Michael Sporn Animation – Splog

- Recently, on this Splog, we saw Dick Moores, who would eventually replace Frank King as the artist behind Gasoline Alley, as the artist behind the beautiful comic books featuring Mickey Mouse. Bill Peckmann continues with the Disney artist, Moores, as he gives us Lambert the Sheepish Lion, Bill Peet’s tale.

But first we saw an early strip drawn by Moores, “Jim Hardy”. Bill Peckmann is here to present some of the Moores history:

When Dick Moores was assisting Chester Gould on his ‘Dick Tracy’ strip in the 1930′s, his big dream was to eventually have a daily strip of his own. In 1936, he was finally able to fulfill that wish with the comic strip ‘Jim Hardy’. It lasted from 1936 to 1942. He left ‘Jim’ to join the ranks of the Disney comic strip dept. in ’42.

In this 1977 Hyperion Press’ book of reprints we get to read Dick’s version of how the strip came about (and what a sweet read it is) and also included are the first 21 dailies of the strip.

The cover page of this Hyperion Press collection of strips.

The back cover of the book.

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Thanks to Germund Von Wowern we have an original ‘Jim Hardy’ strip from the early 1940′s. Beautiful ink work! (Sorry about the rubber cement stains in the word balloons, those are left over from re lettered foreign language versions of the strip.)

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Here, I’ve broken the original strip into two parts
so that we can see it fully enlarged.

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In this 1953 story Dick Moores had a great time adapting the Disney short ‘Lambert, the Sheepish Lion’ to the pages of a comic book. The more I look at the art, the more I start to get the feeling, that in Dick, the cartoonist, there was always an illustrator trying to get out. Some of these panels would have made pretty good page illustrations. (Which makes one wonder and dream of what a comic book page would have looked like if it had been done by the one and only Bill Peet!?!)

The comic book cover which contained Lambert.

The back cover

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In Part 2 we’ll continue celebrating the art of Dick Moores and the release of Library of American Comics’ “Dick Moores’ Gasoline Alley”!

Let’s look a bit more closely at those films which have fallen onto the short list as potential nominees for the Oscar. Of 56 films, ten have been selected for this honor. In the past, this list would never have been released, now it’s part of the process, and a good one, I think. Let’s make the most of the feast.

Back in 1984 when I was nominated, I learned of the nomination the night before the full list of three nominees were announced. Prior to that I had no clue I was even being considered. As a matter of fact, after submitting the film, Doctor DeSoto, I virtually forgot about having entered it. I’d considered it such a ridiculous long shot that I knew there was no chance of it happening.

The nominees have two short periods of glory, and the most has to be enjoyed when you’re on the list. On January 10th 2013, the nominees will be selected. That gives those who are on this list now a good six weeks to cherish the moment. First and foremost, promote yourself and the film. Go out there and let everyone you know hear that you’ve been selected for the list, and seek out every potential way of publicizing the event. Call any local paper and remind them. Getting your name in the Pennysaver is as important as getting it on your own blog. Speaking about blogs, contact everyone you know who has one and make a pest of yourself. This is an opportunity to promote yourself, and you have to take it. God willing, you’ll get to do it all again when you get on the nominee list.

When I was nominated, Entertanment Tonight did no stories on the Best Animated Short. I contacted them so often that they did one (which aired the night of the Awards Show) and they’ve continued to do one every year since. Maybe you can convince TMZ of the importance of the event.

Oh, yes. Back to the list.
These are the ten films that have been selected to move forward from the original list of 56.

Minkyu Lee is a Disney veteran, as are many of the animators who worked on this film; on that took over two years to make. The anmated short takes the Adam and Eve story, allows it to happen off screen, and focuses on a dog who befriends Adam. The character animation is well oned and finely produced, the graphic design is beautiful, and Joey Newman’s music shows his relation to the famous and talented Newman family. The film is a winner, especially, I would guess, in Hollywood where they crave such beauiful animation. Several friends questioned the Christian sub themes, but somehow I missed that as I just watched the animation and movement. It’s a gorgeous old-school film and could do well. It won the “Annie” award last year as Best Animated Short.
Click here to see a clip of the film.

Katsuhiro Otomo, the director of this 21 minute short has a large reputation among Anime directors. His film, Akira, is almost legendary among Japan’s feature length animated films. I find that film’s craftsmanship enormously successful despite the complexity built into just about every single scene. Combustible adds a delicacy to that craftsmanship and a story that, without dialogue, tells a complicated tale. It’s an enormously attractive film and I’d like to know who the audience is that such a short, albeit a long short, obviously has a big budget. The film is a triumph for Otomo, and I rather expected it to show up on this list.

