Norman McLaren

McLaren at Play (2006)

A compilation of various tests, techniques and experiments compiled from the 1940s - 1950s. Silent film. ...

Out-of-Focus Cloudscape (2006)

An idea for backgrounds never used, late 1940s. Silent film. ...

Blurr Test (2006)

Compilation of McLaren's Blurr technique. ...

Little Negro (2006)

Unfinished animated film, 1940s. Silent film. ...

Chaplin Test (2006)

An attempt to animate an abstract Charlie Chaplin-esque figure. ...

Birdlings (2006)

This 1967 footage shows McLaren at a computer with Evelyn Lambart, Rene Pardo and two other technicians, followed by the animation test some call Birdlings. McLaren found computers still too primitive for his needs and continued to explored the optical pri ...

Surrealistic Hand Drawing (2006)

Done during war years. Silent film. ...

Pen Drawings (2006)

Mixes with still images, 1940s. A large collection of McLaren's surrealist illustrations. Silent film. ...

The Hypnosis Film (2006)

1960s. A test using circles. Silent film. ...

On the Farm (2003)

Stop-motion, pixillation and other trick photography methods are used to depict situations on a farm. ...

Six and Seven-Eighths (2003)

Grant Munro dances to New Orleans jazz music. ...

Creative Process: Norman McLaren (1990)

Norman McLaren was a cinematic genius who made films without cameras, and music without instruments. He produced sixty films in a stunning range of styles and techniques, collecting over 200 international awards, and world recognition. In Creative Process, ...

Narcissus (1983)

In this short film by Norman McLaren, dancers enact the Greek tragedy of Narcissus, the beautiful youth whose excessive self-love condemned him to a trapped existence. Skilfully merging film, dance and music, the film is a compendium of the techniques McLa ...

Animated Motion: Part 5 (1978)

In this fifth part, Norman McLaren deals not with motion (if motion is defined as a change of location in two- or three-dimensional space) but with change--change in the amount and color of light within an otherwise static screen. Normally, the animator co ...

Animated Motion: Part 2 (1977)

In this short animation film, Norman McLaren presents the first 3 of the 5 categories of motion: constant, accelerated and decelerated. Various types of acceleration and deceleration are demonstrated, and examples are shown of how these types of motion may ...

Animated Motion: Part 3 (1977)

The third in a series of five colour films that offer an introduction to the basic techniques of film animation. McLaren explains and demonstrates different aspects of movement that are essential to the animator's art. In this case it is the pause and irre ...

Animated Motion: Part 4 (1977)

In this fourth film, Norman McLaren explains and illustrates composite motion, where two of the categories of motion occur simultaneously in one action, such as the motions of jointed or pivoted parts (as occur in animal and human movements). Also shown is ...

Animated Motion: Part 1 (1976)

The first part of this series by Norman McLaren deals only with tempo. It starts by showing the disc travelling in one move (1/24 of a second) from A to B, and progressively demonstrates slower and slower tempos. ...

Pinscreen (1973)

Pinscreen animation makes use of a screen filled with movable pins, which can be moved in or out by pressing an object onto the screen. The screen is lit from the side so that the pins cast shadows. ...

Ballet Adagio (1972)

A slow-motion study by Norman McLaren of the pas-de-deux adagio, one of the most exacting and difficult dances of classical ballet. A ballet originally choreographed by the Russian ballet master Asaf Messerer is performed for this film by the international ...

Synchromy (1971)

The film's soundtrack is an original musical composition produced with synthetic sound - through photographing unusual geometric shapes and running them through an optical sound head. The images are an artistic rendering of this soundtrack. ...

Opening Speech (1969)

Norman McLaren attempts to give the opening speech for the first Montreal International Film Festival, but his microphone won't cooperate. ...

Spheres (1969)

This animated short is a play on motion set against a background of multi-hued sky. Spheres of translucent pearl float weightlessly in the unlimited panorama of the sky, grouping, regrouping or colliding like the stylized burst of some atomic chain reactio ...

