Animation Drawing of Gertie the Dinosaur

Gertie the Dinosaur was produced before the introduction of later time-saving techniques such as cel animation. To create the film, McCay himself drew thousands of frames of Gertie on individual 6.5 x 8.5 inch sheets of rice paper. He hired neighbor and art student John A. Fitzsimmons to draw the backgrounds. Fitzsimmons carefully re-traced the rocks, lake and tree from a master drawing onto each sheet of rice paper.