Cartoon Brew

DISNEY'S ABC'S OF HAND TOOLS

In 1946, long before it owned the ABC Television Network or created alphabet spelling books for children, Disney made an industrial film for General Motors called ABC'S of Hand Tools. Bill Roberts directed this educational short, aimed at adults, which demonstrates the proper use of common tools. The interesting thing is that the film (and accompanying booklet) re-uses the character "Emotion" (an uncouth caveman, and caricature of Ward Kimball, from the 1943 wartime cartoon Reason And Emotion - also directed by Roberts), here with a new name, "Primitive Pete". Bob Sokol posted a pdf of the entire booklet here. J.J. Sedelmaier sent us large scans (below) of several pages of his copy.

(Click on pages below for larger images)

Posted by JERRY at 07:50 AM

LASSETER LAST NIGHT - IN PARIS

John Lasseter sat down and answered questions at the French Premiere of CARS last night. Our friend Kinoo (of the French website, Pixar's Room) has posted video and pictures from the event.

I had the luck to be at the premiere of CARS yesterday in Paris and attended the discussion with John Lasseter following the digital projection of the new movie (and the well received Ratatouille teaser). I was able to ask him a question about his future, as he has many resposibilities now following the merger with Disney, and if he will be able to direct another movie soon? His answer can be seen on the first video clip.

 

This second video clip (below) shows Lasseter discussing his early cartoon influences, STAR WARS and TRON, the inspiration for CARS, and 2-D animation.

(Thanks, Kinoo)

Stylistic Evolution in Crayon Shin-chan

My favorite anime critic, Ben Ettinger, recently wrote a piece about the long-running Japanese animated series CRAYON SHIN-CHAN and how since its debut in 1992, the animators' styles have evolved and become more distinct and personal. Initially, the show remained faithful to the comic that it was based on, which from what I've seen is rather poorly drawn, but within a couple seasons the animators were pushing the look of the show into a more experimental (and even abstract) direction. Check out the revealing stills above—left is from a 1992 episode, right is from 1996. (Ben's article also includes links to video clips.)

What strikes me as fascinating about this stylistic evolution is that it's the complete opposite of the tendencies of US series. Here, the drawing in shows—most shows, at least—tightens up with every passing season, exemplified most clearly (and sadly) in America's longest running animated series THE SIMPSONS, which hasn't had an original character expression or bit of movement in well over a decade.

SIMPSONS producers, quite unbelievably, pride themselves on putting out a show that doesn't exhibit stylistic evolution—and they certainly wouldn't stand for anything that showed personal creativity or the sign of an individual's hand in the production. Imagine a record label that asks a musician to compose one song and then replay that song for the rest of his career. No self-respecting musician would ever agee. But on the SIMPSONS, machine-like repetition of style is the order of the day. If a layout artist on the SIMPSONS draws 'off-model,' that's viewed without question as an error, never as a creative choice on the part of the artist. It wasn't always like that. THE SIMPSONS allowed artists some extent of creative feedom for quite a few seasons, especially during its earliest Klasky Csupo years, and also in some of the subsequent Film Roman seasons. By season six or seven, however, the producers had clamped down and decided that the show was going to exclusively be a platform for smug writing and dialogue, not for anything resembling art or animation. It's refreshing to find that in Japan, certain animated shows still allow for artists to be a creative partner in the production of the series. Animation producers in the US could stand to learn from this and recognize that letting artists grow with a show can only be something positive.

MEET JUNE FORAY AND COREY BURTON

On Wednesday, May 17th, Van Eaton Galleries will host a benefit for the ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archives: The Art of Voice Acting for Animation, featuring a conversation with June Foray and Corey Burton.

After the discussion, Burton and Foray will be signing original art featuring characters whose voices they've created, with a percentage of the sales of art sold that evening donated back to the ASIFA Archives. The program starts promptly at 7:30 p.m. and reservations are required. Seating is limited so people are encouraged to call soon! Tickets are $8 at the door for both members and non-members and all proceeds from ticket sales go to the Archive Project. Van Eaton Galleries is located at 13613 Ventura Blvd. in Sherman Oaks. For reservations call (818) 788-2357 and tell them you saw it on Cartoon Brew.

Cars Trailer #2

Disney has released the second full-length trailer for Pixar's CARS. The animation looks much more appealing than earlier footage, but the trailer gives away too much of the story and leaves me wishing I hadn't watched it. View it at your own risk.

MORE DISNEY INSIGNIA

As a follow-up to our post on Disney At War, our pal J.J. Sedelmaier sent us this 2 page spread from the April 1944 issue of Popular Science showing off more Disney wartime insignia in color.

