One of the more inspiring trends recently has been seeing book projects by animation artists being picked up for distribution by mainstream book publishers. For example, last fall, Pixar’s Sanjay Patel had his book The Little Book of Hindu Deities published by Plume, an imprint of Penguin. Then, Pixar’s Ronnie del Carmen and Enrico Casarosa (along with Tadahiro Uesegi) had Three Trees Make a Forest released by Gingko Press. And now, the boys at Blue Sky Animation have announced that their graphic anthology Out of Picture will be published by Villard/Random House. The first Out of Picture volume will be reprinted this winter and a second brand-new volume will also debut from Villard.

It’s no accident that mainstream publishers are increasingly looking towards the creative works of animation artists. There is an incredible wealth of talent working in our art form today, and most of them are not allowed to explore the full range of their creative potential in their day jobs. Today’s savvy artists, however, aren’t content to accept the realities of the current industry, and are pursuing new outlets of self-expression ranging from short films to comics to these book projects. If anything, I expect we’ll be seeing many more high-profile book projects from the animation community over the coming years.

Bob Schooley and Mark McCorkle (creators of Disney’s Kim Possible) will be signing their new book Liar of Kudzu at Storyopolis in Studio City, CA at 3:00 on Saturday March 31st. They’ll also be appearing at Square Books Jr. in Oxford, Mississippi next Tuesday the 3rd at 4:00. The book is a “Southern-gothic-science fiction-teen-comedy, with a romance” and it was just optioned by the Disney Channel for a Disney Channel Original Movie. They told us that they’d be happy to sign any Kim Possible books for any fans of the show who come out and say “howdy”!

The cover of the book (above) was illustrated by the amazing Chris Turnham.

I’ve known about this for a while and am excited that I can finally let everybody know about it. Pals Jon Gibson (of I Am 8-Bit fame) and Chris McDonnell (of Meathaus fame) have begun working on a bio/art coffeetable book about animation legend Ralph Bakshi. The book is slated for July 2008 release by Rizzoli NYC. Most importantly, Ralph Bakshi himself, currently 68 years old, is 100% on board with the project. Bakshi is allowing full access to his archives and granting these guys the opportunity to write an unbiased tome about his life and career. Here’s more about the project from Jon and Chris:

Since Ralph has worked with such an absurd amount of people in his 40+ years in the industry, we thought the best way to go about doing our research is to open the floodgates. To start things off, we’ve opened a production blog that will chronicle the making-of our book called Ralph’s Spot named after the legend’s own studio from back in the day. Rizzoli NYC, a great publisher that has printed many masterful art books in the past, has given us hundreds of pages and extra-large dimensions to truly exploit all the amazing art and stories that a book about Bakshi should not be without.

We’d absolutely LOVE to here from any Brew readers that have worked with Bakshi, have some Bakshi-relevant artwork to share, or just have some tales (because, as we’ve learned over the last year of getting this book going, pretty much everyone knows a least one Bakshi yarn, whether they’ve met him or not). Seriously, no matter how insignificant someone may think the story is—or if it’s only one drawing—we want it!

Knowing Jon and Chris, I have no doubt they’ll deliver one of the must-have animation books of 2008. So spread the word that they’re looking for Bakshi stories and art, and if you can deliver the goods, get in touch with them at jon [at] jonmgibson.com and chris [at] meathaus.com.

Two new animation magazines appeared in my mailbox last week. Both are very well done, though aimed at completely different audiences.

CARTOONS (Vol. 2, Issue 2, Winter 2006), the John Libbey publication for ASIFA, edited by Chris Robinson, is the best edition yet. This 52-page color, glossy magazine is distributed free to all ASIFA members internationally. I’m not even sure you can buy this anywhere. Another great reason to join Asifa (check here for your local branch).

This issue contains many good articles - among them, Karl Cohen on how ASIFA helped win the Cold War; Martin Goodman on the making of Cartoon All-Stars To The Rescue, and Chris Panzner on kids network demographics. But the standout is John Canemaker’s 13-page profile (part 1) of Disney animator-turned-influential Golden Book illustrator John Parr Miller. Per Canemaker standards, the piece is filled with meticulous research, great writing and rare illustrations. This is a must-have.

CEREAL:GEEK is another matter entirely. This isn’t for everyone. This is a lavish 100-page magazine, printed in full color on heavy gloss stock, devoted to 1980s TV animation. Publisher James Eatock understands that the animation of the era was “junk food” (hence the “cereal” of the title), but has a passion (hence the “geek”) for the cartoons he grew up with, and a sense of humor about it. He believes the 80s were a watershed decade where the young TV animators found their voice. I personally have no love for He-Man, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles or Inspector Gadget, but if you do, then this is for you. There are some in-depth articles, an interview with Larry Ditillo (Jayce and the Wheeled Warriors) and lots of insight into The Transformers, She-Ra and 80s anime. If this excites you, get it. You won’t be disappointed.

Though mentioned on the Brew back in May, I just stumbled upon a copy of Halas & Batchelor Cartoons today, at my local Barnes and Noble.

First off, this book is a must-have. John Halas himself was one of the world’s great animators and producers. He was also a pioneering cartoon historian and was one of the founders of ASIFA and the Annecy Animation Festival. Joy Batchelor was an amazing artist, designer and business woman. Together they created Britain’s largest animation studio creating hundreds of films, from experimental avant-garde works to commercials, full length feature films (Animal Farm) and TV series (Do-Do the Kid from Outer Space, among others). 3-D, stop motion, CG and practically every other technique available was tried in their fifty year career together.

The book itself, compiled by daughter Vivien Halas and historian Paul Wells, covers their entire history thoroughly–the personal side and the professional–with numerous illustrations and photographs and a bonus DVD featuring seven of their best short films. The art and images are especially well chosen and a delight to look at. This book covers an important piece of animation history and two pioneers who should never be forgotten. Amazon.com has it in stock at discount. Buy it.

I was rummaging through my stuff and found this ad I clipped from the October 30, 1980 issue of Rolling Stone.

Of Mice and Magic came out in Spring 1980 (I don’t recall the exact publication date), originally in hardcover from McGraw-Hill. It was issued as a trade paperback by NAL in October 1980, updated in 1987 and hasn’t been out of print since.

I still can’t believe the publisher took out an ad in Rolling Stone! Considering the state of animation back then, I can’t believe they advertised it at all.

This post at Drawn! about Hank Ketcham’s comic work reminded me of an upcoming book that I can hardly wait for—Where’s Dennis?: The Magazine Cartoon Art of Hank Ketcham. The book, which is compiled by friends Alex Chun and Shane Glines, is slated for release by Fantagraphics in August.

The “Unholy Marriage of Art and Comics” is back!

Craig Yoe has redesigned his Arf Lovers blog with new features like an rss feed, perma-links, comments and lots of new links. Yoe’s posts are often hilarious and eye opening - and certainly of interest to Brew readers. Yoe’s new Arf book, Arf Forum is now at the printer and can be pre-ordered at a discount price on Amazon. Based on his previous two Arf collections we highly recommend the latest edition sight unseen.

Craig is also compiling a book full of Clean Cartoonists’ Dirty Drawings, raunchy comics and cartoons by cartoonists known for their
mainstream wholesome stuff (Milton Caniff, Rube Goldberg, Will Eisner, Joe Shuster, Bob Kane, Mort Walker, Dr. Seuss, etc.). Previews of this book and Arf Forum will be posted regularly on Yoe’s blog.