Mondo Knows Facts
King Kong was animated one frame at a time
Willis O'Brien posed a jointed model and shot single frames of each pose For the 1933 film, Willis O'Brien built a metal armature covered in rubber and fur, moved it a fraction between exposures and photographed single frames. When the film ran at normal speed the model appeared to move. A single second of screen time could take hours of work. It sits in Mondo's movies & tv collection, one of 200 facts that each trace back to the reference below.
Where this comes from
Facts that can change over time are reviewed and updated. If something here looks wrong, Mondo would rather know than be confidently incorrect.
Go further
More facts like this
Weta Workshop makes film props in WellingtonRichard Taylor and Tania Rodger founded it in 1987Ray Harryhausen animated monsters against live platesHis Dynamation split the frame so models could sit inside live footageGo motion blurred puppets while the shutter was openA computer nudged the armature during each exposure so the frame carried blurDisney's multiplane camera added depth to cartoonsSeveral layers of artwork moved past the lens at different distancesMost hand-drawn animation is shot on twosEach drawing is photographed twice, so twelve drawings fill a secondFilm foley sound is named after Jack FoleyHe built the craft of performing everyday noises in time with the picture
๐ฌ Movies & TVfact 44 of 200
โ โ to keep reading, or swipe
Tags: stop-motion, 1933, special-effects
King Kong was animated one frame at a time: the short answers
- Where does this come from, and can I check it?
- Willis O'Brien posed a jointed model and shot single frames of each pose. The figure is taken from Science and Media Museum, which is linked in full on this page. Every fact on Mondo Knows names its source rather than repeating an unsourced claim.
- Is this really a movies & tv fact?
- Yes. It sits on the Movies & TV shelf, one of 2,600 sourced facts grouped into space, animals, the human body, history, science and more. Category pages collect every fact in the same field.
- What else can I read about it?
- The links under the fact point to a quiz, game, puzzle or calculator on the same subject, and the shelf below shows related facts. The wording here is original, and quoted phrases are marked as quotations.