Léo Verrier, the director of Dripped is part of a production company named ChezEddy. The company was created in 2002 in Paris; the in-house animation studio is just a part of the company. The film, Dripped, is the story of an art thief, an artist searching for a style. He eats and breathes the art he steals until, finally, something original comes out of him. The film has often been described as an homage to Jackson Pollack. Romanticizing Pollack’s intentions seems to indicate that art history ended back in the early fifties. Perhaps it’s just that he was a convenient stopping point, but I would think if you’re taking “Art” to another level, it should end with something new and vibrant in THIS film. Perhaps the marriage of 2D and 3D cgi is the medium – the dripped art that the title indicated. Unfortunately, for me the story felt marginally dated, though it is graphically interesting and the telling of the story is arresting.
Go here to see a clip.

Mikey Please, directed this extraordinary 3D stop motion short at the Royal College of Art as a thesis film. Immediately, it was a success on the Festival circuit, ultimately winning BAFTA’s 2011 award as the Best Animated Short. The story is intelligent, the technique feels original (though it reminds me of some of Michel Ocelot’s early films), and the approach is funny. My guess is that this is one to beat on the way to the gold.
Go here to see a clip from the film.

Raul Garcia has been dedicated to teling Edgar Allan Poe stories in cg animation. His first film, The Tell Tale Heart, was a somewhat cheeky effort given that the UPA, James Mason film was a classic of the form. However, Garcia’s short was received very well and won a mass of awards from many International festivals. He’s worked on many international features including Asterix and Caesar, The Land Before Time and The Chipmunks Great Adventure. His work on Who Framed Roger Rabbit brought him into the Disney fold working on a number of their recent features, Beauty and the Beast, Hercules and Fantasia 2000. He left Disney to become a sequence director on numerous non-Disney features. In 2002, partnering with Manuel Sicilia he joined Kandor Graphics which became Kandor Moon with the participation of Antonio Banderas. They produced the Oscar nominated short, The Lady and the Reaper. Both The Tell Tale Heart and The Fall of the House of Usher will be part of the feature, The Extraordinary Tales, the title of the Poe feature.
Click here to see a clip.

The animation artist known as PES has finally made the short list after doing about a thousand tiny films. They’ve all bee stop motion pieces employing odd objects to replace other objects. In “Fresh Guacamole,” a hand grenade, a pool ball, a baseball, dice, a green golf ball, and christmas tree lights all replace the ingredients in the making of guacamole. He’s done other such films as Western Spaghetti. I find his films clever, smart and usually just about the right length. However, after seeing a couple of them, a sameness starts to set in. Go here if you want to see a bunch of them. Usually the Academy goes for short and funny and clever. Possibly a good chance for the nominations. Showtime had financed a number of these shorts, and it looks like Fresh Guacamole was theirs as well. Michael Eisner‘s The Tornante Company has just hired PES to direct Garbage Pail Kids movie. This will be his first feature (and probably his first film over ten minutes.)
See Fresh Guacamole here.

Timothy Reckart directed this clever stop motion 10 minute short film. In it, a man and his wife are obviously at odds with each other as each lives on separate planes. He’s on the floor, and she’s on the ceiling (or is it the other way around?). The film was done at the National Film and Television School in Ireland. It took 11 students about 14 months to complete under Mr. Reckart’s supervision. Timothy Reckart seems to be currently involved with the company Dragonframe.
See a clip from Head Over Heels here

David Silverman, who has been connected with The Simpson’s for many years, directed this short film featuring Maggie, as a theatrical film, just as he directed the theatrical feature a couple of years ago. This short is quite funny in the best way of The Simpsons’ television show. I’m not sure it goes very far beyond the best of the TV show, but it is funny. I hope it’s also an indication that there may be another Simpson’s feature in the mix. The last one was a real treat, and it’d be great to see it go into production NOW when the material is still relatively fresh.
See the trailer for The Longest Daycare, here.

I first saw Paperman at a screening of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs at the recent NY Film Festival. There I briefly met John Kahrs, who seemed nervous but proud of his excellent effort. The film is an odd combination of 2D flat animation and 3D cgi. I feel like I’m missing something whenever they describe what they’ve done. It seems like they animated in cgi, flattened the art and rotoscoped it placing some hand-drawn bits over the cgi bits (such as hair).I’m not quite sure why it wasn’t just animated flat; there doesn’t seem to be anything THAT special about the movement that couldn’t or wouldn’t have been done with any of the good 2D animators they work with. But as I say, I must be missing something. As it is, the film is nice with a great musical score by Christophe Beck, who previously had done The Hangover, Cedar Rapids and The Muppets – all fine scores.
The clip for Disney’s Paperman can be see by clicking here

Michaela Pavlátová is a Czech director who worked in France for Screbleu Productions. The film won the Cristal Award at the recent Annecy Animaton Festival. I’s the story of a tram operator who has numerous sexual fantasies while piloting her vehicle. The animation is bouncy fun, as is the musical score. It’s a light film that would have offended me had the director been a male. As it is it just seems dated to me in its sexual override. But those are just my prurient thoughts on the movie. Not quite grown up.
Watch a clip from Tram here.

