Limited animation
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=== United States === {{main|Animation in the United States in the television era}} [[File:The_Lunar_Luger.webm|thumb|right|An episode of ''[[Colonel Bleep]]'', a 1957 animated serial that relied extensively on limited animation]][[Hanna-Barbera Productions]] used limited animation throughout its existence. When the company's namesakes, [[William Hanna]] and [[Joseph Barbera]], separated from the [[Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer cartoon studio|MGM studio]] in 1957, they opted to take a drastically different approach to animation than they had for their fully animated short films; as television screens were much smaller than theater screens at the time, limited animation, with its emphasis on character close-ups and dialogue-based humor, was a better fit for the more intimate home viewer experience.<ref>{{cite book |ref = Hanna & Ito |last1 = Hanna |first1 = William |last2 = Ito |first2 = Tom |title = A Cast of Friends |url = https://archive.org/details/castoffriends00hann |url-access = registration |year = 1996 |publisher = Taylor Pub |isbn = 978-1250040497 |pages = [https://archive.org/details/castoffriends00hann/page/77 77–87]}}</ref> At the time, most feature films (along with animated shorts, including Hanna and Barbera's own work on ''[[Tom and Jerry]]'') were transitioning to the widescreen [[CinemaScope]] process, which made it more difficult to replicate intimacy; [[The Walt Disney Company]], though they continued to use full animation, had also used character close-ups and personality-driven humor in their early films. When Disney produced ''[[Lady and the Tramp]]'' in CinemaScope, the process made it difficult to replicate that style,<ref name="archivelandt">{{cite web|work=Disney Archives|title=Lady and the Tramp History|url=https://disney.go.com/vault/archives/movies/ladytramp/ladytramp.html|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070224175329/http://disney.go.com/vault/archives/movies/ladytramp/ladytramp.html|archive-date=February 24, 2007}}</ref> a problem that Hanna-Barbera did not have with smaller, more square television screens. The financial benefits of limited animation led to television animation companies relying on the process extensively in the television era. [[Jay Ward Productions]] relied on limited animation for those reasons,<ref name="cataroo.com">{{cite web|url=http://www.cataroo.com/cst_ROCKY.html|title=Rocky & Bullwinkle|publisher=Cataroo.com|access-date=2012-09-28}}</ref> compensating with its heavy [[Cold War]] satire and a style of [[deadpan]] comedy that would become a trademark of the studio's style.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://cagle.msnbc.com/hogan/interviews/anderson/home.asp|title=Alex Anderson interview|date=26 October 2010|work=Hogan's Alley |url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101026035438/http://cagle.msnbc.com/hogan/interviews/anderson/home.asp|archive-date=26 October 2010}}</ref> One of the frequent users of limited animation was HB's Saturday-morning rival [[Filmation]] (makers of ''[[He-Man and the Masters of the Universe]]'' and ''[[BraveStarr]]'') which gave their work a distinct look.<ref>[https://archive.today/20130425041805/http://www.bcdb.com/cartoons/Filmation_Associates/ Filmation Associates Studio Directory|BCDB]</ref> [[Bill Melendez]] used a form of limited animation to adapt the ''[[Peanuts]]'' franchise to television and later film; in addition to the cost and time concerns (especially for his first special ''[[A Charlie Brown Christmas]]'', which was given only a $76,000 budget and four months to produce 30 minutes of animation), Meléndez also noted that ''Peanuts'' creator [[Charles M. Schulz]] had designed the characters with a flat style well-suited for limited animation.<ref>{{cite book|last=Mendelson|first=Lee|title=A Charlie Brown Christmas: The Making of a Tradition|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=5VTe58NwxPMC|year=2013|publisher=It Books|isbn=978-0-06-227214-0}}</ref> The short-lived Cambria Studios turned out three [[Serial (radio and television)|serials]] (including ''[[Clutch Cargo]]'') using one of the most inexpensive approaches to animation possible: known as [[Syncro-Vox]], it involved superimposing film of the voice actor's moving lips over a still frame of the character.<ref>"Don't believe your eyes! How 'Clutch Cargo' cuts corners as a television comic strip", ''TV Guide'', December 24, 1960, pp. 28-29.</ref><ref>[https://www.tvguide.com/tvshows/clutch-cargo/cast/1030235618/ Clutch Cargo - TV Guide]</ref> Disney themselves resorted to some limited animation tricks in an effort to cut its budget during the 1960s, particularly with its usage of [[xerography]] in ''[[One Hundred and One Dalmatians]]'', which resulted in artwork with heavier, rougher outlines than had previously been seen in Disney films up to that point.<ref>{{Cite web |date=June 2, 2021 |title=How 'One Hundred and One Dalmatians' Saved Disney |url=https://getpocket.com/explore/item/how-one-hundred-and-one-dalmatians-saved-disney |access-date=2022-06-01 |website=Smithsonian Magazine |language=en}}</ref> By the 1970s, the usage of limited animation in [[Saturday morning cartoon]]s had become pervasive. Walter Williams, creator of ''[[Mr. Bill|The Mr. Bill Show]]'', noted that cartoons in the 1970s were so static, he expected the artist's hands to enter the screen at any moment and physically start moving the drawings around. This inspired him to create the "Mr. Hands" character in ''The Mr. Bill Show'', who literally did just that.<ref>{{Cite book|title=The Mr. Bill Show|last=Williams|first=Walter|date=1998-08-01|publisher=Running Pr|isbn=9780894710858|location=Philadelphia|language=en}}</ref>
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