Pas de Deux (1968)

Two ballet dancers perform a dance enhanced with surreal after-image visuals. ...

Korean Alphabet (1967)

The Korean alphabet, illustrated with animation, spoken, and accompanied by music. ...

Mosaic (1965)

A man sets a ping-pong ball into motion and it becomes fruitful and multiplies. ...

Canon (1964)

Perhaps the only film whose content is totally based on the musical form known as canon. The first sequence is a simple demonstration of the canon "Frere Jacques" where four cubes dance and combine with one another on a checkerboard. The second sequence sh ...

Christmas Cracker (1963)

Three separate sequences related to Christmas, animated in different styles: cutout animation of children dancing in the snow to "Jingle Bells," stop-motion animation of toys come to life, and cel animation of a man who seeks the ideal star to top his Chri ...

Seven Surprizes (1963)

A compilation of seven shorts made for the National Film Board of Canada. Features the NFBC shorts, "Nahanni," "Le Merle," "A Chairy Tale," "The Cars in Your Life," "Corral," "Wrestling," and "Neighbors. ...

Lines: Horizontal (1962)

An experiment in pure design by film artists Norman McLaren and Evelyn Lambart. Lines, ruled directly on film, move with precision and grace against a background of changing colors, in response to music specially composed for the films. ...

New York Lightboard Record (1961)

New Yorkers watch as Norman McLaren's animated promotional film for Canadian tourism plays on the giant pixelboard overlooking Times Square. The caption below the board reads: "Canada... Wonderful World At Your Doorstep". McLaren himself is a member of the ...

The Flicker Film (1961)

'Too esoteric, even for me,' said McLaren about his The Flicker Film. The famous animator's most abstract effort is marginalized to the point of being officially labelled as 'unfinished,' even though the explosion of high-intensity stroboscopic imagery cre ...

Lines: Vertical (1960)

An experiment in pure design by film artists Norman McLaren and Evelyn Lambart. Lines, ruled directly on film, move with precision and grace against a background of changing colors, in response to music specially composed for the films. ...

Test A for Synchromy (1960)

No information given. ...

Test B For Synchromy (1960)

No information given. ...

Doors (1959)

An unfinished animated short from the late 1950s. ...

Mail Early for Christmas (1959)

In this pre-Christmas reminder to mail early, filmmaker Norman McLaren used an electric vibra-drill to engrave the images on black film, and included the occasional "subliminal" burst of lettering, which he hand-scratched on a few frames. ...

Serenal (1959)

A gay fantasia of patterned sound in which Norman McLaren salutes the West Indies, painting the spirit of fiesta on film to the lively beat of an island tune by Trinidad's Grand Curacaya Orchestra. ...

Short and Suite (1959)

A color cocktail by Norman McLaren and Evelyn Lambart, translating into moving patterns of color and light the moods of music written for a jazz ensemble by Eldon Rathburn. Inscribed and colored directly on film. ...

Blackbird (1958)

To the tune of a classic French-Canadian nonsense song, surreal blackbird made of lines loses body parts and gets them back threefold. ...

A Chairy Tale (1957)

An ordinary-looking chair refuses to be sat upon. ...

Rythmetic (1956)

On a blue background, a series of numbers (1 to 5) begin to appear, forming simple arithmetic equations that create a pattern. Numbers and symbols move as the pattern grows, to a soundtrack of simple beats. ...

Blinkity Blank (1955)

A playful exercise in intermittent animation and spasmodic imagery. Playing with the laws relating to persistence of vision and after-image on the retina of the eye, McLaren engraves pictures on blank film creating vivid, percussive effects. ...

Two Bagatelles (1953)

Norman McLaren instructs Grant Munro on the movements he is to make. The film technique for Two Bagatelles is pixillation, where the actor is animated frame by frame, as in the film Neighbours/Voisins. ...

Neighbours (1952)

In this Oscar-winning short film, Norman McLaren employs the principles normally used to put drawings or puppets into motion to animate live actors. The story is a parable about two people who come to blows over the possession of a flower. ...