- Tom Hachtman, who you may remember is the friend who does Gertrude’s Follies and sometimes contributes to this Splog, (see this post about that) and his wife, Joey Hachtman, who you’ll remember has a business painting murals on the big houses at the Jersey Shore. (See this post as an example.) That’s where they live, in a house at the Jersey Shore. Point Pleasant is just a little bit of paradise with one of the rowdiest boardwalks at the shore. It’s a fun place, at least when the weather’s warm enough.

Well, Tom took some pictures. Sandy visited the shore a few weeks back, and things have been a bit different. They still don’t have heat or electric. So here’s the first of some photos of their back yard.

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Some of the boardwalk on Atlantic Avenue.

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A bench from the boardwalk.

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Boardwalk booth.

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Copters all day long.

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Our house with the peak – looking west on Forman Avenue.

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Our street, after Sandy, looking West.

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White fence shows high water mark.

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No parking today.
A parking pay station.

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Northern NJ clean-up crew – did the basement.

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Seton Hall’s Sigma Pi boys – cleaned out the garage.
(They found a possum playing dead convincingly.)

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Soggy collectibles.

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Myrna and Joey on the porch.

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No mini-golf today

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Kitty and Olive stop by visiting Joey (right)

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Debris in Rick’s driveway.

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Our house after some housecleaning.

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Across the street – high water mark on white fence.

And of course, turning to stored artwork that the family did over the many years, things weren’t so good.

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Here’s Tom going through some of the debris
to find anything that can be saved.

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Here are some of the comics that Joey had done cartoons for.
It’s doubtful that the issues can be replaced.

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More of those comics. Do you hold onto them?

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Here are some of the many cartoons she did for Screw Magazine.
Gone.

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A cover for New York Magazine
that Tom had saved.
It was done by Bob Grossman a few years ago.

Hans Perk has begun posting the animator drafts to Disney’s Peter Pan on his blog, A Film LA.

Interesting, the timing. My wife, Heidi, is preparing to direct a version of Peter Pan for and starring school children, and, consequently, the music has been well played in our house these recent days. Quite a great score. (Some of the lyrics have been altered by Disney for PC reasons: “What made the RED man RED” has become “What made the BRAVE man BRAVE.” Hearing a few of the songs has led me to the CD score of the actual film music by Ollie Wallace. what a brilliant composer he was.

I couldn’t be more grateful to Hans for these documents, the drafts. It’s fun to scour the documents and gill in the blanks of who did what bit of animation. (Does anything like this exist in cgi world? Is there some kind of draft that will tell us who the animators are?) I also take some enjoyment from the light bickering that goes on in the coment section of the blog, as people begin to read these drafts and try to discern which characters were assigned to which animators. As Hans comments, it’s nice to take note that Norm Ferguson did his last bit of Disney animation on this feature. He was such an enormous force among the early animators, it was sad to see him burn out the way he did. Though I guess the same could be said for Freddy Moore.

Anyway, Thank you, Hans.

- Here’s Yo La Tengo‘s latest song and a video. It’s all in the family – Art, I mean.
Emily Hubley did the video for the band with Georgia Hubley, Ira Kaplan and James McNew behind the music.

It’s a great number; I can’t stop playing it. I’m looking forward to the album.

Currently, playing in New York – and not getting much attention – is a retrospective of the Ghibli films. This has already begun playing and will continue into the next week. You still have time to see the following films:

Castle in the Sky
Japan, Hayao Miyazaki, 1986, 124 min
Mon Nov 19__ IFC CENTER_____12:20PM
Thu Nov 22___ IFC CENTER_____12:20PM

My Neighbor Totoro
Japan, Hayao Miyazaki, 1988, 86 min
Sat Nov 17___IFC CENTER______3:15PM
Sun Nov 18___IFC CENTER_____12:50PM
Mon Nov 19__ IFC CENTER_____10:40AM 7:40PM
Tue Nov 20___IFC CENTER______3:15PM
Wed Nov 21__IFC CENTER_____12:50PM
Thu Nov 22___IFC CENTER_____10:40AM 7:40PM

Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind
Japan, Hayao Miyazaki, 1984, 116 min
Sat Nov 17__IFC CENTER_____1:00PM 7:45PM
Sun Nov 18__IFC CENTER____10:40AM 5:05PM 9:50PM
Mon Nov 19__IFC CENTER____2:50PM 9:30PM
Tue Nov 20__IFC CENTER_ ___3:15PM 1:00PM 7:45PM
Wed Nov 21__IFC CENTER____3:15PM 10:40PM
Thu Nov 22_IFC CENTER___ __3:15PM

