Michael Sporn Animation – Splog

Howard Beckerman sent me this great photo and a short letter attached to it. I can’t help but post both:

___________________________________________(Click any image to enlarge.)
Hi Michael,
Someone suggested that I send you this photo of Ollie signing my review copy of Disney Animation The Illusion of Life. It was taken in 1982 at the publisher’s office. Frank and Ollie were there with their wives. I was doing an interview to accompany a review of the book.

Howard

- Mike Dobbs has a blog called Made of Pen & Ink. He was once the editor of Animato! and Animation Planet, two fanzines for animation fans.

This blog is designed for Mike to post chapters of a book he’s writing about the Fleischer brothers entitled: Made of Pen and Ink: The Fleischer Studio and Cartoons.
It’s been a long time between chapters, and he’s just posted the third on this blog. It’s about Betty Boop and her history at the studio. If you haven’t kept up with it, this is a chance to read some heavy duty writing about Max & Dave.
____________An illustration by Michael Paulus.

Mike also has an animation blog wherein he reviews animated films and dvds. This, too, is worth checking out. Animation Review.

With all the nopstalgia in this post, I probably shouldn’t be adding a comment here, but it’s on my mind. I saw a few minutes of Johnny Bravo last night on cable tv. I never did warm up to this show, though I have to admit that watching it last night it looked a bit more golden.

Compared to all the monstrously poor animation seen in the Flash shows, Johnny Bravo, as limited as it was, seemed richer and fuller. When a head turned it didn’t just pop from one side to another, it turned. When an arm had to move up, it didn’t just pop, it animated.

Have we reached the point where I miss even limited animation?

Ugly
- A year ago I posted some photos of cranes working on buildings in the area not far from my apartment in Manhattan. The one pictured below to the left was there for half a year. The building it was raising is near completion, and I’ve pictured it below, to the right. It’s one of these monsters that goes up to a seeming infiinity and successfully blocks the view of the Empire State Building, a couple of blocks behind it.

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Not Ugly
A small grouping of older buildings sits six blocks south of the monster above. These I find interesting and attractive. Starting to the right, (note that I’ve lightened the building farthest right to highlight the four in the center) there’s an interesting building which has, to its left, a smaller building. Then a smaller building, and a smaller one yet. I suspect it’d be interesing to have an apartment in one of these which sit across from the Flatiron building at the intersection of Fifth Avenue and Broadway. At one time, these buildings probably housed photographers’ studios – this had once been the neghborhood for that field.

Finally, I couldn’t resist pointing out these carolers who remain on the
ediface of the building above, farthest left.
They probably went up one christmas and have stayed there
singing ever on.

Below is another shot of the same buildings from 23rd Street.
The arrow points to the carolers.

- Annulla has posted a number of fine photos of flowers on her site, Blather From Brooklyn. The daffodil to the left is one of these images which she photographed at the Brooklyn Botanical Garden.

I enjoyed looking at these pictures and found myself wanting to phtograph some flowers myself, however I thought it’d be interesting to shoot them in a more natural city environment. An environment not protected by a Botanical Garden.

I have to admit I was caught up sharp in my limited attempt, and I ended up with only a couple of pictures. I took these on the way to my studio one morning. It’s obvious that the weather here, still rather cold and wet, has not quite helped the floral life of the city, and there doesn’t seem to be much to highlight. The streets are still gray, and the parks aren’t in full bloom. The city is still unusually cold for this time of year.

I did spot a couple of plants in Madison Square Park, but these looked to be having a bit of difficulty in surviving.

(Click any image to enlarge)____________

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I then turned to the internet to see just what sort of flower photos were out there. Of course, I found an embarrassment of riches. It was a humbling trip with on the first couple of links I opened.

I looked at the site of Shoji Ikeda and was taken abock with his photos of flowers from Japan.
Likewise beautiful wer the photos at digital photo artistry.
Finally, when I got to Tony Howell‘s site, I quit. These images were just too beautiful, and I found myself trying to compete. Here are a couple of photos borrowed from these three sites.

