Michael Sporn Animation – Splog

- Yesterday, I posted John Canemaker‘s archival copy of the storyboard for Dumbo; the sequence where he gets washed by his mother and plays around her legs.

I think this sequence, on film, is one of the greatest ever animated. There’s a sweet tenderness and an obviously close relationship between baby Dumbo and his mother which is built on the back of this sequence. It not only establishes both characters solidly, without words, but it sets up the mood of everything that will soon happen to the pair during the remaining 45 minutes of the film. Without that established bond, the audience wouldn’t feel so deeply for the pair during the “Baby Mine” song or care so much about Dumbo’s predicament.

Tytla has said that he based the animation of the baby elephant on his young son who he could study at home. Peet has said that Tytla had difficulty drawing the elephants and asked for some help via his assistant. There’s no doubt that both were proud of the sequence and tried to take full credit for it. No doubt both deserve enormous credit for a wonderful sequence. Regardless of how it got to the screen, everyone involved deserves kudos.

Here are a lot of frame grabs of the sequence. I put them up just so that they can be compared to the extraordinary board posted yesterday. Both match each other closely. Whereas the board has all the meat, the timing of the animation gives it the delicacy that would have been lost in a lesser animator’s hands, or, for that matter, in a less-caring animator’s hands. The scene is an emotional one.

(Click any image to enlarge.)

(Click any image to enlarge.)

- Thanks to a loan from John Canemaker, I can continue posting some of the brilliant storyboard work of Bill Peet. The guy was a masterful artist. Every panel gives so much inspiration and information to the animators, directors and artists who’ll follow up on his work.

This is the sequence from Dumbo wherein baby Dumbo plays around the feet of his mother. Brilliantly animated by Bill Tytla, this sequence is one of the greatest ever animated. No rotoscoping, no MoCap. Just brilliant artists collaborating with perfect timing, perfect structure, perfect everything. Tytla said he watched his young son at home to learn how to animate Dumbo. Bill Peet told Mike Barrier that he was a big fan of circuses, so he was delighted to be working on this piece. Both used their excitement and enthusiasm to bring something brilliant to the screen, and it stands as a masterpiece of the medium.

Of this sequence and Tytla’s animation, Mike Barrier says in Hollywood Cartoons: What might otherwise be mere cuteness acquires poignance because it is always shaded by a parent’s knowledge of pain and risk. If Dumbo “acted” more, he would almost certainly be a less successful character—”cuter,” probably, in the cookie-cutter manner of so many other animated characters, but far more superficial.

I had to take the one very long photstat and reconfigure it in photoshop so that you could enlarge these frames to see them well. I tried to keep the feel of these drawings pinned to that board in tact.

(Click any image to enlarge.)

Bill Peet at his desk on Dumbo.
_______________________________________________Tomorrow, Bill Tytla‘s Dumbo.

– Once again I dip into the oversied Snow White book bought years ago. It’s filled with storyoard/layout drawings and illustrates the story of Snow White using only such drawings. There are plenty of beautiful images in this book, and I can’t help but pull them out to post.

There’s no indication of who drew what, so you have only the B&W images to look at with no other references to go by. This film is a true source of inspiration for me, so these drawings are always great to study, and this
odd book is jam packed. Unfortunately, the only text within the book is the story of Snow White.

This is Snow White’s run from the hunter – really from the Queen – into the deep, dark woods. Her fears get the better of her, and the trees turn into creepy creatures,
frightening her to tears.

(Click any image to enlarge.)
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This looks to me like a rotoscope drawing traced off the live action.

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– This is the second of two posts on the Bill Peet storyboards for the Disney film, Ben and Me. This section, loaned to me by John Canemaker, comes in a xeroxed form – lots of grays – and taped together in a long sheet. I’ve split it up a bit to make it easier to post. I’ve also worked with it a bit to make it more visible thanks to Photoshop.

Bill Peet offered great drawings in his storyboards, and I’m sure he brought a lot of inspiration to the animators.

This is an excedingly long pan (30 inches), and is almost invisible in this minimal thumbnail. Rather than break it up into shorter bits, I’m posting it as is and hope it won’t be too much of a problem for you to follow in its enlarged state. You have to click on it to see it.

