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When I first saw Fantasia, I was fascinated by the moment when Mickey Mouse shook hands with conductor Leopold Stokowski.

The scene is in silhouette—a wise choice that made the rendering both simpler and more dramatic. 

I also liked the scene because it made clear how big Mickey was in relation to a human.

I was intrigued by the intersection between the cartoon world and our own. In his cartoon world, Mickey was a stand-in for a human, living in a house and doing all the things that humans do. 

But he's also a mouse, and we know how big mice are. This relationship of sizes seems to compromise between the two frames of reference.

Costumed Mickey in Disneyland parking lot, 1961, courtesy Yesterland

One real-world Mickey that the Disney organization would probably rather forget, appeared in Laurel and Hardy's film "March of the Wooden Soldiers." The idea was to make all the charming childhood characters appear in a live action movie. There's a scene where a person in a cat costume sits next to Mickey, who is really a monkey in a full-body costume.



Watch the clip (Skip ahead to 25:45) (link to YouTube)



In the clip, the monkey seems to have trouble seeing. Maybe they drugged him a bit to get him to be willing to wear the mask. He claps weakly, then keels over like a drunken sailor. Finally he hurls a brick that hits the cat on the head, and runs off, with the cat in hot pursuit.

A bit creepy — once seen, never unseen.
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Mickey is a trademark of the Walt Disney Company.
Thanks, Mel and Christopher!
Previously: Hustled by Mickey

 Here’s a on offer that many people might just get excited about: The Small Press Expo and Nickelodeon are teaming for a Call for Submissions where cartoonists can pitch ideas for an animated short. One person will be selected and get a cartoon made, working with the Nickelodeon animation staff. The offer is open to exhibitors […]

Illustration by Pete Reynolds of Follow the Lights
Animation by Alex Dobbin
Voiceover by Kate Miles
Script by Daniela Fetta

(Link to YouTube) Film editor Tony Zhou presents this concise summary of what makes the cartoons of Chuck Jones so memorable. Jones developed from a good director to a great one by refining perfectly timed gags driven by memorable characters.

Animation is a medium of movement, and the characters' movements were always original and understated, based on observations of real life.
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The YouTube channel Every Frame a Painting analyzes the techniques of great filmmakers. Check out the episodes on Akira Kurosawa and Jackie Chan.
The book Chuck Amuck:  The Life and Times of an Animated Cartoonist, written by Jones himself, is a good source for his thinking.

“The Land of the Magic Flute is a Motion Graphic Novel, a re-imagined version of Mozart’s classic Magic Flute. We decided to take opera and narrate it in a fresh and entirely new medium. We implemented the opera in a contemporary way, into the shape of a comic and a language that speaks to youth. Mysterious and full of secrets, atmospheric drawings and animations, along with seven complete arias and a music concept which plays with excerpts from Mozart’s composition, The Land of the Magic Flute Motion Graphic Novel creates an unforgettable visual and hearing experience.”

Experience The Land of the Magic Flute here >>

Watch the trailer video here >>

“Trailer of our short film based on a poem of Jacques Prévert “Tant de forêts”.
The poem speaks of the irony of the fact that newspapers warn us about deforestation although they are made of paper themselves.”

Producer : Tant mieux prod
Music : Nathanël Bergèse
Broadcast on France 3

Ben Caldwell dazzles us this week with his eye-popping cover art for Catwoman’s Teen Titans GO! variant. In addition to comics, Caldwell has worked as a toy designer, on various animation/video-game projects, and childrens book illustration. He also writes and draws a popular series of “how to” books called Action! Cartooning. It’s nice to see more and more artists like Caldwell bringing their “animation-style” to comics. It makes perfect sense since there’s so much crossover nowadays between comics & the TV/movie industry.

Ben Caldwell is also known for The Dare Detectives! series of graphic novels, The Wizard of Oz All-Action Classics adaptation, and Star Wars Clone War Adventures comics.

Caldwell graduated from the Parsons School of Design for Illustration and currently lives in New York with his family.

You can see the latest sketches and project updates by following Mr. Caldwell on his twitter page here.

For more comics related art, you can follow me on my website comicstavern.com – Andy Yates

If you’ve ever wanted to work for Disney, well head on over to this “official website for Disney Television Animation talent and recruitment”. You can use it to view and even apply for a variety of artistic and production-related projects.

Visit the Disney Recruitment site here >>

#illustration #wip for #mograph #animation- Space themed!

Klaus teaser ©2015 Sergio Pablos Animation Studios, S.L. & ANTENA 3 FILMS, S.L.U. All rights reserved
(Link to Vimeo video) Sergio Pablos Animation Studios created a teaser for “Klaus,” their latest animated feature film, which is now in financing stage.

