Friday, August 10, 2012

Ollie stages Prince John and Sir Hiss


These lovely sketches by Ollie Johnston show scene continuity and staging for the introduction of Prince John and Sir Hiss in the film "Robin Hood". They are based on original storyboards, which were done by artists like Ken Anderson, Vance Gerry and Dave Michener among others.
But before Don Griffith and his layout team would start working on the the background scenery, Ollie took a last look at the story sketches, intending to improve and refine the continuity and bring out  the characters' personality. 

My generation of animators got involved in this stage of production as a group. 
We had long meetings in which storyboards were scrutinized. Present were the directors, key layout and story people and the supervising animators. Everybody was encouraged to come up with ideas that would plus what we saw in the storyboards. After all changes and improvements were made, so called "Work Books" were printed out as a final guide to the animators, layout and background artists.

If you compare Ollie's sketches to the final film, you'll find out that he pretty much stuck with what he had planned out in his "Work Book" pages.









9 comments:

  1. I prefer more Ollie staging than that group "Work Books".
    Teodor

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  2. It's all rough storyboard sketches, but just look at it! The expressions, the mood, the character is all there, pouring out of those sketches. Amazing!

    The finished completed form is great, but I think when a rough sketch comes to life, it truly is incredible. I'm going out on a limb here and say that Ollie Johnston's draughtsmanship was right up there with Milt Kahl's. Ollie was a truly gifted artist. Heck, they are were. So are you, Andreas...thanks for sharing this! :)

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  3. Speechless. You really made my day with this one Andreas. Thanks!!!

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  4. Went back and watched the final clip – loved seeing the comparison :D

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  5. Ollie once told me "you should be able to convey all of the emotion and business clearly in only one or two drawings.. most of the time." This clearly shows how that works. The emotion and staging is all there, especially in the single drawings.Because these are medium and close shots,he is careful to not complicate the scenes with any extranious business. He is also very good at slowly zooming in to express the emotions closeup on a single character, then working back out.Decades of experience at work. Thanks fer sharing, Andreas!!

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  6. man these are pure gems thanks for posting these andreas!

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  7. priceless shorthand sketches, so much charm.

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  8. This is great. The drawings are simple but very expressive and communicates a lot with minimal information. Love this scene. The way the crown slips down his head is hilarious...

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