I guess, in the end, I realize that I am not in competition since I’m not a professional photographer. Nor am I trying to pose as one. I just wanted to gather a few bright moments of spring. The weather is obviously going to delay that, but I will make some attempts to showcase the more urban guerrilla grass and flower cracking through the concrete when they start to bloom. Until then, it’s back to animation.

I did find one interesting craft site, Crafty Daisies, that shows you
how to press flowers.
Your vibrant living peony can end up looking like this before it dies.

Last week there was a crane accident in New York. A crane, tied to a building under construction, tore away from its ties and fell over. The crane hit a building and cantilevered onto another building totally demolishing a four story brownstone on 51st Street and Lexington Avenue. At least four were killed, several had to be dug out of the rubble. (Remembrance of Sept. 11th for all New Yorkers.)

All I could think last Saturday, was that you’re sitting in your apartment on a Saturday afternoon, cleaning or watching the tv or just doing nothing. Suddenly, your life is over.
The chaos of it all just hasn’t left me all week.

I was going to photograph a crane to dress the site last Sunday, but couldn’t get up the drive to do it. I’ve decided to post these older pictures from last April (all of which are no longer there; the buildings are just about constructed.)

There was a woman interviewed on the day of the accident. She had been born in the building that was destroyed, and she spent her entire life living in the building. She left to go out and buy groceries and came home to devestation. She teared up when she mentioned her two cats left in the building and wondered if they would find them in the rubble. It was several hours later when she was being interviewed, and she was still holding two bags of groceries.

The crane to the left can be seen from many blocks away. It stood at 30th Street and Madison Ave for about six months. An enormous piece of equipment, from a block away it virtually looked as tall as the Empire State Building, behind it. The building they eventually built with the crane does block out the view of the Empire State Building for a good many people.

(Click any image to enlarge.)

Interestingly enough, there’s a second crane – albeit much shorter – half a block away which is working on another construction site. At times, traffic backs up for blocks. (See both in the image above to the right.)

Here are two other views of the same two cranes. The tall one from a block away looking down over a couple of buildings. The image on the right is the short crane as seen from the base of the tall crane.

If you look up to 42nd St from 14th St, you see a mass of construction going on uptown. Even just out of the frame on both the left and right, there’s more. The crane below is to the left at 18th Street. It’s enormous when standing straight up and down. Here it’s bent to pick up materials.

I like the color of the sky against all the cranes pushing into the sky at the right.

Here’s another shot of the same crane from the other side of a building.

The crane above is on 19th Street just east of Broadway. Traffic seems to have learned how to maneuver around these things as it flows without too much difficulty.

Another person who was interviewed on NPR yesterday was the owner of a bar in the building on the street level. He decided that he wanted to see the Yankee spring training game. They’ve aired so few of them that he decided to stay home and go in a bit later so that he could enjoy the game. When he arrived his bar was no longer there. One of his employees was found in the rubble later. Another tenant of the building, a friend of his, had ridden down with the crash and was buried. He was also found alive and was just homeless. The owner of the bar just worried for all the newly displaced people.

Here, to the left, is an image of the Empire State Building. Cranes were obviously key to the construction of this building and others equally beautiful. One can only hope that the construction under way will leave behind some glorious piece of architecture, though it always seems more likely that some rectangular box will be built to hide more of the view from the ground.

There always is this feeling of danger, though. One sees these monumentally tall machines and wonders if it fell over would I be in its range?

As usual, they immediately started searching for someone to blame for the incident that happened last week. At first, they told us innumerable times that an inspection had taken place recently so that wasn’t the problem. Now we learn that the inspector hadn’t done his job properly.