(Click on pages below for larger image)

CARS AND CARTOON BREW

What does CARTOON BREW have in common with Disney/Pixar's CARS?

Give up?? The answer is the lettering in both of our logos was designed by Leslie Cabarga. Cabarga is an animation historian (The Fleischer Story) who is also well known as a lettering and font designer. In addition to designing the original Brew logo, Leslie created the font, Magneto, that Pixar used for, not only its CARS logo, but the titles, ancillary signage (that appear within the film's backgrounds) and merchandising material. Says Leslie:

"Pixar dutifully purchased Magneto (font piracy is a constant concern for type foundries just as DVD piracy is for film studios), a streamlined script, reminiscent of 1930s to 1950s automobile logos, from me more than a year ago. I have been thrilled seeing Magneto all over the place in Cars. Font designers always notice when our typefaces are used well, by talented designers, or badly by other designers, and Pixar has done a beautiful job with the Cars logo and titles.

"But - ironic for me to say - I think they've over used it. My latest book, Logo, Font & Lettering Bible makes the case that designers shouldn't rely so heavily on 'OPF' (other people's fonts) but can learn to draw their own custom lettering. Think about the great hand-lettered movie titles of the past, where every credit was specially designed to emphasize the interesting alphabetical anomalies in each word or name.

"In other words, it's funny that Pixar, the world's leading innovator of quality animation; a company with probably the world's greatest writers, directors, designers and animators has sort-of a blind spot when it comes to the art of lettering. They buy an off-the-shelf font, instead of hiring lettering talent to customize at least some of their titles and signage."

And that would be you, eh Leslie? Regardless, I have a strong feeling that CARS, the film, will live up to its marvelous logo!

CARS GOLDEN BOOK

Speaking of CARS, don't miss the Cars Little Golden Book. I just found it at my local Barnes & Noble last night. Once again Disney Publishing's Global Design Group, with designs by Winnie Ho and ilustrators Jean-Paul Orpinas and Scott Tilley, have come up with another attractive homage to classic Golden Books of the past. (Their previous Little Nemo, Chicken Little and Incredibles Golden Books are worth picking up as well).

Not-Quite-Animation Books

A roundup of recent non-animation books that have caught my attention:

I don't know how Lane Smith does it, but every one of his illustrated books is a gem. His latest, JOHN, PAUL, GEORGE AND BEN, is a quirky take on America's founding fathers portrayed as kids. Compared to the crass manufactured cartoons that children are regularly exposed to on television, the level of thought, care and craftsmanship that Lane puts into his books is a real breath of fresh air. It makes me wonder, Will kids even notice the original painted portraits of the founding fathers that lead off each section, or the inventive manner that Lane combines his illustrations with rich textures and collage elements? There's no question that artists love this stuff (for example, see these comments by designer Cameron Moll), but I'd also like to think that kids will appreciate and subconsciously absorb all the good design in this book. One thing is for sure, children will be laughing (just as I was) because the book does a terrific job of humanizing historical figures like Paul Revere and Ben Franklin and making them appealing. Here's an interview with Lane Smith where he discusses some of the visual ideas in the book.

HE DONE HER WRONG, Milt Gross's 1930 graphic novel (no, graphic novels weren't invented by Will Eisner), is finally back in print. I haven't seen this new edition, but I've seen the book and it's packed with typically great Gross art. I'm planning on picking up a copy soon. And when are we going to see a Milt Gross biography/coffeetable book? Talk about long overdue books.

One of my favorite artist blog discoveries has been the work of German animation artist Uwe Heidschoetter. He uses all sorts of unconventional shapes in his figurative drawings and has a distinctive style all his own. I was excited to see that he recently announced a forthcoming 40-page hardcover sketchbook. Sounds good to me.

THE WORLD ON SUNDAY: GRAPHIC ART IN JOSEPH PULITZER'S NEWSPAPER (1898-1911) by Nicholson Baker and Margaret Brentano is a collection of extremely rare turn-of-the-(last)-century artwork that appeared in New York's SUNDAY WORLD paper. The book has work by well-known comic artists like Outcault, Herriman, and McManus, as well as plenty of lesser known illustrators. I don't have the book, but I'm considering buying it after reading reviews like THIS and THIS.

Disney At War

Cartoon Brew reader Chris Olson, who sent in the fantastic 'making of' PINOCCHIO article a few weeks back, recently sent over a couple other rare articles from his personal collection. Both pieces were published in the WWII-era magazine FLYING AND POPULAR AVIATION. The article "Insignia Industry" was published in the April 1942 issue, and the article titled "Walt Disney's Animated War" was published in the March 1945 issue. On a related note, if anybody is curious to see more of the Disney character insignia, there was a good book published in the early-90s (now out-of-print) called DISNEY DONS DOGTAGS which reprinted hundreds of the insignia in color.

