Tuesday, December 30, 2008

Hemo The Magnificent

"Hemo The Magnificent" is an old educational film with animation produced by Shamus Culhane Productions. Though Culhane had probably little to no creative input as the animation was directed by Bill Hurtz. It features the voices of Mel Blanc, June Foray, Marvin Miller, and even an on screen appearance by Sterling Holloway. Here's the introductory scene from "Hemo". I have to say I love the background used in the first animated scenes.


Thursday, December 18, 2008

Sheldon Mayer - Dizzy Dog

A funny comic from Sheldon Mayer with a cameo by the Crow. I forget what issue of Funny Stuff this is from and I'm too lazy to look through them.

Wednesday, December 17, 2008

Donald Graham

I have been on a quest for some time to get a hold of Donald Graham's book "Composing Pictures" without paying an arm and a leg. Believe it or not, I've seen it on sale for as much as $400. Luckily, it turned up in a local library recently and I've been scanning it for a couple of weeks now. At a little over 400 pages it's quite a monotonous job. For those that don't know, Donald Graham was an instructor at Chouinard Art Institute and later commissioned by Walt Disney to instruct drawing classes for his animators. I found the few pages on storyboarding informative and thought I'd share.

Tuesday, December 16, 2008

Dick Lundy - "Bird-Brain Bird Dog"

Another great Barney Bear short directed by Dick Lundy and animated by Walt Clinton and Grant Simmons. I've been way to busy to post but I'm going to try and pick up the pace a little over the next few weeks.

Tuesday, November 25, 2008

Tex Avery - "Jerky Turkey"

I figured I'd post something with a Thanksgiving theme, so what better than a Tex Avery short. While "Jerky Turkey" might not be one of his best MGM shorts it's loaded with great gags. And who doesn't love a Jimmy Durante impersonation? So here's the short along with a couple of model sheets and animation drawings. Happy Thanksgiving.


Thursday, November 06, 2008

A Little Info On Pat Matthews

I was lucky enough to have recently been contacted by the son of one of my absolute favorite animators Pat Matthews, who also happens to be Pat Matthews. Pat was gracious enough to share some background information about his father and his career. He was also kind enough to encourage me to share it with readers of this blog. Thanks Pat! He cleared up whether or not his father was actually the Abner Matthews that worked for the Fleischer's studio. Recently I caught the UPA short "The Miner's Daughter" on Animania and loved it. Pat Matthews animated on that one and I loved it. I can't believe I hadn't see it before. If anyone knows where to get a hold of a copy please email me. I'd love to see that one a few dozen times more. Here's what Pat had to share along with the "tribute" I made awhile back, "Robing Hoodlum" which Thad posted on his blog some time ago, and "Rooty Toot Toot". (Sorry for the lack of posts, I haven't had much time to post lately.)

Hello Kevin,

Thanks for the tribute. It's beautiful. My dad was actually named John Richard Matthews but he hated that name. He wanted to be called Pat. So when I was born that's what he named me. People at the studio always called me Pat Junior (he hated that too - I don't know why - I liked it).

My father is also on the imdb website and they've got it wrong. I don't know who Abner Matthews is but I'm sure he is somebody else. I don't believe my father ever worked for the Fleischer studio. He started out as in inbetweener at Walt Disney in 1938. He worked on Pinochio and has a credit at the end of the picture. Then the inbetweeners went on strike and he lost his job. He then went to Walter Lantz and became an animator. As you commented, Jimmy Culhane covered this area pretty well. Then he went to UPA.

At UPA he did do Rooty Toot Toot and also Telltale Heart, which I think are among the best cartoons ever made. My dad did not work on Gerald McBoing-boing.

There is an interesting story about how and why he left UPA. You also might find it interesting that my mother divorced dad in 1945 and married Frank Smith, another great animator, in 1949 (who DID animate Gerald McBoing-boing). I spent most of my early life with my mother and Frank but saw my father frequently.

Let me know if you are interested in more.

Hello Kevin,

First, about why he left UPA. Basically he got a better job. He was an animator at UPA and he wanted to be a director. UPA had a crowd of directors, all among the most brilliant in the business. Dad talked to a friend of his, Richard Tompkins (not sure of the spelling), who owned and operated RK Tompkins animation studio in Mexico City. Tompkins needed a director and hired dad. This happened in 53 or 54. Dad, who was fluent in Spanish, packed up and moved to Mexico City. He worked there until 56. I was 17 and on summer vacation from High School in 56 and went down to Mexico City to visit him. At the end of summer I flew back and he drove up to Hollywood. He got a job at Playhouse Pictures and stayed with them until, I think, around 59. I had joined the Coast Guard and was stationed in Alaska and didn't follow what the family was doing very well.

At RK Tompkins and at Playhouse Pictures, he worked on commercials, either for the movie theaters (in Mexico) or television (in Hollywood). Most everything he did after UPA was for TV.

Around 59 dad and my sister Carol, left for England. Didn't find any work there so they went to Spain. Didn't find any work there either. So they ended up in Melbourn Australia where dad was animation director for a TV studio.

I'll have to ask my sister about when they came back from Australia, but when he came back he went through a long period of disability. He had gradually lost control of his left side. His left arm was paralized and he walked with difficulty. He was right handed so he could still draw however.

In the middle 60s he went back to Mexico and married his fourth wife, Noemi. He was able to retire there in Ozumbia, a small town outside of Mexico City, receiving a Social Security Disability pension and a WW2 pension. He worked on and off from then to 1972 at the RK Tompkins studio. He was working on a Spanish language Seseme Street for Mexican television when he and Noemi were killed in an automobile accident as they drove in to the studio one morning. He was 56.

I don't think he had a favorite character but I know that he liked "The Telltale Heart" very very much. I don't know if he had a favorite studio. I know that he loved UPA and the studio in Mexico. He thought the Mexican artists were brilliant.



Uploaded by thadk

Sunday, October 12, 2008

Animaland - "The Lion"

Here's another from David Hand's Animaland series, along with some model sheets. I love the animation of the lion as a cub.



Uploaded by klangley

Tuesday, September 30, 2008

Harvey Eisenberg - Foxy Fagan


Here's some scans from Foxy Fagan #7 by Joe Barbera and Harvey Eisenberg. Every panel is perfectly drawn. Enjoy!

Saturday, September 27, 2008