animation
(ænɪˈmeɪʃən)
[ad. L. animātiōn-em, n. of action f. animā-re: see animate.]
The action of animating, or state of being animated.
† 1. a. The action of imparting life, vitality, or (as the sign of life) motion; quickening, vitalizing. Obs.
| 1597 J. King Jonah xxvi. (1864) 167 Such as are strengthened by the arm and animation of God, his waves. 1623 Howell Lett. I. xxix, The fourth act that goeth to make man, is called Animation. 1721 Bailey, Animation, the informing an animal body with a soul. |
b. fig.
| 1605 Bacon Adv. Learn. ii. xxiii. §49 (1873) 251 The administration, and (as I may term it) animation of laws. |
2. The state of being animate or alive, animateness, vitality. spirit of animation: see animal spirits. arch.
| 1615 T. Adams Leaven 116 Men of our own flesh, of the same animation with ourselves. 1678 Cudworth Intell. Syst. 169 Aristotle himself held the Worlds Animation, or a Mundane Soul. 1733 G. Cheyne Eng. Malady i. x. §1 (1734) 90 Mere Mechanism..can never account for Animation, or the animal life even of the lowest Insect. 1794 E. Darwin Zoon. (1801) I. 37 The spirit of animation is the immediate cause of the contraction of animal fibres—it resides in the brain and nerves. 1818 M. W. Shelley Frankenst. (1865) iii. 58 Capable of bestowing animation upon lifeless matter. 1837 Penny Cycl. IX. 159/2 A case of suspended animation in a seaman who had..fallen into the sea. |
† 3. Representation of things as alive. Obs. rare.
| 1681 Hobbes Rhet. iii. ix. 114 Animation is that expression which makes us seem to see the thing before our eyes. |
4. The action of filling with liveliness, enlivenment; enlivening operation or influence.
| 1818 Scott Rob Roy 93 The animation of the chase and the glow of the exercise. 1820 Shelley Prom. Unb. iv. i. 322 Ha! the animation of delight Which wraps me. |
5. Liveliness of aspect or manner; vivacity, sprightliness, brightness.
| 1790 Boswell Johnson xxiv. 213 Johnson was in high spirits..talked with great animation and success. a 1817 Jane Austen Mansf. Park (1851) 62 She discussed the possibility of improvements with much animation. 1839 Hallam Hist. Lit. i. viii. §28 The substitution of the anapæst for the iambic..gives them [ballads] a remarkable elasticity and animation. 1863 M. Howitt tr. Bremer's Greece I. i. 15 Little fishing-boats on the water gave animation to the scene. |
† 6. a. The action of inspiring or filling with any impulse; inspiration. Obs.
| 1613 Daniel Hist. Eng. 135 [The legate] now by the Kings animation, presumes more peremptorily to vrge them. 1664 H. More Myst. Iniq. 286 She by her counsel and animation stirs up the Seven-headed Beast to this Murther. |
† b. esp. Inspiration with courage, encouragement.
| 1616 R. C. Times' Whistle (1871) 111 A great animation of my subsequent endeavours. 1680 H. More Apocal. Apoc. 303 An intimation and animation to us to follow his example. |
† 7. The imparting of any physical quality or virtue. Obs. rare.
| 1605 Timme Quersit. ii. xli. 117 We are now speaking of the animation of gold. 1667 Phil. Trans. II. 604 The animation of the Voyce of Man by his Masculine and Generative power. |
8. Cinemat. The production of ‘moving pictures’; the technique by means of which movement is given, on film, to a series of drawings (esp. for an animated cartoon). (See quot. 1959.)
| 1912 F. A. Talbot Moving Pictures i. 7 What we describe as animated photography is not animation at all. All that happens is that a long string of snap-shot photographs..are passed at rapid speed before the eye. 1919 A. C. Lescarboura Behind Motion-Picture Screen xvi. 302 The animation of a picture calls for a large number of separate drawings. 1958 Observer 9 Mar. 8/5 Commercial television has brought a boom in animation, with comic men and goofy animals bouncing out from everywhere. 1959 Halas & Manvell Technique Film Animation 336 Animation, the art of giving apparent movement to inanimate objects. The word is also used for the sequence of drawings made to create the movement, and for the movement itself when seen on the screen. |