Boris Pavlovich Stepantsev (russian: Борис Павлович Степанцев; 7 December 1929 — 21 May 1983) was a

Soviet The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nation ...

and Russian

animation director An animation director is either the director in charge of all aspects of the animation process during the production of an animated film or television, and animated segment for a live action film or television show, or the animator in charge of co ...

, animator, artist and book illustrator, as well as a vice-president of

ASIFA The International Animated Film Association (French: ''Association Internationale du Film d'Animation'', ASIFA) is an international non-profit organization founded in 1960 in Annecy, France, by the best known animation artists of the time such as ...

(1972–1982) and creative director of the Multtelefilm animation department of the

Studio Ekran Studio Ekran (russian: Творческое объединение «Экран», or simply, “творческое «ЭКРАН» объединение, Artistical Joint "Ekran") was a Russian (Soviet Union's until 1991) TV film studio. It was ...

(1980–1983).

Honored Artist of the RSFSR Honored Artist of the RSFSR (, ''Zasluzhenny artist RSFSR'') was an honorary title granted to Soviet artists, including theatre and film directors, choreographers, music performers, and orchestra conductors, who had outstanding achievements in the ...

(1972).'' Giannalberto Bendazzi (2016)''
Animation: A World History: Volume II: The Birth of a Style - The Three Markets
at

Google Books Google Books (previously known as Google Book Search, Google Print, and by its code-name Project Ocean) is a service from Google Inc. that searches the full text of books and magazines that Google has scanned, converted to text using optical ...

, p. 287, 77''Sergei Kapkov (2006)''. Encyclopedia of Domestic Animation. — Moscow: Algorithm, p. 615—616

Biography

As a child Boris Stepantsev (born Stepantsov) fell in love with animated films "because there was nothing funnier in the whole world"''Sergei Asenin (1983)''. The Wisdom of Fiction: Masters of Animation about Themselves and Their Art. — Moscow: Iskusstvo, p. 155-159 and decided to dedicate his life to comedy animation. He graduated from the Moscow Art School and in 1946, right after the end of

war War is an intense armed conflict between states, governments, societies, or paramilitary groups such as mercenaries, insurgents, and militias. It is generally characterized by extreme violence, destruction, and mortality, using regular o ...

, joined animation courses at

Soyuzmultfilm Soyuzmultfilm ( rus, Союзмультфи́льм, p=səˌjʉsmʊlʲtˈfʲilʲm , ''Union Cartoon'') (also known as SMF Animation Studio in English, Formerly known as Soyuzdetmultfilm) is a Russian animation studio based in Moscow. Launched in ...

where he watched many "trophy" movies, including films by

Disney The Walt Disney Company, commonly known as Disney (), is an American multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate headquartered at the Walt Disney Studios complex in Burbank, California. Disney was originally founded on October ...

that served as a major inspiration for him. Between 1947 and 1949 Stepantsev worked as animator on a number of films, including the award-winning ''Grey Neck'' (1948) by

Leonid Amalrik Leonid Alekseyevich Amalrik (russian: Леонид Алексеевич Амальрик; — 22 October 1997) was a Soviet animator and animation director. He was named Honoured Artist of the RSFSR in 1965.''Sergei Kapkov (2006)''. Encyclopedia ...

and

Vladimir Polkovnikov Vladimir may refer to: Names * Vladimir (name) for the Bulgarian, Croatian, Czech, Macedonian, Romanian, Russian, Serbian, Slovak and Slovenian spellings of a Slavic name * Uladzimir for the Belarusian version of the name * Volodymyr for the Ukra ...

. He spent the next five years serving in the Soviet Navy, and on his return entered the

Moscow State University of Printing Arts Moscow State University of Printing Arts of Ivan Fedorov (MSUPA (MGUP in Russian); former name: Moscow Polygraphic Institute, Moscow State Academy of Printing) is Russia's largest university in the field of preparing specialists in printing and pu ...

while continuing his animation career. In 1954 he co-directed his first short ''A Villain with a Label'' (together with Vsevolod Shcherbakov) which also became one of the first Soviet post-war

stop motion Stop motion is an animated filmmaking technique in which objects are physically manipulated in small increments between individually photographed frames so that they will appear to exhibit independent motion or change when the series of frames i ...

animated films produced at the newly founded puppet division of Soyuzmultfilm. Stamp of Russia 2012 No 1655 Vovka in a Faraway Kingdom

Starting with 1955 Stepanstev worked with Anatoly Savchenko, an art director and his regular collaborator on the majority of his animated and art projects that included book illustrations and

filmstrip The filmstrip is a form of still image instructional multimedia, once commonly used by educators in primary and secondary schools (K-12), overtaken at the end of the 1980s by newer and increasingly lower-cost full-motion videocassettes and la ...

s produced for the Diafilm studio. (in Russian) In 1958 they produced ''Petya and the Little Red Riding Hood'', a postmodern comedy based on the fairy tale by Vladimir Suteev about a

pioneer Pioneer commonly refers to a settler who migrates to previously uninhabited or sparsely inhabited land. In the United States pioneer commonly refers to an American pioneer, a person in American history who migrated west to join in settling and de ...

Petya who sneaked into the

Little Red Riding Hood "Little Red Riding Hood" is a European fairy tale about a young girl and a sly wolf. Its origins can be traced back to several pre-17th century European folk tales. The two best known versions were written by Charles Perrault and the Brot ...

movie in order to save the girl from the Big Bad Wolf. The film was co-directed by Evgeny Raykovsky and drew inspiration from Disney and

Tex Avery Frederick Bean "Tex" Avery (February 26, 1908 – August 26, 1980) was an American animator, cartoonist, director, and voice actor. He was known for directing and producing animated cartoons during the golden age of American animation. His mo ...

in contrast to the majority of "realistic" movies of that time that used

rotoscopy Rotoscoping is an animation technique that animators use to trace over motion picture footage, frame by frame, to produce realistic action. Originally, animators projected photographed live-action movie images onto a glass panel and traced ...

. It turned very popular and won a prize at the 1960

Annecy International Animation Film Festival The Annecy International Animation Film Festival (french: Festival international du film d'animation d'Annecy, officially abbreviated in English as the Annecy Festival, or simply Annecy) was created in 1960 and takes place at the beginning of J ...

. In 1962 they made a sequel of sorts — a half-hour

live-action animated film A live-action animated film is a film that combines live action filmmaking with animation. Films that are both live-action and computer-animated tend to have fictional characters or figures represented and characterized by cast members through mot ...

''Not Just Now'' where Petya, played by a real-life child actor, traveled through time and interacted with hand-drawn environment.widescreen Widescreen images are displayed within a set of aspect ratios (relationship of image width to height) used in film, television and computer screens. In film, a widescreen film is any film image with a width-to-height aspect ratio greater than t ...

Biography

Filmography

Director

Animator

See also

References

External links