74-634: Seymour Kneitel (March 16, 1908 – July 30, 1964) was an American animator , best known for his work with Fleischer Studios and its successor, Famous Studios . Kneitel was born in New York City where he graduated from P.S. 10 in Manhattan and attended the High School of Commerce, taking commercial art courses. He also took evening classes at the National Academy of Design . His father died when Kneitel
148-425: A big success for Fleischer. That same year, Helen Kane filed a lawsuit against Fleischer, Fleischer Studios, and Paramount claiming that the cartoons were a deliberate caricature of her, created unfair competition, and had ruined her career. The suit went to trial in 1934. Judge Edward J. McGoldrick ruled, "The plaintiff has failed to sustain either cause of action by proof of sufficient probative force." In his opinion,
222-583: A cameo caricature in the early Talkartoon , Dizzy Dishes (1930). Fashioned after popular singer Helen Kane , she originated as a hybrid poodle/canine figure and was such a sensation in the New York preview that Paramount encouraged Fleischer to develop her into a continuing character. While she originated under animator Myron "Grim" Natwick , she was transformed into a human female under Seymour Kneitel and Berny Wolf and became Fleischer's most famous character. The "Betty Boop" series began in 1932 and became
296-413: A cameraman's movements). As a result, some studios now hire nearly as many lighting artists as animators for animated films, while costume designers, hairstylists, choreographers, and cinematographers have occasionally been called upon as consultants to computer-animated projects. Max Fleischer Max Fleischer (born Majer Fleischer / ˈ f l aɪ ʃ ər / ; July 19, 1883 – September 11, 1972)
370-470: A character as a 2D drawing or painting, then hand it off to modelers who build the character as a collection of digital polygons. Texture artists "paint" the character with colorful or complex textures, and technical directors set up rigging so that the character can be easily moved and posed. For each scene, layout artists set up virtual cameras and rough blocking . Finally, when a character's bugs have been worked out and its scenes have been blocked, it
444-475: A combined projector and easel for tracing images from a live-action film. This device, known as the Rotoscope , enabled Fleischer to produce the first realistic animation since the initial works of Winsor McCay . Although his patent was granted in 1917, Max and his brothers Joe and Dave Fleischer made their first series of tests between 1914 and 1916. The Pathé Film exchange offered Max his first opportunity as
518-403: A composited image. This was an improvement over the method used by Bray where a series of 8" x 10" stills were made from motion picture film and used as backgrounds behind animation cels. The Rotograph technique went into more general use as "aerial image photography" and was a staple in animation and optical effects companies for making titles and various forms of matte composites. In addition to
592-483: A cousin Abner Kneitel, who was the animator and assistant animator for Fleischers and Famous from 1935 to 1944. Abner was often credited as "Abner Matthews" in cartoons he worked on alongside Seymour. His son, Tom Fleischer-Kneitel, an avid amateur radio operator (License K2AES), was the founding editor of Popular Communications magazine, and died on August 22, 2008, at the age of 75. His daughter, Virginia, headed
666-534: A demonstration film illustrating the Western Electric Variable Density sound recording and reproduction method. Despite the conflicts with Weiss, Fleischer managed to negotiate a new contract with Paramount to produce a revised version of the "Song Car-tunes", produced with sound and renamed Screen Songs , beginning with The Sidewalks of New York . At this early stage in the sound era, Fleischer produced many technically advanced films that were
740-558: A design and exhibition office for the Smithsonian Institution . Seymour's youngest son, Kenneth, a major collector of vintage material, established and ran the store 'Fandango' in New York City. Kenneth also designed and published many books, and worked several years for Peter Max . Kneitel developed heart problems early in life; he died of a heart attack on July 30, 1964, at the age of 56. Three years later, Paramount shut down
814-510: A feature just when he was preparing to move the studio from New York City to Miami, Florida . Once in Miami relations between Max and Dave began deteriorating, beginning with the pressures to deliver their first feature, complicated further by Dave's adulterous affair with his secretary, Mae Schwartz. Jonathan Swift's classic novel Gulliver's Travels was a favorite of Max's and was pressed into production. Fleischer and Paramount originally budgeted
