# Why do the characters in very old animated cartoons CONSTANTLY bob up & down? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [December 16, 2002, 6:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-the-characters-in-very-old-animated-cartoons-constantly-bob-up-down/143121 "2002-12-16T18:03:08Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2002, 9:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-the-characters-in-very-old-animated-cartoons-constantly-bob-up-down/143121/21 "2002-12-17T21:21:53Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Larry Mudd \* > \*\*This is unsurprising. The Fleischer Bros. were brilliant animators and approached the medium the right way. Walt Disney, on the other hand, was fumbling around in the dark. In the beginning, he did do the animation first and then work on a sound-track to suit it. This ass-backwards approach became known in the industry as “Mickey Mousing”, (particularly w/ regard to adding _music_ to match actions,) the meaning of which has been broadened to refer to any thing that’s done in an inferior way. \*\* Why is it artistically less valid to make the music for the benefit of the images, as opposed to vice versa? ---
**Author:** ![mobo85](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b19c9b/32.png) [@mobo85](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mobo85)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2002, 9:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-the-characters-in-very-old-animated-cartoons-constantly-bob-up-down/143121/22 "2002-12-17T21:25:45Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by CalMeacham \* > **It was a patented process of theirs (they patented the Rotoscope, too), in which a model was built on a large rotating turntable with a fixed camera, and I think there was a special frame to hold the animation cels.** If you can view TIFF images, click on “Images” in this link: [US Patent No. 2054414: Art of Making Motion Picture Cartoons](http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PALL&p=1&u=/netahtml/srchnum.htm&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=2054414.WKU.&OS=PN/2054414&RS=PN/2054414) ---
**Author:** ![blowero](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/41988e/32.png) [@blowero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/blowero)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2002, 9:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-the-characters-in-very-old-animated-cartoons-constantly-bob-up-down/143121/23 "2002-12-17T21:30:16Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Walloon \* > \*\*Disney himself never did the animation for his cartoons after he left Kansas City for Hollywood. He had animator [Ub Iwerks](http://www.digitalmediafx.com/Features/ubiwerks.html) working for him from 1924 to 1930, and it’s Iweks’ style that you see in _Steamboat Willie_ (1928). \*\* Didn’t know that; thanks for the correction. ---
**Author:** ![Larry\_Mudd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/f14d63/32.png) [@Larry\_Mudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Larry_Mudd)\ **Post date:** [December 17, 2002, 11:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-the-characters-in-very-old-animated-cartoons-constantly-bob-up-down/143121/24 "2002-12-17T23:43:33Z")
> [@](#): > > **RickJay** : Why is it artistically less valid to make the music for the benefit of the images, as opposed to vice versa? Generally, because it’s much easier to make a naturally flowing soundtrack, than to try to create animation from scratch which seems like natural movement. A keyframer _might_ rigidly enforce a certain number of “beats-per-minute” throughout a whole project, and _that_ would be easy enough to fit music to-- but in most circumstances it would look stupid. What they did at Disney Studios was make a silent cartoon, and then instruct an orchestra to “accompany” the finished product. Because the scene changes come pretty much randomly, the orchestra sounds like a collective club foot. They were also responsible for supplying “sound effects” – A sliding action would prompt the trombone player to do a little “slide”, and maybe there’d be a cymbal-crash if the “slide” ended violently. Since it’s relatively simple to create a naturally-flowing sound track, it makes sense to do that _first_– then the keyframer has a reference to use to make a naturally-flowing animation. Not only does the soundtrack sound better, it helps to improve the realism of the cartoon. ---