To me, it all comes down to deregulation. It started when Ronald Reagan deregulated the airlines, and it came to its zenith when Bill Clinton deregulated the airwaves. At first the airlines began to fold, then Disney bought ABC, Time Warner bought AOL, and it looks like the taxpayers just bought Bears Stearns for Chase. The pharmaceutical industry is pricing us all out of drugs, dog food is poisoned and our toys are covered in lead paint. It might be time for the Federal Government to begin to open its eye again.

Sorry for the rant; we live in chaos, and New York City seems to heighten the reality of that for us.

- I recently received this email from my friend, Tom Hachtman (the cartoonist who draws Gertrude’s Follies, a strip I’ve featured):

Joey has taken over Three Designing Women. She employs two women and me.

“Three Designing Women. Who’s this guy?”
“Oh, that’s my husband Tom.”
I do get tired of hearing this.
This mural painting is a phenomena.

Joey just lined up some work in Florida. If I can find Joey’s folders, I will try to e-mail some recent work to you.

love,t

Joey, of course, is Tom’s wife. I’ve featured their mural work before, but thought it time for an update. Here are the photos sent me. The comments are Tom’s descriptions.

________(Click any image to enlarge.)

________These are bedrooms in Highland Park, NJ.

________They wanted the bed to look like a fort in the forest.

________The aquarium room

________Joey wanted the aquarium room to feel like you were inside a fish tank –
________I painted this boy on the ceiling feeding his fish.

________Sometimes I think the details are so beautiful – Chris painted these birds.

Take a look at the Three Designing Women site.

- Perhaps you’ll remember that I posted a couple of pieces about the rise of a sculpture placed in the center of Madison Square Park. These were four trees, two together and another two standing alone. There was also a large steel rock. (see those posts here and here.)

These trees were constructed last April, in time for Spring.

You can see from this photo how well integrated they worked
into the atmosphere of the park.

Just last week I posted this photo showing how
they absorbed the snow around them.

Well, now the trees are coming down. All week long the deconstruction of the trees has developed. I snapped a couple of pictures to record the end of the art pieces and to close the book on this chapter.

I knew the writing was on the wall when the main path
leading closest to the trees was closed to the public.
It didn’t take long for the cranes to arrive.

(Click any image to enlarge.)___________

Since the principal road was closed for this tear down,
you had to walk the long way around the mall.

I found it noteworthy that they lay out the pieces of the branches in a
controlled way so that they could all be properly reassembled.
Part A goes into Part D attaches to Part R.

Tree in a cage.

Meanwhile, the solo trees are coming down in one big piece.

No more steel trees.

The artist for these pieces is Roxy Paine. You can read about this installation at the Madison Square Park website. The site also includes a video interview with the artist about the sculptures.
They’re officially called, “Conjoined,” “Defunct,” and “Erratic.”
You can see images of other sculptures he’s created at the artist’s site.

- Back during the production of Raggedy Ann, in New York, there was an Assistant Animator named, Duane Ullrich, whose company I enjoyed much. He came from the West (I’m thinking maybe Oklahoma, but I honestly can’t remember) and had a lot of amusing comments. One that stuck with me was his surprise in finding “black snow” in New York. He thought that this might be one of the most interesting things he’d seen here.

This thought occurs to me every year that it snows in New York. Last week, we had one of our first real snowfalls this year. Within a day the snow was disappearing. When I saw the “black snow” I decided to share some images with you.

These were all taken on a 20 block walk I made enroute to work. It was misting a hail-like rain while I shot. And cold.

(Click any image to enlarge.)__________

1_ 2
______Snow naturally sidles up to corners and crevices when it hits cement.

3_ 4
______Any object it can lean against is where to look for it.

5_ 6
___Curbs and news vending machines seem to be among the last places to find snow.

7_ 8
_Of course, once you enter a park there’s plenty of snow, but it stays fresh and white.

9_10
_Here are a couple of trees and shrubs and bushes collecting snow – not quite black yet.

__11
___These steel trees stood tall through the winter storm and didn’t collect a lot of snow.
___However, they’ve started taking them down. I guess the loan of these art pieces has
___come to an end. (Or else they’ve found some rust.)

