There are three major types of animation. They are called stop-motion animation, hand-drawn animation, and computer animation.

Traditional or Hand Drawn Animation

One important kind is traditional or hand-drawn animation. Traditional animation is photographs of drawings which are first drawn by animation artists. It is very labor intensive, needing many drawings for each minute of film.

The way it works is it starts out is with one drawing on a piece of paper. Then illustrators draw another piece just like it but a slightly different. There is also a painted background that goes behind the characters. The key animator will draw the most important parts of the action, then the other animators in the group will draw all the in between pictures to make the action happen smoothly.

The animators picture is traced onto see through sheets called cels.They are painted on the inside of the drawing.The finished character cels are placed on top of each other against a painted background and filmed by a camera. That way each character can be in their own layer so they don't have to draw the same picture over and over. The traditional cel animation has become much more limited in use in the 21st. century. Now there is much more being done on computers.

Stop Motion Animation

Stop motion animation is the term used to describe animation created by moving real-world objects, photographing them one frame of film at a time and playing them at a speed that gives the illusion of movement.

Clay animation uses figures made of clay to create stop-motion animation.

Another type of stop motion animation is called cutout animation, where animators use paper for characters. One example is South Park animation.

One rare type is puppet animation where animators use puppet figures as characters. Examples would be Robot Chicken or the Pillsbury Dough Boy used in commercials. Puppetoon is another kind of animation, using different puppets for each frame, rather than simply moving one puppet.

Model animation is also a part of stop-motion animation made to work with and exist as a toy or object. Intercutting, matte effects, and split screens are mostly used to blend stop-motion characters or objects with the other parts of the movie. An example is the movie King Kong(1933 film) where the giant ape was a model and the other characters were real people.

Object animation means the use of real life objects in stop-motion animation as liked more to specially created items.An example is Brickfilm,which is made with the use of LEGO. Many science fiction movies use models to show their spaceships.

Computer Animation

Now there are computers to help make animation easier. It is much easier with a computer program to draw a wonderful scene and then make the small changes needed in the characters to give the illusion of movement. One now common form is 3D animation, where the shape is given a digital sculpture. Then there are techniques to make simulated fur or hair effects, and fire or water effects. Many 3D animations are used in special effects for movies.