Michael Sporn Animation – Splog

Jumping in to Miyaakii’s most recent feature – to cross the seas, we find a very complex film with an aggressive approach to ward the telling of a love story. The architect of a bomb designed to destroy lives in fighting that war is the precise subject behind this longish film. It is not endearing (though that would be questionable in discussing these masters of violence for their country.

An horrendous look straight down the nose of a blistering work of nature, the Hurricane, as lovers are brought together afterward she gets ill and suffers from the pangs of war without having been near the font lines of the tumult wherever it is.

From therre to the end is a military mission wherein the architect shoots at the world. A scientist who accomplishes his mission while killing more people than the earthquake he met at the film’s start. This is one fine movie from a thinking man. He’s seen enough sorrow to want a peaceful ending for his children. It isn’t coming.

Animation, you wait and beg to do it, but in your heart you want to do brave things with positive things to say. I want so desperately to do the good stuff. At this point I’ll take the mediocre, with some sadness.

I wish . . . I wish . . . I wish . . .

Theree were only good and responsible pieces of animation anymore. But no they just grow Mickey and his private parts larger and larger in Flash until the money doesn’t sow and then they blow them up.

Just like that SCTV show they blowed him up real good.

Noone knows what will happen. It hurts you know. Croods and Monsters and Incredible him. He was incredible; he made a big success and now the second one. Incredible Him. I guess those turkeys should be big too, a holiday out of Thanksgiving. What do you know? Maybe one or two of the shorts will be fun. Not umbrellas making eyes at each other. We need some Prince Valiant to come along and save us all. Maybe that’s me.

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- Here, from Walt Disney Comics, April 1945 edition is a wacky story mixing the Seven Dwarfs with Dumbo to fight the Wicked Prince.
I couldn’t help but post it. These comic books often seem to mix up the characters from different films to create unbelievable stories.

This comic comes from Bill Peckmann‘s enormous collection, and I thank him for sharing, yet again.

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(Click any image to enlarge.)

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And here from a post I did in November 2006m there is James Stevenson‘s brilliant cartoon about a comic strip artist who was losing it. The piece appeared in his book, Something Marvelous Is About To Happen. It’s a great take on comic strip cartoonists and the relationship they have to their strips.
Here it is, The Last Days of Tootie and Fred.

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______(Click any image to enlarge.)

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Let’s focus on some of the early and brilliant art of Walt Kelly.

- Bill Peckmann had forwarded some of the covers from Walt Kelly‘s Dell comic books, the “Our Gang” series, dated 1946 & 1947. Also included in this stash are a couple of the interior stories.

Bill writes:

I certainly wish I had more than these 7 issues of Walt Kelly’s “Our Gang” comic books published by Dell, but looking at these covers, they will give you a sense of what Kelly was up to.

Each issue contained a 14 to 16 page “Our Gang” story done by Kelly, a “Tom and Jerry” story, a “Flip and Dip”, a Carl Barks “Barney Bear and Benny Burro” piece and ended with an appearance by “Wuff the Prairie Dog”.

I’ll include one “Our Gang” story and one “Barney Bear” to round out the post and save the “Pogo” comics for a post by themselves.

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August 1946

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September 1946

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December 1946

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January 1947

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February 1947

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June 1947

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back cover
All the back covers have basically the same subscription ad,
but I thought I’d send one along for the “currency” shock of it.

What happens when you pour deceptively simple and totally charming into a bottle and shake ‘em up? Why out pours Walt Kelly’s “Our Gang” comics of course! What a touch he had for combining “cartoony” and “straight” in those stories, not an easy thing to pull off, he and Roy Crane were masters of it! Norman Maurer of “Boy” and “Daredevil” comics also had that wonderful ability.

I enjoyed posting Sasek’s illustrated book to Rome last week, and Bill Peckmann followed the cue of his sending me scans of “This is D.C.“, the artist’s follow-up to the U.S. Capital. I hope you enjoy, because I have “This is NY” developing sitting in the wings. look forward to it.

The book’s cover

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Ken Hultgren was an animator who worked for Disney during the height of the animal artistry that went on in the studio through the making of Bambi. Ken was a brilliant draftsman whose work was turned into a couple of beautiful drawing books after the finish of Bambi. It’s certaily worth pursuing the couple of books he produced. They all vary enormously and show off his flagrant abilities as an anmal artist.

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Bill Peckmann sent scans of this glorious and beautiful children’s book by Martin Provenson. There really, as far as I’m concerned, is no reason necessary. The illustrations are just beautiful, and I find myself staring at them for long periods of time. It’s a great book.

Bill writes the accompanying note:

The reason I have this book is because when George Cannata Jr. was our Animation Design teacher at Visual Arts in 1960, he recommended that his students buy it because it was known as the “animation designers bible” in those days.

The oversized book cover

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I apologize for any problems you’re having with the Splog just now. Verizon is a tough foe who cannot do their job correctly despite the high prices. They promise everything will be in order by Sunday July, 7th. I can only hope and keep trying.

Michael

A couple of days ago I posted some attractive designs that were done in the late thirties/early forties in preparation for the making of the animated feature, Bambi. The drawings were quite beautiful, and they led, without a moment to spare, to Bill Peckmann‘s forwarding some amazing comic strip pages. The Disney studio published an accompanying comic strip for the newspapers.

- Suppose we had a comic book version of The 3 Caballeros; wouldn’t that be fun to see? What if the artwork were done completely by Walt Kelly; would that make it a treasure? I think it does. Bill Peckmann made my week when he sent me the scans to the following comic book. As Bill wrote to me: “Beautiful stuff, like Barks’ art, it’s timeless, looks like it was done yesterday.”

However there’s some residue floating about. Sorry about that, but it is Kelly’s residue.

Not only is the artwork out of this world, but the quality of the printing is brilliant. And the quality of the book, itself, is wonderfully well preserved. You only have to look below to read it. Take your time; this is great.

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Many thanks to Bill Peckmann for sharing this gorgeous material with us.

I’ve always loved the extraordinary work of Chuck Saxon and have watched it closely. I do have one cel from a commercial done in his style, thanks to a good friend, Jim Logan who acted as an assistant on the spot. Unfortunately, it’s currently in storage or I’d post it.

Bill Peckmann sent me a number of pieces,and I’m glad to share them. Here’s Bill:

Exquisite and scrumptious are two words that describe the work of New Yorker artist Charles “Chuck” Saxon to a fair thee well. The cover below which I had clipped, was one of my favorites because of his animals in it. The human condition was always Saxon’s main concern, but one can still wish that he could have included more critters, stuffed or otherwise in his incredible art.

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We, in animation, are all familiar with the work of the talented designer, Peter de Seve. Bill Peckmann has sent me a number of clippings of his work: covers from New Yorker magazines, ruff illustrations and articles about him. It makes for a good post on this talented artist.

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