Monday, April 30, 2007

Tex Avery - "Senor Droopy"

Here's some model sheets and a clip from "Senor Droopy". These model sheets were drawn by Louis Schmidt.



Thursday, April 26, 2007

Fox and Crow - "The Magic Fluke"


Here's a fine John Hubley cartoon. I believe this was the second Fox and Crow cartoon made under UPA. I'm not the biggest UPA fan but I do really enjoy their earlier cartoons. Especially the Fox and Crow shorts and Gerald McBoing Boing.

Monday, April 16, 2007

Milt Gross- Wanted: No Master

Here's Milt Gross' other awesome cartoon for MGM, "Wanted: No Master". If you haven't seen "Jitterbug Follies check it out here. These two cartoons are among my very favorites. The animation is really funny, especially when it comes to J.R. Enjoy!

Tuesday, April 10, 2007

Tex Avery - "Lucky Ducky"

Here's some model sheets from "Lucky Ducky" and a clip to go along with them. The model sheets were drawn by Louis Schmitt who was an animator at Disney throughout the 30's and early 40's before going over to Columbia/Screen Gems. He drew the model sheets for most of Tex's cartoons made in 1948. I love the Duck's smart ass laugh.



Monday, April 09, 2007

MGM Cartoon Studio 1956


Art Lozzi was kind enough to send me this a while back. The drawing is by Ben Shenkman and yes that's "The" Jack Nicholson in the upper right hand corner. I believe he was the office gopher at the time. I love the Michael Lah and Robert Gentle caricatures the best. Thanks Art!

Wednesday, April 04, 2007

Jim Tyer-"Off To The Opera"

Here's a cool scene from the Heckle and Jeckle short "Off To The Opera". This piece of animation is awesome because Tyer hits you with not one but two shrink takes.




Monday, April 02, 2007

Night On Bare Mountain

Here's some art from my favorite sequence in Fantasia.

Monday, March 26, 2007

Greatest Man In Siam

Before I get into the post I have to thank Thad K. for hooking me up with this one. I love the Lantz Swing Symphonies, there's never really much of a story just gags, dancing and jazz but I think they're just so damn entertaining. "The Greatest Man In Siam" has some really great dancing animation in it. Particularly Pat Matthews (one of my all-time favorites) animation of the Sultan's daughter. Here's Grim Natwick's model sheet for "Miss X" (I had erroneously credited it to Matthews. Steve Worth commented that it was really by Natwick) and two clips from the cartoon. The first clip picks up at the best part of the film when the "hottest man in Siam" enters through the end of the short. The second clip is part of the same clip but of an incredible dance sequence by Pat Matthews in which I've slowed it down to see each drawing in action. Fantastic animation, done without live reference! This is really great cartoon with some nice experimenting going on. The backgrounds are flat colors and even made from colored paper and there's some nice cutting throughout the cartoon. I think these thing typify a lot of Shamus Culhane's Lantz cartoons, he had a great unit working with him.







P.S.-My pal Andy Latham is on the lookout for demostration videos featuring animators. Please check out his blog and let him know if you know of any other videos online that he can link to. Thanks!

Tuesday, March 20, 2007

Wags To Riches-Bobe Cannon

Bob Cannon, along with Pat Matthews and Michael Lah, is one of my all-time favorite animators. He's an excellent draftsman and I love his use of smeared inbetweens (is that what they're called?). I've been practicing drawing from his scenes in Tex Avery's "Wags To Riches" and thought I'd share some screenshots along with a clip of the actual scene.