The image below is a recreation of this pan from the final film done using multiple frame grabs.

(Click any image to enlarge.)

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There’s an excellent article about the making of Ben and Me by Wade Sampson at Jim Hill Media. It gives quite a bit of information about this odd short and is well worth reading as a companion to these boards.

Today’s Ollie Johnston‘s 95th Birthday. Happy Birthday, Ollie. Let’s celebrate with the first feature Ollie worked on.

- I’m a Snow White fan. If there’s one feature I look to for that chill of inspiration to hit me, it’s Snow White. There’s something about it that screams out great drawings all done by hand on paper. There’s something about those incredible watercolor backgrounds, the beautiful animation by the young masters. All the daring, all the pride in their work, all the challenges met by these excellent animators; it’s all on display in every frame of this film. I love it.

I have an extraordinary book that displays a lot of artwork from this film. It was published for American Express and released by them in a limited edition. To my knowledge it never hit the bookstores. So, because I love the film, because I get a kick out of this book, and because it’s Halloween, I thought it a good time to post some images of the Witch preparing her apple and delivering it.

Most of the images are obviously storyboard drawings, though a few beautiful animation drawings and Layouts slip in there. I’m not sure if any or all of these have made it to the dvd or other books, but it doesn’t quite matter to me.

Here they are.

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- Bill Peet was one of the prime artists who shaped many of the Disney features. He has been an enormous influence on me and thans to John Canemaker, who has loaned me the following storyboard, I’m pleased to post some of Mr. Peet’s excellent artwork.

Ben and Me was a 20 min short produced in 1953. It’s an oddity in the Disney canon. The story of a mouse who influences Benjamin Franklin through many of his most famous moments was originally a book by Robert Lawson and was adapted by Bill Peet for the studio.

The photostats of the storyboard, like others I’ve posted, is extremely long. Hence, I’m posting them as large as I possibly can so that you’ll be able to read them once you’ve enlarged the images.

These three panels are followed by a couple more revisions. The revisions I only have as xeroxes – lesser quality. I’ll post those tomorrow.

(Click any image to enlarge.)

This image is a recreation of the extraordinary pan as seen in the first row of the storyboard posted above. It’ll enlarge to a size where you can properly see it. A couple of the objects were on secondary overlays creating a minimal multiplane effect.

- Continuing my post of the Song of the South boards by Bill Peet, I find I have just two pages left. John Canemaker loaned these to me for this site. There’s a bit of an overlap between the two pages of storyboard.

The first is a bit overexposed, so some of the detail couldn’t come across, although I tried pushing it a bit in photoshop.
The second board has a bit more meat in it, and comes across nicely even though it is large.

(Click images to enlarge.)

I also recommend you go to Hans Bacher‘s Animation Treasures 2 to see backgrounds he’s reconstructed from this film.

- I’ve been an enormous fan of Bill Peet‘s work. Thanks to John Canemaker I have this storyboard from Song of the South. It’s the Tar Baby sequence.
One page is reworked; the others develop beautifully.

I’ve split the sequence I have into two posts. It takes a while to scan and reconstruct these very large stats in photoshop. I’ll post the remainder of the sequence I have on Monday.

(Click images to enlarge so that you can read them.)

Here we have a reworking of the second board – or, at least, a repositioning and editing of some of the drawings. Unfortunately, the original stat here is blown out a bit (making some of the writing invisible) and smaller (meaning I blew it up a bit larger.) However, you can see the drawings better in in the first board.

- Continuing my posting of the art in the 1940 book, published by Simon & Schuster, Deems Taylor’s Fantasia, I focus on the Rite of Spring segment from the film. There are some fine images here, and I’m pleased to post them.

If anyone has any idea of who drew any of these stills, I’ll be glad to give appropriate credit to the artists. I know that
_______ William Martin,
_______ Leo Thiele,
_______ Robert Sterner and
_______ John Fraser McLeish were credited for Story Development Research,
and
_______ McLaren Stewart,
_______ Dick Kelsey and
_______ John Hubley were the segment’s Art Directors.

Here, then, are the stills. A number of them are beauties.

(Click any image to enlarge.)