Ernest Rister
Senior HTF Member
- Joined
- Oct 26, 2001
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CAPS = Computer Animation Production System
The clean-up animation is scanned into the computer, and then the drawings are inked and painted digitally, as opposed to the old process of artists tracing the drawings onto cels with paints and brushes. All the composite layers (f/x animation, character animation, backgrounds, computer animation) are captured and layered via digital means. Even classic multiplane photogrpahy can be simulated by layering in levels of backgrounds and animation (the best example being the opening shot of Hunchback). After the whole process is complete, you have a "digital negative" of the movie, which is written to film in a three-strip process by lasers to form the "hard negative" from which all the interpositives are struck. The CAPS system was tested in a single shot of The Little Mermaid, and the first feature to use the CAPS system exclusively was The Rescuers Down Under, and it has been used for every Disney feature film since.
This is why some of us are a little cheesed off about the DVDs for Rescuers Down Under, Pocahontas, Hunchback, Hercules, and Mulan -- these all have "digital negatives", like the PIXAR titles and Star Wars Episode II, and yet the DVDs were struck from existing interpositives (in some cases, the DVDs feature the same transfers used for the old VHS and Laserdisc releases). The definitive DVDs for Rescuers Down Under, Pocahontas, Hunchback of Notre Dame, Hercules, and Mulan have yet to be made.
The clean-up animation is scanned into the computer, and then the drawings are inked and painted digitally, as opposed to the old process of artists tracing the drawings onto cels with paints and brushes. All the composite layers (f/x animation, character animation, backgrounds, computer animation) are captured and layered via digital means. Even classic multiplane photogrpahy can be simulated by layering in levels of backgrounds and animation (the best example being the opening shot of Hunchback). After the whole process is complete, you have a "digital negative" of the movie, which is written to film in a three-strip process by lasers to form the "hard negative" from which all the interpositives are struck. The CAPS system was tested in a single shot of The Little Mermaid, and the first feature to use the CAPS system exclusively was The Rescuers Down Under, and it has been used for every Disney feature film since.
This is why some of us are a little cheesed off about the DVDs for Rescuers Down Under, Pocahontas, Hunchback, Hercules, and Mulan -- these all have "digital negatives", like the PIXAR titles and Star Wars Episode II, and yet the DVDs were struck from existing interpositives (in some cases, the DVDs feature the same transfers used for the old VHS and Laserdisc releases). The definitive DVDs for Rescuers Down Under, Pocahontas, Hunchback of Notre Dame, Hercules, and Mulan have yet to be made.