Princess Mononoke
Japan, Hayao Miyazaki, 1997, 134 min
Sat Nov 17__IFC CENTER____5:05PM
Tue Nov 20__IFC CENTER____5:05PM
Wed Nov 21_IFC CENTER_ ___9:50PM
Thu Nov 22__IFC CENTER____9:30PM

Spirited Away
Japan, Hayao Miyazaki, 2002, 124 min
Sat Nov 17__IFC CENTER_____10:40AM 10:00PM
Sun Nov 18__IFC CENTER_____2:35PM 7:25PM
Mon Nov 19___IFC CENTER____5:10PM
Tue Nov 20__IFC CENTER_____10:40AM 10:00PM
Wed Nov 21_IFC CENTER______2:35PM 7:25PM
Thu Nov 22__IFC CENTER___ __5:10PM

- I’m a big fan of Shohei Imamura‘s films. Yes, I love Kurosawa and Mizoguchi and Oshima, but I feel more of a kinship to Imamura.

A NYTiimes piece by Mike Hale alerted me to the scheduled mini-fest of documentaries by the great director. The films will be screened at the Anthology Film Archives.

I’ve touched on his work before and have written about him in those posts. How could I not, he brings out the artist in me (if, in fact, there is one.) Back in 1979, I stumbled upon a major retrospective at the Japan Society in NYC in 1979. They were about to screen all of his films – two a night – in a complete program of all his work to that point. That meant he hadn’t done Black Rain (1989), The Ballad of Narayama (1983), or The Eel (1997) – three of his greatest. After seeing the first double-bill I was there every Monday – the opening night of each newly screened films – many of them US premieres. Most of the films, to that point, were done in B&W, but the themes were all brilliantly colorful. The weak and corrupt men, the violence, the strong women (the backbone of japan in Imamura’s eyes). They were all there from the beginning, but they grew in depth as the director grew in experience. The films added up to a strong portrait of Japanese society.

Whereas Kurosawa is a poetry of beautiful imagery, Imamura is a prose of themes, imagery, sounds and hand-held camera. He sarted as a “B” movie director, and like Don Siegel or Sam Fuller or Edgar Ulmer. He was part of the Japanese “New Wave” eracting against the slick studio flms of the time, in particular the style of Yasujirô Ozu. There’s a grit to his work, and very much like the theme of his films. The brutish male refined by that female backbone. He’s a master and I’m looking forward to seeing these documentaries.

Garrett Gilchrist is assembling another cut of Dick Williams’ would-be-masterpiece, The Cobbler and the Thief. The first fifteen minutes are up and running and can be found embedded, below. It really does feel more finished.

The Thief Archive is Garrett’s YouTube site for all things Richard Williams.

A number of people have recently asked me to promote their Kickstarter campaigns to raise funds for their movies or projects. I’ve turned down most of them and will continue that policy. There are too many going after funds, and I don’t have enough interest to support everyone with space on this Splog. It would end up making the contents of the posts dull, at least for me.

But there’s the occasional film in process that excites me.

Uli Meyer‘s film version of Ronald Searle‘s the animated Bells of St. Trinian’s excited me. They hadn’t yet started their Kickstarter campaign, but I was ready to promote them full out. Unfortunately, they’ve had a setback and their project is on hold, as is their fund raising campaign.

Mark Sonntag‘s film Bounty Hunter Bunny will be a challenge. I like Mark’s blog Tagtoonz, I like the film he’s proposing, and I like Mark. Given such, I will support his Indiegogo campaign as much as is possible.

Then, this week I was approached by Fumi Kitahara about Pamela Tom’s proposed documentary, Tyrus Wong: Brushstrokes in Hollywood. Wong, of course, designed Bambi, one of my all-time favorite films, nevermind animated films. Wong is 102 years old, and I want to see him talk, paint, breathe. If there’s a chance this film will capture that, and I feel pretty confident that will happen, then I want to see the film made. Yes, I support this film. The documentary has been in the works for the past twelve years, and I would like to see it completed. Hopefully, this Kickstarter campaign will make it happen. Tale a ;ppk, and read their proposal.

For the past week I think I’ve been endlessly running. Running from screening room to screening room. A lot of movies to see before December is over. I should bypass them all for the blog, but I started doing this recently, so I want to continue. Even if I have to boil some of the films down to a word or three. Next week, there’ll be a couple of animated films, so it’ll get more pertinent then, but for now, let me tell you what I’ve seen. By that I mean movies.

