Michael Sporn Animation – Splog

Gustaf Tenggren, of course, was the designer who worked at Disney’s studio during the thirties creating art which became models for Snow White, Bambi, and Pinocchio. John Canemaker wrote extensively about Tenggren in his book, Before the Animation Begins.

The artist moved into publishing after work at the Disney studio where he created The Poky Little Puppy for Little Golden Books. The Tales of the Arabian Nights was another of the many books Tenggren did for them. While visiting John Canemaker I saw the book and photographed some of the illustrations. Hopefully, the quality will be good enough so that I can share them with you. They’re completely original for Mr. Tenggren; not at all inspired by the many European-styled work he was known for. A true artist.

– Retta Scott‘s name was always an intriguing one for me.

She was an animator on Bambi, Dumbo and Plague Dogs. She was layed off at Disney’s when they hit a slump in 1941 but came back to do a number of Little Golden Books for Disney. The most famous of her books was her version of Cinderella, one which was so successful that it remains in print today as a big Little Golden Book.

When asked why females weren’t animators at the studio, the Nine Old Men who traveled the circuit, back in the 1970′s, often mentioned her. They usually also said that she was one of the
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most forceful artists at the studio, but her timing always needed some help (meaning from a man.) Ms. Scott was known predominantly for her animation in Bambi. Specifically, she’s credited with the sequence where the hunter’s dogs chase Faline to the cliff wall and Bambi is forced to fight them off.

The scene is beautifully staged and, indeed, is forceful in its violent, yet smooth, movement. I was a young student of animation, so this sequence had a long and lasting impression on me.

Here are some of her illustrations for Cinderella published in 1950 to tie in with the Disney film. Oddly, the illustrations don’t completely look like the film’s characters. The cat and mice are close, but Cinderella, herself, is very different, less realistic. She looks more like a Mary Blair creation. When I was young, I was convinced that these were preproduction illustrations done for the film. If only.

I won’t post all the illustrations of the book; I want to give an indication of her work, and I think this should be enough to do that.

(Click any image to enlarge.)

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I’ve written two posts about Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnston‘s book, The Illusion of Life the last couple of weeks. I came to the book only recently and realizing that I’d never really read the book, I thought it was time. So in doing so, I’ve found that I have a lot to write about. The book has come to be accepted almost as gospel, and I decided to give my thoughts.

There were two major complaints I’ve had with what I’ve read in their book so far, and I spent quite a bit of time reviewing those.

First out of the box, I was stunned to read that these two of Disney’s “nine old men” said that they’d originally believed that each prime animator should control one, maybe two characters in the film. Then, later in life they decided that an animator should do an entire scene with all of the characters within it. This is not what I’d seen the two (or the nine) do in actual practice. post 1

Secondly, they argue for animating in a rough format, and they give solid reasons for this. As a matter of fact, it was Disney, himself, in the Thirties who demanded the animators work rough and solid assistants who could draw well back them up. Then much later in the book the two author/animators suggest that it’s better for an animator to work as clean as possible with assistants just doing touch-up. This helped out the Xerox process, but didn’t necessarily help for good animation. post 2

The book starts out sounding like it’s going to be a history of Disney animation, but then starts getting into the rules of animation (squash and stretch, overlapping action and anticipation and all those other goodies) exploiting Disney animation art in demonstration. Soon the book moved into storytelling and how to try to keep the material fresh and interesting. It all becomes a bit obvious, but you keep hoping that some great secret will be revealed by the two masterful oldsters.

They do go into depth about how to develop characters when making animated films. They offer lots of examples from Orville, the albatross in The Rescuers to the three fairies in Sleeping Beauty, but their greatest attention goes to Baloo the Bear in The Jungle Book. They were having a hard time with this guy; they had been trying to do an Ed Wynn type character, until Walt Disney, himself, suggested Phil Harris. Once they auditioned Harris, they knew they were on the right track, and the character kept grabbing more screen time and grew ever larger. In the end, audiences just loved him.

Personally, I’ve always hated Phil Harris’ performance in this film. What was it doing in Rudyard Kipling’s book? When I was a kid, Harris and Louis Prima were the perfect examples of my father’s entertainers. He loved these guys and spent a lot of time in front of the family TV watching the Dinah Shore Show______Tom Oreb designs for Sleeping Beauty.
and other such entertaining Variety Shows with
lots of little 50′s big-band jazz-type acts. I hated it; this was my parent’s kind of music and humor and had nothing to do with me. I was the kid who paid his quarter to see the Walt Disney movies (that was the children’s price of admission in 1959.)

