William Hanna

Picture from:http://www.tomandjerryonline.com







Despite the cutting edge technology in the modern day's animation industry, it is the painstaking perseverance of the fore fathers of animation that laid the foundation and thus paved the way that the subsequent aspiring animators of the industry.

William Hanna is one such revolutionary figurehead in the animation industry, leading the industry to great heights even in the dire times of television animation. Due to his rich history in the industry, he is known by many as director, animator, producer, and cartoon artist.

Famous titles such as The Flintstones, The Smurfs, Yogi Bear, and Scooby-Doo are some works that propelled the awareness of television animation to a new level back in the day, and as such set a milestone in animation that are fondly embedded into the memories of television audiences even today. Such cartoons are also the main highlight of my childhood days, when television was my only entertainment.
A little bit of history of William Hanna provides an insight as to what kind of person he was, and what inspires him to be what he was that stirred the industry to life during the peak of his career.
William Hanna, Hanna for short, was born in Melrose, New Mexico in July 1910. It appears that Hanna has been made to adapt to different environments often due to his father's work commitments as a construction engineer, meaning his job requires him to move from place to place for work. Finally in 1919, his family settled down in Watts, California, it is then Hanna realised his love for the outdoors when he joined the Boyscouts in 1922. In 1925 to 1928, Hanna attended middle school and developed a passion for music, which proved to be invaluable to him when he helped to created theme music for his cartoons such as The Flintstones. However, due to the transpiration of the Great Depression, Hanna dropped out of college.

Hanna joined Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, or MGM for short, and moved up the ranks quickly due to his strong natural talent and his passion for the industry. He was enthusiastic about his perseverance in seeking to better his skills allowed him to continue to improve until the mid-1930's, where he landed the position as director in the animation unit at MGM. It is there he played a big part in his debut directing, the musical short "To Spring" in 1936.

This short musical cartoon proved to be highly successful with audiences largely due to the excellent directing. While the background was lush and detailed, the quality of animation was also smooth and flowy, with appropriate musical accompaniment. The theme of the short cartoon is evident in the title, depicting the changing of the seasons from winter to spring through the eyes of gnomes living in a mining cave, whereby the elements of nature such as winter and spring were portrayed as somewhat sentient beings. The gradual arrival of spring slowly creeps over the winter, which was taking the role of the antagonist, depriving the gnomes of their work due to the harsh conditions that comes with. Concurrently, it also portrays the shift in the overall mood and ambience amongst the gnomes as they stir from their slumber, getting ready for work, at the same time dealing with issues arising from the transition of seasons. Overall, lively, vibrant colours are being used to bring across the message of the arrival of spring, very successfully utilising the popular Technicolor process (a color film process) which was very popular at that time due to it's clear and saturated levels of colors.

It may have seemed that a lot was going for Hanna at that point of time, however, life was not like a bed of roses, for during 1938-1939, Hanna to get demoted to a story man when the series he was directing,”Captain and the Kids” got canceled. Perhaps it was a blessing in disguise, for it is then Hanna was able to hook up with Joseph Barbera, who was then Hanna's colleague, sitting just opposite him. Their fateful meeting would then lead to a long lasting collaboration, and as such would then contribute to the industry of animation new perspectives, as well as to audiences, a series of memorable and lovable cartoon characters, and catch phrases, which will survive the the passing of generations to come.

While Hanna had a gift for comedic timing and gags, Barbera was a skilled gag writer and sketch artist, their differing yet synergistic talents as well as their agreeable personalities with each other has allowed them to work especially well together. Henceforth, the team of William Hanna and Joseph Barbera begun working together, directing first "Puss Gets the Boot", a cat and mouse themed cartoon, which the later cult hit "Tom and Jerry" spun off of. The concept is clear and easy enough for audience to understand, having two main characters who are constantly in conflict, resulting in ongoing hilarious comedic gags. The success of Tom and Jerry is also in part due to the cartoon relying heavily on the movements of the characters to relay messages instead of speech, thus allowing even children or audience who are hard of hearing to be able to enjoy the cartoon.

The notable achievements of William Hanna and his partner Joseph Barbera is evident in the industry over the course of their tenure, and along with the recognition, they won seven Academy awards, and eight Emmys, as well as numerous other prestigious awards, acknowledging their invaluable contribution to the animation industry.

However, come 1957, the MGM animation division was closed and as a result, Hanna went around looking for other opportunitiest o continue his work, and stumbled upon the potential of television animation while in a short collaboration with Jay Ward, forming Shield Productions. Hanna, motivated and energised by the idea of moving on to television, once again hooked up with Barbera and following their discussion, finally formed the Hanna-Barbera Productions in 1957. "The Ruff and Reddy Show" then debuted as their first television project. It is also noteworthy that in Hanna and Barbera's life long partnership that spanned over sixty years, over 2,000 animated characters have been conceived, including the memorable and timeless classic hits such as The Smurfs and The Flintstones.

