It was with Walt Disney's creation of first cartoon character that animation witnessed a modest beginning in 1928. But the subsequent years saw a deluge of cartoon characters becoming a part and parcel of daily life. Mickey Mouse, Tom & Jerry, Dennis the Menace are some of the notable characters.

Simply defined, animation is the manipulation of static images to give the illusion of moving pictures. This happens when a sequence of pictures are passed through the projector at a rapid speed of 24 frames a second.

One could flip, flop, stumble and tumble and yet spring out fresh as ever. And this is only possible in the world of animation, which can make your weindest dreams come true.A sense of colour, a sense of balance and proportion is a must in this profession. An eye for detail will take you places. The essence of the job is to know how exactly each character should move or react and create something extraordinary which seems full of life.

Animation can be of two types -2D (two dimensional) and 3D (three dimensional). While 2D animation can be cell, puppet or sand animation, clay modelling, cut - out animation or computer generated; it goes through the stages of story, boarding, character development on paper, background and layout, scanning, inking and painting, key frames and in betweens, sound - effects and editing. Therefore, a one hour film takes almost one year of hard work. As the name suggests, 2D animation generates characters like what we see in Cartoon Network.

The 3D animation also goes through the similar processes but uses more sophisticated gadgets and processes. Real and life like features of characters created through 3D animation can only be restricted by the creator's imagination.

There are computer animators who work on computers to make their characters come alive. But there are also cartoon animators who draw the pictures for the animated movies. Most computer animators draw their characters by hand and then plug them into the computer to make them act out their part in the movie or the commercial.