The Second Golden Age of Animation is creating enormous
revenues from both box office gross to billions of dollars
in sales generated by all manner of kids' products spinning
off from Intellectual Properties aimed at the kiddy market,
products that range from the bizarre (Spongebob) to the
sublime (Harry Potter).
When was the First Golden Age of Animation? This was a
period in American animation history beginning in 1928 that
began with the introduction of sound cartoons. It
continued into the early 1960s when the introduction of
this new medium of television animation drew audiences away
from cinemas. It was during these years that an impressive
number of Animation Properties came into being; such
characters as Tom and Jerry, Superman, Woody Woodpecker,
Felix the Cat as well as a huge range of Disney characters.
Walt Disney's first films; Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs
and Bambi came into being during this era.
What then is the Second Golden Age of Animation? It is
happening today. Traditional animation, called cell
animation, had been the standard since the 1920's. Very
labor intensive, cell animation was the backbone of the
Disney corporation production facility and other companies
such as Hanna Barbera. The introduction of computers, while
slow to take hold, has completely changed the face of
animation production taking animation from two dimensional
characters to three dimensional images that are more
realistic, easier to manipulate and store and most
importantly, are the backbone of the huge video gaming
market.
Animated films have far outstripped other genres in home
video and DVD sales in the last fifteen years with retail
dollars now capturing 32% of total sales, far ahead of
second place comedy at 20% according to the Producer To
Producer Book, 2nd Edition. In recent years, the licensing
and merchandising industry driven by animated television
series targeted at children has performed beyond most
industry expectations. An excellent case in point, the
children's craze, Pokemon, surpassed accumulated worldwide
sales of $10.0 Billion by 2001. Licensing and Merchandising
revenues are expected to exceed $100 Billion annually by
the year 2010 fueled by such monster hits as Shrek 2 - $881
Million Dollars, Finding Nemo - $865 Million and The
Incredibles - $624 Million to name just three.
The target market for children's television and films is
the 50 million plus 4 - 12 year old North American kids
whose buying power for toys, games and puzzles was
approximately U.S.$13.4 billion per year in the nineties
and now in excess of $200 Billion a year. The secondary
markets are Europe, Asia and the Pacific region where North
American companies have traditionally experienced success
with many movie driven properties.
Kids buying power grew 12% over the 90's and is expected to
continue at a double digit growth rate well into the
2000's. So dramatic was this growth of the Kids market that
marketers dubbed the 90's as the "Decade of the Child". In
response to this phenomenon, more and more toys, clothes,
food and entertainment products are being developed for
this huge and growing market. The companies involved in
producing children's live and animated productions have now
identified this Kid's market as the pot of gold at the end
of the rainbow and now team up with toy companies and other
manufacturers to exploit this lucrative ancillary market
with an unimaginable number of products ranging from
downloadable clips for cell phones to video games to social
networking websites.
Computer generated films are now the driving force behind
the enormous jump in sales of toys, electronic games and
the multitude of other products aimed at the kid and tween
market. items.
What does the future hold in this new Golden Age of
Animation? Producers, manufacturers, distributors and kids
are always on the lookout for that next new product. What
will that be? As usual, it's anybody's guess. Who would
have thought that some years ago, adults would be fist
fighting over something called Cabbage Patch Dolls?
Whatever the next hit is, it will no doubt be spawned from
the depths of a computer chip.
----------------------------------------------------
When was the First Golden Age of Animation? This was a
period in American animation history beginning in 1928 that
began with the introduction of sound cartoons. It
continued into the early 1960s when the new medium of
television animation drew audiences away from cinemas and
an impressive number of Animation Properties came into
being; such characters as Tom and Jerry, Superman, Woody
Woodpecker, Felix the Cat and all the Disney characters.
The next big kids phenomena? Greanwold. See
http://www.greanwold.com
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