"60 Years of Hong Kong Animation" Exhibition
March 2012, written by Emily Wong
During the opening ceremony for this "60 Years of Hong Kong Animation" on the 19 March, it is a celebration and as well a reunion of local animation. Animation is for enjoyment, it is a mixture of passion and care and hardworking.
Love to see John's pupils all coming back, it is warm! And all the original artworks and pieces from all our dear animators and Neco, and the Oxberry animation system from The HK Film Archive (which is donated by John); and the beautiful design and layout of all the promotional materials and setting from Colan; and the great trophy design from Mak Siu Fung; and of course the efforts from all our b&s of HKAFS; and final but not the least, the wonderful music and songs played by some of my talent artists friends which to enhance and highlight the whole things, thank you all! And it is just the beginning. — at HKCEC Grand Hall.
Photo Link:
Video
recording during the opening reception of the 60 years of hk animation.
Video
Link:
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香港動畫60年陪我長大
■撰文：Sandy ■攝影：Dennis
「如果有太多牛奶味，朱古力味冇掟企，等到朱古力味返番嚟，牛奶味又唔爭氣！」大家會不會跟著一起唱以上的歌詞？除了廣告歌之外，你又會否記得它的動畫製作呢？
1982年維他朱古力奶廣告的手稿。
是次展覽，主要讓業界和學生參觀。
在《成語動畫廊》中，除了主角熊貓博士和YY，不同的製作人參與製作成語故事中的動畫，因每個故事都不一樣，不用怕「不連戲」。圖為守株待兔篇的手稿。
一份手稿畫好之後，接著分層次，一張膠片只畫一個層次，最後把所有膠片疊起來，形成一個鏡頭。這個好處是方便鏡頭的拼湊，只需更換要動的層次便可。
動畫攝影台猶如小型電影製作，有攝影機和打燈的設備。
盧sir講解這個動畫攝影台的操作原理。
1981年，香港首部動畫長片《老夫子》上映。
早期的動畫師受迪士尼的動畫影響很深，林紀陶笑說：「連熊貓博士的手指，都和米奇老鼠一樣，只有4隻手指。」
動畫還會出不少周邊商品，提高知名度。
鍾志行（左）表示南方的動畫人比較喜歡麥兜；而北方的則以《阿凡達》為奮鬥目標。
黃宏顯在研討會上分享到印度工作的經驗。
林紀陶認為香港暫未能有突破性的發展，只能夠保持水準，但內地已出現人才斷層的情況。
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The Footprint of Hong Kong Animation
By Keeto
Lam
Editor’s
Note: Film critic and historian Keeto Lam did a presentation at the 60 Years of
Hong Kong Animation event and was kind enough to provide AWN with a great
synopsis of the history of animation in Hong Kong.
Animation
production in Hong Kong has been around roughly for sixty years. It is not
until recently that it has been recognized and appreciated as a respected
industry.
As early
as in the 20’s, when movie making was just emerging, the four Wan brothers of
Shanghai had already been considering making an animation film. In the 40’s,
Wan lai-min and his twin Wan gu-chen came south to Hong Kong to look for
filming resources. They used their
animation "Princess Iron Fan", released in ’41 in Shanghai, as part
of the Hong Kong film"Father and Son" which was directed by Shuen Wei
in 1953. The “Movie within movie” format
made the record as the earliest animation in Hong Kong. Until 50’s to 60’s, Hong Kong animation
pioneer Mr. Lo kei-ping used self-developed special animation technique to produce the early special effect
films such as"The Buddha's Palm"in ’64(a series of seven films). A
lot of animations were hand drawn onto the film stock, without optical
synthesis. Those “hand drawn” film
copies were extremely precious.
During
’64, the founder of US animation company UPA, Mr. Steven Bosustow, came to Hong
Kong and formed an animation company with Mr. Lin Jie of The China Paint
Company, with the intention of making an animation title "The Red
Child". It fostered people such as
Au Ching, Dick Wong, John Kay and Chan Ding Chung. Although the project was
turned down finally, they adopted one man band practice and produced quite a
lot of popular animated commercials.
Adding animated TV commercials produced by Hong Kong Film Company, a
company founded by Woo shu yue in the 70’s, it had made great impression to all
the Hong Kong people at that time.
In the
mid-70’s, a group of movie enthusiasts established The Phoenix Cine Club, which
promoted making independent short films.
At around that time, the Extramural Studies of the Chinese University
started a short workshop in animation.
Its students produced many independent animation short films.
The
creative atmosphere in making short films in Hong Kong in the 70’s was hot. A
lot of such creators emerged. Most of them used super 8 for production. But
still quite a lot of them used the more expensive film type of 16mm. Later on,
a lot of independent filmmakers joined the animation team of TV station and
became the core members of professional animators in the early days.
Independent
animation in Hong Kong fostered one-man-band animation creative characteristic.
The animator built his own style independently.
When they were part of a large organization, due to the industrial
system was not yet in place, they were able to have the special roles of sole
creators.
In 1976,
the Art Department of RTHK and TVB had started their own animation team. They
produced many self-made titles for drama programs, and animation clips for News
reports. In ’79, Mr.Lee Shum taught an
animation production course for Hong Kong Film Culture Centre. It was also the first time in Hong Kong a
certificate course in animation consisted of both theory and production. Between ’79 & ’82, TVB and RTHK showed a
lot of influential animated short films.
Youth program "The Banana Boat Show" and "430 Space
Shuttle" in ’82 were some of the major programs that consisted of many
animated shorts in every episode.
Hong
Kong’s first animation organization, Single Frame, was founded in 1982. Its
objective was to liaise and promote animation in Hong Kong and overseas. At the same time, it organized animation show
on a monthly base, published magazines and implemented animation promotional
activities. These animators growing up
in the 80’s, especially growing from creative independent into animation
professionals such as someone like Neco Lo, Keeto Lam, Roger Ho and Aaron Yeung
were professional pioneers who established the characteristics of Hong Kong
animation.
The 4 to
6 panels comic "Old Master Q", by cartoonist, Mr. Wong Chak, had been
popular since the 60’s. It had then been
adapted and used real castings for six movies.
In ’81, initiated by Mr. Woo shu-yue, three"Old Master
Q"feature animations were made by joining forces with Taiwan
animators. It showed that Hong Kong did
have creative animators, but not production talents. It had been the problem of Hong Kong all
along. It was due to the fact that Hong
Kong’s education then tended to overlook the nurturing of art.
In the
80’s, a bunch of mainland animators came south and became a new force among
animators in Hong Kong. In 1982, Mr. Lee
Shum founded an animation company called HK-Animation. He intended to introduce Taiwanese animation
processing factory to Hong Kong but was not successful.
In the
same year, big budget special effect movies had also emerged. We had movies such as "Star Crazy"
and "Zu: Warriors from the magic mountain" were all due to the popularity
of the Hollywood movie Star Wars.
In 1986,
Mr. Run Run Shaw formed Jade Animation Ltd. in Shenzhen and produced the first
TV animation series in Hong Kong, they were "The animated Idiom"and
"Little Monkey King". He made use of China factory to solve the
problem of shortage of manpower in Hong Kong.
In the same year, film director Tsui Hark established special effect
department CINEMAX. It specialized in making movie special effect, such as
optical animation, special model effect and special effect make-up. It went on to become an influential special
effect company in both Hong Kong and Taiwan.
The
appearance of" Jurassic Park" in ’94 brought visual media into the
digital technology era. Centro digital
pictures and Menfond were formed and become major forces in digital special
effect in Hong Kong lately. Some of
their well-known production included "Shaolin Soccer", "Kung Fu
Hustle" and "Old Master Q 2001", etc.
Entering
millennium, the popularity of computer animation programs had turned 3D
animation into a sunny industry. Many
young people entered it, even one-man company appeared. Nowadays, a lot of colleges have animation
and comic courses. We encounter many
student works in 3D animation every year. Mainland TV animations have many Hong
Kong people participated in its creative process. Launched in 2001, "The Life of
Mcdull" had proved that even having extremely tight budget and man power,
one could still produce good quality feature animation in Hong Kong, this film
had won many awards in Hong Kong and abroad. "The secret of Bo Wu Lo"
was jointly produced by Walt Disney company, mainland China investors and Hong
Kong, it also won that year’s Best Children’s Film of Golden Rooster Award in
China,"Astroboy", a production of Imagi Studios, its 3D animation
technique had reached international standard.
In the meantime, a lot of mainstream film directors had joined the
animation industry.
Up until
2007, the data shows that there are 260 digital entertainment production
companies in Hong Kong. Among them, 30% are into animation, 45% are in the
business of Game Software. Adding those one-man companies and freelancers,
there are over 5000 workers in digital animation/comic industry. On top of
that, independent animation field produces a lot of new forces every year, as
well as new stars.
This is
the full blooming stage of 3D animation.
We animators in Hong Kong will also move from 2D to the new era. We look
forward to what is in store in the future!