In their book they say they knew he was perfect because generations of kids later (who have no idea who Phil Harris was) still take joy from Baloo. What they forgot is what I knew all along. This was The Jungle Book. If they had been truly creative, they would have developed a character in line with Kipling’s material that would have been an original, not an impersonation of Doobey Doobey Doo, Phil Harris. The same is true of Louis Prima as a monkey. (There was a time when Disney said that they should never animate monkeys because monkeys are funny on their own, in real life. Animation wouldn’t make them funnier.) Sebastian Cabot, as Bagheera, works as does George Sanders as Shere Khan.

Right: A discarded sequence from Robin Hood showed a messenger pigeon so fat and heavy he had to be shot into the air. This gave the animators the beginnings of The Albatross Air Lines in The Rescuers.

Phil Harris was so successful, they dragged him into Robin Hood as well. Robin Hood. The very same character from The Jungle Book is now Little John! All those cowboy voices in Robin Hood don’t work either, especially when you mix them up with Brits like Peter Ustinov and Brian Bedford. When these two thespians work against Pat Buttram, Andy Devine and George Lindsey, it’s one thing. Throw in a Phil Harris, and you have something else again. Where are we, the audience, supposed to be? Is it “Merry Ol’ England”? Or is it the lazy take on character development by a few senior animators who have taken license to jump away from the story writers for the sake of easy characters of the generation they’re familiar with. Robin Hood is a mess of a story – even though it’s a solid original they’re working from, and I find it hard to take written advice from these fine old animation pros who take an easy way out for the sake of their animation; shape shifting classic tales to fit their wrinkles.

At least, that’s how I see it – saw it. And perhaps that’s why it’s taken me so long to read this book. I felt (at the age of 14 when these films came out) that the Disney factory had turned into something other than the people who’d made Snow White and Bambi and Lady and the Tramp.

They had, in fact, become the nine old men.

The Jungle Book was the last film Bill Peet worked on. He left
before the film was done. He’d had a long, contentious relationship
with Disney. He never felt he’d gotten the respect he deserved.

They were incredibly talented animators, and they certainly knew how to do their jobs. The animation, itself, was first rate (sometimes even brilliant as Shere Khan demonstrates), but try comparing the stories to earlier features. Even Peter Pan and Cinderella are marvelously developed. Artists like Bill Peet and Vance Gerry knew how to do their jobs, and they did them well. When Peet quit the studio, because he felt disrespected, Disney’s solid story development walked out the door.

The animators were taking the easy route rather than properly developing their stories. The stories had lost all dynamic tension and had become back-room yarns. Good enough, but not good.

Today was Nik Ranieri‘s last day at Disney’s studio. He’s definitive proof, in the eyes of Disney, that 2D animation is dead as an art form. This is the end result of some of the changes Thomas and Johnston suggest in their book. The medium took a hit back then; it just took this long for the suits to catch up. Good luck to Nik and the other Disney artists who no longer work steadily in what is still a vitally strong medium.

To keep in accord with Hans Perk‘s recent posting of the drafts to Lady and the Tramp, I am reposting a couple of these valuable past posts. Here’s one I like a lot.

- A friend (who asked to remain anonymous) sent a copy of this script of “The Story of Pluto,” an early episode of the Disneyland TV show. This document obviously follows the show very closely, but I think a lot of the on screen dialogue is actually missing. Regardless, I thought it a good opportunity to go back to the show (which when it hit TV was called “The Story of Dogs.” (At least, the video on the Lady and the Tramp DVD, which has the same date listed is longer.)

I’ll first post the “script” and then will follow with frame grabs from the TV program wherein Lady runs from some rough dogs who are chasing her, and Tramp comes to her rescue. The original show aired in B&W, but this version mixes B&W PT to color ruff-cut. It’s one of my favorite sections of the film with a lot of animation by Woolie Reitherman. (It comes on page 11 of the script.)

Here are the script pages:

Script Cover

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This sequence is followed immediately by Milt Kahl‘s sequence where Lady and the Tramp go to the zoo. They seek the help of the beaver to remove her muzzle.

- The recent posts by Hans Perk on his blog A Film LA of the animation drafts to Lady and the Tramp have led me to add to the mix by posting some of these older posts.

Here are a lot of drawings done predominantly by Joe Grant in the early forties in preparation for the movie.

