L O T T E R E I N I G E R D O N H E R T Z F E L D T

T O O L K I T 1 : A N I M A T I O N R E S E A R C H
 A N I M AT O R

LOTTE REINIGER

1899 – 1981

Lotte Reiniger was a German film producer and pioneered
silhouette animation. From a young age, Reiniger held an
obsession with silhouette paper puppetry which was inspired
by the Chinese arts of paper cutting, and would frequently put
on a ‘puppet theatre’ for friends and family.
The success of her work launched her into the industry and
gained a placement at the Institute for Cultural Research,
where she would meet her future husband, Carl Koch, and
directed her first film, making lots of important connections in
the animation industry along the way.
 TECHNIQUES
Reiniger would hold the scissors still in one
hand and move the paper with her left hand
so that she could make sure each cut was
made in the right direction everytime. She
would then connect the separate bits of
paper with a fine lead wire.
Then the foregrounds, midgrounds and
backgrounds of Reiniger’s set would be
placed between lead sheets to be filmed,
pioneering an early version of the multi-
plane camera. This developing technique
created an inspiring illusion of depth and is
what Reiniger referred to as her ‘Trick-Table’.
THE ADVENTURES OF
PRINCE ACHMED
(1926)
Reiniger created what is thought to be
the oldest surviving animated feature
film, The Adventures of Prince Achmed
in 1923 and finally released it in 1926.
Her techniques involved paper and
cardboard cutouts between layers of
thin sheets of lead under a camera.
Reiniger painstakingly filmed this
frame by frame using 24FPS.
 LOTTE REINIGER

Other Works

DR DOLITTLE (1928) GALATHEA (1935) PAPAGENO (1935) HARLEQUIN (1931)

 A N I M AT O R

DON HERTZFELDT

Born: August 1st 1976

Don Hertzfeldt is an American animator and

filmmaker, twice Oscar nominee who is best
known for his works ‘World of Tomorrow’, ‘It’s
Such a Beautiful Day’, and ‘Rejected’.

He also had his work appearing as the opening

‘Couch scene’ for season 24 of The Simpsons in
2014. Creating an odd futuristic and unsettling
animation after he was approached by producers
via Facebook.
 DON HERTZFELDT

World of Tomorrow

Te c h n i q u e s

When creating World of Tomorrow, Hertzfeldt only used three programs;

Photoshop, Final Cut and Protools for adding sound. But usually he prefers to
mostly make things by hand drawing them and shooting them on an old 35mm
camera. Manipulating his creations using a mixture of in-camera techniques and
by drawing on the film post-shooting.

Hertzfeldt focuses less on impressive visuals, and is known for using overly
simplified stick figures and basic polygons in his animations, but is still able to
express emotion and story through the movements of his animations.

Episodes

World of Tomorrow is a science fiction short, which includes the voice of his niece
and has won many awards at film festivals around the world; the most noteworthy
being Sundance film festival.

Hertzfeldt has since also gone on to make a second ‘episode’ short for World of
Tomorrow, which revisits his character ‘Emily’.
OTHER SHOTS OF HIS WORK