Monday, September 21, 2015

Smee in Trouble



A photostat of actors as pirates, as they go through the motions of threatening Smee. As the sequence's story goes, they feel they are wasting their time near the island and would rather set sail to find ships to loot.
The brilliant animation in the film by Ollie Johnston shows that ideas of this live action reference could be adopted, but needed to be re-staged and pushed for cartoonier staging and acting.




It's unbelievable to see how far Ollie went to portray Smee's anxiety, having the pirate's saber  getting closer and closer. Completely unrealistic animation, but you sure feel his jitters. Great scene!
(I had originally planed to show key drawing from this scene in my book, but we ran out of room.)




Smee's body is basically a water ballon, resulting in extreme squash and stretch animation.



Great facial reaction on Smee as the blade approaches his neck. These emotions are entertaining, but they also ring true.  Most people would put on a similar expression being caught in a predicament such as this one.

6 comments:

  1. Do you have an update for us who have already pre-ordered your book as to when it might be released?

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    Replies
    1. This Wednesday, in a couple of days:

      http://www.amazon.com/gp/new-releases/books/491380/ref=zg_b_hnr_491380_1

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  2. I've been reading through "The Illusion of Life" this week and find it fascinating to see extra snippets like this here on your blog, thank you for sharing.

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  3. You know what I never thought of Mr. Smee's character concept as a water balloon shape before. So who are the guys in the reference shot in your first photo?

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    Replies
    1. To supply the animator ideas for acting and staging.

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  4. Dịch vụ mua hàng mỹ an toàn và uy tín nhất Việt Nam: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/mua-hang-my-fado-vietnam

    Fado Việt Nam là một trong những đơn vị hàng đầu về thương mại điện tử xuyên biên giới, tham khảo chi tiết tại đây để có những trải nghiệm mua hàng tuyệt vời

    ReplyDelete