Michael Sporn Animation – Splog

- Usually the gag cartoons done in a studio don’t stand the test of time. No one can figure out what half of them mean – never mind what the gag is. However, sometimes they come off still funny.

After posting the Ward Kimball models, yesterday, I thought it might not be a bad time to post these images I have all on one pretty small photostat. I can hardly identify half of the people caricatured, but I’ll let you know what I can figure out.

This collage was done by Ward Kimball pasting photos and caricatures into the heads of the characters of the film. Ollie Johnston with a cigar in his mouth and Ward as the “Lost Boy” in “Michael’s” hands.
The image is long (above and below) so I split it in half to make it easier to enlarge; the right half is below.

(L) A surreal image out of Ward Kimball’s hands. Who knows what it meant?
(R) Ward stands off to the side (arms crossed) watching others laugh at one of his gag cartoons.

I have a couple hundred of these cartoons from “Raggedy Ann”. Someday when I get them out of storage I’ll try to remember what they mean and post some of them.

- About a hundred years ago, it seems, John Canemaker gave me some copies of models and drawings by Ward Kimball. I’m sure at least a couple of these have been published in some of John’s books. His book, Nine Old Men, includes many other beautiful Kimball drawings, and I’d suggest you look there for more Kimball inspiration.

I once posted a couple of these, and I like them a lot. I’m posting them again and adding a bunch more that weren’t included. Ward was a brilliant artist with a very active and excited intelligence. His material from the 50′s is just excellent, and it’s always worth a look.

During the making of “Peter Pan” Kimball illustrated how Frank Thomas, Ward, Milt Kahl, Marc Davis, Clarke Mallery (an Asst at the time) and Ollie Johnston would look as “Hook”.

When Ollie Wallace, a composer at the studio, went to hospital to have his appendix removed, Kimball made this card for Ollie. It was based on Rembrandt’s painting, “The Anatomy Lesson”. It got Wallace laughing so hard in the hospital that he burst his own stitches and had to have them re-sewn.

______________(Click any drawing to enlarge.)

- Back in Jan 2007, I posted these photos from the animation production of Woman of the Year. I think these are interesting enough that they’re worth revisiting. So here, again, is that post:

– To recap:
Woman of the Year was a project that came to me in the very start of my studio’s life – 1981.
Tony Walton, the enormously talented and fine designer, had gone to Richard Williams in search of a potential animator for WOTY (as we got to call the name of the show.) Dick recommended me. But before doing WOTY, there were some title segments needed for Prince of the City, a Sidney Lumet film. (I’ll discuss that film work some other day.)

Tony Walton designed the character, Katz, which would be the alter-ego of the show’s cartoonist hero, played by Harry Guardino. Through Katz, we’d learn about the problems of a relationship with a media star, played by Lauren Bacall.

It turned out to be a very intense production. Three minutes of animation turned into twelve as each segment was more successful than the last. ___________(All images enlarge by clicking.)
There was no time for pencil tests. I had to run
to Boston weekly, where the show was in try-outs, to project different segments; these went into the show that night – usually Wednesdays. I’d rush to the lab to get the dailies, speed to the editor, Sy Fried, to synch them up to a click track that was pre-recorded, then race to the airport to fly to the show for my first screening. Any animation blips would have to be corrected on Thursdays.

There was a small crew working out of a tiny east 32nd Street apartment. This was Dick Williams’ apartment in NY. He was rarely here, and when he did stay in NY, he didn’t stay at the apartment. He asked me to use it as my studio and to make sure the rent was paid on time and the mail was collected. Since we had to work crazy hours, it was a surprise one Saturday morning to find that I’d awakened elderly Jazz great, Max Kaminsky, who Dick had also loaned the apartment. Embarrassed, I ultimately moved to a larger studio – my own – shortly thereafter.

Here are a couple of photos of some of us working:

Tony Charmoli was the show’s choreographer. He worked with me in plotting out the big dance number – a duet between Harry Guardino and our cartoon character. I think this is the only time on Broadway that a cartoon character spoke and sang with a live actor on stage. John Canemaker is taking this photograph and Phillip Schopper is setting up the 16mm camera.

Here Tony Charmoli shows us how to do a dance step. Phillip Schopper, who is filming Tony, figures out how to set up his camera. We used Tony’s dancing as reference, but our animation moves were too broad for anyone to have thought they might have been rotoscoped.