The illustrations – some are obviously BG layouts, others storyboard drawings – have a light and jaunty feel. They’re very cartoon in nature, and belie the actual feature they produced which, at times, is quite beautiful. Disney truly got the feel of “Main Street, USA” in this film.

I’m interested that most of the images don’t take in Cinemascope (since they were obviously done before the decision to go Scope.Cnemascope didn’t come into being until 1953) Most of them are also fast drawings that don’t feature the Tramp as we know him, and even Lady takes on a different form.

You get the feeling this film was pushed out relatively quickly. The results are excellent, regardless. Sonny Burke and Peggy Lee wrote an excellent pop-song score that doesn’t quite capture the turn-of-the-century, but it does capture the atmosphere of early 50s USA.

This drawing is in B&W on the DVD, but it appears in
Bob Thomas’ 1958 book, “The Art of Animation.”

(Click any image to enlarge.)

Bg for The Princess and the Frog.

This looks not too different from a shot in Hitchcock’s Psycho.

You can find more Bgs from Lady and the Tramp on Hans Bacher‘s site, one1more2time3.

The following are Joe Grant development drawings.

We seem to be in the Little Golden Book territory
with some of these images.

An earlier and different view.

Or did I mean the New Yorker circa 1948?

I love weather and would have applauded more of it in the film.

(Click any image to enlarge.)

- Before there was video tape (which means before there were dvds), there was only 16mm film that you could project in your own home. I had (and still have) a nice collection of decaying movies and used to show these often. One of the regulars to show and watch and laugh at was the great Mickey short, The Whoopee Party. Everyone loved this short, no matter how many times we watched it. It’s a great film!

This encouraged me to watch it again on the B&W Mickey dvd I have. So I couldn’t help but jump for joy over the story sketches they include in the extras. Why not post them? So here they are – sketches from the limited storyboard they produced. I’ve also interspersed frame grabs from the film so you can compare images.

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Bill Peckmann forwarded this wonderful package of comic stories. They’re three Junior Woodchuck stories by Carl Barks; classic ones, at that. It’s always great fun to revisit the Donald stories by Barks, so without any more wasted time, here we go to Bill:

In 1951, Donald Duck comic book artist Carl Barks had stepped up to the next level of his extraordinary creative powers. Lucky for us little ankle biters then, that was the year he introduced Duckburg’s memorable kid’s organization, the “Junior Woodchucks”. (Boy, did we all long to join up also!)

Here from that year are two of the first JW stories. It only went uphill from there, the JW’s eventually got their own comic book.These couple of stories are reprinted and re colored from Gladstone Publishing.

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The first “Junior Woodchucks” story appeared in “Walt Disney’s Comics and Stories” #125, Feb. 1951. This second story is from “WDC&S” #132, Sept. 1951.

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“Walt Disney Comics & Stories” #132 gave us little squirts an extra bonus; not only did it contain a Donald Duck story by the “good guy artist”, there was also a second story in that issue illustrated by his deft hand! Even though the “Grandma Duck” story wasn’t written by Barks, it still has the master’s touch in all of those beautifully rendered panels.

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Among the remains of the material saved by Vince Cafarelli, there was this newspapaer, The News World, dated Tues. May 23, 1978. On the same page, there were two articles about animation.

Once was a piece about Disney’s Jungle Book, which was just about to be released. The second was an article about Perpetual Motion Pictures. This, of course, was the company where Vinnie and Candy worked with Buzz Potamkin producing and Hal Silvermintz designing.

Below, I post first the two parts of the Disney article (I’ve also singled out just the type in case you want to read at a larger scale.)Then I follow with the two parts of the Perpetual Motion article.

The Disney article (part 1)

The Disney article (part 2)

(The Disney article (Type only/part 1)

(The Disney article (Type only/part 2)

The following is the article about Perpetual Motion Pictures:

Perpetual article (Part 1)

Perpetual article (Part 2)

Perpetual article (Type only)

I started discussing some of the thoughts put forward in The Illusion of Life, the book by Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnston. I had some major problems with some of the discrepancies in that book. Here’s the second, a continuation of that post.

It cannot be doubted that without the speedy roughs, there would never have been the brilliance of Tytla‘s best work or Ferguson’s great comic animation.