A Phantasy (1952)

An animated film drawn entirely in pastels. Various fantastical plant-like things "grow" from the ground, eventually launching five spheres. The spheres drift in space while changing shapes and come back down to another setting, which eventually becomes mo ...

Twirligig (1952)

Early abstract 3d stereoscopic animation by Norman McLaren collaborator Gretta Ekman. ...

Now Is the Time (1951)

Early abstract 3D film by animation master Norman McLaren. ...

Pen Point Percussion (1951)

A documentary showing Norman McLaren working on the hand-drawn sound process he uses for his short film, Loops. ...

Around Is Around (1951)

Early abstract 3D film by animation master Norman McLaren and collaborator Evelyn Lambart. ...

The Corridor (1950)

This uncompleted film uses a technique invented by McLaren in the 1930s; the travelling zoom. McLaren's intention was to make the corridor gradually disappear so that the viewer's initial imprisonment would give way to the freedom of infinite space. ...

Begone Dull Care (1949)

In this extraordinary short animation, Evelyn Lambart and Norman McLaren painted colours, shapes, and transformations directly onto their filmstrip. The result is a vivid interpretation, in fluid lines and colour, of jazz music played by the Oscar Peterson ...

A Summer Day in Ottawa in 1949 (1949)

Produced for the National Film Board of Canada ...

Dots and Loops (1948)

An hand drawn animation merged from two originally separate films. ...

La poulette grise (1947)

An experimental short film of images and music made by Norman McLaren. ...

Fiddle De-Dee (1947)

A film fantasy of dancing music and dancing color. Listen to the Mocking Bird played by an oldtime fiddler, brilliant patterns ripple, flow, flicker and blend. A Norman McLaren painting on film, translates sound into sight. ...

Up There in the Mountains (1946)

In Là-haut sur ces montagnes, Mclaren used for the first time a chain-of-mixes (chiaroscuro) on a pastel-drawn landscape. The idea for such a technique had been planted by seeing Alexandre Alexeïeff's Night on Bare Mountain in the late thirties. ...

A Little Phantasy on a 19th-century Painting (1946)

Taking "Isle of the Dead," a work by the Swiss symbolist painter Arnold Böcklin as his starting point, Norman McLaren creates a deeply disturbing surrealist dream. ...

Hoppity Pop (1946)

An animated film in which colored shapes dance to calliope music. The visuals were drawn by Norman McLaren directly upon the film with pen and ink. Simple forms dance about the screen to the discordant strains of an old-time circus calliope. ...

Rock the Boat (1944)

One of a series of French-Canadian folk songs, this film was illustrated by Norman McLaren for the Chants populaires series. White gouache drawings on black cards were photographed with overlapping 'zooms' to suggest the forward movement of a canoe along r ...

Keep Your Mouth Shut (1944)

This animated short from Norman McLaren features a human skull cautioning Canadians to "keep their mouths shut" in an effort to end gossiping during World War II. ...

Alouette (1944)

This animated short co-animated by René Jodoin and Norman McLaren was produced for inclusion in the Let's All Sing Together sing-along series. It illustrates the popular song Alouette, gentille alouette. The technique used is single-frame animation of pap ...

The Head Test (1944)

An unfinished animated short by Norman McLaren. ...

A Rainy Day (1944)

An animated victory bond message with the advice, "Don't cash in your bonds. ...

Chants populaires nº 5 (1943)

Alexandre Alexeïeff illustrated the song "Et moi je m'enfouiyais" (En passant) using the pinscreen technique. Norman McLaren illustrated "C'est l'aviron" using drawings on a fixed background, with the characters pasted in as they were drawn. ...

Snakes (1943)

Made during WWII ...

Barrel Zoom (1943)

Images supered on a revolving barrel. ...

Dollar Dance (1943)

This wartime publicity trailer by Norman McLaren focuses on wartime inflation and the role of price control. Single-frame animation is used with pen drawings made directly on 35mm film stock. Music is by Louis Applebaum, a leading composer and advocate for ...

