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
Willard Mullin Dailies 1941-1946
New York Daily World-Telegram
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Willard Mullin was a genius at depicting the human form in motion. His characters seemed to spring off the page with life and vitality. Mullin’s characters ran the gamut from heroes to everyman characters. His influence extended far beyond the newspaper world to cartoonists like Jack Davis and the Disney animator John Sibley. For animators, Mullin’s sketches are a revelation because they appear to be already in motion. His knowledge of anatomy merged perfectly with the spirit of the action to create gesture drawings of the highest order. Best of all, his drawings are steeped in fun. They encapsulate the spirit of casual camradery shared by all of the sports fans in the bleachers on a sunny afternoon.
HD VIDEO:
Two Visions Of Prehistoric Times
Rite Of Spring From Fantasia (Disney/1940) / Bolero From Allegro Non Troppo (1976)
From beginning to end the environments and animals in "Rite Of Spring" look real, not at all like an animated cartoon. Disney’s artists worked with paleontologists and were clearly influenced by the work of Charles Knight, a wildlife artist who worked with the American Museum of Natural History in the early decades of the 20th century to reconstruct the way the prehistoric animal skeletons on display may have looked when they were alive. Disney’s animated depiction of this ancient world is experiential, a lot like a theme park ride.
Bozetto’s telling of the story of the dinosaurs has meaning and satirical comment that leaves the audience thinking. Starting out with a satirical gag- life on Earth starts with littering in outer space- the music starts and life emerges from the primeval ooze… or at least from high fructose corn syrup! Bozetto doesn’t just stick to the animals seen in museums, he creates his own creatures. They develop an edge that allows them to flourish for a time, only to be replaced by an animal that develops and even better edge on survival. The music propels the entire piece forward as an inevitable progression, which interestingly enough represents evolution much better than Disney’s "Rite" did.
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SD VIDEO:
A Quiet Glade
Boris Dyozhkin / Soyuzmultfilm, Russia / 1946
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"A Quiet Glade" starts off as a typical three bears cartoon. They look for a quiet place to hang their hammocks and nap, but noisy woodland creatures prevent that. It seems as if Dyozhkin discovered this story was too thin to sustain a whole cartoon, so halfway through, he introduces a soccer game with rabbits. The fast action perfectly suits Dyozhkin’s style of snappy timing, and this sequence established the format for many of his films to follow. Make sure to still frame through this film to break down the timing of the action.
SD VIDEO:
Silhouetten Opernhaus: Carmen
Lotte Reiniger / Germany / 1933
Lotte Reiniger is one of the most important figures in the history of animation. She made the oldest surviving animated feature film, The Adventures of Prince Achmed, she pioneered the merging of animation and music, and developed a multi-plane camera stand over a decade before anyone in Hollywood built one. This film is a fantastic example of the way Reiniger merged motion and music seamlessly. Her puppets never feel flat or stiff, and their movements never feel limited. In fact, the characters are able to dance, run, jump and act as well as any animated character in any technique of animation.
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SD VIDEO:
Revolt Of The Toys
Hermina Tyrlova / Czechoslovakia / 1947
Hermina Tyrlova isn’t mentioned often when people refer to female animators, but her impact on the art form in Czechoslovakia was significant. "Revolt Of The Toys" is unique among her work because it combines live action and animation. It’s also unique because of its use of violence. Tyrlova said that she didn’t care for the American style of animation, with its slapstick pratfalls. She preferred to animate characters as objects existing in their own worlds outside of our awareness of them. Her films aren’t overtly political like those of her contemporaries. Instead, they are targeted to children and exhibit a sense of discovery and wonder, rather than gags and action. Even though this film is different from her other work in many ways, it is still an excellent example of her simple, appealing design style and clever stop motion techniques.
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Dog, Cat And… Ep 5
Alina Maliszewska / Studio Miniatur Filmowych, Poland / 1972
In this Reference Pack, we are sharing another short cartoon from a series produced by Studio Miniatur Filmowych, Pies, Kot I… which translates to Dog, Cat And… The episode is titled "Tape Recorder". These cartoons are almost devoid of dialogue with the focus on loose, funny animation. In fact, the drawings are often hilarious on their own, even removed from their context within the gag sequence. The facial expressions are well observed, and the poses employ clear silhouettes that form funny graphic shapes.
SD VIDEO:
Hustle Punch
Curated by JoJo Baptista
Eps. 1 & 3 / Toei, Yasuji Mori (1965)
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Hustle Punch is a funny animal TV series created by Yasuji Mori, who directed The Little Prince And The Three Headed Dragon, (which we featured in a previous Reference Pack) as well as illustrating children’s books. He was a senior artist at Toei and mentored many animators who went on to do great work, including Hayao Miyazaki (who worked on this series), Isao Takahata, Yasuo Otsuka and Yoichi Kotabe. Mori was responsible for the cute animal designs in several Toei features and Hustle Punch was clearly influenced by the early television cartoons from Hanna-Barbera.
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For Heaven’s Sake
Sam Taylor / 1926
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In past Reference Packs, we’ve featured Buster Keaton and Charlie Chaplin, but there is another slapstick comedian who deserves mention alongside them… Harold Lloyd. I’m happy to introduce him to you with one of his most action-packed features, "For Heaven’s Sake". You will want to take note of the staging of the scenes. Every one is crystal clear and puts across its point lightning fast. The exposition doesn’t drag because it is full of gags that reveal both the personalities of the characters and their relationships to each other. The comedy builds as the film progresses, culminating in one of the most suspenseful thrill sequences ever put on film. Watch it through once, and then go back through it, analyzing the nuts and bolts that make it work. There’s a lot of great techniques in here for animators willing to take the time to mine it for ideas.
HD VIDEO:
Impact
Curated By David Eisman
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Animation Resources Board Member, David Eisman discusses a subject that occurs all the time in animated cartoons… impacts. Impact is the result of an accelerated force coming into contact with a stable form– be it character or object– and then transferring that force to generate some form of reaction. It can be divided into five stages – anticipation, action, point-of-contact, follow-through, and settle. Moreover, impacts can be linked together, wherein the point-of-contact of the initial impact becomes the anticipation of the secondary impact.
AUDIO PODCAST:
Cartoony Music With Skip Heller
Animated Discussions 011 / Hosted by Davey Jarrell with Stephen Worth and Skip Heller
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Back in 2007 when the Animation Archive was still under the umbrella of ASIFA-Hollywood, Stephen Worth sat down several times with musician Skip Heller to talk about cartoony music for the A-HAA Podcast. Each time, they chose a musician and explained how their music related to cartoons, playing a representative bit of their music. There were five segments altogether and they were a lot of fun. We’ve combined them all into one podcast for Animation Resources members.
Skip Heller is a remarkably versatile musician. He’s performed in every style imaginable. He’s composed for symphony orchestras, played country music and blues in honky tonks, performed in jazz trios and punk bands and did music for both Dexter’s Lab and Flintstones On The Rocks. A true renaissance man with deep roots in the history of his medium, no one knows more about this kind of music than Skip.
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Available to Student and General Members
- E-BOOK: All The Funny Folks
- VIDEO: Two Films By Charlie Bowers: "He Done His Best" and "Wild Roomer"
- VIDEO: Popeye in "Puppet Love"
ANIMATION RESOURCES ANNUAL MEMBERS: Reference Pack 020 is now being rerun and is now available for download. It includes a PDF e-book of high resolution scans of a newspaper all-star jam, two imaginative short films by comedian/animator Charlie Bowers, and a great Popeye cartoon in HD! These downloads will be available until July 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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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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