Sunday, last week, started off with a wierd double bill including two parties. First there was a film starring Elle Fanning. Ginger and Rosa was, sort of, a love story between two young women. Girls, really, in England. Ginger (who had ginger colored hair, of course) and Rosa (who had darkish colored hair) were the closest of buddies. At least they were until Rosa fell in love with Ginger’s father, and she betrayed their love. The real surprise was at how tall Ginger . . . er, Elle Fanning was. She was just a smidgen taller than I. The tallest female I’d seen since seeing Keira Knightley in person last week. She’s almost five inches taller than I and she’s also incredibly thin. Whereas Keira is charming almost to a fault, Elle is as shy as you might suspect.

The second film that night was Silver Linings Playbook. This was a fabulous film directed by David O. Russell, who got enormous credit for his film two years ago, The Fighter. But this is the good one. An absolute delight with a great after party. But Harvey Weinstein always has the best parties. At a great and expensive place. No animators there but lots of celebrities and great food. That was a wonderful start for the week; the end of the weekend.

Monday brought another film, Anna Karenina. This was the film that had the luncheon the Thursday before. What a sumptuous delight, the movie. It’s supposed to take place in a theater, but the film broils over with Russian delight. Lots of waltzing camera moves and rich visuals. The camera danced all movie long in the tale of passionate infidelity as the cast pulsated with theatrical emotion led by the Tom Stoppard screenplay. A thousand page novel clocks in at just over two hours with more swooning temperament than can be found anywhere in real life. The director of Pride and Prejudice, Joe Wright, doesn’t quite pull off the emotional ending, but leaves you dumbfounded by the rich splendor on screen throughout his movie.

Tuesday was led by a lunch with Ang Lee celebrating The Life of Pi. Ths is the film I’m desperate to see, yet have only been available, so far, for the celebration. John Canemaker and I ate at the table with several of those who were marketing the film, so we learned a lot abot the making of the movie. The had also just shot an interview with Charlie Rose and were full of talk about that chat. The food at Michael’s was great. . . cod.

Tuesday evening two movies. The Persecution . . . I mean Prosecution of an American President was a political screed trying the former President, G.W.Bush, for War Crimes. Needless, to say the movie found him guilty. I didn’t sleep through ALL of it, though I tried. Ths led into Skyfall, the new James Bond film. Tis was good, but it was more action-adventure than Romantic-Action Adventure. In short the sex and the laughs were drained from the movie. Not quite your father’s James Bond, more like the teenager’s movie.

Wednesday evening brought a date with Mrs. James Bond, Rachel Weisz. She starred in the Terence Davies movie adaptation of the Terence Rattigan play, The Deep Blue Sea. Like all Davies movie, very claustrophobic, very British film wherein the cast usually finds themselves singing in the local pub. I love it, though it really is very slow-moving and insular for most people. The Q&A afterward had the stunningly attractive Ms. Weisz showed us how regular a person she is. The final question from the audience, of course, was, “. . . how does it feel to be married to James Bond?” “Wonderful,” was the answer she shot back. “How do ou deal with all the posters of your husband all over NY?” “I don’t notice them. I see more of them in my mind than are really there.” Ah, true love. Her movie was about guilt ridden infidelity in the fifties.

- Last week we began this post. Harvey Eisenberg took success in doing the Tom and Jerry comic books for many years, but he began with Mickey Mouse. We began posting the great story, Mickey and the Beanstalk, last week, and here is the finish. Bill Peckmann has been doing much of the heavy loading by scanning and sending the material on to me. Here’s Bill’s comments on the piece:

‘Mickey…’ was a very fortunate pairing of cartoonist and story, it’s hard to picture anyone else doing a better job of adapting that movie to the comic book page than Harvey Eisenberg. There’s some really good stuff going on in these pages, the work was done 65 years ago and doesn’t seem dated at all.

Here’s a reproduction of the original
Dell comic book cover for
‘Mickey and the Beanstalk’ from 1947.

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It is now 1953, six years after Harvey Eisenberg did ‘the Beanstalk’ story, he did this story for ‘Silly Symphonies’ no. 2, it’s titled ‘Peculiar Penguins. It’s beautifully done, he’s encroaching on Walt Kelly territory, with his characters, posing, spotting blacks and oh, that lovely lettering!

The “Penguins” front cover

The back cover of this issue.

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- From 1991-1992, Tissa David, taught a class in animation which was open to anyone who wanted to attend. R.O. Blechman offered his studio, The Ink Tank for a loction where the classes were held after hours. Those who worked in the day could attend the evening sessions..

Eugene Salandra, a talented young animator, took notes in the classes, and recently I’ve been posting those notes here, with his permission. Some of the lessons seem a bit dated since they were done for 2D animation which was shot under a camera. However, all of the notes are important since learning the information will help you understand the proper use of the “camera” even if the camera is a computer.