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#1733092383067888-473: A given scene was hand-drawn, then transposed onto celluloid, where it would be traced and painted. These finished "cels" were then placed together in sequence over painted backgrounds and filmed, one frame at a time. Animation methods have become far more varied in recent years. Today's cartoons could be created using any number of methods, mostly using computers to make the animation process cheaper and faster. These more efficient animation procedures have made
962-607: A metaphoric account of the building and loss of his studio, casting himself as Noah. Following the war, he supervised the production of the animated adaptation of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer (1948), sponsored by Montgomery Ward . Fleischer left Handy in 1953 and returned as production manager for the Bray Studios in New York, where he developed an educational television pilot about unusual birds and animals titled, Imagine That! In 1954, Max's son, Richard Fleischer ,
1036-731: A poor Jewish neighborhood in Brooklyn . He continued his education at evening high school. He received commercial art training at Cooper Union and formal art instruction at the Art Students League of New York , studying under George Bridgman . He also attended the Mechanics and Tradesman's School in midtown Manhattan . Fleischer began his career at The Brooklyn Daily Eagle . Beginning as an errand boy, he advanced to photographer, photoengraver, and eventually, staff cartoonist. At first, he drew single-panel editorial cartoons, but then graduated to
1110-442: A producer due in part to the fact that Dave had been working there as a film cutter since 1914. Max chose a political satire of a hunting trip by Theodore Roosevelt . After several months of labor, the film was rejected, and Max was making the rounds again when he was reunited with John R. Bray at Paramount Pictures . Bray had a distribution contract with Paramount at the time and hired Max as production supervisor for his studio. With
1184-636: A sideshow clown at Coney Island. It was one of the later tests made from footage of Dave as a clown that interested Bray. Fleischer's initial series was first produced at the Bray Studios and released as a monthly installment in the Bray-Goldwyn Pictograph Screen Magazine from 1919 to 1921. In addition to producing Out of the Inkwell , Max's position at Bray was primarily production manager, and supervisor of several educational and technical films such as The Electric Bell , All Aboard for
1258-595: A studio due to the demand for military training films, Fleischer was brought in as head of the animation department for the industrial film company, The Jam Handy Organization in Detroit, Michigan. While there he supervised the technical and cartoon animation departments, producing training films for the Army and Navy. Fleischer was also involved with top-secret research and development for the war effort including an aircraft bomber sighting system. In 1944, he published Noah's Shoes ,
1332-405: A team of story artists, and synchronizing lip or mouth movements to dialogue already prepared by a screenwriter and recorded by vocal talent. Despite those constraints, the animator is still capable of exercising significant artistic skill and discretion in developing the character's movements to accomplish the objective of each scene. There is an obvious analogy here between the art of animation and
1406-515: A year was one of three animators. From 1925 to 1927, he worked as an inbetweener at Max Fleischer's " Out of the Inkwell " Studio, and was there for two years when he was offered a position at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer studios in California as a junior writer. Kneitel spent six months at MGM writing sub-titles for silent pictures, but was dismissed when sound pictures arrived. Heading back East he worked briefly for an outfit that produced cartoons based on
1480-800: A year, the Fleischer brothers started experiencing mismanagement under Weiss and left the company in late 1928. Inkwell Films, Inc. filed for bankruptcy in January 1929, and Fleischer formed Fleischer Studios, Inc. in March 1929. Fleischer first set up operations at Carpenter-Goldman Laboratories in Queens with a small staff (see Fleischer Studios ). After eight months, his new company was solvent enough to move back to its former location at 1600 Broadway, where it remained until 1938. At Carpenter-Goldman, Fleischer began producing industrial films including Finding His Voice (1929),
1554-459: Is not a character; most commonly vehicles , machinery , and natural phenomena such as rain, snow, and water). Stop motion animators do not draw their images, instead they move models or cut-outs frame-by-frame, famous animators of this genre being Ray Harryhausen and Nick Park . In large-scale productions by major studios, each animator usually has one or more assistants, " inbetweeners " and " clean-up artists", who make drawings between
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#17330923830671628-880: Is complete and has been perfected through the " sweat box " feedback process, the resulting data can be dispatched to a render farm , where computers handle the tedious task of actually rendering all the frames. Each finished film clip is then checked for quality and rushed to a film editor, who assembles the clips together to create the film. While early computer animation was heavily criticized for rendering human characters that looked plastic or even worse, eerie (see uncanny valley ), contemporary software can now render strikingly realistic clothing, hair, and skin. The solid shading of traditional animation has been replaced by very sophisticated virtual lighting in computer animation, and computer animation can take advantage of many camera techniques used in live-action filmmaking (i.e., simulating real-world "camera shake" through motion capture of
1702-450: Is extremely labor-intensive, which means that most significant works require the collaboration of several animators. The methods of creating the images or frames for an animation piece depend on the animators' artistic styles and their field. Other artists who contribute to animated cartoons , but who are not animators, include layout artists (who design the backgrounds, lighting, and camera angles), storyboard artists (who draw panels of
1776-427: Is handed off to an animator (that is, a person with that actual job title) who can start developing the exact movements of the character's virtual limbs, muscles, and facial expressions in each specific scene. At that point, the role of the modern computer animator overlaps in some respects with that of his or her predecessors in traditional animation: namely, trying to create scenes already storyboarded in rough form by
1850-544: The Superman series has been grossly overstated for decades on the basis of Dave Fleischer's UCLA 1968 Oral History interview by Joe Adamson. The actual figure stated in Fleischer's 1941 contract was in the $ 30,000 range, twice the cost of a Popeye cartoon. Superman was a "serious" type of cartoon that was not being made by rival studios which features anthropomorphic comic animal characters. The science fiction/fantasy elements of Superman appealed to Max's interests, finally leading
1924-614: The Betty Boop and Popeye the Sailor series, Talkartoons , Screen Songs (with the famous " bouncing ball "), and the studio's first feature-length film, Gulliver's Travels . In early 1939, Kneitel suffered a heart attack, and would be absent from the studio until late 1940. Kneitel returned just when Fleischer obtained the right to animate Superman. Kneitel wrote several Superman episodes with Isadore (Izzy) Sparber , and directed one short, The Mechanical Monsters (1941). In January 1942,
1998-485: The Motion Picture Country House in 1967. Fleischer died from arterial sclerosis of the brain on September 11, 1972, two months after his 89th birthday. In the announcement of his death, Time Magazine labeled him the "dean of animated cartoons". His death preceded the reclaiming of his star character, Betty Boop, and a national retrospective. The anthology film The Betty Boop Scandals of 1974 started
2072-659: The "Stereoptical Process", a precursor to Disney's Multiplane animation. This technique used 3-D model sets replacing flat pan backgrounds, with the animation cels photographed in front. This technique was used to the greatest degree in the two-reel Popeye Features Popeye the Sailor Meets Sinbad the Sailor (1936) and Popeye the Sailor Meets Ali Baba's Forty Thieves (1937). These double-length cartoons demonstrated Fleischer's interest in animated feature films. While Fleischer petitioned for this for three years, it
2146-456: The "baby" technique of singing did not originate with Kane. Fleischer's greatest business decision came with his licensing of the comic strip character Popeye the Sailor , who was introduced to audiences in the Betty Boop cartoon short, Popeye the Sailor (1933). Popeye became one of the most successful screen adaptations of a comic strip in cinema history. Much of this success was due to
2220-413: The "key poses" drawn by the animator, and also re-draw any sketches that are too roughly made to be used as such. Usually, a young artist seeking to break into animation is hired for the first time in one of these categories, and can later advance to the rank of full animator (usually after working on several productions). Historically, the creation of animation was a long and arduous process. Each frame of
2294-553: The 36 Song Car-Tunes 12 used the De Forest Phonofilm sound-on-film process, the first of which was My Old Kentucky Home in 1926. This preceded Walt Disney 's Steamboat Willie (1928), which has been erroneously cited for decades as the first cartoon to synchronize sound with animation. The Song Car-Tunes series lasted until early 1927 and was interrupted by the bankruptcy of the Red Seal company—just five months before
