An Exhibit That Explores the Magic of Animated Film
New exhibit charts the making of “The Burial of Natty Bumppo”
Built from over 28,000 hand-drawn images, “The Burial of Natty Bumppo” was the creation of animator Fred Burns. Taking decades to make, the film almost never made it to screen – it was rescued, restored, and digitally mastered by filmmaker and Duke lecturer Casey Herbert in 2019. The project was completed in 2023.
The Rubenstein exhibit, “From Pencils to Pixels: The Evolution of an Animated Film,” charts the myriad steps involved in the production of “The Burial of Natty Bumppo.” Content from the film is presented on screens, as physical art as produced, storyboards, animatics, pencil tests, 35mm film as shot and scanning technology.
To complete the project, Burns sent more than 2,000 pounds of art to Herbert in his Durham studio in 2019. The pandemic shutdown gave Herbert time to make the finishing effort. He scanned tens of thousands of pieces of art, eventually creating 130,000 separate digital files.
He also restored some art that had been damaged and digitally completed key scenes that had been designed, animated and color-keyed, but never inked or painted. Burns original storyboards, layouts and shooting sheets aided the final assembly and editing.
The Rubenstein exhibit takes visitors through the steps of that process. But it also is a story of the history of animated filmmaking. Many of the pieces in the exhibit connect “The Burial of Natty Bumppo” to the early days of film animation. One piece is an Oxberry Master Animated Stand, recently acquired by Herbert.
This animation stand is reported to have been used by the Disney studios in the 1960s and ’70s. The 2,000 lb. mechanical animation production device features an articulated and movable table where artwork would be placed to photograph it using a motion picture camera that mounted above.
Other parts of the exhibit show how new technology is integrated into classic animation technology. The display includes an early IBM personal computer and motion control system to help control the camera, thus improving and increasing the workflow process.
Learn More About the Film
Animator Fred Burns and Casey Herbert tell more about the story behind the making of the film on the “The Burial of Natty Bumppo” website.
Herbert is the founder of the Flying Foto Factory, an animation production studio in North Carolina. He specializes in 2D and 3D animation, motion control and stop motion photography and special venue production.
Burns has also taught animation production, animation history, and live action production at Duke University. He now lives in Taos, New Mexico.
The 28-minute film can be viewed in the exhibit room, room 235 of the Rubenstein Art Gallery. It uses the character of Natty Bumppo, the fictional creation of James Fenimore Cooper’s Leatherstocking Tales, to critique 19th century cultural images of American innocence to show how they hide outcomes such as colonization, slavery and environmental degradation.
Images from the film
The Burial of Natty Bumppo has been shown at the Montreal International Animation Film Festival (2023) and the Bucharest International Animation Festival (2023). It won the awards for Best Animated Short at Indie Short Fest in Los Angeles (2024), the California International Film Festival (2024), and at the Paris International Short Awards (April 2024).
Most recently if was recognized with the "Outstanding Cultural Contribution in a Short" from the Portland Festival of Cinema, Animation & Technology, and "Best Animation Short" from the Vancouver International Shortfest.