Famous Studios Backgrounds-Tom Ford

I've been spending a lot of time capturing screenshots of the backgrounds from various Famous cartoons. I'll be doing a series of posts highlighting the different background artists that worked at Famous Studios during the mid to late 40s and early 50s. I'm very fond of a lot of the shorts Famous put out during that period and aside from some great animation here and there, I love the backgrounds.

Tom Ford is one of the artists that really caught my eye right away, particularly the backgrounds in "Teacher's Pest" and "Helter Swelter". Please excuse the quality of some of the pics as those are from public domain DVDs and I think we all know the quality is usually not that great.

"Teacher's Pest"

"Law and Audrey"

"Little Audrey Rainmaker"

"Sock-A-Bye Kitty"

"Helter Swelter"

"Mice Paradise"

"The Voice Of Turkey"

"Cat Choo"

"The Emerald Isle"

Tex Avery - "Happy Go Nutty"

Here's yet another Screwy cartoon. They're all so damn funny, enjoy.

Happy-Go-Nutty

Chuck Jones - "Feed The Kitty"

My sons have quite the appetite for classic cartoons. But my four year old is already showing signs of become a cartoon junkie like his old man. He's always going through my DVD collection and asking to watch everything from Woody Woodpecker to Barney Bear to Herman and Katnip. We've been on Droopy overload at home since the DVD came out. He carries a damn Droopy beany with him whenever we go out. Which is fine with me since I'm a Tex Avery fanatic. For some reason he never showed much interest in Warner shorts but over the last week or so he's finally discovered Bugs Bunny and the rest of the Looney Tunes crew. In particular he's hooked on Chuck Jones' "Feed The Kitty". After watching for the hundredth time I realized I had a model sheet from the short so I figured I'd post it. Now, does anyone have any idea how to explain to him that there aren't any Pussyfoot toys? His answer is "We can get it at the Pussyfoot thtore."

This guy digs the classics

Tex Avery - "Big Heel-Watha"

I promised to get back to the Screwy Squirrel posts so here's "Big Heel-Watha". Red was revamped for the this one, appearing as Minnie Hot-Cha at the end. Also, Preston Blair used Heel-Watha's sneak animation as an example in his original printing of Advanced Animation, and here's a model sheet to go with it.

Big Heel-Watha

Uploaded by klangley

Tex Avery - "Cock-A-Doodle Dog"

Here's a clip, some layout drawings and screenshots of the corresponding scenes from another Tex Avery classic starring Spike. I'm not sure who was doing the layouts for Tex around the time of this short. I'm too lazy right now to go look it up. Anyway, I like reading all the notes on the layouts intended for John Johnson when painting the finished backgrounds. Anyone know if those notes are from Tex or the layout artist? Also, the last two layout drawings are from a scene that's not in the cartoon I have. Was there any cuts made to this short or maybe it's from a scene that never made it past layout? I can't remember ever seeing that scene.

Cock-A-Doodle Dog

Barney Bear - "Barney's Hungry Cousin"

I'm going to interrupt these Screwy Squirrel posts to throw in one of my favorite Barney Bear shorts directed by Dick Lundy, "Barney's Hungry Cousin". Though Lundy's shorts aren't on the comedic level of Tex Avery's I think they're real funny and he at least had Tex's great animator's working on them. I love the bear's design in this one. He reminds me of the "hick" wolf in Tex's "Little Rural Riding Hood". Here's some model sheets I found online some time ago. Though they're not from Lundy's unit, they're most likely from one of Rudy Ising's shorts or possibly even George Gordon's.

Barney's Hungry Cousin

Tex Avery - Lonesome Lenny

I'm going to keep the Screwy cartoons coming over the next couple of posts for those of you who enjoy them. "Lonesome Lenny" was released in 1946 and would be Screwy's last appearance. After four Screwy cartoons were released between 1944 and 1945 it seems that interest in Screwy started to wane and that was probably the main reason he didn't appear in any other cartoons. I think this cartoon has the greatest chase scene ever on film. Enjoy and check out the Screwy Squirrel label for some model sheets and animation art from some older posts.

Lonesome Lenny

Uploaded by klangley

Tex Avery - "The Screwy Truant"

This is without a doubt one of my all-time favorite cartoons, definetly in my top five. Screwy's design isn't as slick as in his earlier shorts but it's very fitting. I can only assume it's closer to Avery's own drawing style than say Louis Schmitt's or Claude Smith's designs for Avery's unit. I still can't for the life of me understand why more people don't really like Screwy that much. The scene where the truant officer blows out a foot is hilarious. Perfectly animated. Enjoy!

Oh, I finally got around to adding some labels to most of my posts so it should be easy to sort through all this stuff.

Screwy Truant

Uploaded by klangley

Tex Avery - "Senor Droopy"

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

Senor Droopy

Uploaded by klangley

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.

The Magic Fluke

Uploaded by klangley