WALT DISNEY

Walter Elias "Walt" Disney  (December 5, 1901 – December 15, 1966) was an American business magnate, cartoonist, and filmmaker. As a prominent figure within the American animation industry and throughout the world, he is regarded as a cultural icon, known for his influence and contributions to entertainment during the 20th century. As a Hollywood business mogul, he and his brother Roy O. Disney co-founded The Walt Disney Company.

As an animator and entrepreneur, Disney was particularly noted as a filmmaker and a popular showman, as well as an innovator in animation and theme park design. He and his staff created various fictional characters including Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, and Goofy. Disney himself was the original voice for Mickey. During his lifetime, he received four honorary Academy Awards and won 22 Academy Awards from a total of 59 nominations, including a record of four in one year, giving him more awards and nominations than any other individual in history. Disney also won seven Emmy Awards and gave his name to the Disneyland and Walt Disney World Resort theme parks in the U.S., as well as the international resorts, Tokyo Disney Resort, Disneyland Paris, and Hong Kong Disneyland.

HANNA BARBERA

Hanna-Barbera Productions, Inc. (also known at various times as H-B Enterprises, H-B Production Company, and Hanna-Barbera Cartoons) was an American animation studio that dominated American television animation for nearly four decades in the mid-to-late 20th century. It was formed in 1957 by former MGM animation directors William Hanna and Joseph Barbera (creators of Tom and Jerry) and live-action director George Sidney in partnership with Columbia's Screen Gems television division.The company was sold to Taft Broadcasting in late 1966, and spent the next two decades as a subsidiary of the parent and its successors.

Over the years, Hanna-Barbera produced many successful animated shows, including The Flintstones, Yogi Bear, Scooby-Doo, The Smurfs and The Jetsons, earning eight Emmys, a Golden Globe Award, and a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, among other merits. The company's fortunes declined in the mid-80s after the profitability of Saturday morning cartoons was eclipsed by weekday afternoon syndication. Hanna-Barbera was purchased from Taft in late 1991 by Turner Broadcasting System, who used much of its back catalog to program its new channel, Cartoon Network.

WARNER BROTHERS

Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. (commonly called Warner Bros. or WB) is an American producer of film, television, and music entertainment. As one of the major film studios, it is a subsidiary of Time Warner, with its headquarters in Burbank, California and another in New York, New York. Warner Bros. has several subsidiary companies, including Warner Bros. Pictures, Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment, Warner Bros. Television, Warner Bros. Animation, Warner Home Video, New Line Cinema, Castle Rock Entertainment, DC Entertainment, and the former The WB Television Network. Warner Bros. owns half of The CW Television Network.

The corporate name honors the four founding Warner brothers (born WonskolaserHarry (born Hirsz), Albert (born Aaron), Sam (born Szmul), and Jack (Itzhak, or to some sources, Jacob). Harry, Albert, Sam and their parents emigrated to North America from Krasnosielc which was located in the part of Poland that had been subjugated to the Russian Empire following the eighteenth-century partitions of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth near present-day Ostrołęka, Poland.

NORMAN McLAREN

Norman McLaren, (11 April 1914 – 27 January 1987) was a Scottish-born Canadian animator and film director known for his work for the National Film Board of Canada. He was a pioneer in a number of areas of animation and filmmaking, including drawn-on-film animation, visual music, abstract film, pixilation and graphical sound.His awards included an Oscar for the Best Documentary in 1952 for Neighbours, a Silver Bear for best short documentary at the 1956 Berlin International Film Festival Rythmetic and a 1969 BAFTA Award for Best Animated Film for Pas de deux.

Grierson, who was at that time head of the UK General Post Office film unit, saw another of his movies at an amateur film festival and took interest. He hired McLaren for the GPO after his studies, following a stint as cameraman on Defence of Madrid, Ivor Montagu’s documentary on the Spanish Civil War. McLaren worked at the GPO from 1936 to 1939, making four films including: Book Bargain (1937), Mony a Pickle and Love on the Wing (1938), and News for the Navy (1938).

AARDMAN ANIMATIONS 

 Aardman Animations, Ltd., also known as Aardman Studios, or simply as Aardman, is a British animation studio based in Bristol, United Kingdom. The studio is known for films made using stop-motion clay animation techniques, particularly those featuring Plasticine characters Wallace and Gromit. It entered the computer animation market with Flushed Away (2006).

Aardman was founded in 1972 as a low-budget project by Peter Lord and David Sproxton, who wanted to realise their dream of producing an animated motion picture. The partnership provided animated sequences for the BBC series for deaf children Vision On. After creating a segment called "Greeblies" (1975) using clay animation, became what was the inspiration for creating Morph, a simple clay character. Around the same time Lord and Sproxton made their first foray into adult animation with the shorts Down and Out and Confessions of a Foyer Girl, entries in the BBC's Animated Conversations series using real-life conversations as soundtracks. However, these two shorts were not actual Aardman productions. Aardman also created the title sequence for The Great Egg Race and supplied animation for the multiple award winning music video of Peter Gabriel's song "Sledgehammer".They produced the music video for the song "My Baby Just Cares For Me" by Nina Simone in 1987.