John Canemaker is working with Sy Fried, our editor. John did principal animation with me on the big number. Here they’re working with the click track and the live footage of Tony Charmoli to plot out the moves.

Steve Parton supervised the ink and paint. To get the sharpest lines, we inked on cels and didn’t color the drawings. It was B&W with a bright red bowtie. A spotlight matte over the character, bottom-lit on camera by Gary Becker.

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5. Steve Parton works with painter Barbara Samuels
6. Joey Epstein paints with fire in her eyes.

Joey Epstein paints “Katz.”

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8. Harry Guardino on stage with the creation of “Tessie Kat” developing on screen behind him. This was Harry’s first big solo.
9. John Canemaker gets to see some of his animation with Sy Fried, editor.

One of my quick stops from the lab on the way to Boston? No, I think this is a posed photo.

The success of the animation (including good reviews) posed a small problem for me. The rest of the show was ripped over the coals. When I started using some quotes about me in industrial ads, the producers came down on me for gloating over the others who’d gotten negative reviews.

All the same, it was a real learning experience in a big Broadway kinda way.

- On Monday, the Museum of Modern Art will continue its series of Jazz on Film (Jazz Score)with their first all animation program. This is a program of classic Hubley shorts. which feature jazz by such classic composers/musicians as Dizzy Gillespie, Quincy Jones, Benny Carter and others.

The program will be presented by Emily Hubley, Benny Carter’s biographer Ed Berger, and Benny’s widow Hilma.

The highlight of the program are MoMA’s newly and beautifully preserved prints of Adventures of an * and The Tender Game. Having seen the print of Adventures of an *, I can tell you it’s a treat. I saw the film originally projected back in 1963 when it was just seven years old, and this version is significantly better. I don’t think I’ve ever seen Tender Game in a good copy in all the many times I’ve seen it, so this is what my Monday will be about.

The show will start at 6:30pm in Theater 1 (The Roy and Niuta Titus Theater 1). It’ll run 100 mins.

Come to the theater a bit early and take a look at the exhibition in the lobby outside the theater. There’s an enormous amount of art beautifully displayed for you to see. It’s a treat, believe me. (I wrote about the opening of this exhibit and posted photos here.)

This is not the end of the animation in Jazz Score. These and other shorts will be screened with feature films:

Carmen D’Avino’s Pianissimo – screening on June 5 and 9
John Canemaker’s Bridgehampton – screening on July 2 and 5
Zbigniew Rybczynski’s Plamuz (Music Art) – screening on August 7 and 9
Adam Beckett’s Sausage City – screening in September
Pierre Hebert’s Population Explosion – screening in September

You can check MOMA’s calendar to find out exact times.

- I have to say that I’m just loving Mark Mayerson‘s breakdown of 101 Dalmatians. He has a lot of informed commentary to offer about the film giving some real statements about this excellent Disney feature. If you’re not watching this site regularly, get to it.

You should also check out Mark’s post of the FMPU Motion Picture Unit. Wow!

- Then, we also have to promote, once more, the excellent site A Film LA, Hans Perk’s blog. This is where the drafts for 101 Dalmatians orginally made it to the web, and there’s plenty more there as well. The more you dig, the more you’ll find. Where else could you find a photo of the Disney cafeteria shot in the 30′s? There’s always a great surprise.

- John Canemaker has loaned me so many excellent pieces that I’m almost embarrassed at how quickly they’ve been eaten up by this blog. Many of them deserve as much attention as I can give.

Consequently, over the next few Fridays I’m going to re-post some of these gems. Let’s start with the wizard’s duel from Sword In The Stone. Here are some sketches Bill Peet did on yellow foolscap. I originally posted them in two days’ worth of blogging, since it took a while to scan them all.

Here they are condensed into one:

- Continuing the post I offered last Tuesday, here’s a display of some more of the artwork created for The Midsummer’s Night Dream, directed and animated by Tissa David. The film features a live-action orchestra with Shakespeare’s characters running wild over the footage. Eventually, the picture opens to an animated woods. It was photographed by Kalman Kozelka, color styled by Ida Kozelka-Mocsary, and Bg designs by Richard Fehsl.

The film aired on the BBC in 1983 and was released on VHS by Goodtimes Video.

(click any image to enlarge.)
Bottom chases Titania in the woods.

At one point the instruments of the orchestra take on an animated life of their own.

