Every other month, Animation Resources shares a new Reference Pack with its members. They consist of e-books packed with high resolution scans video downloads of rare animated films set up for still frame study, as well as podcasts and documentaries— all designed to help you become a better artist. Make sure you download this Reference Pack before it’s updated. When it’s gone, it’s gone!
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The latest Animation Resources Reference Pack has been uploaded to the server. Here’s a quick overview of what you’ll find when you log in to the members only page…
PDF E-BOOK
53 Stations Of The Tokaido Road
Utagawa Hiroshige
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Animation Resources is proud to be able to share an e-book featuring the complete collection of one of the masterpieces of Japanese art, Utagawa Hiroshige’s 53 Stations Of The Tokaido Road. Vincent Van Gogh collected prints from this set, and Frank Lloyd Wright described them as "the most valuable contributions ever made to the art of the world." These are not cartoons, designed to be flipped through quickly. The images look deceptively simple at first, but closer examination will reveal amazing details that make the pictures come to life. Each one is a world unto itself.
SD VIDEO:
It’s Everybody’s Business
Carl Urbano / John Sutherland Productions / 1954
John Sutherland was a producer of industrial films. His studio maintained high production values thanks to the top artists that worked under him. Carl Urbano directed the film we are sharing here, and Bill Scott and George Gordon were the story artists. The animators on this short include Emery Hawkins, Abe Levitow and Bill Melendez, and the production designer was Maurice Noble. The music is by Les Baxter and Eugene Poddany. That’s a staff that would be the envy of any major animation studio.
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SD VIDEO:
Stompy
Fyodor Khitruk / Soyuzmultfilm, Russia / 1964
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In previous Reference Packs, we shared Fyodor Khitruk’s adaptation of A. A. Milne’s stories about Winnie the Pooh. This time, we are sharing one of Khitruk’s early films, "Stompy". Khitruk’s design in this film is brilliant, especially the use of flat areas of color surrounding lush textures. It makes you want to reach out and pet the characters.
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Mystery Of The MK204 Turning Point
Karel Dodal / Prague, Czechoslovakia / 1934
In one of our previous Reference Packs, we included two commercials from Czechoslovakia. This time, we feature a very early animated commercial by Karel Dodal. The history of animation in Czechoslovakia goes back to the 1920s. Karel Dodal, not only produced advertisements like this one (some featuring Felix the Cat), but also puppet and experimental films.
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The Breakdown
Klaus Georgi & Lutz Stutzner / DEFA, East Germany / 1988
Lutz Stutzner was trained as a designer of posters. While attending school in Dresden, he met Otto Muller the head of the DEFA animation studios in East Germany, who encouraged him to apply as a trainee at the studio. He rose to the position of director and teamed with Klaus Georgi who had helped to establish the animation division at DEFA. Georgi directed over 80 animated films in a variety of techniques: cel animation, cut outs, silhouette and puppet animation. When the Berlin Wall fell, many of the state owned businesses were liquidated, including DEFA. Lutz Stutzner was instrumental in organizing efforts to rescue important artifacts and film elements from East German film studios from being dispersed.
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Professor Balthazar in "The Rise And Fall Of Horatio"
Zlatko Grgic / Zagreb Films, Croatia / 1967
In a previous Reference Pack we featured several Maxi-Cat mini-cartoons by Zlatko Grgic, a Croatian animator who later emigrated to Canada to join the Canadian Film Board. Grgic is best known for his series of cartoons featuring the character Professor Balthazar, an old man who solves problems for his friends by creating inventions with a magical machine. Produced between 1967 and 1973, the series ran all over the world. Its silent pantomime with voice over narration made it easy to translate to other countries It aired everywhere from New Zealand to Romania to Zimbabwe. In the United States it was featured on Chuck Jones’ television program, Curiosity Shop.
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Big X
Curated by JoJo Baptista
Eps. 41 & 50 / TMS, Osamu Tezuka (1964)
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Big X was created by Osamu Tezuka, and it was the first television series produced by TMS (Tokyo Movie Shinsha). It debuted on August 3rd, 1964 and 59 episodes were made, of which 22 survive. This early series breaks a lot of rules, from wildly off model poses to crazy perspective in the backgrounds to strange exaggerated movement. The artists were experimenting and learning as they went. The results are pretty rough, but they manage to make a fun and entertaining show, even with all the mistakes.
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Four Films By Hans Richter
Rhythmus 21 (1921) / Ghosts For Breakfast (1927)
Inflation (1928) / Race Symphony (1928)
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Our Sidetracks section features a pioneer of abstract filmmaking this time. Although Hans Richter may not be as well known as Salvador Dali, Piet Mondrian or Marcel Duchamp, he occupies as important a role in the history of the Dadaist and abstract movements in art. Between WWI and WWII, he explored abstraction as well as film making. In fact, his experimental film, "Rhytmus 21" was one of the very first abstract animated films. We’re sharing several of his major films, along with an interview done with Richter in 1972. These films may look primitive and technically crude today, but at the time they were made, they were groundbreaking. There was no precedent for these techniques. Throughout his life, Richter was a catalyst, always on the forefront facilitating revolutionary changes in art.
HD VIDEO:
Trucks & Pans
Curated By David Eisman
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Animation Resources Board Member, David Eisman discusses a subject you might not have thought about seriously before… trucks and pans. The truck, in essence, is the movement of a camera inward or outward. The pan is the movement of a camera from side-to-side, either left to right or right to left. In live action these camera moves are pretty straightforward, but they are more complicated in hand drawn animated films.
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Available to Student and General Members
- E-BOOK: Arthur Rackham – Rip Van Winkle & Grimm’s Fairy Tales
- VIDEO: Three Early Betty Boop Cartoons – Dizzy Dishes / Barnacle Bill / The Bum Bandit
- VIDEO: Five Films By Norman McLaren – Mail Early / Hen Hop / Fiddle De Dee / Begone Dull Care / Blinkety Blank
ANIMATION RESOURCES ANNUAL MEMBERS: Reference Pack 019 is now being rerun and is now available for download. It includes a PDF e-book of high resolution scans of illustrations by Arthur Rackham, three of the earliest Betty Boop cartoons, and a handful of films by the revolutionary animator Norman McLaren! These downloads will be available until May 1st and after that, they will be deleted from the server. So download them now!
If you are currently on a quarterly membership plan, consider upgrading to an annual membership to get access to our bonus page with even more downloads. If you still have time on you quarterly membership when you upgrade to an annual membership, email us at…
membership@animationresources.org
…and we will credit your membership with the additional time.
Click to access the…
Downloads expire after May 1st, 2023
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Whew! That is an amazing collection of treasures! At Animation Resources, our Advisory Board includes great artists and animators like Ralph Bakshi, Will Finn, J.J. Sedelmaier and Sherm Cohen. They’ve let us know the things that they use in their own self study so we can share them with you. That’s experience you just can’t find anywhere else. The most important information isn’t what you already know… It’s the information you should know about, but don’t know yet. We bring that to you every other month.
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Check out this SAMPLE REFERENCE PACK! It will give you a taste of what Animation Resources members get to download every other month!
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Animation Resources is a 501(c)(3) non-profit arts organization dedicated to providing self study material to the worldwide animation community. If you are a creative person working in animation, cartooning or illustration, you owe it to yourself to be a member of Animation Resources.
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Animation Resources is one of the best kept secrets in the world of cartooning. Every month, we sponsor a program of interest to artists, and every other month, we share a book and up to an hour of rare animation with our members. If you are a creative person interested in the fields of animation, cartooning or illustration, you should be a member of Animation Resources!
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