- On page 39 of the book, we read, “Walt introduced two procedures that enabled the animators to begin improving. First, they could freely shoot tests of their drawings and quickly see film of what they had drawn, and, second, they each had an assistant learning the business who was expected to finish off the detail in each drawing. Walt was quick to recognize that there was more vitality and imagination and strength in scenes animated in a rough fashion, and he asked all animators to work more loosely. The assistant would ‘clean up’ these drawings that looked so sloppy, refining
them to a single line that could be traced by the inkers onto celluloid. The assistants became known as ‘clean-up men,’ and the animators developed one innovation after the other, achieving effects on the screen that no one had thought possible. In some cases, the drawings were so rough it was difficult to find any cartoon figure inside the tangled swirl of lines, and the men who made a duck or a dog out of smudges and scratches had to have a very special type of knowledge.

Shooting tests of scenes while they were still in the rough enabled the animators to check what they had done before showing it to anyone. Any part that was way off could be corrected quickly and
shot again. This encouraged experimentation, exploration, and imagination, quickly promoting a closer bond among the animators.

- Yet on page 229 the authors turn to side with management when they suggest that “. . . a new procedure called ‘Touch-up’ was instigated. It asked that the animator draw slowly and carefully enough so that the assistant need only touch up the drawings here and there to make them ready for the Ink and Paint Department. By this time all of our animators had become more skillful and were able to adjust to the new idea without noticeable damage to the product. Top quality clean up work is needed on only a handful of scenes in any sequence, and a great variety_____________Three Tytla ruffs
of shortcuts can be used on the balance
to make them acceptable.”

In short, this means that the older nine men and some of the other more seasoned veterans could work clean because they were already brilliant at the animation thing. Whereas Walt had demanded that animators, in the 1930s, work rough so as to keep the animation as loose and free and alive as possible.
It also veered toward Milt Kahl’s pleasure at seeing hos own lines used in the newly developed Xerox outline in the final ink & paint. If the assistants would indiscriminately erase only some of the animators’ lines leaving many other key lines (including, at times, construction lines for the face and body parts). Kahl’s ego wanting to see his own beautiful line meant superseding color inking – as had been done in the past._______A relatively clean drawing by Norm Ferguson

Using this new procedure would mean a need for fewer clean-up artists who could work faster and with fewer problems, thus speeding up the footage rates. It also depended on the animators, such as Thomas and Johnston who worked fast enough, that the footage rates were now closer to what they could turn out.

One wonders if this new found speed would also cut into the imagination of the scenes these men animated. (By they way, I use the term “men” because Johnston and Thomas do not once in this book consider the possibility of a female animator. It’s always”men” or “he” or “him”. Old prejudices die hard; though I suspect the two had no problem with the idea of a female animator. In fact they always bowed low in front of Tissa and her abilities. And I’m certain they were not patronizing her in any way.

One wonders if a chink in the armor hadn’t developed then and there in the animation production. Younger people would do all they could to work clean, thus handicaping the animation they turned out.

As a long-time assistant, I know that my animation has been tight to the extreme, annd more than once Jack Shnerk advised me to start working rough when I animated. However, as management (I am the boss of my own company and controller of my own films), I sought to turn out the largest output and eliminated any assistant or inbetween working on my material. I sacrificed good animation for speed and production. It has not only hurt my work but my films, and I know it.

- In yesterday’s post, we saw artwork that Bill Peet had done. It was obviously art that was prepared for a book. Whether he was doing this for himself or the studio I can’t say. I do know for sure that it didn’t become a book, but I do know it did develop as a film completed in 1951.
That film was directed by Clyde Geronomi.
The Layout was by Don Griffith and Hugh Hennesy.
The animation was by Bob Carlson, Ollie Johnston, Hal King and Cliff Nordberg.
The backgrounds were by Ralph Hulett.
The music was composed by Paul Smith.

Thanks again to John Canemaker, I have the storyboard by Peet for this short Disney film.

As in the past I’ve broken the board down so that I could post it as large as possible so that you can read it when the images are enlarged. Enjoy.

This is the complete board. I’ve broken up each individual row, they appear below.

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(Click any image to enlarge.)

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The following seem to be LO drawings and don’t appear to be part of the storyboard. Perhaps it was prepared for a Leica reel? Regardless, the drawings are interesting, though I doubt Bill Peet did them all.

As with other recent posts of storyboard material, I’ve
broken it up and repositioned the images so that you can
enlarge them for better viewing. The above image represents
what the photo given me looks like.

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Finally, I wanted to give an indication of the film’s color, so
I’ve gone back to John Canemaker’s book,
The Art and Flair of Mary Blair,
and have taken this color sketch she did in styling
to represent the film as a whole.