The dark coloring loses some of the emotional delicacy of the drawing,
but is appropriate within the context of the film.

Titania catches Bottom in her arms.
Three cels from a sequence.

Titania dances with Bottom’s stool. (He’s brought it into the woods
when he transformed from the tympanist to the animated character.)

Tee Bosustow has been making podcasts of the many interviews he recorded for the documentary he has in progress. This is a history of the UPA studio. Slowly these interviews are appearing on his site.

You can hear Tee’s interviews with the likes of Dave Hilberman, Barrie Nelson, Bill Melendez, Tissa David, Derek Lamb, Mark Kausler, Howard Beckerman and many others. Go here and pick your poison. More interviews are added weekly.

One he recorded with me has just gone up. I seem to speak at an enormous speed and giggle throughout. The recording was done as we’d just completed our film, The Man Who Walked Between the Towers. To hear it go here.

Tee is also selling, on this site, a good book edited by Amid Amidi, Inside UPA. If you’re a fan, you have to search out a copy of the book. It’s a beauty. The book is predominantly a collection of amazing photographs of the studio and artists of UPA in its heyday.

Just to fill out this post, here’s a Grim Natwick drawing of Nellie Bly from Rooty Toot Toot (minus a face.) It seemed appropriate to match it with Tee Bosustow’s site.

- From 1983-85, Tissa David teamed with three other friends in Holland to begin work on an animated version of Mendelssohn’s Midsummer’s Night Dream.

This film would introduce several animated characters from Shakespeare’s play over a live action orchestral performance of Mendolssohn’s music. These characters chased each other around the orchestra until, eventually, the animation took over, and the orchestra melted away. The tympanist, himself, melded into Bottom.

This film was completely animated by Tissa, including all inbetweens and layouts. She was the film’s director, though in all the time she worked on this film, she never once described her role to me as such. She was just making a film she loved with several extraordinarily talented friends.

Kalman Kozelka was a brilliant cameraman who shot the entire film in a home built multiplane camera. It’s unjust to call it simply photography, because every scene involved seven to ten exposures with mattes and special lighting. Half of the scenes combined live action with the animation, and all of the scenes involved multiple levels with back and front lighting.

Ida Kozelka-Mocsary, Kalman’s wife, designed all the character coloring and colored all the cels . She worked closely in helping Kalman to prepare everything for the photography including mattes.

Richard Fehsl was the brilliant designer who colored and, in many cases, animated the Bg’s. All of these Bg’s were painted with dyes on frosted cels under rather delicate inking.

All four took story credit.

I have a good handful of the overlarge cels and artwork from the film. Here are a few of those cels along with a number of representative frame grabs from the film.

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__________________(Click any image to enlarge.)

__________________Titania, the drawing and the cel.

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__________________Three of Richard Fehsl’s Bg elements. These were back lit
__________________and front lit and combined with other Bg levels.

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___I have so much more art from this film, that there’ll surely be more posts to come.

This video (vhs) can still be located – used copies – on Amazon here.

_

- After all the artwork from Fantasia that I posted in the past week or so, I received an email from Howard Penner. He had a beautiful sketch of Zeus looking down from the clouds.

Howard wondered whether it could have been drawn by James Bodrero, who did other storyboard sketches in a series I posted on loan from John Canemaker.

It looked somewhat different in style to me, so I asked John. He wasn’t able to affirm that it was Bodrero’s work, though he suggested it also might be by Martin Provenson or Jack Miller, both of whom also worked on this same sequence. It has more the cartoony look that I would expect from a Provenson drawing, so that’s where I’m siding. Any other guesses?

Here are some closer scans:

(Click any image to enlarge.)

Having written “A-Spied” shouldn’t
he have written “A-Nymph”?

- Ken Priebe has written me to inform about the Vancouver Art Gallery’s program called Krazy!. It’s a show of original sketches, notes, concept drawings, animation cells, and 3-D models.

Ken writes in depth about it on his blog The Boundaries of Fantasia.

Ken also informed me that the brilliant animator, Tony White, has just posted a number of his films and reels on YouTube. Go here to see all of these short films. Don’t miss Hokusai; it’s a great film which won the BAFTA in 1978. Tony’s commercial work can be seen here.

Ken Priebe is the author of The Art of Stop-Motion Animation.
Tony White has written Animation from Pencils to Pixels and the classic book The Animator’s Workbook.