Unfortunately, this is the last of the notes. Eugene also did tighter notes which were more cleaned up, and I may post those as well. I have to read them all before I decide one way or the other.

You can see the earlier parts by going to these links:
____________________________________part 1, part 2, part 3. part 4, and part 5

Here is part 6:

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(Click any image to enlarge so as to be legible.)

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- Fred Mogubgub did a lot of varied work. Here are three pieces which were done large. In all three cases I’m posting them in the full format and then breaking them up to allow you to see them in a larger size.

Here is what, undoubtedly, was a storyboard opening for the Broadway show, Oh Dad Poor Dad Mama’s Hung You In the Closet and I’m Feeling So Sad, Arthur Kopit‘s furst play; it opened on Broadway in 1963 for 47 performances. The show was directed by Jerome Robbins, and the animated prologue was done by Fred Mogubgub and Pablo Ferro. This is only one of three animated films done for the Broadway stage. This piece accompanied music written by Robert Prince. (The other animated films were both done/directed by me for Woman of the Year, a number of segments that incorporated dialogue as well as a musical duets between a character and a stage actor. The third film was an animated overture done for Meet Me In St. Louis, animated archival-looking postcards, animated. The final one turned into a live setting of the town ice skating.)

This is Oh Dad, Poor Dad, a full image of the board:

The final art used flat colors.

This is the same thing broken down into panels
to allow you to see them in a larger format.

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(Click any image to see them at a larger size.)

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To follow that famous piece, there is a Christmas card, or it seems to be a Christmas card. The thing is so large it took a lot of work in photoshop to put it together. The whole is 30″ x 24. I’m posting it twice. Once full size, then in pieces so you can see/read it.

The full thing

(Click any image to enlarge.)

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The six parts of the card. Top Left

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Top Center

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Top Right

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Bottom Left

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Bottom Center

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Bottom Right

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- Another large piece by Fred Mogubgub is a painting from which he created 500 photographic prints. It was a major part of an exhibit Fred had, and the prints were sold by the gallery. As with the other large pieces, I’m posting it whole and then again, in parts.

The painting is entitled, “Paris Streets.”

The full image

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The first woman on the left.

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The woman in the center

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The woman on the right.

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An ad for the company drawn by Irene Certas.
Very interesting. She was a brilliant checker, inker,
production coordinator who, for years, managed a
number of small studios including J.J.Sedelmaier‘s.
She is also Janet Scagnelli’s sister.
Obviously, brilliance runs in that family.

- Here’s a gem of a comic story/adaptation drawn by Harvey Eisenberg for Silly Symphony Comics. Bill Peckmann scanned and sent the book, and I am enormously grateful. Here’s the magazine and bill’s comments:

As a kid reading Dell Funny Animal Comics there were a number of ‘good guys’ cartoonists who one always looked forward to seeing. Harvey Eisenberg (of course we didn’t know his name then, just like Barks) was always near the top of this ‘good guys’ list. He was sometimes called the Carl Barks of ‘Tom and Jerry’.

Harvey Eisenberg‘s ‘Mickey and the Beanstalk’ first ran in 1947. This here is a reprint from 1953 which was in ‘Silly Symphonies’ no. 3, 25 cents comic book. If you think about how daunting it would be to bring a Disney movie to the comic book page, all I can say is that Mr. Eisenberg did an excellent job.

Here are the front and back covers of the comic book. They were penciled by Paul (”Buck O’Rue”) Murry and the finished art was done by Donald T. MacLaughlin (see comments). As a kid I was always a sucker for these Disney illustrated/painted covers, and still am.

Front Cover

Back Cover

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To be continued, on Friday, Oh migosh !

- Suzanne Lemieux Wilson, wife of the late Rowland B. Wilson, just sent me a guide to how she, with information from Rowland, put together their invaluable book of notes called Trade Secrets. Seeing the skeleton come together for this book is quite an informative document, and I couldn’t be happier that she trusted my blog to relay the information..

Some of these illustrations and pictures have passed across this blog before, but they take on a very new meaning here, so I’m glad to post them anew. I have to thank Suzanne for the gift of this post especially given some of the hard work I know it took to scan and send documents that are large enough to work here.

By the way, if you don’t have this book, you should. The book offers an enormous amount of information about his design for animation as well as for the printed cartoon and illustration trade. How ofen does a genius of his craft offer such a guide to the “trade secrets”? Trade Secrets is an invaluable book.

May I suggest that you click any image as you go through to enlarge them and get a better look at the illustrations and the type. It’s great stuff.

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New England Life

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The insurance campaign ran for eighteen years–

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Rowland also drew cartoons for the New Yorker, Esquire,
The Saturday Evening Post, Playboy and others.

