Rolling Boil: A Geopolitical Labor History of the Rotoscope

Abstract

This article offers a geopolitical labor history of the rotoscope by analyzing the technology’s use by three animators—Max Fleischer and Walt Disney in the US, and Claudio Díaz-Valdés in Chile—to shape political subjects. In the first two cases, rotoscoping, an animation technique of tracing live-action footage into cartoon bodies, was used in composite-style shorts that dramatized life in the cartoon factory. Rotoscoped animations featured characters with explicit live-action referents that were infinitely plastic and hyperactive, downplaying exploitation in the Fordist workplace and its interconnection with US-imperial expansion. In the third case, the rotoscope’s unique capacity to image subjects dislocated from a geography or time helped expose the psychic cost of US intervention in Chile across nations and generations. In contrast to industrial North American animation, these independent films highlighted the painstaking labor of rotoscoping to suggest ethico-political links between animation workers across continents.