- Sony Classic Pictures bought the distribution rights of Waltz with Bashir before the Cannes Festival closed yesterday. This assures that the film will eventually be released in the US. The film did not win any awards at the Festival as was predicted by a couple of reporters. Juror Natalie Portman commented on this, “I think it’s a testament to the amazing selection (in the Festival) that a film as good as ‘Waltz With Bashir’ didn’t win an award.”

- I’m sure I’ve mentioned before that I love silent films. I particularly am a fan of D.W.Griffith’s work. I think I’ve read just about every book about the man’s career and biography.

If you’re looking for a great one, read Adventures with D.W. Griffith by Karl Brown, who was an apprentice on Birth of a Nation and Intolerance. I thinnk often enough about Brown’s story about his daily walks with D.W. It seems that they both lived near 14th Street, and their studio was on 125th St. when they worked in NY. They’d walk together to the studio in the morning and walk home at night. The young Karl Brown would use the opportunity to learn as much as he could from the master. He tells how Griffith, at one time, pulled out a big six shooter which surprised Brown. That’s when he realized that most people carried guns. It was protection from criminals. ______Griffith filming Birth of a Nation.
I’m sure it was also protection from the patent
holders group who would beat up anyone making a film without paying for the use of a camera, whose operation was patented and owned by Thomas Edison.

Billy Bitzer, Griffith’s brilliant camerman, reconstructed their camera so that it was different from the patent rights’ group’s cameras – therefore not in violation of the patent. This didn’t stop the constant attacks on Griffith’s sets.

I have a book by Kevin Brownlow that I love. Photographs from the sets of silent films. Hollywood, the Pioneers is a companion book to a series he produced. The photos are outstanding. Here are a few:

Billy Bitzer on the front of a train filming the movement
for a pre-Griffith film, a Hales Tour film.

This is how the Hales tour films were screened. It’s a duplicate of a railroad car, and you ride facing the screen where you got to watch the movement, as if you were on a train. Future director, Byron Haskin, talked about spending whole days in a theater
watching these tours since they were so spellbinding.

Here’s a shot of the skeleton to the set of Babylonia in the film, Intolerance.
This film was shot in California. Film makers ran to the west coast
as much to escape the patent holders as to find all sun all the time.

This is what the final set looked like for the film. (Those are
real people and elephants inhabiting the set, not computerized creations.)

This is closer shot of one of the elephants that lined the walls. The care that was put into these films was amazing. Griffith loved recreating famous paintings and etchings that illustrated the stories he was filming. Quite often, the intertitle would tell you that you were watching such a recreation and show you the painting.

After the film was completed, the set remained standing for many years. If Roger Corman had been around at the time, there would have been another dozen films featuring it.

There’s also a wonderful Italian film by the Taviani brothers called, Good Morning, Babylon. It’s about two architect brothers who emigrate to the US and get work helping to build the set. It’s worth hunting down for a look.

The Griffith film led to bigger and bigger sets.
This is Ernst Lubitsch’s German film, Loves of a Pharoah.

Douglas Fairbanks got even larger with his set for The Thief of Baghdad.

Years later, after a number of films had failed for him, Griffith tried to make one more special film. He bought some land in Mamaroneck, NY and built his own studio. There he had constructed Paris. This would be the set for Orphans of the Storm.

It was a film that featured the sisters, Dorothy and Lillian Gish. The girls are separated in the period melodrama. here, Dorothy, playing the blind sister, is searching the streets for her sister.

She isn’t very successful and sinks lower and lower into the depths of revolutionary France. Needless to say, there’s eventually a reunion.

Lillian took a very big part in the making of these films. During Intolerance she actually was an uncredited editor. Since she had a small role in the film, she would spend the days assemblilng footage to view with D.W. in the evenings and would rework the film to Griffith’s instructions on the next day.

There was no script when they started this film. Griffith wrote it all and kept it in his head as he shot the film. This was quite a feat since it’s four separate stories that are interwoven. (The first time this was done on film.)
Anita Loos was employed, early in her career, after the fact to help write the intertitles and offer suggested changes to the footage.

In 1917, during WW I, Griffith actually went to the French front to film his movie,
Hearts of the World. The film was financed with British money as
early propaganda. The footage shot in France wasn’t all he’d hoped for,
so some of it was recreated back in the US when he returned.