OLI'S CHANCE

OLI'S CHANCE is a new German short that I discovered on character designer Harald Siepermann's blog. The film can be viewed HERE (Windows Media Player version). Directed by Saschka Unseld and Johannes Weiland, the short was commissioned by the German rail to warns kids against playing on or near railroad tracks. The film is in German but its story should be clear to those who don't speak German. I agree with Harald, who writes on his blog, "It succeeds not only in terms of animation but also in its unpretentious, non-patronizing storytelling." Some of the design choices are questionable—for example, the extreme separation of the eyes and nose on such realistic designs gives the characters an awkward alien-like quality—but all in all, it's a pretty good film worth checking out. The film was produced by Studio Soi, a young German commercial animation outfit. Be sure to watch their super-appealing "Bunnies" commercial they produced for MTV; it's posted on their site.

ADDENDUM: Jakob Schuh, one of the directors at Studio Soi, emailed to let me know that their studio has another website at ChezSoi.de where they have job listings posted. They're currently looking to hire designers; submission info is on the site.

FLOCK OF DODOS

FLOCK OF DODOS: THE EVOLUTION-INTELLIGENT DESIGN CIRCUS is a live-action documentary that premiered recently at the Tribeca Film Festival. The film notably uses animated inserts to bring some levity to its serious subject. The film's animation director was Disney and DreamWorks veteran Tom Sito, and the animation was produced by Gang of Seven Animation. Here's an ARTICLE that interviews Tom Sito and DODOS director Stephen Olson about the idea of using animation in the film.

(Thanks, Aaron Simpson)

Animation Blast 9 Update

Good news folks. ANIMATION BLAST 9 will be (finally) headed to the printer this Friday. I'm spending all this week doing final edits and making sure everything is in order before sending it up to Canada. The final specs are 108 pages, 6.5"x9.5", full-color throughout, and of course, ad-free. Here are four double-page spreads from the mag:

Pierre Bernard takes on Cartoon Network

Graphic designer Pierre Bernard has a regular segment on LATE NIGHT WITH CONAN O'BRIEN where he rants about things that annoy him. Last Friday, LATE NIGHT ran a segment about Bernard's visit to Vancouver and his appearance on the LARRY AND WILLY radio show. When the interviewer asks him if there's anything that's bothering him at the moment, Bernard responds:

Actually yes. One of my big things is the Cartoon Network. I love watching that at night. For some bizarre reason, at 12:30 on the Cartoon Network they're airing SAVED BY THE BELL.The reason why I watch the Adult Swim is because a lot of their programming is Japanese anime. I mean, I had a problem a while back when they took COWBOY BEBOP off the air. I complained about that. And all of a sudden now they're putting this real TV show, a TV show which I spent years avoiding. I'm hoping this is not going to be a future trend.

While it's easy to laugh at Bernard's comments, he makes an extremely valid point: Cartoon Network is on the fast-track to alienating its core viewership, namely dedicated animation fans like Bernard who tune in for anime, Adult Swim and Cartoon Network originals like POWERPUFF GIRLS and SAMURAI JACK. The YouTube video of the LATE NIGHT segment is below. Bernard's Cartoon Network complaint begins at about 2 minutes, 15 seconds into the clip. (Video removed from YouTube by NBC).

Earlier coverage of Cartoon Network's decision to begin producing and airing live-action series: 1, 2, 3, 4

TWEETY STORYBOARD

Our friends at the Van Eaton Galleries have just sold the complete storyboard to the classic 1949 Merrie Melodies cartoon BAD OL' PUTTY TAT. This kind of material is extremely rare. The studio threw out the majority of its production materials decades ago. Thankfully, Van Eaton has posted the entire board on their website for all of us to enjoy.

HILARIOUS CARTOON STATUES

Some will considered these to be awful, others will praise them as genius. Either way, these hilariously off-model cartoon maquettes from Brazil are worth a look. Get a load of the looney Peter Potamus and this pathetic Hoot Kloot. I don't know about you, but know what I want for Christmas!

DISNEY TREASURES - THE COMIC BOOK!

David Gerstein at Gemstone Comics has a new Disney comics anthology in the works for August release, Disney Comics: 75 Years of Inspiration. This 160 page volume, cleverly designed as a print equivalent to the Disney Treasures DVD series (tin case not included) features rare, restored and, in some cases, never before seen stories by golden-age greats Carl Barks, Al Taliaferro, Floyd Gottfredson, Dick Kinney, Paul Murry and Gil Turner - as well as the best of the current generation: Don Rosa, Daan Jippes, Willian Van Horn and others.