Michael Sporn Animation – Splog

- Last week we posted the second of two parts of Frank Thomas‘ animation on the short that never went to completion, The Laughing Gauchito. John Canemaker brought me Bill Tytla‘s scene from this very film, and it’ll take two parts to post it. This one came with the exposure sheets!

Here’s the first part.

The Background

The wine glass overlay

1A

2A

3A

5A

11

13

15

17

19

21

23

25

27

29

31

33

1 2
These are the X Sheets for the scene.

________________________

Here’s a QT of the scene with all the drawings from this post..

Many thanks to John Canemaker for the loan of the scene.

- A lot of pre-production artwork from Bambi has been released in numerous forms. One of the groups of images I find particularly interesting is a host of thumbnail paintings that an art director had done trying to get quick sketches of the backgrounds for a sequence. These seem to all come from the forest fire sequence. They could be Maurice Noble or John Hubley or Tom Codrick or Al Zinnen. Or others. There were great artists backing up this film.

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13
A Harold Miles sketch.

14
A still from the film.

15
Tyrus Wong
Loaned from the Cowan collection.

16
Loaned from the Cowan collection.

17
Marc Davis
Loaned from the Cowan collection.

- It all starts with a drawing. Bambi is, to me, one of the most beautiful of animated features. Collectively, the artists at the Disney studio pulled together to create some wonderful artwork which produced a wonderful film.

The initial work went through many phases, as would be a natural state for animation. However, all of the artists seem to be trying for a higher plane, and oftentime they reached it.

To celebrate the latest release of this film, the Blu-Ray/DVD version, I’ve pulled a lot of the drawings from the film and post them here. It’s amazing how much nifluence Marc Davis had early on. I can only ID the artists of some of the sketches. If you know, let me know.

1
David Hall

2

3
(above and below) Marc Davis

4

5
David Hall

6

7
(above and below) Ken Peterson

8

9

10
David Hall

11
Marc Davis

12
Murray McClelland

13
Fred Madison

14
(Probably) Gustaf Tenggren

15

16

17

18

19
Frank Thomas

20

21
Marc Davis

22

23
Lynn Karp

24
Ken Peterson

25
Ken Hultgren

26

27

28

29

30
(above and below) David Hall

31

32
A Tyrus Wong pastel sketch.

- Here are the last of the drawings of Frank Thomas‘ scene from The Laughing Gauchito. This was a short that was stopped mid-production in 1942. Thomas animated this, the most emotional of scenes in the film. Bill Tytla and Ollie Johnston were the other animators assigned to director, Jack Kinney on this film.

Go here to see part 1, here for part 2.

Many thanks to John Canemaker for lending me these drawings.
As usual I begin with the last drawing from the last post.

99

0709

1113

115

1719

2123

2527

129

3133

3537

139

4143

4547

149

5153

5557

159

6163

6567

169

7173

7577

179

8183

8587

193

197

________________________

Here’s a QT of the scene with all the drawings from the entire scene.

- Here we go with the final installment of the Raggedy Ann & Andy: A Musical Adventure drafts. This, of course, was the feature Richard Williams directed (3/4 of the way) in 1977. You’ll note that as we’ve gone on, the drafts have gotten sloppier and sloppier. This last batch (separated from the last installment by 2 sequences of live-action film) included a couple of faux sheets. They were started and redone. I only include the redone sheets.

The animators working on this ending sequence include: Hal Ambro, Dick Williams, Tissa David, Jim Logan, Tom Roth, Spencer Peel, Irv Spence,Art Vitelo, Art Babbitt, Dan Haskett, Cosmo Anzilotti and John Gaug.

The final three sheets are a sequence breakdown – a reduction of the drafts, in case you’ve lost your place and want to find out what sequence to look for.

A Corny Cole rough (above) done with BIC pen and
a Corny Cole clean up (below) done in pencil.

Sequence 12

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

1
Corny Cole storyboard drawings.

Sequence Breakdown

1

2

3

2

3

4

- Continuing on with the Raggedy Ann & Andy: A Musical Adventure drafts, we move onto seqeunces 7, 8 and 9. This involves the Loony King, the Loony Knight and Babette at sea.

