Red Raven Animated Records

When portable CD players were relatively new, a friend of mine had a unit with a little window in the lid.  I thought that it would be really cool to create a CD that had sequential frames on it that would seem to animate through the window.  There are a number of technical reasons why that wouldn't work (the window doesn't have a shutter, every CD player has a different window, etc.), but it still seemed like a good idea.

Just like so many good ideas, mine had been done forty years before by Red Raven records.  These were cardboard children's records with the animation printed right onto the disc itself (later versions like the one above had the animation on the label of regular colored vinyl).  The Red Raven included a little mirrored device that you pop onto the turntable's spindle that reflected the animation in such a way that while the record plays you get to see a little cartoon.

The effect is rather hypnotic (the mirrored device is an ersatz praxinoscope for all of you optics junkies), and a neat addition to the typical children's fare on the record itself.  Sixteen Magic Mirror Movie records were released by Red Raven (making for 32 animations of course).

Nice video from Kempa.com of the Red Raven in action

Comments

[matrix]

Pretty cool James. Another I couldn't resit from putting up on http://sparkletrain.blogspot.com

I promise not to post too many of these. There is a bar for sparkle. : )

[james]

Awesome! Thanks, Matrix. The post was written by Bohus - I'm definitely not cool enough to own a set of animated records.

[Mike Cornwell]

I found your site via BoingBoing.

This great! I had one of these when I was very young. I remember it was pre-kindergarten. And I was fascinated. It was if there was something inside that was dancing. Thanks for the memories.
/Mike

[Denise]

I also had one of these back in the mid 1950's and absolutely loved it to. I must have been only 5 or 6 yrs old. And wished I still had it!

[Melody]

Wow, what a smart little idea, especially for a record player.

My grandmother kept old books and toys from thr twenties and thirties. The old books with their heydey radio production quality read-along records and turn-wheel, custom dye cut (georgious) illustrations were the most magical things I was lucky enough to own.

The book I remember the best was called The Melody Makers, from the thirties or forties, and featured classical music and a deep-voiced narrator re-telling classic fairy tales to children who were magically transported through their record. The eye of the swan, or the green lantern door of the little elves was the disguised little door to the turn-wheels that told the story along with the album.

Why don't we make toys like this anymore???

[snoogans]

Grandaddy's album the Sophtware Slump had stop-motion frames of a bird flying on the front side of the CD. On some players with the window, you could see the bird flap its wings during the slow spin down/spin up times...

[anon]

Marcel Duchamp made several such "Rotary Demispheres": http://www.understandingduchamp.com/

[Mr Sang-Myon LEE]

Hi! I'm interested in various "optical toys" for children like the toy with animated pictures above (on the homepage of your website) such as film karussell, mirror cylinder (praxinoscope) etc. But where do I find these items in your website? Thanks for answer in advance.

Sang-Myon LEE in South Korea

[Declan]

hey,ive been looking into making an animated cd image myself and althou it cant be done in this traditional sence due to the speed a disk turns at,has there ever been reseach into distorting and skewing an image so that it would re-join and become ledgible again as the disk spins?this kind of information is hard to find online so thanx for this info!!

[newsuperhero]

I made a video of this player ,. i love these .. I have been using it for my site newsuperheros.com ..

anyhow .. check it out : http://www.vimeo.com/720146

[alpacatex]

yes, I had several of these records with the mirrored center piece and it was my favorite past time; it was mesmerizing. My other favorite was Bozo the clown read along records, mine happened to be about birds. And it made a bird chirp or something when you had to turn the page.

[garry]

Thanks

I've asked so many folks over the years if they had seen one or could locate one

This is nice.
Thanks for the effort