Michael Sporn Animation – Splog

– I’m an Eyvind Earle fan. I have been ever since getting my hands on Bob Thomas‘ original version of The Art of Animation (1959), which promoted Sleeping Beauty and its artwork, and then going up to Radio City Music Hall to see the first theatrical run of the film. After the Disney film, seeing Earle’s Nativity film on the Tennessee Ernie Ford show and watching Paul Bunyan and other Disney shorts of the period even closer, studying his work made me more of a fan.

I got to meet the man thanks to Michael Barrier. We had one of the craziest interviews ever when we drove upstate to his house and sat in a somewhat darkening room as the afternoon dimmed and Earle continued to quietly answer the questions.
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I loved that day, but I loved Earle’s work even more. After posting Retta Scott‘s Golden Book of Cinderella, I realized that I had this book, Peter and Wendy, which is Earle’s odd adaptation of Peter Pan. He’s obviously in love with Cinemascope in that most of the book’s illustrations are two-page spreads. Sort of wide screen proportions. This is unusual for a Little Golden Book.

The images look a bit like the backgrounds in Paul Bunyan, and the characters are not quite on model with the film. The printing, as with most of these books, is pretty dull. You know a lot has been lost in the transfer.

Again, because of the number of illustrations, I’ll break it into two postings.
Enjoy.

– Dave Hilberman has died.

Karl Cohen of ASIFA San Francisco sent me a note to inform me that Hilberman had passed away. Along with his long time partner, Zach Schwartz, he was one of the key founders of UPA, and his death marks a dark moment ending an era. I’d like to lead you to another document I posted a while back;
it’s an interview by John Canemaker which was originally published in Caroonist Profiles. Please check it out. Here.
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– On the entertaining site, A Hole In The Head, Johnny C posts some drawings from an old 1947 Life Magazine article in which some well known cartoonists were asked to draw their cartoon characters blind folded. The results are published and they’re fascinating.

Equally fascinating is that many of these “famous” cartoons are probably not recognizable to a substantial part of the world today. Even the most famous, at the time, Dick Tracy isn’t published any more. Still out there is Gasoline Alley and Blondie, but their hold is a tenuous one.

At first I laughed at the drawings the blindfolded cartoonists had made, and then I got a bit sad at the fragility of fame.

- We all know George Herriman’s incredible work on Krazy Kat, but Alan Holtz on his site Stripper’s Guide has been hosting completely different work by Herriman. Every Saturday there are several panels of early work by this inspiring artist.

Why do cartoons look so meagre these days in comparison?

- Here’s the link to a Russian site which features reuse of animation in the Disney features. Apparently, they found another use for xerography in the era of the Nine Old Men. (I wonder if Don Bluth was there at the time.)

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Here’s a nice article about Pixar artist Jason Deamer. He talks about character design for Ratatouille and Cars and examples of his drawings are featured. As a matter of fact there’s a lot of material out there about this film. Lots of drawings and interviews. Just go to YouTube and type in Ratatouille.

- Grim Natwick wrote a number of articles for Cartoonist Profiles Magazine. The first of them was written for the fourth issue, November 1969.

This article is pretty much just a bio as written by Grim in a somewhat light style. At the end, he adds some opinions.

I’m posting this short, two page article. And I follow it with the same article as Grim handed it to the magazine. The first two pages were typed (Of course this is pre-computer, so the typing is hunt and peck.) Then he adds the last couple of paragraphs in a hand-written form. This is the most interesting part of the article and the most interesting in the docs posted here. I thought you’d like to see it all, so here it is.

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(Click images to enlarge.) The article as published, above. The original manuscript, below.

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- This week we celebrated July 4th, and naturally displayed our patriotic fervor by displaying our flags. Well, I’ve noticed that New York (a Blue state if ever there was a Blue state) has many American Flags on display all of the time.

As a matter of fact, all of the flag photos posted here were taken over a month ago with no holidays in sight. These flags are just always there and don’t try to call attention to themselves, but they certainly decorate the landscape.
(Click any image you’d like to enlarge.)

One walks down the street completely oblivious to the large number of flags all around us. In the recent past, bronze plaques outside of stores have been replaced by draped signs everywhere announcing the names of stores. Mixed in with these fabric signs are many American flags announcing some bit of patriotism.

Here are some of those I’ve noticed:

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1. There are those flags that are positioned outside banks such as this Chase Bank
2. and there are those outside office buildings.