Seymour Kneitel - Misplaced Pages Continue
2368-542: The East Coast, extending as far west as Cleveland, Ohio . During this period, Fleischer invented the " Follow the Bouncing Ball " technique in his Ko-Ko Song Car-Tunes series of animated sing-along shorts. In these films, the lyrics of a song appear on screen and theater patrons are encouraged to sing along with the characters. An animated ball bounces across the top of the lyrics to indicate when words should be sung. Of
2442-600: The Fleischer Renaissance with new 35mm prints of a selection of the best Fleischer cartoons made between 1928 and 1934. This was followed by The Popeye Follies . These special theatrical programs generated interest in Max Fleischer as the alternative to Walt Disney, spawning a new wave of film research devoted to an expanded interest in animation beyond trivial entertainment. Notes Citations Also, he appears in Walt
2516-581: The Fleischer brothers were forced to resign from the studio they had created; they had borrowed money from Paramount between 1938 and 1941 to finance their expanded Miami facilities and two feature films. After the failure of their second feature, Mister Bug Goes to Town , the studio called in their loans, effectively foreclosing the studio. The successor studio was re-formed by Kneitel, Sam Buchwald and Isadore Sparber and renamed it Famous Studios . Kneitel, Buchwald and Sparber ran Famous Studios for 11 years (1942–1953), after which Paramount Pictures subsidized
2590-594: The Inkwell Films, Inc. and partnered with his former animator Hal Seeger , to produce 100 color Out of the Inkwell (1960–1961) cartoons for television. Actor Larry Storch performed the voices for Koko the Clown and supporting characters Kokonut and Mean Moe. While Max appeared in the un-aired pilot, he became too ill to appear in the series, and, in poor health, he spent the rest of his life attempting to regain ownership of Betty Boop . Fleischer and wife Essie moved to
2664-459: The Moon , and Hello, Mars . And it was as production manager that Fleischer hired his first animator, Roland Crandall , who remained with him throughout the active years of Fleischer's studio. Out of the Inkwell featured the novelty of combining live action and animation and served as semi-documentaries with the appearance of Max Fleischer as the artist who dipped his pen into the ink bottle to produce
2738-496: The action from the script), and background artists (who paint the "scenery"). Animated films share some film crew positions with regular live action films, such as director, producer, sound engineer, and editor, but differ radically in that for most of the history of animation, they did not need most of the crew positions seen on a physical set. In hand-drawn Japanese animation productions, such as in Hayao Miyazaki 's films,
2812-403: The animation studio. Kneitel's last cartoon credit was Space Kid (1966). Animator An animator is an artist who creates images, known as frames, which give an illusion of movement called animation when displayed in rapid sequence. Animators can work in a variety of fields including film, television, and video games. Animation is closely related to filmmaking and like filmmaking
2886-420: The animator's job less tedious and more creative. Audiences generally find animation to be much more interesting with sound. Voice actors and musicians , among other talent, may contribute vocal or music tracks. Some early animated films asked the vocal and music talent to synchronize their recordings to already-extant animation (and this is still the case when films are dubbed for international audiences). For
2960-401: The art of acting, in that actors also must do the best they can with the lines they are given; it is often encapsulated by the common industry saying that animators are "actors with pencils". In 2015, Chris Buck noted in an interview that animators have become "actors with mice ." Some studios bring in acting coaches on feature films to help animators work through such issues. Once each scene
3034-570: The clown figure on his drawing board. While the technique of combining animation with live action was already established by others at the Bray Studio, it was Fleischer's clever use of it combined with Fleischer's realistic animation that made his series unique. In 1921, Max and Dave established Out of the Inkwell Films, Incorporated, and continued production of Out of the Inkwell through various states-rights distributors. "The Clown" had no name until 1924, when Dick Huemer came aboard after animating on
Seymour Kneitel - Misplaced Pages Continue
3108-545: The day he died. In the summer of 1957, Paramount ceased production of theatrical Popeye shorts. King Features Syndicate , aware of the high ratings that the Popeye shorts had earned on television, commissioned a new series of Popeye shorts for syndication in 1960. Kneitel, head of the Paramount Cartoon Studios (renamed from Famous Studios in 1956), supervised one of four animation units assigned to this project. Due to
