Jungle Book Mix

More Jungle Book.
As I said before, the film had so much going against it, it could have been a disaster. To quote Woolie Reitherman: "Walt checked out half way through the picture."
Story genius Bill Peet quit the studio even sooner, how are you going to pick up the pieces and create a film worthy of Disney. Well, they did.
It's no secret that had this film not been a box office hit, Disney animation might have been finished right then and there. Executives were eager to stop animated feature production, too expensive. They were counting on revenues from future re-releases of the classic films, and focus on future live action movies instead.
It took a few decades to finish the job. Classic Pencil animation was finally halted in favor of CG and live action films.

I love this Ken Anderson sketch of Mowgli, acting like a wolf cub by scratching his head with his foot. This moment should have been in the movie, the kid was raised by wolves...show it!
Missed opportunity.

One of Ken Anderson's many inspirational doodles, showing Mowgli in relation to a vast, wild  jungle.

A couple of Ollie Johnston's sketches, as he explores Baloo's pleasure of scratching.

A couple of rough layouts. Outside of the wolves' den, and high in the trees, a path for Bagheera to travel on.

Frank Thomas almost animated 1/4 of Jungle Book. Like all animators on this movie, he surely FELT the characters' personality.

It seems you can't come up with a bad character composition, when a snake is involved. Another Frank Thomas sequence.

The Sherman brothers working with Louis Prima, the voice of King Louie. What a great sequence this turned out to be.

Colonel Hathi

I had the chance to watch the new live action/cg version of The Jungle Book last night.

Really liked it. Great script, and the jungle they created for the film is pretty spectacular. For the most part the animal motion looks pretty good. The one thing I could have brought to the film is an improvement in all the dialogue scenes. The animators seemed to have been a little timid in defining mouth shapes that reflect the actor's voice reading within the realistic mouth configuration of each animal.

That being said, I recommend the movie highly, it's epic.

As a reminder if the 1967 animated version, I want to post keys from a scene by one of Disney's unsung heroes, Eric Cleworth. His work on The Jungle Book as well as other films is every bit as good as that of the supervising animators. Here Colonel Hathi brags in front of the herd about his past military glory: "It was then I received the Victoria Cross for bravery above and beyond the call of duty!"

Cleworth mimicked the walk of a human drill sergeant, pompous and very pleased with himself.

What can I tell you...I LOVE this scene. The way Hathi slowly puts one foot in front of the other, before clicking his heels together at the end. Putting his bamboo stick behind his ear adds a nice acting touch.

Everything is applied here, the massive weight of an elephant, perspective and character attitude.

The end result looks entertaining and utterly believable. Brilliant!!

To revisit the film's great cast of animal characters, go here:

http://andreasdeja.blogspot.com/2011/07/cast-of-jungle-book.html

Alice Art

Sometimes I think there isn't enough love for Alice in Wonderland. People question the film's narrative, and I get that, but I do like the fact that this movie is different. One zany sequence follows another, and the in the end you feel like you've been on this nutty but fun ride.
Alice is the only realistic character in the film (aside from her sister), a concept Marc Davis agreed with. "You can have all the crazy stuff in the world, but if the heroine isn't handled in a believable way, the whole film falls apart."

A couple of beautiful animation drawings by Ollie Johnston, who always makes it look so easy.

Eric Larson animated the opening scenes with Alice and her cat Dinah, such as this one.

These few cels showcase the extraordinary craftsmanship of the ink & paint department.
Amazing colors choices for the characters.

One of the old background painters once noted that a background by itself without any characters should look like a deserted stage set. The image will look complete once combined with the character cels. The BG below proves that point very clearly. Terrific painting!

Images Heritage Auctions and Howard Lowery.

Bambi Art & Artists

Some years ago I had the chance to ask a few key artists from the Bambi crew to sign my copy of Frank & Ollie's book. Quite the title page!
The inscription on top of the page was written by Frank Thomas. Donnie Dunagan is the voice of Bambi, and Peter Behn did Thumper. Then there is Mel Shaw as well as Tyrus Wong.

I am not sure who created this amazing artwork for the romantic sequence in the film (I bring You a Song).  All I know is that such a sentimental treatment can go down the drain really fast and become kitsch. I am sure that there are people who think that's exactly what it is...but to me these visuals look stunning.

The Moviola II

These pics were taken by Hans Bacher after we had moved out of Disney's original animation studio into a "temporary" facility in Glendale. John Lounsbery's Moviola moved with me into my new office.
We were not on the Disney lot anymore, but I sure wanted to be surrounded by Disney visuals. So I made up these framed collages on the wall from movie stills.
In the top right corner you see a partial model sheet made up of Vance Gerry's character sketches for Oliver.

Below a sheet of expression studies for an early version of Creeper.

A photo stat showing Milt Kahl's version of Taran and Eilonwy.

In doing some research on Cauldron online I was sorry to came across the news that Susan Sheridan, who voiced Eilonwy, passed away last year.

More of my early development designs for the film here:

http://andreasdeja.blogspot.com/2011/11/early-black-cauldron.html

The Moviola

This film viewing contraption, called the Moviola, was in use at Disney for many decades, all the way into the 1980s. In the photo you see Ollie Johnston examining a 35 mm filmstrip, most likely a pencil test from one of his scenes for Bambi. By his side is Marian Darlington, who whistled imitations of every bird in the forest for the film.
The piece of film was viewed on a loop, allowing for a thorough inspection and search for mistakes.
Fast forward a few decades.

After about one year sketching character designs for The Black Cauldron, I moved into a different office in order to start animation. Clean up artist Rebecca had moved out of this office, but before I settled in, she had somewhat of a warning for me. She pointed out that the Moviola in this room used to belong to animator John Lounsbery (who had passed away a few years prior).
How cool, I said, that's fantastic.
But...according to Rebecca who had spent many late nights trying to help finish clean up on The Fox & the Hound, the Moviola's foot peddle occasionally went down by itself setting the machine in motion. She was dead serious.
I was really looking forward to encountering the ghost of Lounsbery, but despite some of my own late hours in the office, that never happened.