Hen Hop (1942)

This joyful short animation features a dancing hen that transforms into an egg. The film was made without a camera by Norman McLaren, who drew directly onto 35 mm movie stock with ordinary pen and ink. Colour was added optically. ...

5 for 4 (1942)

This animated short by Norman McLaren serves as a wartime savings campaign. Symbolic figures, drawn directly on 35mm film stock, move and dance against a simple painted background. The score is "Pinetop's Boogie Woogie," by Albert Ammons. ...

Boogie-Doodle (1941)

An animation film, made without the use of a camera, in which "boogie" played by Albert Ammons and "doodle" drawn by Norman McLaren combine to make a rhythmic, brightly colored film experiment. The main title is in eight languages. ...

Mail Early (1941)

This publicity clip for Canada Post is Norman McLaren's first film for the NFB. For this animated short, McLaren drew symbols by pen onto clear 35 mm stock, which was then superimposed on a photographed painted background. Benny Goodman's rendition of Jing ...

V for Victory (1941)

This animated short by Norman McLaren is a publicity message for a war bond campaign. Symbols, a stick man and lettering are drawn directly on 35mm film stock and synchronized with a brass band rendition of Sousa's march "The Thunderer. ...

Loops (1940)

An experimental film in which both sound and visuals were created entirely by McLaren drawing directly upon the film with ordinary pen and ink. The titles are in eight languages. Rereleased with multilingual titles in 1949. ...

NBC Valentine Greeting (1940)

A play on the theme of hearts. Two hearts cavort, change shape, shoot arrows at one another, give birth, and finally become one heart bearing the message "Will you be our Valentine? ...

Dots (1940)

An experimental film in which both sound and visuals were created entirely by Norman McLaren drawing directly upon the film with ordinary pen and ink. The main title is in eight languages. Rereleased with multilingual titles in 1949. ...

Spook Sport (1940)

It's midnight in a graveyard. The principal characters are spooks, ghosts, bats, bells, and, at the end, the sun. As midnight strikes, 12 spooks appear, then two ghosts. They move to the music's rhythm. Against the black night, they are blue and yellow. Ba ...

Scherzo (1939)

Norman McLaren made Scherzo early after his arrival in North America in 1939, but the film was subsequently lost. In 1984 the original materials were found and the hand-drawn images and sound were reconstituted. Picture and sound dance triple-quick in this ...

Stars and Stripes (1939)

An abstract animation by Norman McLaren, who was born in Scotland in 1914. His interest in filmmaking began early in life after he became acquainted with works by the great Russian filmmakers Eisenstein and Pudovkin and the German animator Oskar Fischinger ...

Love on the Wing (1939)

Animation featuring dancing black and white shadows. ...

The Obedient Flame (1939)

Advertising cartoon showing advantages of using gas supply and gas cookers. ...

Mony a Pickle (1938)

A brisk GPO Film Unit promo for the Post Office Savings Bank: pub talk and daydream vignettes tout penny-by-penny thrift, peaking in a playful Norman McLaren passage where household furniture springs to life—selling the idea that "many a little makes a l ...

A Job in a Million (1937)

A Cockney lad trains to be a messenger boy. ...

News for the Navy (1937)

Norman McLaren's documentary-style account of how a letter from home reaches a sailor on duty in foreign waters. ...

Book Bargain (1937)

Shows the production of the London telephone directory. ...

Defence of Madrid (1936)

This cinematic travelogue consists of three parts. In the first part, texts and small maps are our guides through Madrid in 1936. We see pictures of daily life against the background of the fascist shillings. A sad portrait of destroyed houses, the search ...

Hell Unltd (1936)

In this film Norman McLaren uses puppets, diagrams, animation and live-action to present an anti-war message for use by peace organizations. ...

Camera Makes Whoopee (1935)

Montage and animation in two Acts: the preparation for the Glasgow Arts School Ball; and the ball itself. ...