3182-518: The early Mutt and Jeff cartoons. He set the style for the series, redesigning "The Clown", and named him "Ko-Ko". Huemer created Ko-Ko's canine companion, known as Fitz, and moved the Fleischers away from their dependency on the Rotoscope for fluid animation, leaving it for special uses and reference points where compositing was involved. Because Max valued Huemer's work, he instructed Huemer to make just
3256-469: The film Gulliver's Travels at $ 500,000—the same miscalculation made by Disney with Snow White . The final cost for Gulliver's Travels was $ 1.5 million. It played limited engagements with only 24 prints in 36 theaters during the 1939 Christmas season, but grossed more than $ 3 million during the Christmas week, giving Paramount a profit of $ 1.5 million before going into foreign release. But Fleischer Studios
3330-600: The full strips "Little Algie" and "S.K. Sposher, the Camera Fiend". These satirical strips reflected his life in Brownsville and his fascination with technology and photography, respectively—both displaying his sense of irony and fatalism. It was during this period he met newspaper cartoonist and early animator, John Randolph Bray , who would later give him his start in the animation field. On December 25, 1905, Fleischer married his childhood sweetheart, Ethel (Essie) Goldstein. On
3404-466: The key animator handles both layout and key animation. Some animators in Japan such as Mitsuo Iso take full responsibility for their scenes, making them become more than just the key animator. Animators often specialize. One important distinction is between character animators (artists who specialize in character movement, dialogue , acting , etc.) and special effects animators (who animate anything that
3478-460: The key poses and have an assistant fill in the remaining drawings. Max assigned Art Davis as Huemer's assistant and this was the beginning of the animation position of "inbetweener", which was essentially another Fleischer "invention" that resulted in efficient production and was adopted by the entire industry by the 1930s. It was during this time that Max developed Rotoscoping , a means of photographing live action film footage with animation cels for
3552-452: The majority of animated films today, the soundtrack is recorded first in the language of the film's primary target market and the animators are required to synchronize their work to the soundtrack. As a result of the ongoing transition from traditional 2D to 3D computer animation , the animator's traditional task of redrawing and repainting the same character 24 times a second (for each second of finished animation) has now been superseded by
3626-411: The mere mention of Disney's name, Max would mutter, "that son-of-a-bitch". Fleischer won a lawsuit against Paramount in 1955 over the removal of his name from the credits of his films. While Fleischer had issues over the breach of contract, he had avoided suing for a decade to protect his son-in-law, Seymour Kneitel, who was a lead director at Paramount's Famous Studios. In 1958, Fleischer revived Out of
3700-404: The modern task of developing dozens (or hundreds) of movements of different parts of a character in a virtual scene. Because of the transition to computer animation, many additional support positions have become essential, with the result that the animator has become but one component of a very long and highly specialized production pipeline. In the 21st century , visual development artists design
3774-666: The outbreak of World War I , Max was sent to Fort Sill , Oklahoma to produce the first Army training films on subjects that included Contour Map Reading , Operating the Stokes Mortar , Firing the Lewis Machine Gun , and Submarine Mine Laying . Following the Armistice , Fleischer returned to Bray and the production of theatrical and educational films. Fleischer produced his Out of the Inkwell films featuring "The Clown" character, which his brother Dave originated; he had worked as
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#17330923830673848-480: The perfect match of the Fleischer Studio style combined with its unique use of music. By the late 1930s, a survey indicated that Popeye had eclipsed Mickey Mouse in popularity, challenging Disney's preeminence in the market. During its zenith by the mid-1930s, Fleischer Studios was producing four series, Betty Boop , Popeye , Screen Songs , and Color Classics , resulting in 52 releases each year. From
3922-517: The popular Joe Jinks comic strips (the cartoons never were seen publicly). In 1928 he worked for six months at Loucks and Norling on industrial films and the Mutt and Jeff series. In 1928, Kneitel returned to Fleischer Studios as an inbetweener, staying there for fourteen years (1928–1942), He was there only about six months when he became an animator, and a year later became a head animator. During his time there he provided animation for many films, including
