The Story of the Motor Car Engine - Ford (1959)
Year: 1959
Format: Leaflet
Illustrator: Richard Williams (1933-2019)
Client: Ford
Details: This 1959 leaflet entitled 'The Story of the Motor Car Engine' was published by Ford in Dagenham, UK. The workings of a four cylinder car engine are explained with accompanying illustrations.
The stylised artwork looks like the storyboard for an animation. This could be because there was an animated version made in 1958, directed by Richard Williams (1933-2019).
Williams was born in Ontario, Canada and his parents were commercial artists. He studied at the Ontario College of Art and worked for Disney Studios as a teenager before moving to England at the age of 22. He joined fellow Canadian George Dunning's company T.V. Cartoons Ltd, which mainly created television commercials. At the same time, Williams created his first animated short feature, ‘The Little Island’ (1958), which won the 1959 BAFTA Award for Best Animated Film.
His next film was commercially successful and enabled Williams to set up his own animation studio. As well as producing commercials, Williams made title sequences for motion pictures including ‘The Return of the Pink Panther’ (1975) and ‘The Pink Panther Strikes Again’ (1976).
Williams is probably best known as the animation director for ‘Who Framed Roger Rabbit’ (1988), which won him two Academy Awards. He is also known for his 2002 book ‘The Animator’s Survival Kit’.
From 2008, he was an artist in residence at Aardman Animations in Bristol, UK. In 2015, he received BAFTA and Oscar nominations for his animated short film ‘Prologue’.