3. Hotels display many flags of many nations trying to induce everyone to check in.

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4. There are flags atop poles in public parks
5. and there are flags outside private buildings where tenants reside.

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6. There are the typically average flags outside office buildings,
7. and there are many flags sitting high up there on the top of many buildings.

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8. They sit quietly unnoticed
9. even outside construction sites.

Even our public transportation displays decals on buses and in subways.

– I’ve had an attraction to those junk videos you’d find in bins in Walmart or supermarkets or Woolworths (remember Woolworths – five & dime stores?). You know the type I mean, the badly drawn Bugs Bunny or Porky Pig. Mickey Mouse’s Bizarro twin. The drawing was always so bad you’d wonder what high school art student did this job? Sometimes, once you bought the video for a buck, you got what you paid for; a bad copy of the cartoon you wanted. However, sometimes you got gems.

Well, two of my films have shown up in those bins. At least it looks it. The covers are so pathetic that you have to wonder. Wonderbags. That’s why they call it that. You wonder who drew these replicants that look like bad rip-offs of my films. It’s a long story how they got there, but I found two of my films in horrible packaging in Chinatown. No one dollar package; they cost $10 each. You can buy the real dvd’s on line for nine dollars, and the real ones come with another film and a documentary.
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Let’s take a look at what the dvd cases look like inside those bags.

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These two dvd’s are available in Wonderbag packaging for a
higher price than the real dvd costs from my distributor, First Run Features.

Obviously, those packages were produced in some alternate universe. My draw dropped when I first saw them. I mean, look at that frogs fingers and toes! But, you know, the video transfer is a good one. The packaging is UGLY, and they cost $10!

So why would you buy these things? Is it for the other surprise gifts? Let’s look at what else comes in the Wonderbag.

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There’s a bunch of fish stickers and a rubber frog.

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There’s another rubber thing, what is it a spider? I don’t know. And a rubber band.
I think you get better gifts in Cracker Jack boxes!

I’m hoping you won’t find these collector’s items. But, if you do, all I can say is don’t waste your $10.

By the way, if you want to see some of those public domain video packages you can go to Tom Stathes’ Cartoons on Film site. They showcase a number of them.

– Coming soon to the Film Forum in NYC will premiere the German film, Summer ’04. It’s a film with echoes of Roman Polanski’s masterpiece, KNIFE IN THE WATER. This contemporary German drama sketches a love triangle that plays out, in part, on a sailboat.

On the same bill, they’re including the short film, NEVER LIKE THE FIRST TIME!, a Swedish animation in which four disparate people tell the story of their first sexual encounter. Documentary sound tracks lead us into separate stories, all visually different, The film has played at a number of
animation festivals and has won quite a few awards. You can see a short clip from this short here.

I like knowing that this theater continues their excellent programming, including animation in its schedule. However, I do hope they’ll soon put together another complete program of progressive shorts.

Here’s the schedule for the double bill: SUMMER ’04 and NEVER LIKE THE FIRST TIME!
August 1-14, at Film Forum, W. Houston St. (W. of 6th Ave.)
with screenings daily at 1, 3:15, 5:45, 8, and 10:10.

- Eddie Fitzgerald gives us two fabulous posts in the last two days.

Today he comments on acting by giving us a couple of videos. One in particular is dynamite, Stanislavsky dominating an interview and talking a bit about his craft – something anyone in animation should be interested in. Hell, it’s interesting just seeing what the guy looks like.

It’s odd though that Stanislavsky died in 1938 and the guy in this video is wearing what looks like a 1980′s coat. But he’s kinda funny.

Yesterday he gave us a Ratatouille review which touches on points I hadn’t seen elsewhere. When a professional gives professional criticism, I listen. Eddie Fitzgerald is a consummate professional; he knows his business, and he shares some purely professional comments after a screening of Ratatouille.

To illustrate his points, he doesn’t solely compare Ratatouille to other animated films, he compares it to other films. To talk about set pieces, Eddie doesn’t mention anything from Peter Pan or Pinocchio, he talks about the Marx Brothers. To talk about sophisticated dialogue, he makes his points with dialogue from Casablanca or Silence of the Lambs. This seems to be totally appropriate to this film which comes close to being more than an animated film.

It’s a good review that goes to the heart of it. I enjoyed reading it, and I encourage you to check it out. However, like most good internet postings, the comments are not up to the original. Somehow, those who comment don’t seem able to discuss the meat that’s been revealed on the blog.