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As well as illustration and advertising.

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Rowland’s first and last jobs were in Animation, with many
interspersed throughout his career.

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Rowland devised illustrated instruction pages as quick reference
guides for the Layout, Background and Animation staff when he worked
at Don Bluth and Walt Disney Studios.

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He worked on the Captain Pistol series of cartoon novels
from the 1970′s onward.
Captain Jack Pistol was a Retired Pirate and Rich Man who met with a
series of misadventures as he moved through various literary genres,
from swashbuckler to romantic comedy to spy thriller
to Western to science fiction.
Rowland sculpted three-dimensional models of the characters.

Rowland endeavored to apply the principles of drawing to life.

He created an artful environment to work and live in–

He designed and constructed a sunflower gate for the garden.

He painted the signs of the Zodiac around the base of a vaulted
ceiling…

He built a workbench for his woodworking projects and decorated it . . .

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. . . with caricatures of Laurel and Hardy.

Because he worked in a variety of disciplines, Rowland sought
solutions that would apply to all of them and save him from “solving
the same problem over and over again”.

He consolidated the information into charts and hung them in his studio,
whether it was in Connecticut, New York, Ireland or California.

Rowland documented many techniques and observations.

The writings and illustrations filled dozens of
notebooks, binders and sketchbooks.

Much of it was xeroxed and consolidated into two giant binders as
resources for the book entitled Rowland B. Wilson’s Trade Secrets.

But the genesis for all of the notebooks and for Rowland’s oeuvre
were three flow charts that outlined procedures
that could be applied to any project.

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The Introduction of Rowland B. Wilson’s Trade Secrets describes the
Flow Charts in general. Then each chapter is based on an aspect
contained in them. The logo at the top right shows what aspect is
covered in the chapter.

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Chapter 8, the Process, follows a project from idea to finish
as it progresses along the Flow Charts.

Chapter 9 presents many of the charts and posters
that actually hung on the studio walls.

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Chapter 11 shows a gallery of artwork throughout Rowland’s career,
including well-known images and some of his personal art,
never before published.

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A page of observations on comics, graphic novels, stage and film:

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One of three pages illustrating Styles of Notan:

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A page showing notes on various aspects of Line:

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A page depicting various types of Tonal Treatments:

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Demonstration of watercolor techniques:

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The cover image is a composite of 6 Value Studies showing the
dominance of Tone over Color:

We hope you enjoy Rowland B. Wilson’s Trade Secrets and find
inspiration within.

With Special Thanks to Bill Peckmann for photograph of
Rowland B. Wilson in his studio.

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And as a bonus to this post, here are some drawings RBW did on a napkin at a lunch with Dick Williams.
Suzanne wrote:

I discovered some vintage Rowland B. Wilson “doodles”, sketched on
napkins at Mario’s Restaurant in Westport, Connecticut–thought you
might enjoy them. The caricature of Suzanne and Rowland (image 2)
looks to me like the RBW take on Richard Williams’ drawing of us (image 3).

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Mario

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Suzanne and Rowland caricatures

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Dick Williams’ caricature of Suzanne and Rowland

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Man

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two Dudes

KNZJAH59VWUM

- I’m a sucker for silent movies. I think I’ve read at least a dozen biographies of D.W. Griffith, and I’ve seen a lot of his films (probably all of the features) at least once. I’m impressed with the drive and the love those people put into their work. They didn’t think of it as an art form, and they weren’t considered artists in their time. But in the end, there can be no doubt that some of the filmmakers of the time were creating art.

A scene from Griffith’s The Birth of A Nation. It’s a recreation of
Ford’s Theater as Lincoln gets shot.

I once saw a silent feature with no musical accompaniment. The silence was deafening. It was amazing how silent the audience remained throughout the feature film. I guess the film was absorbing enough to make that audience unaware of the silence. That was about 15 years ago; I wonder if the same would occur today.

DW Griffith on the Booth Theater set under construction.

Watching silent films with organ music playing background is not the ideal way to see them. Most piano players who back up these films also aren’t really up to the task. But when you see a film with a great pianist or a good orchestral score it makes all the difference. There’s a musical group called the Alloy Orchestra that enhances the films they accompany, and allows the movies to live up to their full potential. I suggest you try to attend one of their programs if they’re in your neighborhood. (Or just buy one of their cd’s; you won’t regret it.) I suggest Metropolis or one of their sampler albums.

To the left, a rare picture of D. W. Griffith and Billy Bitzer on location for Biograph around 1912. Bitzer is lining up a shot through ground glass, which he has inserted into the gate — there was no viewfinder on the Mutograph camera. This large machine, which punched its own sprocket holes, was smaller and more portable than Biograph’s first cameras. Negatives made with it are still providing superb quality prints.
________(Click any image to enlarge.)

