Blinkity Blank

Blinkity Blank is a 1955 animated short film by Norman McLaren, engraved directly onto black film leader, Blinkity Blank features a soundtrack combining improvisational jazz from composer Maurice Blackburn along with graphical sounds created by McLaren scratching onto the film's optical soundtrack.

Blinkity Blank features lines, dots and other abstract forms, along with fruits, trees, planets and chickens—the latter featured at length in another McLaren hand-drawn film Hen Hop—which blink in and out of existence, or merge with or modulate other shapes. McLaren also left some frames blank, which he described as “sprinkling on the empty band of time”.

It received the Short Film Palme d'Or at the 1955 Cannes Film Festival, the first prize for Best Animated Film at the BAFTA Awards as well as a Silver Bear at the Berlin International Film Festival. Blinkity Blank was produced by the National Film Board of Canada.