Disney Animated: App Review
Disney Animated is a sparkling new app from Touch Press and Walt Disney Animation Studios. Taking you through the whole process of an animated film, from story to designs, animation to release. It hosts an absolute wealth of information, clips and images that appear to be never ending.
As the familiar ident appears revealing the Disney castle you feel like you are in for a treat. The main menu floods you with a selection of great chapter headings including Art in Motion, Visual Development and Character. Straight away revealing that this is something created for and by animation buffs. Heading in, the history of Disney is explained showing great pictures of Walt in his early days along with his brother Roy and lead animator Ub Iwerks. Starting from the shed and the Alice comedies it traces the birth of the company all the way up to what the future holds.
From here on in you swipe from chapter to chapter, each as engaging as the last. Starting in Story through Visual Development, Character, Layout, Animation, Visual Effects and Sound, each stage is explained in detail with relative examples to boot. Even as a Disney fan there were things that came as a surprise to me or little nuggets that appeared to be exclusive to the app. If you’ve heard it before then you certainly haven’t had the ease to touch an image and see it first hand.
Every page is full to the brim with examples and videos explaining the process, a lot of the time from Walt himself. As you touch upon an image of a character it is bought to the front and animates in front of your eyes. Pencil tests are also available for the viewing and with a double tap you can see them full screen and able to go in and watch frame by frame. This is where the app really comes into its own. Every film can be slowed down like this and many come with the opportunity to turn on different layers within the scene, making it even more interactive. Maquettes and 3D characters are also free to be turned and seen from different angles.
As well as this there are interactive sections that allow you to become the animator. The first is the good old favourite, the bouncing ball. This allows you to play around with squash and stretch and slow ins and outs, with a tutorial showing how best to create the movement. The other is a little more testing, even for an animator. It gives the reader a chance to animate Vanellope from Wreck-It-Ralph. Either choose from existing poses or create something totally unique. There are a lot of controls and it can become quite frustrating, but it’s great to be in control of a famous movie character all the same.
For the real geek, Disney have for the first time made an interactive version of the ‘Character’ chapter from Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnston’s prestigious book The Illusion of Life. The content is exactly how it was printed way back in 1980 but this time you get to bring the images to life! Each example is fully animated, scalable, tap-able, you name it. With further comments from existing animators, namely Eric Goldberg and Clay Kaytis, it gives extra depth to this already great book. An extra treat is the amount of sneaky clips and insight there is to Disney’s new film Frozen. You can learn a lot more about this future release and create some animatable snow patterns straight from the finger of new character Anna.
As cliched as it sounds it is a truly ‘magical’ experience. Disney Animated is jam-packed with content that will easily keep you amused for hours. For the animation geek among us, it is a companion to the wealth of books that are already out there. The in depth analysis and way that scenes are interact-able makes it a a great research tool and tip top Disney history and animation lesson. A must have for any animator with a surprising lack of sponsored links to the gift shop.
