June 5th, 2024

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RefPack058: Another Reason Why You Should Join Animation Resources Today!

Reference Pack

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

Willard Mullin Dailies Volume 3
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New York Daily World-Telegram / 1941-1946
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Willard Mullin wasn’t just the greatest sports cartoonists of his day, he is one of the greatest cartoonists of all time. For RefPack058 Animation Resources has dug deep into its collection of newspaper cartoons to assemble a fantastic e-book packed with incredible images that haven’t been seen in over half a century.

Mullin produced six cartoons a week, and they were printed large across a full page in the sports section. They usually were centered around the likeness of a famous athelete or a humorous depiction of a team mascot. Mullin was called upon to draw every form of animal as a team mascot, except perhaps elephants and donkeys, which were relegated to the editorial pages. He was famous for creating the character known as the Brooklyn Bum. Sporting a tattered and patched suit of clothes, a stub of a cigar and a big belly, the Bum perfectly represented the rough and tumble Brooklyn Dodgers.

The volunteers of Animation Resources have taken great pains to restore these crumbling scraps of newsprint to their original condition. You won’t find this material anywhere else.

SD VIDEO:
Jim Tyer Stuffy Durma

The Milton The Monster Show
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Episode 1 / Four Stuffy Durma Shorts 1965

Hal Seeger’s Milton The Monster Show is pretty typical of mid-1960s TV cartoons- nothing much to set it apart from the other shows crowding the Saturday Morning airwaves. But sprinkled in to a few episodes are some real gems. Seeger jobbed out the animation of the Stuffy Durma shorts to the legendary Terry-Toons animator, Jim Tyer. From the look of them, Tyer animated them all by himself. It’s very simple television animation, but it’s full of delightful Tyer touches that raise it up above the other segments in the show.

It’s easy with limited to animation to get carried away with the mechanics of breaking off limbs and mouths and eyes and forget the joy of movement. This is especially true of library based Flash cartoons. With Stuffy Durma, Tyer reminds us of the value of special poses, even ones that only appear on the screen for two frames in fast action. If you are trying to create quick, inexpensive internet cartoons, there isn’t a better group of shorts to study than this.


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SD VIDEO:
Bruno Bozetto

Mr. Rossi At Camping
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Bruno Bozzetto / Italy / 1970
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Bruno Bozzetto is an Italian animator known for his parody of Fantasia titled Allegro Non Troppo. His other feature films include a superhero parody called VIP My Brother Superman and a spaghetti western parody titled West And Soda. Bozzetto’s work is often satirical and political in nature, championing the common man and lampooning government inefficiency and oppression.

Bozzetto’s most famous character is Signor Rossi, an everyman figure he featured in many animated shorts and three feature films, Mr. Rossi Looks For Happiness, Mr. Rossi’s Dreams, and Mr. Rossi’s Vacation. In the short film we are sharing today, Mr. Rossi takes a camping trip and ends up dangling from a mountain crag.

Bozzetto’s work is not as well known in the United States as it should be, but it is recognized and appreciated across Europe. We think you’ll find a lot to inspire you in Bozzetto’s work.

SD VIDEO:
Czech Theatrical Commercial

Two Czech Theatrical Commercials
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Adi The Raccoon 1931 / Hannibal In Virgin Forest 1932

Animation Resources’ digital archive recently received a batch of early Czechoslovakian animated films. Among them were these two animated commercials. We tend to think of commercials as being primarily from the television era, but in the 1930s, a great deal of advertising animation was produced for theaters. These two shorts are interesting examples, and they illustrate how influential Disney and Fleischer cartoons were, even in Europe.

The history of animation in Czechoslovakia goes back to the 1920s. I believe the two films we are sharing with you here are by Karel Dodal, who not only produced advertisements (some featuring Felix the Cat), but also puppet and experimental films. The first advertisement, "Adi The Raccoon" looks very much like a contemporary American Mickey Mouse ripoff. The second one, "Hannibal In Virgin Forest" shows the influence of the Fleischer Betty Boop and Bouncing Ball cartoons. The notes that came with these films were sparse and all in the Czech language, so we don’t know much about them. If you have information you can share with us, please drop us a line.


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SD VIDEO:
Scayrecrow

The Scayrecrow
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Ashley Thorpe / UK / 2008

Not too long ago we shared Ashley Thorpe’s feature film, Borley Rectory. Today we share one of the experimental shorts he made leading up to his feature, "The Scayrecrow".

Although on the surface this film sometimes feels like a live action film, it is actually animation, composed and visualized from the ground up. As you watch it, you have to keep reminding yourself that none of this exists in reality. It’s convincing without being overly realistic. Visually, the film is gorgeous with artfully composed shots and effective cinematics. It’s efficient too, with cascading images to make up for low frame rates and animation and live action used for the things they each do best. The collage technique creates an effective mood to put the story across. "The Scayrecrow" is a brilliant example of "thinking outside the box" and if the art of animation is to progress, it needs to push the boundaries of what an animated film can be.