3996-722: The recommendation of Bray, Fleischer was hired as a technical illustrator for the Electro-Light Engraving Company in Boston. In 1909 he moved to Syracuse, New York , working as a catalog illustrator for the Crouse-Hinds Company, and a year later returned to New York as art editor for Popular Science magazine under editor Waldemar Kaempffert . By 1914, the first commercially produced animated cartoons began to appear in movie theaters. They tended to be stiff and jerky. Fleischer devised an improvement in animation through
4070-414: The result of his continued research and development that perfected the post-production method of sound recording. Several of these devices provided visual cues for the musical conductor to follow. As dialogue and songs became major elements, more precise analysis of soundtracks was possible through other inventions from Fleischer such as "The Cue Meter". Max Fleischer's Betty Boop character was born out of
4144-670: The second of six children of a tailor from Dąbrowa Tarnowska , Aaron Fleischer, who later changed his name to William in the United States, and Malka "Amelia" Pałasz. His family emigrated to the United States in March 1887, settling in New York City, where he attended public school. During his early formative years, he enjoyed a middle-class lifestyle, the result of his father's success as an exclusive tailor to high society clients. This changed drastically after his father lost his business ten years later. His teens were spent in Brownsville ,
4218-451: The start of the sound era. Alfred Weiss, owner of Artcraft Pictures, approached Fleischer with a contract to produce cartoons for Paramount. Due to legal complications of the bankruptcy, the Out of the Inkwell series was renamed The Inkwell Imps and ran from 1927 to 1929. This was the start of Fleischer's relationship with the huge Paramount organization, which lasted for the next 15 years. After
4292-432: The studio into maturity and relevance for the 1940s. The early returns on Gulliver prompted Paramount president Barney Balaban to order a second feature for their 1941 Christmas release. This second feature, Mr. Bug Goes to Town , was unique, having a contemporary setting. Most importantly, it was technically and artistically superior to Gulliver's Travels . Paramount had high hopes for its Christmas 1941 release, which
4366-562: The studio, and Kneitel was employed as director of production. Kneitel himself had become one of the most prolific directors of the Popeye shorts and also directed many of the Casper the Friendly Ghost shorts. Famous Studios also created a series called Noveltoons that included the three popular series; Casper the Friendly Ghost , Herman and Katnip and Baby Huey . He produced cartoons until
4440-551: The theatrical comedy films, Fleischer produced technical and educational films including That Little Big Fellow and Now You're Talking for A.T.&T. In 1923, he made two 20-minute features explaining Albert Einstein 's Theory of Relativity and Charles Darwin 's Evolution using animated special effects and live action. In 1924, Fleischer partnered with Edwin Miles Fadiman, Hugo Riesenfeld and Lee de Forest to form Red Seal Pictures Corporation, which owned 36 theaters on
4514-443: The time-consuming and tedious process of cel inking. While ahead of his time, that same year Fleischer and Paramount experienced lost revenues owing to the failure of the new series Gabby , Animated Antics , and Stone Age , all launched under the leadership of Dave. After Republic Studios allegedly failed to develop Superman as a live-action serial, Max acquired the license that fall and initiated development. The cost for
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#17330923830674588-416: The usage of limited animation , the quality of these films is inferior to those produced by the Fleischer and Famous Studios. Kneitel was married to Ruth Fleischer, becoming Max Fleischer 's son-in-law, Dave Fleischer ’s nephew-in-law, and director Richard Fleischer 's brother-in-law. He was also the nephew of musician Sammy Timberg , who wrote many of the scores for Fleischer's cartoons. Kneitel also had
4662-519: The very beginning, Fleischer's business relationship with Paramount was a joint financial and distribution arrangement, making his studio a service company supplying products for the company's theaters. During the Great Depression , Paramount went through four bankruptcy reorganizations, which affected their operational expenses. As a founding member of the Society of Motion Picture Engineers , Fleischer
4736-453: Was a Polish-American animator and studio owner. Born in Kraków , Poland, Fleischer immigrated to the United States where he became a pioneer in the development of the animated cartoon and served as the head of Fleischer Studios , which he co-founded with his younger brother Dave . He brought such comic characters as Koko the Clown , Betty Boop , Popeye , and Superman to the movie screen, and