- Speaking of interesting Ratatouille posts, Michael Gagne has a post about the “Visualization of Taste” sequence from the film. He posts some interesting 2D graphics and writes about the sequence. Here’s hoping we get to see more behind-the-scenes postings by those who worked on the film.

Here, also, is an interview with Michel on the same sequence.

- Speaking of comments that further the conversation, check out the excellent conversation begun with Mark Mayerson‘s current post. He discusses the desire/need/excitement and the difficulty/complications and depression over doing an animated short. All that work. All that lack of respect. All that glory. The comment are of the highest level and further the conversation. The post is such a rich comment to start things rolling, that it’s hard to imagine things not progressing as such.

David Nethery has been collecting photos of animators at work taken off the internet. He’s gathered them together in one place.

A large assortment of photos can be seen including: Ken Harris (pictured to the left), Art Babbitt, Glen Keane, Tissa David, Eric Goldberg, John Pomeroy, Frank Thomas, Retta Scott, Fred Moore, Ward Kimball and Ollie Johnston.
(Actually, I can probably lead David to quite a few more photos.}

It’s a good idea and an interesting reference point, if like me, you enjoy seeing images of animators working.

– One of my favorite posts most of you have probably already seen is on the Animation Who & Where site by Joe Campana.

He looks back at the building and staff of the Charles Mintz studio. What we see is a specific point on the old building, as it still stands, with photos of the staff superimposed over the exact spot where they were standing in days gone by. You really get a sense of the place and the building as much as you do of the people. It’s a truly original posting of something so interesting that it becomes exciting for me.

The posting is a great piece of detective work revealed.

– I’m not sure I should be thankful of reading the news report (vian Animated News) that The Christmas Carol will be “animated” via motion capture and directed by Robert Zemeckis. Even more stomach churning is the news that Jim Carrey will be one of the stars of it – playing Scrooge. Bob Hoskins will be Fezziwig.

Why not do a new version of Mr. Magoo’s Christmas Carol starring Leslie Nielsen – oh, wait. He’s Mr. Yesterday. How about Steve Martin, is he “With it” enough?

I recently watched Cast Away for the hundredth time. This film is my favorite of Zemeckis’ films, and I’m upset that he spends so much time flailing away at animated imitations rather than at making more good movies. I guess now that he has that good deal with Disney, he wants to compete with Pixar (without doing the work.)

- So here we have the last of the elements from the Fantasia Leica reel. I have these on loan fom John Canemaker, and it’s great to see what they look like.

The strips I’m posting today seem to be bits and pieces that have, for the most part, been removed from the Nutcracker Suite sequence. Enjoy.

(As always click any image to enlarge a bit.)
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A. The first of these pieces might seem familiar to those of you who’ve seen the Robert Feild book, The Art of Walt Disney. It resembles the Ballet of Falling Leaves seen on pg. 190. The Feild book puts this cut sequence in Bambi, but this similar scene is obviously in Fantasia, and cut out (note that it’s been “X-ed” out on the film) from that film as well. For those unfamiliar with the Feild book, I’m posting this page below.
B. & C. These frames are part of the Milkweed Dance.

The Falling leaves in the Feild book.

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C, D. & E. are all part of a dance of snowflakes.

Thanks again to John Canemaker for this revealing footage.

- It’s Independence Day, and what better image to feature.

These two flags fly on Fifth Avenue, and I caught them on a weekday about a month ago. I like the Empire State Building situated in the background.

I like to remind myself of my own personal Independence on July Fourth. My studio operates to make animation, and even when I’m forced to accept some mediocre job to pay the rent, it’s always something that I approve and accept. It’s always my choice. It’s one great part of the position.

The only other really import-ant one is that I get to choose who I want to work with (when I can afford to hire others.) For the past year or so, we’ve been relatively quiet here, and only the stable few have worked here.

I’m looking forward to a larger upcoming project that’ll require me to bring on more people. There are some friends I’d like to get back in here. Not to mention the fact that I really want to make the film we’re planning. It wouldn’t be possible without the “Independence” we have.
What a great life I lead.

Have a happy holiday, everyone.

- I thought I’d bring your attention to my website which has a couple of pages that might not have been noticed before.

I’ve had a slowly developing feature which is just about to take off. A page on my site is dedicated to that film’s production and preparation.