Ruff the cat and Reddy the dog, the main protagonists of The Ruff and Reddy Show, utilizes the very familiar “personified animals” formula, apparent in Hanna’s earlier works such as Tom and Jerry and Puss gets the Boot


The rise of Limited animation

Due to the extensive cost required to work on animation in the 1950s through 1960s, there has been budget constraints for most studios working on animation. This is particularly animation for the television, as cartoons are usually on short schedules and the series are long running. William Hanna and Joseph Barbera pioneered the usage of the “limited animation” technique in order to cut the cost and time required to produce animation. The mechanics of this limited animation technique uses recycled backgrounds and footages where possible. Characters with similar torso will use the base stock footage while the heads are interchangeable.

This technique advocates the absolute minimum of additional drawing to animate scene, so much so that often when a character is speaking, only the mouth moves and the rest of the body remains still. However, the usage of such a cost cutting technique has allowed Hanna and Barbera to bring some hope to the industry which is rapidly affected by cost issues presented by the demanding requirements of animation.

Limited animation is also rampant in other markets doing animation, such as Japan. I have noticed many similarities in a lot of Japanese animation, whereby limited animation was used. Stock footages have been reused in different manners, such as re-coloring, re-positioning, or re-timing the key frames to bring about certain effects, meaning to say that the animation technique advocated by William Hanna and Joseph Barbera is still very heavily utilized even with today’s technology.

The Flintstones in particular was one such series that made much impact during my childhood, especially so due to their vibrant colors and endearing characters. Although the cartoon was made and broadcasted as early as 1960, which was way before my age, the show was able to withstand the passing of time and the popularity grew from strength to strength, resulting in spin off series, and thus allowing the younger generation the good fortune of being able to enjoy such entertaining masterpieces.

The Flintstones depicts a Stone Age family dealing with life like any other normal household, comedic interaction between parents, and between children, and friends, going about daily chores, going to work. The interactions between the large cast of characters provides versatility and potential in story telling, shifting sometimes to Fred and his wife Wilma, or to Fred and his good natured unassuming friend Barney, or to unmanageable disobedient pet dinosaur for example, among other scenes.

Unlike Tom and Jerry, which focused heavily on movements, The Flintstones are very on speech. This is especially so due to the fact that The Flintstones have been utilizing the limited animation technique, thus restricting lush, fluid movements.

A lot of their activities reflect what happens in real life, however with a creative twist such as the Stone Age theme, and the insertion of gags and exaggeration of events to bring about the humor. One would never fail to notice and remember the signature “man-powered” transport vehicle that Fred uses to drive to work – another tell-tale trademark of creative work and humor behind The Flintstones.

I vividly remember the show’s main protagonist, Fred, shouting his famous one liner “Yabba-Dabba-Do!” whenever he’s in a state of joy. This immediately became the favorite catchphrase used by kids my age at that time that The Flintstones were still a television cartoon mainstay.

Another cartoon with a trademark catchphrase is Scooby-Doo, Where Are You?, whereby a talking dog by the name of Scooby-Doo sporadically yells out “Scooby-Dooby-Doo!” when excited, a play on words of his own name, and obviously incorporated because of the influence of the popular catchphrase by Hanna-Barbera’s preceding success of The Flintstones’ “Yabba-Dabba-Do!”














Scooby-Do, Where Are You first aired on television as early as 1969, and much like The Flintstones, have main protagonists who are young adults or adults, and as such was made to target the adult audience, although many elements in these cartoons have proved entertaining to children as well, such as the easily understood comedy, vibrant colors, exaggerated poses and single episode stories, allowing children who have shorter attention span to better focus on the show. And as a resulted, they proved to be successful as family oriented cartoons.

One respectable fact about the above two shows is that their popularity has sustained through time and even at this age, has demonstrated tremendous come back power, even so much as to garner a live action movie for each, “The Flintstones” in 1994, and “Scooby-Doo” in 2002. Further, sequels for the live action movies have also been released in the theatres. Another live action movie for Scooby-Doo is due for release in 2009 as well, very much sending the message to fans that the love for these characters has not yet faded.

Another noteworthy point is that the characters that William Hanna and Joseph Barbera worked together to bring to life have become cultural icons, crossing over to other media such as films as mentioned, and in addition also to books, and toys, successfully utilizing a large aspect of the marketing spectrum.














A futuristic version of The Flinstones was also produced and aired in 1962, named The Jetsons. Using the tried and tested formula of its predecessor, The Jetsons similarly achieved popularity, with a live-action movie in the making, due to be released in 2012 as well.

In conclusion, I would like to point out the fact that although the much respected Mr William Hanna had been laid to rest on March 22, 2001. His life is still being often celebrated through his surviving characters such as the cast of The Flintstones, Yogi Bear, Tom and Jerry among a myriad others, who continue to remain as fond memories for audiences of the golden age of cartoons, while creating new and lasting influences on the newer, as well as more generations of audiences to come.

In other words, William Hanna’s work and influence as an entertainer will continue to live on.