Is this cartoon boiling?

January 20, 2009 1:50 PM

Calling all animators. What do you call it in animation when the lines are all wobbly? I see it a lot in hand-drawn animation such as this but I'd like to know if this is something that has a name that is recognizable among animators. On this page it's called "boiling" or line boil but is that the right term? Bonus points if you can provide citations to books or articles that talk about this in academic literature.
posted by mariokrat to media & arts (12 comments total)

Not exactly an answer to your question, but there is a patented process for doing this called Squigglevision that was used on a few TV shows.
posted by burnmp3s at 1:58 PM on January 20 [1 favorite]

I was about to suggest the term burnmp3 suggested as it was coined by some of the popularizers/pioneers of the technique, and searching around squigglevision or alternately "sguiggle vision" will get you on to at least a lot of discussion of the technique and shows that used it. I don't think there's really an established generic technical term for it though I wouldn't be surprised to be proven wrong.
posted by nanojath at 2:03 PM on January 20

I'd check out Soup2Nuts' page and try contacting someone there for some potential resources. Dr. Katz and the early days of Home Movies both used it. Perhaps the animators or admin there can shed some light.
posted by HolyWood at 2:08 PM on January 20

It's called "boiling", I believe.
posted by le morte de bea arthur at 2:35 PM on January 20

It is indeed called "boil" or "line boil". You can read a little about it if you scroll down to "technique" in this wiki article.
posted by pseudostrabismus at 2:37 PM on January 20

And there's further mention of it in the Roobarb entry.
posted by le morte de bea arthur at 2:44 PM on January 20

Squigglevision is the term used in the wikipedia article for Dr. Katz, Professional Therapist which was animated this way.
posted by JuiceBoxHero at 2:46 PM on January 20

I think "line boil" would be the best term, it's most noticable in something called a moving hold that has been created by cycling several drawings of a non-moving element rather than putting it onto a separate, held level. One of the drawings of a moving hold is called a "trace-back".

"Line boil" started out as a term for objectionable line wiggling caused by poor inbetweening before it was used to describe a certain intentional "look".
posted by bonobothegreat at 3:02 PM on January 20

I worked on Dr. Katz, and said Squigglevision was largely a low-res version of the same technique you'd use if you were just tracing with a pencil. It's pioneering insofar as it's applying an analog technique to a digital medium.

I think back in school we called the analog version a 'wiggle hold', but, yeah, line boil is more proper. It's used in simpler-styled animation to keep the motion from 'dying' between more dynamic actions.
posted by zusty at 4:46 PM on January 20 [2 favorites]

Another animator here (albeit a 3D animator) -

its definitely called boiling.
posted by AsRuinsAreToRome at 4:56 PM on January 20

Thanks all for the quick answers. Are line boil or boiling the types of words that you'd find in a textbook or handbook on animation? Are there any authoritative books that might mention it?
posted by mariokrat at 4:59 PM on January 20

You might find books that recount the histories of the different studios and how some of the classic terms came to common usage as the medium incorporated new principles and techniques but I don't think boiling lines as a style would be nailed down that definitively because every studio would come to it's own consensus on terminologies or terms would migrate between studios as people moved from one to another. Boiling linework is called whatever you can convince the people around you to call it.

I also should mention that I called it a moving hold above but I've heard 3D animators use the term moving hold to describe a pose that reads very clearly without it coming to a complete standstill. So, nothing's written in stone.
posted by bonobothegreat at 10:14 PM on January 20