This we call the POE page, POE being the film’s title.
There’s a production blog there, called POE Updates. I’ve written, maybe monthly more or less, about the film.

The film’s about to get a real start with the recording of three celebrities in the next month, and I realized that I haven’t called much attention to this part of my site. Presumably, as we get further along, the log notes will be more frequent.

– Here, I continue my posting of the illustrations from a version of George Orwell’s novel, Animal Farm. The drawings are credited to “Joy Batchelor” and “John Halas.” It’s probable that Joy Batchelor did illustrate the book, but I haven’t found evidence as yet. On my last post, Rudy Agresta thought that he remembered Vivien Bachelor discussing her mother’s illustrating it in the book Halas & Batchelor Cartoons. I haven’t found that passage.
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The animated film was produced by Louis D. Rochemont Associates in 1955 at a studio they set up in Stroud, Gloustershire in England. The studio was formerly the home of the Anson-Dyer company and GB Animation wherein ex-Disney veteran, David Hand, made his short films for Rank.

We left off the story with Boxer, the horse, setting an example for the other animals.

The pigs move into the farmer’s house and become little more than a replacement for “man”.

Many animals take the lead of Boxer and try to do their share, while the pigs fight for the lazy leadership.

The pigs push Boxer to the limits and use the dogs as their personal guards and force their will on the others.

Boxer grows ill as the pigs grow lazier.

The lazy pigs celebrate their success. Animals hear gossip about the humans planning a charge to take back the farm.

The weakened Boxer, no longer useful to the pigs, is sold for glue.

Eventually the humans return, and in some eyes of the animals they blend with the pigs.
The line illustrations do a nice job of representing the film. They’re also quite consistent.

With all the articles and discussions of Ratatouille, there’s an interesting article in today’s NYDaily News by theater critic, Joe Dziemianowicz. He talks about the recent popularity of the dish, ratatouille.

- Fred Cline has an interesting and informative reminiscence of Mary Blair on his blog. This entry is a letter Fred wrote to John Canemaker who was researching his book on Mary Blair. The letter talks about Fred’s first meeting with the Blairs and continues on through to her death and funeral.

John’s book The Art and Flair of Mary Blair is the last word on this brilliant artist. (The photo to the left comes from the book. It shows Ms. Blair painting in South America in 1941.)

Fred World is developing into an excellent blog, so I’d suggest you keep atuned to it.
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Ratatouille had a successful opening in the US. Just not as successful as Disney/Pixar might have hoped for. It opened on Friday with a $16.6 million opening to lead the box office (including the new Bruce Willis Die Hard movie). The important first weekend comes in at $47.2 million. That’s a bit lower than analysts had predicted. Unfortunately, this doesn’t equal the opening weekend of ANY other PIXAR film, and it’s likely to end up being one of their lowest grossing films. Thus it stands up to last week’s commentary from Jim Hill and Michael Barrier (see Two Days Away). the PixaRatatouille takes Manhattan.

Jim Hillcontinues the conversation today about the prospects
for the box office suggesting it’s still too soon to write things off. Indeed.

Personally, I think to some extent all this is irrelevant. Brad Bird has pulled off an amazing feat. Technically this is the greatest achievement of
the Pixar films. The animation is the finest, the technology is top notch, the design is excellent. I encourage you to see it as long as you don’t squirm at the sight of dozens of rats running around kitchens. Brad Bird deserves all the congratulations he’s been garnering regardless of the grosses (which are still high and make the film a financial success). It’s an enormous achievement he’s pulled off.

By the way you can follow a complete week by week comparative breakdown of Ratatouille against all of the other Pixar films here.

I very much like that this film has generated such positive commentary about animation from within and outside the community. Reviewers nhave written some of their best on this animated film. A.O. Scott‘s review in last Friday’s NYTimes is a good example. (The Times also has an audio slide show with an interview with Brad Bird.) Many of the blogs are lighting up with positive comments. Michael Barrier led the way after he’d seen a preview. He also continues with additional comments. Jenny Lerew at Blackwing Diaries writes an excellent piece giving us a nice view of LA studios. There are many others from Cartoon Brew to Will Finn.

On a completely different note, Larry T. on his blog, Random Semiconscious Musings, has a great post on Mother Goose Goes Hollywood wherein he identifies all of the caricatures with matching photographs. It’s great to see the likes of Ned Sparks (pictured), George Arliss and Joe Penner.

Thanks, Larry.