Animators for these sequences include: George Bakes, Gerry Chiniquy, Doug Crane, Dick Williams, Chrystal (Russell) Kablunde, Hal Ambro, Charlie Downs, Art Vitello, Jack Schnerk, Corny Cole, Tom Roth, Irv Spence, Bob Bemiller, and Warren Batchelder.

A lot of talent in one place; too bad the film doesn’t hint at it.

To dress up the post I’ve added five of Tissa’s key drawings from an early scene.

Sequence 7

7-1

Sequence 8

8-1

8-2

8-3

8-4

8-5
For some reason this bad drawing of the “Greedy” was attached
to the drafts. So I just iuncluded it here, as well.

Sequence 9

9-1

9-2

9-3

9-4

9-5

9-6

9-7

9-8

9-9

9-10

9-11

9-12

9-13

- As I wrote last week, The Laughing Gauchito was to be a stand alone short for Disney in 1942. It wa one of the first products of the group that had just returned from the South American trip. The film was to be part of a series that featured the “Little Gauchito”. They’d already completed one film. That film was originally The Flying Donkey, but they turned it over to the boy, and retitled it The Flying Gauchito, and it was added to The Three Caballeros.

To read more about this series, I suggest you go to J.B. Kaufman’s excellent book, South of the Border with Disney.

The story concerned itself with a boy who could not laugh. We see in this scene the boy trying to laugh in the mirror.

Ultimately, Disney, himself, put a stop to The Laughing Gauchito. Under the direction of Jack Kinney, some animation had already been done by Ollie Johnston, Bill Tytla and, particularly, Frank Thomas, to be well into the film. It took years to find some of the animation scenes in the morgue.

This dramatic scene is by Frank Thomas.

53

5557

59

6163

6567

69

7173

7577

79

8183

8587

89

9193

9597

99

________________________

Here’s a QT of the scene with all the drawings from both posts to date.

- Here’s a little flipbook gem. It’s part of the dance from The Three Caballeros, Animated by Ward Kimball there’s still a wild freshness about this long scene that’s been rarely duplicated. It’s obviosly one of the highlihts of the film.

I beleive these were published in one of the many Disney coffee table books, but I don’t have them at hand to try finding it. At least, if you do have whatever book it’s in, you can see these better, sincde I’m posting them in a larger size. A chance to admire the verve of these drawings.

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

________________________

Here’s a QT of the scene with drawings exposed to what I think are
their appropriate frames.

Watch the number here, on YouTube.

Happy Birthday to my love, Heidi.

_____________________________

- Thanks to John Canemaker, I have the following scene by Frank Thomas to post. It’s from “The Laughing Gauchito” Sc 71 of Prod # (U290) 2719.

This was to be part of a series of shorts built around the “Little Gaucho.” “The Flying Donkey” was retitled “The Flying Gauchito” to be the first release in this series. “The Laughing Gauchito” was second up to be directed by Jack Kinney with a story by Norm Ferguson and Ernie Terrazas. Animation was by Bill Tytla, Ollie Johnston and Frank Thomas. It was about a boy whose laugh shattered glass. The climactic scene is this one where the boy tries to break a mirror in front of an audience.

The film was stopped by Disney who got tired of the breaking glass motif. Fortunately, some of the artwork was rediscovered, and happily it included this scene.

There are 197 frames expposed, so I’ll have to divide it up into a couple of parts. This is part 1.

The Background LO

1

35

79

11

1417

2023

26

2932

3538

41

4345

47

4951

53

________________________

Here’s a QT of the scene with drawings exposed to what I think are
their appropriate frames.

Here’s the continued saga of Raggedy Ann & Andy: A Musical Adventure. These are the film’s drafts for the continuation of sequence 6. Seq. 6.2 and 6.3. The Loony Knight and the equally loony King.

The animators involved include: John Kimball, Gerry Chiniquy, Grim Natwick, Tissa David, Gerry Potterton, Dick Williams, Tom Roth, Chrystal (Russell) Kablunde, and Warren Batchelder.

Here are those drafts: