Animator David Nethery has created a wonderful photo album of classic and contemporary animators at their animation desks.

This is the original main title, unseen for 70 years, to Popeye The Sailor Meets Ali Baba’s Forty Thieves, shot with my cel phone camera off a TV screen with glare.

I promise you the visual and sound quality of this cartoon (and 59 others) on Warner Home Video’s Popeye the Sailor: 1933-1938, Vol. 1 is outstanding. If it were only the 60 cartoons alone it would be worth the $64.98 suggested retail price ($45.49 on amazon). But the collection (on sale July 31st) is loaded with additional content. Here are the bonus materials currently scheduled for inclusion:

Disc 1

Commentaries:
• Popeye the Sailor by Michael Barrier with Animator Dave Tendlar
• I Yam What I Yam by Animator Mark Kausler
• Blow Me Down! by Animators Jorge Gutierrez and Sandra Equihua
• I Eats My Spinach by Michael Barrier with Dave Tendlar
• Wild Elephinks by Historian Jerry Beck
• Sock-a-Bye, Baby by Historian Glenn Mitchell
• Can You Take It by Filmmaker Greg Ford
• A Dream Walking by Director Eric Goldberg

Full Length Documentary
I Yam What I Yam: The Story of Popeye the Sailor

Popumentaries
• Mining the Strip: Elzie Segar and Thimble Theater
• Me Fickle Goyl, Olive Oyl: The World’s Least Likely Sex Symbol

From the Vault
• Colonel Heeza Liar at the Bat
• Domestic Difficulties [1916 Bud Fisher Short]

Disc 2

Commentaries:
• Beware of Barnacle Bill by Jerry Beck
• Choose Yer “Weppins� by Greg Ford
• For Better or Worser by Greg Ford
• You Gotta Be a Football Hero by Jerry Beck
• King of the Mardi Gras by Michael Barrier with Jack Mercer
• Adventures of Popeye by Historian Glenn Mitchell
• The Spinach Overture by Historian Daniel Goldmark

Full Length Documentary
Forging the Frame: The Roots of Animation, 1900-1920

Popumentaries
• Wimpy the Moocher: Ode to the Burgermeister
• Sailor’s Hornpipes: The Voices of Popeye
• Bobby Bumps Puts a Beanery on the Bum [1918 Bray Short]
• Feline Follies [1919 Pat Sullivan Short]
• The Tantalizing Fly [1919 Bray short]

Disc 3

Commentaries:
• A Clean Shaven Man by Writer Paul Dini
• I-Ski Love-Ski You-Ski by John Kricfalusi, with Eddie Fitzgerald and Kali Fontecchio
• Popeye the Sailor Meets Sindbad the Sailor by John K., Eddie and Kali
• The Paneless Window Washer by Mark Kausler

Popumentaries
• Blow Me Down! The Music of Popeye
• Popeye in Living Color: A Look at the Color Two-Reelers

From the Vault
• Modeling [1921 Out of the Inkwell short]
• Invisible Ink [1921 Out of the Inkwell short]
• Bubbles [1922 Out of the Inkwell short]
• Jumping Beans [1922 Out of the Inkwell short]
• Bed Time [1923 Out of the Inkwell short]
• Trapped [1923 Out of the Inkwell short]

Disc 4

Commentaries:
• Lost and Foundry by John K., Eddie and Kali
• Protek the Weakerist by Jerry Beck
• Popeye the Sailor Meets Ali Baba’s Forty Thieves by John K., Eddie and Kali

Popumentaries
• Me Lil’ Swee’Pea: Whose Kid is He Anyway?
• Et Tu, Bluto? Cartoondom’s Heaviest Heavy

From The Vault:
• A Trip to Mars [1924 Out of the Inkwell short]
• Koko Trains ‘Em [1925 Out of the Inkwell short]
• Koko Back Tracks [1927 Out of the Inkwell short]
• Let’s Sing with Popeye [1933 Fleischer short]

Asifa-Hollywood’s Animation Archive has unearthed and posted a rare silent 8mm film shot by animators at Terrytoons detailing the process of making an animated cartoon. This color film, from 1939, was shot by artist Larry Silverman and was recently found in the estate of animator Carlo Vinci. The film features key Terry personnel, from Director Connie Rasinski to musician Phil Schieb, producing a cartoon called Harvest Time. The Archive has also uploaded the finished short.

New York freeform radio station WFMU has one of the best blogs devoted to alternative pop culture and strange music. Today’s post by Kliph Nesteroff celebrates character actor Arnold Stang (voice of Top Cat, Herman Mouse, and numerous other cartoon characters). It’s an entertaining overview of Stang’s still-active career (he’s 81!) with lots of fun images and links.

How many facists does it take to create a classic cartoon character?

A play we posted about earlier concerning a fictional meeting between Hitler and Disney is nothing compared to the recent revelation that Benito Mussolini may have inspired the creation of Dick Huemer’s Toby The Pup.

Harry McCracken has all the details.

Animator and director Will Finn has posted a letter that he received from Ward Kimball in 1973 packed with sage words about becoming an animation artist. His advice about learning to become a well-rounded human being and having a flexible open-minded attitude towards art is not just empty verbiage but very much how Ward lived his own life and one of the keys to understanding why he was such an amazing artist. Similarly, it’s hard to think that any of the other Nine Old Men would ever encourage a budding animation artist to go and watch The Yellow Submarine or Fritz the Cat. The letter may be over thirty years old but the advice within it is still relevant and well worth listening to.

Here’s a killer item on ebay.

If I could afford it, I’d buy this. Since I can’t I might as well post it here and maybe one of our rich readers will get it and make a high rez scan for me.

One of the “Holy Grails” amongst us cartoon historians is the series of four Barney Google cartoons produced in Technicolor by Columbia Pictures’ Screen Gems cartoon unit in 1935.

King Features had it in their contracts with Hollywood studios that the films adapting their comic strip creations would be destroyed after ten years (popular demand allowed exceptions to the rule for the Popeye cartoons, Flash Gordon serials and Blondie movies). Thus, many of King Features movie adaptations were considered lost for many decades (luckily prints of King’s numerous serials - The Phantom, Mandrake The Magician, Secret Agent X-9, etc. - have surfaced in recent years). However, Google still remains on the “Most Wanted” list by cartoon buffs and comic strip historians. (A 1946 Paramount Snuffy Smith cartoon, Spree For All is, as far as I know, still non-existant).

British film collector Lee Glover has tracked down several 50 foot rolls of black and white silent Barney Google 16mm home movies versions (excerpts of the Columbia Google cartoons were sold to home movie enthusiasts of the era). He has virtually reconstructed Teched In The Head (1935), the first of the series. It’s no classic, but it’s a treat to see one of these, just to get a taste of what we’ve been denied all these years. Check it out on his website. Thanks Lee, nice job!

(Cel set-up above is from the final Google film, from 1936, Spark Plug)