Polychrome Fantasy (1935)

In this early film Norman McLaren shot crystal formations through a low-power microscope, using polarized light with the lower part of the picture masked off. The film was then rewound and a scene of dancers was filmed. ...

7 Till 5: A Pattern of the Day's Doings (1933)

Experimental film showing a day's activities at the Glasgow College of Art. ...

Daedalus (2024)

"Fly too high and you will burn, go too low and you won't breathe." A 7 day vlog during the summer of 2023, a story of dreamers and drowners. ...

Jacques Drouin: In Relief (2009)

This documentary is a portrait of the animator of Le Paysagiste, from his childhood in Eastern Quebec to his career at the NFB. Trained at the École des beaux-arts de Montréal and the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA), Drouin became in some ...

Beginnings (2006)

The first thematic mini documentary about revolutionary filmmaker Norman McLaren. ...

Painting with Light (2006)

The third thematic mini documentary about revolutionary filmmaker Norman McLaren. ...

Blurr Test (2006)

Compilation of McLaren's Blurr technique. ...

The Art of Motion (2006)

The fourth thematic mini documentary about revolutionary filmmaker Norman McLaren. ...

Birdlings (2006)

This 1967 footage shows McLaren at a computer with Evelyn Lambart, Rene Pardo and two other technicians, followed by the animation test some call Birdlings. McLaren found computers still too primitive for his needs and continued to explored the optical pri ...

Evelyn Lambart (2006)

The fifth thematic mini documentary about revolutionary filmmaker Norman McLaren; this time with a focus on his collaborator Evelyn Lambart. ...

Tanguy Landscape Test (2006)

Featuring a voiceover. 1944 test inspired by surrealist painter Yves Tanguy, an improvised moving growing landscape in a surrealistic manner. ...

War and Peace (2005)

This documentary short illustrates the thematic role of war in the works of filmmaker Norman McLaren, from his traumatic experiences in the Spanish Civil War to the Korean conflict, which inspired him to make Neighbours. ...

On the Farm (2003)

Stop-motion, pixillation and other trick photography methods are used to depict situations on a farm. ...

Creative Process: Norman McLaren (1990)

Norman McLaren was a cinematic genius who made films without cameras, and music without instruments. He produced sixty films in a stunning range of styles and techniques, collecting over 200 international awards, and world recognition. In Creative Process, ...

McLaren on McLaren (1983)

An opening address, a tribute and highlights of a long and productive career--McLaren on McLaren is Norman McLaren on camera. The occasion is the opening of a prestigious festival in Arnhem, the Netherlands, in November, 1983, marking the tenth anniversary ...

Grierson (1973)

A portrait of John Grierson, the first Canadian Government Film Commissioner and founder of the National Film Board in 1939. Interweaving archival footage, interviews with people who knew him and footage of Grierson himself, this film is a sensitive and in ...

Pinscreen (1973)

Pinscreen animation makes use of a screen filled with movable pins, which can be moved in or out by pressing an object onto the screen. The screen is lit from the side so that the pins cast shadows. ...

Cinéastes de notre temps : Norman McLaren (1972)

The Eye Hears, the Ear Sees (1970)

The Eye Hears, the Ear Sees is a 1970 documentary exploring the career of Norman McLaren, a Scots-Canadian animator known for his pioneering work in experimental animation, using innovative techniques to blend visual art with sound design. ...

Opening Speech (1969)

Norman McLaren attempts to give the opening speech for the first Montreal International Film Festival, but his microphone won't cooperate. ...

Mosaic (1965)

A man sets a ping-pong ball into motion and it becomes fruitful and multiplies. ...

New York Lightboard Record (1961)

New Yorkers watch as Norman McLaren's animated promotional film for Canadian tourism plays on the giant pixelboard overlooking Times Square. The caption below the board reads: "Canada... Wonderful World At Your Doorstep". McLaren himself is a member of the ...

Pen Point Percussion (1951)

A documentary showing Norman McLaren working on the hand-drawn sound process he uses for his short film, Loops. ...