Barbara Firth

I love Barbara Firth's illustrated children's' books. They capture the innocence of childhood without ever being childish. Beautiful sensitive watercolors with strong and appealing character poses.

It's curious to find out that she did not begin her career as a book illustrator until 1980. Before that she had worked for many years in the fashion industry,

Sadly Firth passed away last March at the age of eighty-four. Here is a quote from The Guardian's obituary:

Barbara Firth, who has died aged 84, achieved success relatively late in life with her rich, warm and evocative illustrations for books such as Martin Waddell's Can't You Sleep, Little Bear? Her realisation of Waddell's touching story of Big Bear helping Little Bear overcome his fear of the dark by bringing him bigger and bigger lanterns, before taking him outside to show him how the moon – the biggest lantern of them all – is always there, touched a chord with parents and children. Firth created an engaging, rumpled and shambling Big Bear and an enchantingly bright-eyed and eager Little Bear. Their cave is a haven of cosiness and Firth's illustrations are full of depth and surprise, as well as charm.

Firth never had any formal art training. Her lively work almost suggests that she might have had some kind of animation experience. Here is a small sampling from a variety of her books.

All illustrations © Barbara Firth

Secretary Bird

I wonder if Milt Kahl ever saw this illustration by James A. Shepherd from his 1894 book "Zig Zags at the Zoo". No idea, if the vast Disney Library had a copy of it.

But it looks like the Shepherd drawing might have been inspirational for the design of the Secretary Bird in the film Bedknobs and Broomsticks. 

Milt Kahl animated most of the scenes with this character, who constantly has to put up with King Leonidas' volatile temper. The Lion's roar is so powerful, it repeatedly messes up the Secretary Bird's outfit. Those scenes where he puts himself together again, straightening out his tie and adjusting his cufflinks are among my favorites from Milt's later work.

I'd like to talk about these animated scenes in a future post.

Chanticleer, Rough and Final

I think it is always interesting to compare preparatory work with the final illustration, especially when you are looking at art from Marc Davis. These color images are stunning, but it's the pencil sketches that tell you how Marc approached the research for his characters and compositions.

These images are as good as it gets when it comes to staging ideas for personalities and environments.

The pencil sketches were pinned onto a board and photographed in August of 1960. Marc had finished work on Cruella De Vil, but 101 Dalmatians wouldn't be in theaters until January of 1961.

I see the same confidence with which Marc animated Cruella displayed here in the designs for Chanticleer, which was hopefully going to be the next animated feature.

Disney anthropomorphic animals enter a modern aera, more designy and sophisticated than anything from the Golden Age of Animation.

To this day they cry out to be animated…as moving drawings.

More Chanticleer

Here are a few more of Marc Davis' rough character studies for Chanticleer. I love the bewildered waiters and the painter.

The images below represent final illustrations based on a few sketches from the previous post. 

Too bad this movie was never made, but at least some of these designs sort of survived and can be found in the vintage Disneyland ride "America Sings" (also Marc's work), "Splash Mountain" and the animated movie "Robin Hood".

Marc Davis Roughs

Last year I posted some of Marc Davis' color designs for the unproduced feature Chanticleer.

Here are a few of Marc's rough character designs and staging ideas for certain story situations.

Two things are worth pointing out:

I can totally see Marc's Fine Art sensibility in some of these sketches. There are unusual abstractions taking place that go beyond standard Disney drawing. Just like the edgy avant garde design of Cruella De Vil, these drawings show a search for new graphic representations of Disney personalities.

Secondly it is SOO reassuring to see that Marc worked hard at his compositions. There are often several versions of the same image. I guess, that makes him human after all.

These drawings give you an idea of Marc's creative process. He took the challenge of shaping new animated animal characters very seriously. They are anthropomorphic representations of their species, but all of them are based on thorough knowledge of actual anatomy.

I know that the cancellation of the project was quite a blow to Marc's enthusiasm for animation, but in the end it resulted in Marc's transfer to WED, and what would the parks be without the his rides?!

By the way, I could post more of Marc's work on Chanticleer if you are interested.