4810-449: Was affected by a five-month strike , resulting in a boycott that kept the studio's releases off theater screens until November. Having a paternal attitude towards his employees, Max took it personally, as if he had been betrayed, and thus developed an ulcer. Following the strike, Max and Dave Fleischer decided to move the studio for more space and to escape further labor agitation. In March 1938, Paramount approved Max's proposal to produce
4884-427: Was asked for his resignation. Dave had resigned following the completion of Post-production on Mr. Bug in late November 1941. Paramount finished out the remaining five months of the 1941 Fleischer contract with the absence of both Max and Dave Fleischer, and the name change to Famous Studios became official on May 27, 1942. Paramount installed new management, among them Max's son-in-law, Seymour Kneitel . Unable to form
4958-524: Was aware of the technical advancements of the industry, particularly in the development of color cinematography. Due to Paramount's financial restructuring, he was unable to acquire the three-color Technicolor process from the start. This created the opportunity for Walt Disney , who was then a small fledgling producer, to acquire a four-year exclusivity. With this, he created a new market for color cartoons beginning with Flowers and Trees (1932). In 1934 Paramount approved color production for Fleischer, but he
5032-529: Was directing 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea for Walt Disney . This brought about the honorary luncheon that united Max with his former competitor and reunited him with several former Fleischer animators who were then employed by Disney. This meeting of the former rivals seemed cordial, and Max remarked that he was very happy making educational films at this point in his career. However, in his collection of memoirs entitled Just Tell Me When to Cry , Richard relates how, at
5106-631: Was left with the limited two-color processes of Cinecolor (red and cyan) and Two-Color Technicolor (red and cyan) for the first year of his Color Classics . The first entry, Poor Cinderella (1934) was made in the two-emulsion/two-color Cinecolor Process and starred Betty Boop in her only color appearance. By 1936, Disney's exclusivity had expired, and Fleischer had the benefit of the three-color Technicolor Process beginning with Somewhere in Dreamland . These color cartoons were often augmented with Fleischer's patented three-dimensional effects promoted as
5180-563: Was not until the New York opening at Radio City of Disney's Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (February 1938) that Paramount executives realized the value of animated features and ordered one for a 1939 Christmas release. The popularity of the Popeye cartoons created a demand for more. To meet Paramount's demands, the studio was challenged with rapid expansion, production speed-ups, and crowded working conditions. Finally, in May 1937, Fleischer Studios
5254-457: Was penalized $ 350,000 for going over budget, and the contract did not allow Max and Fleischer Studios participation in the foreign earnings. This was the beginning of the financial difficulties of Fleischer Studios with reduced royalties due to this debt to Paramount. In 1940, Max was relegated to business affairs and continued technical development. His efforts resulted in a reflex camera viewfinder and research into line transfer methods to replace
5328-461: Was responsible for several technological innovations, including the rotoscope , the " follow the bouncing ball " technique pioneered in the Ko-Ko Song Car-Tunes films, and the " stereoptical process ". Film director Richard Fleischer was his son. Majer Fleischer was born July 19, 1883, to a Jewish family in Kraków , (then part of Austria-Hungary : Austrian Partition ). He was
5402-485: Was still in high school, and he needed work to provide support for his mother and sister. He was able to attend an annex of Commerce HS and work after school and Saturdays for Bray Studios, coloring drawings for Colonel Heeza Liar cartoons. On graduation, he was able to find employment with a small company, L.F. Cornwell, producers of a series called Ebinizer Ebony, which were being made in a now-defunct color process known as Kelly Color. He began as an office boy and within
5476-429: Was well received by critics during its December 5 preview. However, the exhibitors rejected it, fearing that it would not do business because it was not a Disney animated Fairy Tale. And with the bombing of Pearl Harbor two days after the preview, the original Christmas release due in three weeks was cancelled. With the cancellation of Mr. Bug Goes to Town , Max was called to a meeting with Balaban in New York, where he
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