American Cinematographer - September 1993 - 51

At left, heavy platen
dust clouds this

sically, this camera allowed the ani¬
mators to stack

cels

on

separate

scene

planes to create a feeling of dimen¬
sionality. There was a glass plate or
platen on each plane, and the bot¬
tom plate would typically contain
a cel with the
background. Other
cels

were

of Snow

White

peering over
a balcony. Below:
With platen dust

jects. In the end,
the dyes chosen

then stacked, with each

adding characters and objects to the
picture. This technique added im¬
mensely to the sophistication of

weren't as vivid

animated cartoons.
The first use of the multi¬

Technicolor car¬

plane animation

Disney felt that

camera was

in

those typi¬
cally used in
as

toons, because

a

cartoon

that the usual

short entitled
The Old Mill.
Both the tech¬

ultra-bright colors would be too
intense for a feature-length movie.
The three separations had to be precisely registered to create a
Technicolor print using the
company's patented "imbibition"

1937

nology and the
cartoon earned

Oscars for the
studio.
The

process.
Snow White premiered at
Carthay Circle Theater in Los
Angeles on December 21, 1937.
There were plenty of skeptics who
expected it to flop. The naysayers
simply didn't believe audiences
would pay the going price of 25
cents to sit through 83 minutes of

multi-plane
camera

to

went

the

on

serve as an

essential

tool

during produc¬
of Snow
White and the
Seven Dwarfs.
More than 750 Disney art¬
ists worked on the film between
1934 and 1937. Their ranks in¬
cluded 10 art directors, 32 anima¬
tion

tors, 102 assistants, 107 inbetweeners (who filled in bits of
critical action between key draw¬

Music for the film was

ated

cre¬

Harline and Paul Smith, and was
recorded by an 80-piece orchestra.
A good deal of the music and lyr¬
ics

still familiar

today: "Some
Day My Prince Will Come,"
are

"Whistle While You Work," "Hi
Ho, Hi Ho, It's Off to Work We

animators (who drew

Go."

smoke,

wa¬

ter, clouds and similar objects), and
158 people who inked and painted
the cartoon figures on transparent
celluloid sheets.
Actors and actresses were

carefully cast to play the speaking
and singing roles. The cast included
as

Snow White,

Harry Stockwell (father of Dean
and Guy Stockwell) as Prince
Charming, Lucille LaVerne as the
queen, Moroni Olsen as the magic
mirror, Billy Gilbert as Sneezy,
Pinto Colvig as Sleepy and
Grumpy, Otis Harlan as Happy,
Scotty Mathraw as Bashful, and
Roy Attwell as Doc. Each of the
characters had

"attitude" or per¬
was reflected in
their animation and voices.
an

sonality which

animation.

by Frank Churchill, Leigh

ings), 20 layout specialists, 25 back¬
ground artists, 65 special effects

Adriana Caselotti

Postprducin

removed.

Snow White totaled 700

not counting two that were
cut from the film near the end of
scenes,

completion of production. Some
119,550 frames of film
duced. Each

scene was

were pro¬
shot onto

black & white film stocks three
times

sequentially through blue,

red and green filters on three suc¬
cessive frames. From these sequen¬
tial
exposure
negatives,
Technicolor made three-strip YCM

cause

There was some legitimate
for concern. It took four years

produce the film, at

a cost of
figure ap¬
proximately 10 times higher than
the original budget. To complete
the film, Disney and his brother
Roy had to scramble to borrow a
quarter of a million dollars.
Many of Hollywood's
brightest stars attended the pre¬
miere, including Charlie Chaplin,
Judy Garland, Douglas Fairbanks,
Carol Lombard, Charles Laughton,
to

around $1.5 million

Marlene

-

Dietrich

a

and

John

was a night to re¬
member. Minutes after the film be¬

Barrymore. It

gan,

the celebrity audience

was

captivated, laughing and crying in
all the right places. They cheered
and applauded individual scenes
as if they were at a Broadway play.
It was a harbinger of good things to

positive masters. These were used
as
dye-laden matrices to make the
Technicolor print.
Dyes were mixed by
Disney chemists who tried roughly

general release, some 20 million
people saw Snow White. It set a new

1,500 colors and shades to deter¬

box office record which

mine the final hues for

painting
characters, backgrounds and ob¬

eclipsed the following year by Gone

September 1993

American

come.

Within three months of the

was

With the Wind.

Cinematographer

49
American Cinematographer - September 1993

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