Pronunciation ChallengeWhy cartoon characters wear gloves

[Transcript]

Intro

Hey guys, great to have you here! New friends, hello! And old friends, thanks for tuning in again! Today I’d like to begin by talking about cartoons and animation. Animation is the process of taking still, static images and adding them together as a sequence to make them appear as though they’re moving.

Did you know that in the early days of animation, movies were all drawn by hand? The artists used to draw the scenes frame by frame, creating movement and story this way. Animation technique has come a long way since then and movies today are mostly done with state-of-the-art software on powerful computers. If we trace all the way back to ancient times, some people consider early Grecian pottery as an early form of animation, depicting scenes of movement and expressions along its surface, like a comic strip. Shadow puppetry is said to have originated in China over two thousand years ago during the Han Dynasty. There’s also something called the magic lantern which was developed in the 17th century where images were projected using an optical lens, painted glass slides, and candlelight.

The basis for today’s animation was created around 200 years ago. This is the technique of creating sequences of drawings, where each one is only slightly different from another. For example, have you ever tried making a flip book (a.k.a. kineograph)? I remember I used to draw a series of doodles of a boy on a skateboard on the bottom corners of my school textbook. I would repeat my doodles and change it slightly on each page. Then when I’ve finished, I would enjoy flipping through the pages really fast to see an illusion of a moving animation.

The most famous animation company in the world is Disney of course. But in fact, before Disney was formed there were many other companies that produced and sold animation movies. So what made Disney so big and famous? In fact, in the early days Walt Disney, the founder of the company, wasn’t very successful. He got frustrated working for other people, he decided to never work for other people again. He started up his own company and after two unsuccessful movies, he finally found success when he created a mouse character named Mickey, and the rest is history.

Disney always stayed on the cutting edge of technology, and pioneered new ways of making animation and telling stories. In my mind, Disney’s main strength was how well they could tell a story. And that is probably more important than any technology. A good story is the drive behind every successful piece of art. These days, Disney is the leader in creation and distribution of animation films. What will animation look like 50 years from now? Perhaps in the future, we’ll be sitting in our living rooms surrounded by animated characters, watching and experiencing a story from this point of view? Or perhaps we will be able to create our own stories just by the power of thought and imagination? It is truly fascinating to think about what the options might be.

Ok, let’s stop here and listen to our pronunciation challenge sentence.

Sentence:
So in addition to saving time and providing color contrast, gloves bring non-human things to life, making their grand gestures stand out.


Pronunciation tips:
Contrast
Gloves
Gestures

Vocab:
1.
contrast KK[ˋkɑn͵træst] IPA/ˈkɑːn.træst/
(n.) an obvious difference between two or more things

Example: Although they are brothers, there is a big contrast in personalities.


2.
in addition to
(phr.) as well (as)

Example: In addition to a side dish, you also get a drink of your choice with the meal.


3.
stand out
(phr.) to be very noticeable

Example: Cayden always stood out because he was the tallest in his class.

Outro:

It is believed that Walt Disney became the first animator to put white gloves on Mickey Mouse when he made The Opry House in 1929. Prior to that, Mickey's hands were just big black circles. Remember how animations were still in black and white back in the days? White gloves allowed the audience to distinguish the hands better when they appeared against the black bodies. Also, it made the characters seem more human-like, as mentioned in our featured sentence today. I think it’s a very nice touch! The animated characters look much cuter this way! OK, it’s time to wrap up the episode. Remember to record your sentence and if you’d like, you can leave a comment and share with us your favourite animation film or character! Bye-bye for now.

Day 274

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