“It would’ve been much simpler to just use an animated cigar.”

In this 7-minute video, kaptainkristian talks about the fascinating process of making Who Framed Roger Rabbit, the pre-CGI hybrid animation/​live action movie from 1988: This is called “bumping the lamp” – a phrase coined by Disney during the production of Roger Rabbit to describe going above and beyond what was expected of the animators. It would’ve been perfectly feasible if Roger stayed flatly illuminated throughout this scene like a cartoon normally would, but instead the animators put in the time to shade every cell uniquely so that the practical light would bounce off from the same way it would a physical object. And they had to account for that dynamically shifting lighting with every contour in Roger’s limbs, his clothes, his face, the cast shadow he creates on the environment as well as the texture of the light, the slightest difference in color temperatures, the lamp sways… even Roger’s ears have a slight translucency, since they’re much thinner than the rest of his body.…