One story from the book Adventures with DW Griffith by Karl Brown has stuck with me for many many years. He and Griffith both lived near 14th Street. Daily they’d walk together to the studio on 125th Street, walking through Central Park. Brown said he once talked about how dangerous it could be walking so early in the morning. At that point, Griffith pulled a long nosed pistol out of his inner jacket pocket, and told Brown he was prepared for any event. This made me realize how volatile a society they must have lived in that early in the century. Thank god times have changed.

DW Griffith was obsessed with Lincoln and did a number of films that featured the 16th President. One of Griffith’s last films was an early talking film called, Lincoln. It starred Walter Huston (John Huston‘s father) as the President.

Spielberg has a new film, Lincoln, in theaters, now. Take a look at the picture of Daniel Day Lewis, above. It may as well be a penny. Incredible, the makeup. Lewis got me even before I saw this film. The voice – what he did with his voice – just took my breath. He
spoke throughout the film in a higher register than was natural for him. The expected dulcet tones and stentorian readings were not there – on purpose. I keep wanting to say a Nebraskan accent, but that’s wrong. It has to be Illinois, the accent. Daniel Day Lewis obviously worked his voice off for this one, and it’s just amazing.

The brilliant makeup nowadays was expected, but it’s only the acting under the makeup that could pull it off. Stick a lot of makeup on James Caan, and you still have James Caan in makeup. But Daniel Day Lewis knows how to act beyond the mask outside his head, and that performance is astounding. (No, it’s not better than what Jean-Louis Trintignant has done in Amour, both performances are formidable.)

For the first half hour of the movie I was astounded. Everything melds so well together and moves seamlessly in a wonderful recreation of historic Lincoln in the White House of the era. Daniel Day Lewis has you searching the screen for him in every scene. He’s remarkable. Spielberg makes us feel Private Ryan, Gone With the Wind, Birth of a Nation and all of movie history; what a glorious feeling. But the film gets down to business and unfortunately the 2½ hour movie feels rushed. A lot was undoubtedly cut out and consequently the film feels smaller than it is. The story is basically about politics. Getting a vote across in a lame duck Congress. (Great idea for a story.) But you want more – or at least, I did, and I’m sure it was once there. They just took it out to get the film down to a reasonable length. Our loss and the movie’s loss; it makes the movie smaller.

There’s a brilliant scene where the exhausted Lincoln, toward the film’s start, goes into his office. His son (I originally thought it was his daughter, but I was corrected) is lying asleep on a newspaper. (The scene of him on the floor is beautifully done and feels as thogh it’s an outtake from Gone With the Wind. Beautiful in every possible way, and it brings us back to another great Civil war movie.) Lincoln lies down beside him on the floor and embraces him. He wakes up and climbs onto dad’s back and Lincoln takes him off to bed. S. Epatha Merkerson is a character who enters in the very end of the film. She should have been seen earlier. They certainly reduced her part to nothing (even though it’s a key character to the epic version of Lincoln.) And you know there was more of the character once upon a time. The character doesn’t just enter for two scenes and is gone, not in a script by Tony Kushner. No they had to have cut her character onto the editing room floor.

The film needed more breathing room. It’s 2½ hours, and they should have gone for 3. It may have made it a bit stodgy, but it deserved the time. Toward the end it also has too many cherished moments for Spielberg’s romantic side. Lincoln becomes too noble in those beautiful shots, and the music soars in case we missed it. Yet we didn’t need it. A drier film would have been a better film.Still, I’ll see it again. This film should be on a double bill with Spielberg’s Amistad. Then send them both out to the schools of the nation.

See it for all that it is, and all that it should have been. See it for the performances – so many fine ones. See it for the photography. Unfortunately, it’s not the best film of the year. I still don’t know what that is, but this one is not quite an A, maybe a B+ or an A- in my opinion. Great work that was pushed to completion doesn’t always get the full regard.

Since seeing this film three days ago, I haven’t been able to stop thinkng about it. No, not the story, but the actors. The three who try to con the vote out of the opposition, James Spader, John Hawkes and Tim Blake Nelson keep popping up, as does, of course, the incredible Daniel Day Lewis. Even Sally Field is on my mind, particularly in the one scene she, as Ann Todd, argues violently with her husband in their bedroom. I very much want to see the film again. I’d guess that’s a good thing to say for a film.

- To write about another film seems almost blasphemous, but here goes. The NYTimes‘, Robert Ito, writes at length today in a story about Marcell Jankovics‘ new animated feature, The Tragedy of Man. The film took almost three decades to complete and is premiering at the Hungarian Film Festival of Los Angeles on opening night, Nov. 15th. If you live in LA, it sounds like you should be there.