Week 26.25 - Socials Roundup RACK FOCUS pt3 Animation
15 June - 21 June 2026: drawn shots which pull focus to draw our attention
The last two weeks we looked at rack focuses in live-action, from mind-bending mirror racks and pulling attention to wedding rings, to repeated rack to bees and hyper-close gun-trigger-pulls.
Animation uses this technique, too, even though it’s often a much more painstaking process to create. And so, Week 26.25 posts include shots from Tom and Jerry (1940–1967); The Lion King (1994); BoJack Horseman (2014-2020); Mars Express (2023); and Arcane (2021-2024).
The Lion King
This is possibly the first shot to jump to mind when you think ‘rack focus in animation’ (just as Beauty and the Beast is the first film to come to mind when you think ‘animated boom shot’ or ‘library ladder on rails’).
What better way to show the SCALE of the Pride Land and vast variety of its inhabitants than to show contrast within one shot, pulling focus from tiny ants marching on a high branch to a whole herd of zebra (or ‘dazzle of zebra’) galloping across wide open plains far below.
It’s also a literal A-to-Z . . . Ants racking to Zebras.
Arcane
Sure, “all you need to make a movie is a girl and a gun,” but the often-elided final part of the quote (seemingly from D. W. Griffith) is:
“and if you have a hot girl and a cool gun, rack focus from one to the other.”
Tom and Jerry “Tall in the Trap”
Near the start of this 1962 short, the focus pulls from a WANTED poster of Jerry to the General Store getting shot up in the background.
The effect is we know EXACTLY who is stealing the cheese, long before we see Jerry actually (and literally) running away with it.
Mars Express
This scene uses multiple rack focuses to give us vertigo, and draw attention to different crowd elements — see it all here!
What effect does it have when there is a lack of rack focus, when the audience may be expecting it?
BoJack Horseman
The opening moments of the second season packs a lot of information into one shot, and the rack focus works because it presents us with details up close and in-focus, then draws our attention to BoJack and the TV.
Then, when the scene cuts to a wide, we know exactly what the smoking cigarette is doing in the background, that it’s got lipstick marks on it, etc.