The Walking Shadow of Danny O’Shea – film short made in Taos, NM. Charcoal illustrations appeared as still screens wherever special effects would have been necessary (scene at the Louvre, shape-shifting character, etc), giving it a unique film/graphic-novel kind of feel.

Produced by Benjamin Goldman Pictures….here’s a sneak peek at my concept art for short animated bios in the American Labor Movement. Commissioned by the National Museum of American History. Open to the public this July!

The animated film "Ghost in the Shell" was released in 1995, and the backgrounds were produced with physical paint.

Observer K Huitula described the technical process: "They were painted with about 30 different colors of bottled poster color [a liquid form of gouache, also known as tempera]. On wet paper, first the basic color surfaces and tones are painted with a bigger brush, after which you move on to smaller details little by little."

"The straight lines are painted with a brush, taking support from a ruler and a stick gliding on its groove.


Here's an example of such a grooved-ruler device in action (thanks, Todd Bowlin)

"A paintbrush [airbrush?] is used only very seldom to achieve some certain effects, still most of the painting is done with a traditional brush. Hair-dryers are also used for drying the painting when needed."

"While not working on a precise project, all the free time is used for making painting exercises, taking advantage of the studio library consisting of various books on nature and photography. Also different variations are being done from the same painting, varying the colors and the impression of lighting."

Ghost in the Shell was based on a manga by Masamune Shirow. The film was produced by the company Production I.G., and the crew of about 200 people was directed by Mamoru Oshii. The backgrounds were the work of Hiromasa Ogura and his team. 

The original film cost 5 million dollars to make. For the upcoming Hollywood live action remake, the fee for actress Scarlett Johannson alone is said to be 10 million.

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Thanks, K Huitula!

43 samples of Ghost in the Shell backgrounds

By Chloe

Sticky Monster Lab is a multidisciplinary creative studio based in Korea. They cover various mediums from illustration to motion graphics, graphic design to product design. This wide spectrum helps make their work so unique and dynamic. Sticky Monster Lab have great wit and attention to detail which has allowed them to collaborate with Nike, Nissan and MTV.
If you’d like to see more work from Sticky Monster Lab, please visit their portfolio.

3D version and animation scene mockup of a crocheted Dendennis amigurumi figure.

More: MetinSeven.com.

"Chuck Jones brought to animation an unparalleled talent for comic invention and a flair for creating animated characters with distinctive and often wildly eccentric personalities. Jones perfected the quintessentially suave and wisecracking Bugs Bunny, the perpetually exasperated Daffy Duck, the hapless but optimistic Elmer Fudd, and created the incurably romantic Pepé Le Pew, and the eternal antagonists Wile E. Coyote and the Road Runner."

Hombre McSteez, also known as Marty Cooper, strikes again with a new compilation of madcap plein-air animations (Link to YouTube).



Cooper creates the films by shooting a series of stills with his iPhone. He draws the cartoon creatures with paint pens and a Sharpie on many sheets of transparency film held up in front of real scenes.

Attempting some basic animation!
I might try to animate my picture books, eventually.

Hi everyone!

I spent the last few days creating this animation for the About/Contact page on my website. I asked a pal of mine(David Walters) how to avoid collecting spam through my contact page and he suggested CAPTCHA, which is great, but it would have taken me at least a couple weeks to dope it out and get it running right. I never have that kind of time. So instead I decided that it would be really hard for bots to scan and scrape an email address from a moving image, and since I love to draw and animate I went to work.

Ryan's Boats from ryanloghry.

I used muted colors, and pencil texture (in the pier, and the gull on the piling) to help this piece blend with my illustration style. I should have some artsy-fartsy, fancy pants reason, but I don't. I just really like the look of washed out color, translucent, so you can see the pencil work through it.

I also sketched some gulls sitting on top of the buildings, but they would have been so small, they would have been confusing. I might go back and add a couple 3D ones in though, so I can move them a little. We'll see.

I hope you enjoyed this peak behind the scenes. I sure enjoyed creating it. --Ryan

Some Legend of Korra for your afternoon.

"Watch Me Move," an exhibition that explores the art form of animation from its origins to the present day, is currently on display at the Museo Marco in Monterrey, Mexico through March 1. (link to video)

Museo Marco website

more characters…there’s something surly about the original barmaid…we changed her for more universal appeal (uh, well, ‘client appeal’ which really matters quite a bit) but I’m still posting my favorite.

…more character concept work…I like posting the rough sketchbook stuff too.

Character concepts…H.P. Lovecraft’s Chthulu beast makes an appearance in an animated commercial for fruit/veg juices. I know, bizarre, but the good kind of bizarre, right? Posting the initial sketches for process-fun.