- This past week, I featured a bunch of the Bill Peet drawings which are located on a dvd copy of The Sword and the Stone. There are also quite a few photos on the disc. Here are some I thought interesting. None of the people are identified in these photos, and I recognize too few of them.

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_________________Here’s Bill Peet at the storyboard he drew.

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______________Bill Peet (left) and Woolie Reitherman work with the actors.
______________Karl Swensen (Merlin) is far right next to Woolie. I think that’s
______________Barbara Wentworth (Mim) talking to Peet.

_____
_______A Bg LO artist (anyone recognize her? Sylvia Cobb, perhaps?) at work.

___________________________The final BG.

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(Amid Amidi posted this in the comments section:The left hand photo below the painted bg is in Blast 9. I don’t have a copy handy but the two guys sitting are Woolie Reitherman and John Sibley. I think the two guys on the left are Basil Davidovich and Don Griffith but I don’t remember. If anybody has the issue, perhaps they can post the correct idents.)

_____
______________The Multiplane camera with only a couple of levels in use.

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______________The horizontal Multiplane camera and the final scene.

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___________Left: cameramen shoot at the Multiplane Camera.
_____________________Right: Jim MacDonald creates a sound effect.

_____
_______Xeroxing a drawing onto cel. This is not something often photographed.

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________A Painter and a Checker in action (Sorry, I don’t know their names.)

- Has anyone else noted that the world has gotten meaner?

Remember the comic strip Pete the Tramp by C.D. Russell? no, it’s probably before your time. Pete was a tramp who stole pies from windows and got in trouble with the law. He was the typical hobo in comic strip form, and the strip started during the depression and lasted through 1963. I read it in color in Saturday’s NY Journal American.

Pete usually slept on park benches under newspapers and got his feet slapped by the cop. I noticed park benches this week and wanted to call attention to the way our society has handled tramps, hoboes, homeless people. In New York, they’ve made them uncomfortable.

This is the park bench I noticed.

It’s a bench in Madison Square Park, and I noticed it because it’s become a relic of the past. A person could actually sleep on it.

The few longer seats are “Priority seating.” This means bums have to get up for older people. I’m not sure what it means if the bum is an older person.

__________(Click any image to enlarge.)

- With all the screenings I’ve attended in the last few weeks, I seem to continually end up at the Fifth Ave. subway station at 59th Street and Fifth Ave. On display at the station are a
number of polar bears tiled into the walls. These are set far enough away from each other so that the white tiled polar bears set on the white tile backdrops don’t bother each other. You also have to walk the length of the station to see them.

These are glass mosaic murals by artist, Ann Schaumberger done in 1996 in collaboration with Miotto Mosaics. I was able to locate _________________(Click any image to enlarge.)
another work by her but not much other information.

Apparently there are other animals displayed in the 60th Street exit of this station, but I didn’t get to see them. I was primarily interested in the tile artwork downstairs where you wait for the trains.

In the past, I’ve posted features on the tile art displayed at the 23rd St. and the Prince St. subway stations. These are both on the BMT train line. (NY has three lines: the IND, the IRT and the BMT. Originally these were different guage tracks; now there’s no real difference.)

There are fewer bear setups than there were hats or working people – as appeared in other station art. Yesterday, after going to one of the last screenings I had in the area, I decided to photograph these tile bears and present them here.

You’re greeted by these penguins at either side (Uptown or Downtown) of the station.

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Farther down the station, you come upon these polar bears with an excellent orange ornamentation about them.

Close up you can see the detail on the tiling, but the bears as a whole look better a bit back from them.

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As I mentioned, penguins greet you at the entrances/exits of the station. You can see them on both sides of the platforms.

Above ground, the Plaza Hotel (no longer a hotel) stands. Lots of horse-drawn carriages stand in the cold waiting to take tourists for a ride through Central Park.