SD VIDEO:
Chingo Muchabei

Chingo Muchabei Ep. 18 & 21
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Daikichiro Kusube / TMS – A Production / Japan / 1971

Chingo Muchabei is a slapstick comedy series based in 17th century Japan. The titular character is a freelance samurai who peddles umbrellas to support himself. The heir to the lordship of the province, Bokemaru is believed to be dead, but in fact he lives and Chingo Muchabei serves him. Lord Toyotomi discovers that the true heir to his province is alive and sends a bumbling ninja named Kaburezukin to kill him. But Chingo Muchabei foils him at every turn, using his umbrellas as weapons.

The two episodes we are presenting this time involve Sumo Wrestling and a haunted house full of Yokai Monsters, which are themes that always seem to make for good subjects for cartoons. The historical time period isn’t adhered to completely. You’ll see modern ideas thrown in for the sake of gags, and the tone of the show is pretty goofy with lots of fun expressions.


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SD VIDEO:
Monty Banks

Play Safe
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Monty Banks / 1927
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From a 21st century perspective, we tend to focus on the parts of the past that we know about and assume that is all that there ever was. When it comes to slapstick comedy from the silent era, we think of Chaplin, Keaton and Lloyd, but there were more slapstick clowns worth studying. One of these was Monty Banks.

In the past, we shared Harold Lloyd’s classic thrill comedy Safety Last. Monty Banks worked in the same genre of film making, and Play Safe is a great example. The film follows the basic cinematic structure set by Keaton and Lloyd- establishing a solid story premise up front and gradually building gags up to a big climax involving elaborate stunts. Banks was equally adept at the scenes involving the personality of the character and the big slam-bang finishes. Like Keaton and Lloyd, Banks did most of his own stunts, and at times they were quite dangerous. He became seriously injured when he was dragged over a cliff by a car. There are several sequences in the train chase where a miscalculation could have easily resulted in instant death.

Take some time and analyze the shots and angles and see if you can apply the techniques to your own work… without the risk of death!

HD VIDEO:
Breakdowns

More Pickups
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Curated By David Eisman
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Animation Resources Board Member David Eisman presents a continuation of the "pickups" theme introduced in Reference Pack 056. There is always more to say about any given topic, and there is an ad-infinitum of possible breakdowns to choose from. While each respective article endeavored to explain the basic structures of important animation concepts, these “pickup” articles will, instead, add addendums that can be used to enhance the reader’s understanding of the formal and informal principles of animation. While it is not necessary to have read the articles from previous reference packs, the context provided will certainly be helpful in understanding the lessons from this article. Nevertheless, basic context and explanations of the concepts will be provided as pretext before analysis of the individual breakdowns. The concepts and principles discussed in this particular article are motion frames, resistance, pans, hand articulation, head turns, and impact.


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Bonus Download

As a special thank you to our annual General and Student members, we have created a special page where we will archive past Reference Packs. There will be a new rerun of a complete RefPack between the new ones.

ANNUAL MEMBER BONUS ARCHIVE
Download Page
Available to Student and General Members

REFPACK027: April / May 2019

DVD QUALITY VIDEO:
Momotaro

Momotaro’s Sacred Sailors
Download Page
Seo Mitsuyo / 1945

In 1939, due to the outbreak of WWII, Japan banned all foreign movies. This provided a boon for the Japanese film business, which stepped into the gap and ramped up production of domestic wartime training films and propaganda. The Japanese Navy contracted with Director Seo Mitsuyo to create a feature length animated film to promote the draft, and give support and encouragement to children whose fathers had been taken up into military service.

However, Momotaro’s Sacred Sailors failed to accomplish its goals. By the time it was completed most Japanese men of age to serve had already been drafted. The movie was finally released immediately following a series of allied bombings that had effectively destroyed movie exhibition in Tokyo. Within a few months, almost nothing remained from the making of the film. Allied bombers had destroyed both the studio building where the film was produced, and the home of the director where thousands of production sketches were being stored. In September, the Japanese surrendered, and a purge was undertaken to destroy all traces of propaganda before the US occupying force arrived. The prints of this film, and many others were shredded and burned. The film was effectively wiped out of existence.

In the years one solitary print of the film lay hidden in the warehouse, while animation in Japan flourished and grew and became an important part of Japanese culture. When the dusty film cans were discovered in the back of a warehouse in 1984, they were restored and exhibited. But this time, instead of being dubbed a creative and commercial failure, Momotaro’s Sacred Sailors was recognized as the first of a long line of Japanese animated features, and as the film that established the animation business in Japan.