**Author:** ![pizzabrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/e9c0ed/32.png) [@pizzabrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pizzabrat)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2002, 12:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-the-characters-in-very-old-animated-cartoons-constantly-bob-up-down/143121/25 "2002-12-18T00:19:52Z")
[QUOTE}Bosco and Honey cartoons do this all the time. It is part of the reason the Bosco cartoons suck, they spend so much time doing lame things showing off that it is an animated show that they don’t do any gags.[/QUOTE] Those “lame things” WERE the gags. And Bosko toons had scads of gags ranging from cute to hillarious, like the one where Bosko finds his garage empty and goes calling for his car until it tiptoes apologetically out from the outhouse, or in “The Booze Hangs High” where everyone gets drunk and starts singing until the pig sings so hard he vomits out a half eaten cob of corn. Then he picks it up, timidly dusts it off, and opens his stomach like a door to place the corn back inside, looking completely embarrassed the whole time. The dancing was the best part anyway. I wish cartoons today had characters who grooved constantly to a very modern beat while playing out loose plotlines. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2002, 1:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-the-characters-in-very-old-animated-cartoons-constantly-bob-up-down/143121/26 "2002-12-18T01:01:39Z")
> [@](#): > > ## quote: > > ## RickJay: Why is it artistically less valid to make the music for the benefit of the images, as opposed to vice versa? > > Generally, because it’s much easier to make a naturally flowing soundtrack, than to try to create animation from scratch which seems like natural movement. A keyframer might rigidly enforce a certain number of “beats-per-minute” throughout a whole project, and that would be easy enough to fit music to-- but in most circumstances it would look stupid. What they did at Disney Studios was make a silent cartoon, and then instruct an orchestra to “accompany” the finished product. Because the scene changes come pretty much randomly, the orchestra sounds like a collective club foot. They were also responsible for supplying “sound effects” – A sliding action would prompt the trombone player to do a little “slide”, and maybe there’d be a cymbal-crash if the “slide” ended violently. Since it’s relatively simple to create a naturally-flowing sound track, it makes sense to do that first-- then the keyframer has a reference to use to make a naturally-flowing animation. Not only does the soundtrack sound better, it helps to improve the realism of the cartoon. I was unaware that Disney did this in its early days. They certainly learned, though, because it was their standard method by the time they started making their features. One o the Disney fiascos was when the decided to re-record the sound for **Fantasia** in the late 1980s. They got a new orchestra together and a new narrator to take the place of Deems Taylor. Of course, theyt couldn’t do anything about Leopold Stokowski, since he was alread in the movie, so we had the image of Stokowski conducting the sound of musicians who likely hadn’t even been born when he went through his actions. Worse, no matter how carefully you try to match he action on screen, _it never matches up!_. The next time Disney released Fantasia, it was with the original soundtrack. ---
**Author:** ![Larry\_Mudd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/f14d63/32.png) [@Larry\_Mudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Larry_Mudd)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2002, 1:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-the-characters-in-very-old-animated-cartoons-constantly-bob-up-down/143121/27 "2002-12-18T01:23:45Z")
Eesh-- I never knew they did that to _Fantasia_, (which I think is the best thing Disney ever put out.) Still the original soundtrack is flawed-- An _orchestral_ version of Bach’s _Toccata and fugue in D minor_? Offensive, of the face of it. The oscilloscope-on-acid animation that they did for that sequence was _brilliant_, though. As for Bosko, I wish WB stuck with him-- those cartoons were _f’d up!_. The one where Bosko has a movie theatre, and there’s a bunch of newsreel parodies? Oh, god, the “Geneva Peace Summit” – and Hitler with that axe! What the hell? ---
**Author:** ![tracer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tracer/32/20578_2.png) [@tracer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tracer)\ **Post date:** [December 18, 2002, 1:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-the-characters-in-very-old-animated-cartoons-constantly-bob-up-down/143121/28 "2002-12-18T01:48:02Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Larry Mudd \* > \*\*In the beginning, he did do the animation first and then work on a sound-track to suit it. This ass-backwards approach became known in the industry as “Mickey Mousing”, (particularly w/ regard to adding _music_ to match actions,) the meaning of which has been broadened to refer to any thing that’s done in an inferior way. \*\* In the modern world of movie soundtrack music, “Mickey Mousing” is (still) used to refer to music that mimicks the action in an overly literal or “cartoony” way. For example, when Mickey’s hand goes up, the pitch of the instruments go up (e.g. they play an ascending scale), and when Mickey’s hand goes down, the pitch also descends. It’s appropriate for slapstick or kiddie cartoons, but it just sounds silly when it’s done for a “real” movie or TV show. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-do-the-characters-in-very-old-animated-cartoons-constantly-bob-up-down/143121.md?page=1)