Very early on there was an interest in using computer animated films for education. Initially, the interest was mainly with regard to films that would be difficult to produce by conventional animation, (this normally meant requiring significant computation for each frame). Cheaper computers and cheaper film generation opened up more interest. If the computer language required to generate the film needed less computer knowledge the possibility of individual teachers being able to generate their own films for a course even when not particularly computer literate.

In the USA, universities often had access to microfilm recorders at local research laboratories and could make use of the Polytechnic Institute of Brooklyn's SC4020 service. In the UK, the Atlas Computer Laboratory provided a service initially using the AWRE SC4020 and later their own SC4020.

The Open University with the BBC started generating computer animation for their weekly televised lectures.

The first simple animation languages for non-programmers were CAMP and CAMPER (Anderson). They allowed non-programmers to punch a set of cards, submit them to a computer service and receive an animated film back. By 1968, it was possible for an educator to produce a sequence of films aimed at a specific course and have some confidence in being able to produce them.

Some relevant papers are: