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Eric Larson, Animator & Mentor

July 11, 2013, 1:31 am
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Eric Larson's animation training program, which started in the mid 1970s, was groundbreaking and very important. I was so lucky to have benefited from Eric's one on one mentoring. He was the most patient teacher I have ever known. Even when you knew that what you were showing to Eric was REALLY bad stuff, he always saw something positive in your work that encouraged you to keep going. He would often flip a trainee's scene, and most likely he pointed out that there was too much going on in the animation, too many ideas. What is your statement here, what are you trying to communicate? After a brief discussion Eric would pull out drawings that weren't necessary, and he simplified and clarified your whole scene. It was magical to see him do this. Eric also drew over poses and strengthened them, so by the time you were done with your session you left Eric's office with something that WORKED.
This photo above was taken in the early 1980s in a screenting room of the original animation building. In the back are Ron Clements and John Musker, and there is also animation assistant Sue Frankenburger.

Many of today's influential animation artists went through Eric's training program, including Tim Burton, Brad Bird, Ron and John, Mark Henn, Andy Gaskill and Glen Keane, just to name a few.

I love many characters Eric animated over the years. Figaro from Pinocchio, the flying horses in Fantasia, the Owl in Bambi, Sasha from Peter and the Wolf, Little Toot, Joe and Jenny from Once Upon a Wintertime, Roquefort from The Aristocats among many other assignments. 
But I think that Eric did some of his best work for Lady & the Tramp. He animated the first half of the sequence with the beaver at the zoo. Milt Kahl did the second half.
These drawings might not be a stunning as Milt's, but Eric's acting is top notch. The effort the beaver puts into trying to move a big log into the water is so entertaining and believable.
Whoever wrote on the made up model sheet that these are Milt's drawings is wrong.




Eric's shining moment in the film is his animation of Peg. I swear, Milt Kahl told me that he believes it's the best stuff in the picture.


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More Wire Sculptures

July 13, 2013, 12:07 am
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I sold these three pieces at a charity auction last year. They actually date back quite a few years, the cow was the second piece I ever made.
The lion was a weekend project during the lion king production days, but he has nothing to do with Scar. 
I made the circus elephant a few years after that. Hopefully sometime in the future I'll find the time to bend some wire again and experiment a little.
For now it's all about making a little animated movie.



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Medusa Thummbnail Sketches

July 15, 2013, 12:28 am
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Milt Kahl used a thin felt pen for his exploratory sketches during production of The Rescuers.
He produced a ton of these sheets searching for the most inventive poses, expressions and acting patterns. Even if the scene is only 16 frames long, like the one shown here, Milt tried several variations on the main idea of Medusa freaking out at the sight of two mice.
I love the energy in these drawings, and the lines of that felt pen seem to be dancing on the paper.
It's interesting to see that he used a through away rough animation sheet, probably because it was the closest within reach.
There is so much unconventional stuff going on with Medusa's design, including the way her very round shoulders contrast her straight lower arms.

These are the key drawings for this short scene.








More thumbnails that show Medusa's panic. She grabs the lower end of her dress…because she needs something to hang on to.




Snoops is having an uncomfortable encounter with the alligators.
There will be a post with more Snoops material coming soon. He is a terrific character.



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Classic Squash & Stretch

July 17, 2013, 1:44 am
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Wether applied forcefully or subtly, I don't think anything comes alive without it.
Hollywood animation from the 1930s to the late 1940s normally shows a broad use of squash and stretch. As the years went on and animation styles, especially at Disney, integrated more realism, distortions of a character's head or body were handled more subtly and carefully. 

I don't know from what short film this elephant originates from, but this bold shape change works magnificently. Note that the bulk of the body moves forward, but the rear moves backward for counter balance.




The goal keeper from Bedknobs and Broomsticks inhales, with his trunk all squashed in, holding the soccer ball. The forward stretch position is either from another scene or it preceded the squash drawing.
Milt Kahl had something to do with these two sketches. Looks like he made corrections on someone's scene.




Bill Tytla was a master of distorting the forms of his powerful characters, like Stromboli.
When he animated the devil on Bald Mountain shortly afterwards, he did not go nearly as far though.
Because of the degree of realism in the devil's design he knew that in order to be convincing, squash and stretch needed to be incorporated much more subtly.




Fred Moore animated Lampwick as a donkey. In his horrified state he anticipates, then stretches forward in a loud call for help. Beautiful counter action on the arms and ears.




Very gutsy change of shape as Archimedes hops forward. The animation is on one's and very fluid. What you see is smooth motion, the drastic change is only felt. That's a Kahl scene of course.




Baloo moves around his sparring partner Mowgli in a series of hops. The graphic change is more subdued here and not by the book, but then again Frank Thomas always had his own unique way of using animation principles.



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Don Towsley is Amazing!

July 19, 2013, 12:14 am
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He really is!!
Towsley was mostly a Donald Duck animator, but he also worked on some of the early Disney features such as Pinocchio, Fantasia and Dumbo.
He created the most dynamic model sheets like the one above for Disney stars like Donald, Mickey and Goofy. His short film credits start with the 1934 Two-Gun Mickey and ends with 1948 Drip Dippy Donald. Towsley went on to work for other studios in Hollywood as an animator and director.

The animation drawings I am showing here are from Donald's Cousin Gus. As I mentioned before in a previous post, Gus was brilliantly animated by Woolie Reitherman. Towsley's Donald is equally fantastic. To me these drawings show the real Donald at his peak as an animated character.
The poses are alive, they are drawn with an inventive touch, and no angle seems impossible.
As a matter of fact, those unusual perspectives add greatly to the characters range in terms of motion and acting. And that's why Donald looks so believable here. No formulas, no limitations, only  energetic, inspired personality animation.
Because of the fact that these drawings don't show any numbers makes me think that they could be tracings off Towsley's roughs by an assistant. This was not uncommon practice, tracing the animators' keys allowed the follow up artists to get to know a particular animation and drawing style.
Then again, I could be wrong and these really are Towsley's original roughs.

In any case I am totally in love with this type of approach to animation. What a freeing feeling for the animator to know that he could infuse his character with such spirited, dynamic life.









These last few drawings are from a different short.





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Disney Owls

July 21, 2013, 11:12 pm
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There have been so many owls over the years in Disney animation that I can't list them all in this post. Their personalities range from warm paternal to comedic types. Some of them took on the role of a teacher, educating other characters or the audience on a certain subject matter.

A lot of photographic research went into Bambi, to inspire styles for the environments but also the characters. The picture above is part of that research. Walt sent a couple of cameramen on a seven-month trip through the Katahdin county of Maine state, with instructions to photograph and film as many sceneries and animals as possible.
Beautiful realistic studies were made based on that material, and Joe Grant's department produced  wonderful preliminary model sheets. 
It looks like Friend Owl used to be a mom.





Great owl studies that are starting to show personality. The second sheet is a Marc Davis  story sketch. The animation of Friend Owl was done by Eric Larson and Preston Blair.




Wise Old Owl appeared in the 1949 animation/live action film So Dear to My Heart. 
The storyline might be a bit too corny for some of you, but let me tell you, the animated sequences are worth the purchase of the DVD (which is a beautiful transfer of the film).
Milt Kahl did some outstanding scenes with the owl character lecturing Danny, the black lamb.
Worth studying frame by frame!!



The "Accordion Owl" from Alice in Wonderland.



This is Professor Owl from Toot, Whistle, Plunk and Boom, 1953. Milt Kahl didn't animate on the short, but he drew these design poses of the character. 
(Previously posted on 365 Days of Ward Kimball)  I actually prefer these proportions over the final version.





The owl in Sleeping Beauty was designed by Kahl based on rough sketches by Tom Oreb.
By now the owl's appearance is a variation of an older theme. Fantastic stylization though.



Archimedes was mostly animated by Ollie Johnston, Milt did a few scenes with a more graphic approach, as you can see in his model sheet.



