Animation Source Forums

Hello I am wondering if anyone knows how Balto or its sequels were made, I am learning animation and I was inspired by this film to finally begin my journey ahead. I Know that several members here posted drawn story plots, characters, and several other fascinating information about the film so please share your knowledge with me in any way possible, thanks.

There's more to a animated film than what can be said here. If you're interested in animation, I would suggest asking somewhere other than AS for better information.

If you're looking into making your own film, this has been tried time and time again with no success. It just isn't possible.

Yeah your right it is a hard task to accomplish but I must at least give it what I can, so do you have any recommendations to start learning, I just really want to learn the steps that the Balto team took in order to create such a film, oh and thank you for responding to my question.

If you're interested in learning animation as a career opportunity, I would look into finding a college course on animation. Otherwise I would just look around online for some tutorials.

Like I said before, there's a TON of work that goes into a animated film (or any film in general). It isn't impossible in this day in age for people to create their own animated shorts, but I think some people just don't realize what they're getting themselves into.

I think this video on how Walt Disney made his films will give you an insight:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mhfp6Z8z1cI

Thank you for the link Mighty, I am currently learning from tutorials from Youtube from ex animators and have learned a lot from watching classic Walt Disney animations and how they were achieved, without the technology that we have now it would take a lot of individuals to accomplish such a task but I hope that from what we have now it would become easier to make an animated film but until I learn for sure that it could not be done with only few individuals then all I could do is hope and continue on with this project.

I forgot to ask another question Mighty, who made this web page and what is its purpose? Oh and do you know if there is a created forum about the film's technical aspects such as frames per second used, I would really appreciated if you could direct me to it if there is one.

Steet did, and this is a fan site (which is unofficial)... It even says that at the top of every page. As for frame rate, the standard is 24 frames per second.

http://www.animationsource.org/hub/en/custom/&nump=5638

From what I understand, the Balto movies were made in traditional two-dimensional animation. Figures drawn on "cels", one for each segment of its animation (resulting in many hundreds of cels being made), and then combined with still-painted backgrounds.

You could also learn a great deal from the great animators, artists and directors who worked at Warner Brothers' "Termite Terrace", where the famous Looney Tunes cartoons were made. Here are some videos that you can look at when you want to devote the time:

Thank you JerseyCaptain and Might for taking your valuable time in providing resource regarding animation, and thank Steet for me as this webpage has great quality and a lot of resources for animation fans. I have seen a behind the scenes video that one of the members filmed while celebrating and I heard them mention that they used cells and painted the backgrounds with oil paint but what do you think of the possibility of personally contacting some of the remaining members of the team, has It been done before by others?

Mighty has mentioned that other people before me have tried creating a full-length animated film before, I Know it takes a lot of work and resource but is that it or am I missing something because it seems that something stopped them but I really do not know why, was it the impossibility of the task, but what makes this task an impossibility other than time and the work you implement to the work that it will take which will depend on you and your team's knowledge and experience in animation. Sorry if I seem like I am asking a lot of questions but if Mighty is correct I do not want to do something that was or is impossible but If it can be done with today's personal technology then I am willing to work even if takes a very long time. About the resources I mentioned I studied some of the original art work and oil painted backgrounds and without using any vector based animating software like pencil2d, maybe to get the same quality as the original film ArtRage or any other digital drawing/painting software could be used to paint the backgrounds and characters when in the final stage of refining the art but if I am still missing something please do not hesitate in telling me, oh and thank you for your time.

Actually, there are no production cels for Balto. Balto was animated different from normal 2-D animated films. The only available cels for Balto were non-production ones.

I know that the backgrounds were hand painted with oil based paint but I believe that the animation was done using cells then transferred onto digital. The reason why they transferred onto digital is still unknown to me but I am currently working to my best of my ability to learn everything from old and new methods of animations especially in animated films.

Oh and did they use visual effects on for the snow or was it done by hand as well? I ask because Wings of Change had water that seemed digital rather than traditionally drawn onto the animation.

The cels were drawn out on paper, then scanned and colored digitally using a program they created themselves (which was based off a program called "Toonz"). As to why they did it this way, my guess is the 90's was a transitional time in the animation world. Much like how films are 3D now.

Edit: For the special effects (snow fall) a particle system was used. Balto was likely the first 2D feature film (according to my press kit) to use a particle system.

Thank you Mighty this information is very useful, so I have an idea of the backgrounds, character drawings, and sort of the animation used in the film but does anyone here know what method or technique if any did they use to record the voices needed and sound effects(weather, background, etc.). I know that James Horner created the music for the film and his team of orchestral musicians but I think FL Studio or any other similar program could be used to create beautiful film scores especially if you work with these programs for quite some time.

I would assume they got the sound effects from a professional source - maybe someone who records nature sounds for a living or something. As for voice acting, I know that in some movies they record the lines from a script, put them to the animation, have the actors watch it, and then do a second recording to get a more polished version (this was apparently very helpful to at least one of the actors in Racing Stripes, which is where I learned about that approach). There may also be some collaboration with the voice actors to bring the characters more into line with how they (the actors) would like them to be, as was done with Dom DeLuise for the character of Jeremy in The Secret of NIMH. I don't know if either approach was used in any of the Balto movies, but they might have been.

Thank you for your input Tamer, since I asked this question I have learned much about voice recording but I believe all that I would need now would be experience and great advice from animators. I hope with all of the hard work and dedication to one day release something great like what the Balto team has done but only time will tell.