When we talk about animation the name of Walt Disney is very likely to be the first which comes to your mind. But perhaps, you are more fond of anime and thus more familiar with other names, such as Akira Toriyama or Hayao Miyazaki. In order not to miss some important pieces from the world of animation, we should start from the very beginning.

The history of animation as we know it today, that is to say, cartoon animation, began long before the advent of cinema. Actually, before the invention of photography, every attempt to create motion pictures was made using drawings and cutouts. From the asian shadow play of the 1st millennium BC to the popular Zoetrope of 1834, animation has always been part of the human existence. At the beginning of Cinema, the line between animation and live action was very thin, since the only aim was to create motion pictures, no matter if they were drawings or photos. Anyways, what we can consider as the first animation was realized in 1900 by J. Stuart Blackton’s and it is called The Enchanted Drawing, later followed by the renowned Humorous Phases of Funny Faces, also released by Blackton, in 1906. You will easily find these short movies on the Internet: the viewing is strongly recommended!
The technique used by Blackton was the stop-motion. This means that the appearence of movement is created by slightly moving or changing the object or drawing between one photograph and the other. Once the photographs are played in fast succession, the animation is ongoing! Even if quite energy and time consuming, this technique is still used nowadays by some animation studios like Aardman Animations, producer of the modern masterpieces Chicken Run and Wallace&Gromit.
However the most traditional technique consisted in drawing each frame of the sequence by hand, instead of physically modify the same object (which, in J. Stuart Blackton’s case, was a drawing on a blackboard). The traditional technique could be even more demanding than the stop-motion, but thanks to the invention of celluloid sheets, the process of drawing and photographing became easier and quicker.
Walt Disney, who started producing his animations in the ’20s and definitely gained his immortal fame with the creation of Mickey Mouse in 1928, used to make his movies with the traditional Cel animation. Actually, the golden age of animation is believed to start precisley with the first Mickey Mouse movie, called Steamboat Willie. It was with this movie that Disney managed to synchronize animation and sound for the first time in history. This was just the first of a streak of innovations and breakthroughs. 1937 was a flourishing year for Disney. It was the year when Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs was released as the first feature animated movie, awarded with many prizes. But it was also the year the multiplane camera was launched by Disney, causing a real revolution in animation technique. The multiplane camera allowed the animator to create a completely new effect of depth and realism in the animation, by putting on multiple levels the different elements of the scene (background, foreground, main character, extras).
The last big step in the evolution of animation was taken in the ’60s, when Computer Generated Imagery started thanks to the rudimentary short movie Hummingbird. However, CGI really took hold in the ’80s and a new production company emerged as forerunner in this art, that is to say, Pixar. The 1980s have been also the decade of the great anime cartoons series for tv. Anime were still realised with a traditional technique. Actually, anime animators didn’t even use the Cel animation, due to their low budgets, but just cutouts.
In 1995 Pixar released the unforgettable Toy Story, a real milestone of animation since it was the first CGI feature movie. Since then, CGI animation has never stopped improving.
I wonder how far animation will get, making the borderline with live action thinner and thinner.

SOURCES: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zoetrope
https://www.powtoon.com/blog/the-evolution-and-history-of-animation/
https://animationcriticalperspectives.wordpress.com/2017/03/01/economical-animation-and-astro-boy/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anime
https://youtu.be/YdHTlUGN1zw