John Lounsbery supervised the animation of Owl for the three Winnie the Pooh featurettes.
By now a very familiar design formula, but Lounsbery brought the character to life with unique character animation as the pseudo-intellectual type.



A model sheet by Dale Baer, who animated Owl for Winnie the Pooh's most recent feature. Dale trained under John Lounsbery in the 1970s, so he was perfectly cast on this character. Beautiful job, Dale!



Guess what! I animated one scene with Owl interacting with Tigger in the film. It was so much fun to do, but articulating wings as hands is not as easy as it might seem.


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From Live Action to Final Frame

July 23, 2013, 11:08 pm
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These black and white photostats show clearly how the actors' performance influenced the Disney animators. To me it is always fascinating to find out what parts were kept and which ones were changed. 
Young dancer/actress Marge Champion, who had just finished acting out the role of Snow White for the animators, also performed as The Blue Fairy in Pinocchio.
By the way, today at age 93 Marge looks as beautiful as ever. I had the good fortune to get to know her a little, she is a remarkable lady, who had a remarkable career.




That's actor Christian Rub, painting Pinocchio's mouth. He not only acted out the part of Geppetto for animator Art Babbitt, he also voiced the character. Rub was born in Germany and his accent was for real.




Actress Rhoda Williams, as Cinderella's stepsister Drizella, beats up on actor Don Barclay, who is trying his best to fit the glass slipper on to her foot.
Ollie Johnston animated this scene.




In this group shot Wendy, John, Michael and Mrs. Darling are feeling sorry for the dog Nana, who just had an accident running into Mr. Darling.
Wendy of course is Kathryn Beaumont, John is Paul Collins, Michael has Mickey Mouse standing in for him, and Mrs. Darling is played by English actress Heather Angel, who also voiced her character.
Nana is put together by a sac, a box and a plunger. 




Young Prince Phillip is being presented to baby Princess Aurora by the Queen, except that he is not supposed to look into the camera !!
The boy is Cubby O'Brian, who was a famous Mouseketeer in his day job at that time. The Queen is played by Jane Fowler (later Boyd), a Disney effects artist.



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Busch Circus Sketches

July 25, 2013, 4:23 pm
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More spectacular gesture drawings by German artist Wilhelm M. Busch.
Throughout his career as a prolific book illustrator, he kept going to the circus to study animals interacting with their trainers. 
I am astounded by his ability to find golden moments in front of his fast moving objects.
You can tell by the line work that each sketch took only seconds to put down. 
This man continues to amaze and inspire me. He is the real deal!







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Bambi Vis Dev Art

July 28, 2013, 1:02 am
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In their 1990 book Bambi, The Story and the Film, Frank and Ollie don't identify the artist who produced these magnificent poetic renderings. They probably didn't remember.
The use of light gives the settings a magical, dreamlike quality. There is subtle shading on the characters, even though the final appearance of Bambi, Thumper and all the others would mostly consists of thin ink lines and flat cel paint. 
Nonetheless these drawings sure helped to establish the mood for one of the most beautiful films ever made.







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Fred Moore from the Back

July 29, 2013, 10:28 pm
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As far as I'm concerned there aren't enough photos of Fred Moore around.
This is the guy who changed the look and feel of character animation during the 1930s in a big way.
The photo above was taken in Fred's office at the Disney Hyperion Studio. It looks like Walt is dropping by with guests Leopold Stokowski and Deems Taylor, and Fred is giving a demonstration on how animation works by flipping a scene with Mickey from The Sorcerer's Apprentice.

This was the time when Mickey's design changed, and he was given pupils for the first time.
You can see the character has come a long way since the early black and white films.
There are plenty of graphic cheats going on in this model sheet from 1938, but who cares, there is ultimate appeal in every single sketch!



The next image shows Fred decorating a board with centaurettes. That board served as a backdrop for a filmed drawing class as part of the feature film The Reluctant Dragon. The photo was taken on one of the sound stages of the new Burbank Studio.


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Gag Drawing

August 1, 2013, 12:55 am
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You've probably seen some of those vintage gag drawings that were done at Disney way back. They usually poke fun at something that had happened between animators, occasionally even Walt was portrayed in a satirical sketch. Milt Kahl and Ward Kimball kept huge files of those drawings.
In the 1995 documentary film Frank and Ollie Frank Thomas revealed several gag drawings that involved him and Ollie . Pretty funny stuff.
Perhaps my generation of animators wasn't as quick with gag artwork, but we drew them, too.

Years ago I was one dollar short when paying for my lunch in the commissary. So my buddy Nik Ranieri lent me a buck, I told him I'd pay him back tomorrow. Months later I found this drawing on my desk.


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TS Sullivant 7

August 2, 2013, 11:31 pm
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What an amazing Sullivant cartoon, one of many based on the story of Noah's Ark.

I am off to Germany for the Hamburg Animation Award event, so there won't be any new posts for a week and a half. In the meantime enjoy these Sullivant beauties, scanned from original Life magazine pages.






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London & Peter Pan

August 20, 2013, 6:22 pm
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I am writing this post slightly jet lagged, having just gotten back to LA from a week in London (after a few days in Hamburg, Germany).
The weather was beautiful for outdoor activities, so I skipped museum visits this time around.
I decided to look up the bronze statue of Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens. 
Walt Disney paid a visit there while working on his animated version of the J.M. Barrie story. Commissioned by Barrie in 1902, the tall statue was sculpted by Sir George Frampton and placed in the park in 1912. There are all kinds of characters like rabbits, squirrels and fairies climbing up the base toward Peter.

Last Sunday a few friends joined me for a boat trip on the Thames, from the London Eye to Tower Bridge and back to Big Ben. How can you not think about Peter Pan as you pass by these incredible sights. It was an absolutely beautiful evening.




I have always liked this attractive illustration which was used for the film's poster as well as other promotional material.



These are key drawings from a Milt Kahl scene which takes place inside Skull Rock. 
"(Psst, Wendy) watch this!"
Milt didn't use any live action reference here, he was more than capable of pulling this one out of his head. The action is a little cartoony, but believable anatomy is maintained throughout.














Woolie Reitherman animated this surreal moment with Captain Hook emerging from inside of the crocodile's mouth. Other animators criticized the scene at the time for its irrational quality.
All I can say is…works for me! And you couldn't portray Hook's scream for Smee any better.









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Getting to know Milt Kahl

August 22, 2013, 7:49 pm
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I originally prepared these interview clips as part of a presentation for the 2009 Milt Kahl Tribute at the Academy. This is a series of brief, but fascinating statements which reveal Milt's passion as well as his artistic ego (watch for his comment about the use of live action, priceless).
He reflects on certain character assignments, talks about the genius of Walt Disney, and he even draws a few characters.
It is shocking to watch him start a sketch, he begins with details, as if he sees the complete drawing already on paper.
One thing is clear, this is an artist who challenged himself constantly to raise the standard of character animation. He had no patience for people who didn't try as hard as he did…he called them lazy bastards.
It's a shame he left Disney so early in 1976. As Brad Bird mentioned, at that time he had two or three more pictures in him.



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Cruella as Medusa ?

August 24, 2013, 11:11 pm
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During the early development phase of The Rescuers Ken Anderson gave some serious thought to the idea for a Cruella De Vil comeback. He made these sketches to experiment with the concept of Cruella as Madame Medusa.
When I asked Milt Kahl later about this initial approach, he said: " Can you believe how people think sometimes?" He didn't mention Ken Anderson, they remained friends long after Milt left the studio, despite of the disagreement over Milt's final character.




One of the last drawings Milt did of Medusa, as we know her. What a fantastic expression!
This sketch was given to animation assistant Bud Hester, who over the years not only worked for Milt, but all the other Nine Old Men. If anybody knows some scoop about these animation giants, it would be Bud.


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Bill Peet's Dumbo

August 26, 2013, 11:14 pm
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A young Bill Peet sketches elephants at a circus, backstage around 1940.
He ended up doing story work on critically important personality sequences like those playful scenes with Dumbo and his mother. Bill Tytla saw the potential in these storyboards and turned them into animated gold. In the hands of lesser artists, emotional story material like this could have turned saccharine very quickly, but both men approached this assignment with such sincerity that you can't help but fall in love with these characters.









The circus moves during a rainstorm at night. I love this sketch, you can feel the elephant using its weight to push the tiger cage up the ramp on to the train.



Peet came up with the final character design for Dumbo, those are his drawings on the model sheet.



Bill Peet at work at the studio. It's fun to study all the research he assembled.
That's an early model sheet by J.P.Miller on his left.


Peet was brilliant at handling elephants in his story work. That's probably why he chose them so often as main characters in his many children's' books.

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Alice giggles...

August 28, 2013, 11:41 pm
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…and if you don't think this is the most adorable photo you've seen in a long time, I really can't help you.
It looks like Kathryn Beaumont is cracking up at something that happened on the set. I don't believe this is a photo stat image provided to the animators for live action reference.
Kathryn is standing on a mock up giant mushroom. This is the sequence for which Milt Kahl animated his first few scenes of Alice.
He recalled years later: " Yeah, that's a cute litte Alice I did there. Unfortunately for much of the picture (when other animators took over) she doesn't look like this, and I know I could have done those scenes a whole lot better !"

Here are few beautiful roughs from Milt's early Alice animation.





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Jafar Clean Ups

August 30, 2013, 5:24 pm
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A while ago I posted some of my rough animation of Jafar. When it came to cleaning up those rough key drawings on a new sheet of paper I tried to stay in touch with my clean up lead Kathy Bailey as much as possible. Especially on the first scenes we went back and forth on how the character should look in that nice calligraphic line that was called for to fit in with the style of the film. 
Looking at these sheets now after such a long time I am still pretty happy with how Kathy handled the character. Sometimes the clean up process can flatten out the drawings. Not here. Kathy's elegant lines show a subtle "thick and thin", something that was not easy to maintain for her follow up artists, the clean up inbetweeners.
This is a character that was a lot of fun to draw and to animate. The story material was very rich, too,  which made it easier to find decent performances.
I don't think there was an animation artist who didn't enjoy working on this film.













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"…You worry too much, old boy!"

September 2, 2013, 12:37 am
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Here is a very simple and effective scene with Robin Hood in the opening sequence of the film.
He responds to the bear Little John, who is concerned about the pursuits by the Sheriff of Nottingham. "Ah, come along, you worry too much, old boy!"
The animation reads beautifully because the action is broken up very clearly. Robin raises his arms and slides down the side of an oak tree to land in a sitting position, hands behind his head. To show his confidence as well as comfort level, he crosses his legs at the end of the scene. During this leg motion the rest of body is kept pretty still, so it doesn't interfere with the principal action.
Milt Kahl animated the character in this early sequence to establish his personality.
I like the final pose, it shows that Robin is utterly unconvinced that the Sheriff poses any threat.
As a matter of fact he is so relaxed, it looks like he is about to take a nap.















Little John is worried, Robin is calm. Remember what Frank Thomas said: "When you have two characters interacting, they better show contrasting emotions."

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James Affleck Shepherd

September 3, 2013, 9:12 pm
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J. A. Shepherd is not as well known nowadays as he should be. 
I first came across his work during the production of Roger Rabbit in London, when animator Chuck Gammage showed me one of his illustrated books. It was called "Zig Zags at the Zoo" and was published in 1894. Shepherd caricatures animals beautifully, and he often depicts them in anthropomorphic ways. He has no trouble whatsoever mixing animal with human anatomy to create unique personality types.
Shepherd was born November 1866 in London. As an illustrator he published his cartoons in Punch and Strand Magazine.
The gorgeous images shown here are from the 1926 edition of Joel Chandler Harris' "Nights with Uncle Remus".  I find his approach very charming, but also sophisticated. Shepherd knew exactly how to simplify the appearance of animals to bring out their main characteristics. 
Like a pre-animation Milt Kahl.




That lion is just amazing! A completely plausible pose.














Every pose a gem in this fun composition!
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