Click to access the…

Annual Member Bonus Archive
Download Page
Downloads expire after April 2024

HD QUALITY VIDEO:
Rhapsody of Steel

“Rhapsody Of Steel”
John Sutherland / 1959

John Sutherland’s studio was very influential in the mid-1950s, employing some of the best designers in the business. This film is no exception. Legendary stylists Eyvind Earle (Sleeping Beauty, Pigs is Pigs) and Maurice Noble (Duck Dodgers, How The Grinch Stole Christmas) collaborated on Rhapsody of Steel, and you can see evidence of both of their hands everywhere in this film. (Earle in the landscapes and textures, Noble in the bold primary and secondary colors…)

Rhapsody of Steel

Time Magazine said of this film…

Rhapsody of Steel, a 23-minute animated cartoon that cost $300,000, is one of those rare industrial films with enough specific quality and general interest to play the commercial circuits. In the next few months it will be shown as an added attraction in several thousand U.S. movie houses. Made by former Disney Staffer John Sutherland, Rhapsody sets out to tell a sort of child’s history of steel from the first meteor that ever hit the earth to the first manned rocket that leaves it, and most of the time Moviemaker Sutherland proves a slick entertainer and a painless pedagogue. Unhappily, the music of Oscar-Winning Dmitri Tiomkin, who is probably the world’s loudest composer, bangs away on the sound track like a trip hammer. But the picture’s pace is brisk, its tricks of animation are better than cute, and the plug, when the sponsor slips it in on the final frame, is modestly understated: “A presentation of U.S. Steel.”

As always, many thanks to Steve Stanchfield for sharing his treasures with us. If you haven’t already, check out the videos at his Thunderbean Animation Store at Amazon.

Click to access the…

Annual Member Bonus Archive
Download Page
Downloads expire after June 2024

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…

Download Page
membership@animationresources.org

…and we will credit your membership with the additional time. These bonus downloads expire after June 1st, 2024.


MEMBERS LOGIN To Download

JOIN TODAY To Access Members Only Content


Whew! That is an amazing collection of treasures! 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.

THIS IS JUST THE TIP OF THE ICEBERG!

Animation Resources has been sharing treasures from the Animation Archive with its members for over a decade. Every other month, our members get access to a downloadable Reference Pack, full of information, inspiration and animation. The RefPacks consist of e-books jam packed with high resolution scans of great art, still framable animated films from around the world, documentaries, podcasts, seminars and MORE! The best part is that all of this material has been selected and curated by our Board of professionals to aid you in your self study. Our goal is to help you be a greater artist. Why wouldn’t you want to be a member of a group like that?

Membership comes in three levels. General Members get access to a bi-monthly Reference Pack as well as a Bonus RefPack from past offerings in the in-between months. We offer a discounted Student Membership for full time students and educators. And if you want to try out being a member, there is a Quarterly Membership that runs for three months.


JOIN TODAY!
https://animationresources.org/membership/levels/

FREE SAMPLES!

Not Convinced Yet? Check out this SAMPLE REFERENCE PACK! It will give you a taste of what Animation Resources members get to download every other month! That’s 560 pages of great high resolution images and nearly an hour of rare animation available to everyone to download for FREE! https://animationresources.org/join-us-sample-reference-pack/

Sample RefPack

PayPalAnimationAnimation Resources depends on your contributions to support its projects. Even if you can’t afford to join our group right now, please click the button below to donate whatever you can afford using PayPal.


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Posted by Stephen Worth @ 12:02 pm

June 3rd, 2024

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RefPack057: Animation Resources Delivers Another Great Reference Pack!

Reference Pack


View At YouTube

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!


MEMBERS LOGIN To Download

JOIN TODAY To Access Members Only Content


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:
Hokusai Manga

Hokusai Manga Volume 3
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Katsushika Hokusai / 1814
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Katsushika Hokusai was arguably the greatest artist Japan ever produced. Best known for his monumental set of woodblock prints titled Thirty-Six Views of Mount Fuji, his career spanned more than 75 years, and in his lifetime he produced more than 30,000 paintings, sketches and woodblock prints. Japan was closed to the Western world while Hokusai was living and working, but it didn’t take long after Japan’s borders were opened to the world for his fame spread to the West. He is now regarded as one of the greatest artists in the entire history of art.

Hokusai’s fame attracted talented young artists, eager to study under him. He took on 50 pupils over the years. In 1812, he found himself in need of some quick money, and decided to publish an art manual called Quick Lessons In Simplified Drawing. The book was surprisingly successful, so the following year, he published the first volume of a series of sketchbooks known as Hokusai Manga. At that time, the word “manga” meant “random drawings” and that is exactly what his first volume consisted of… scenes of everyday life, animals, plants, landscapes, rendering experiments… the book contained very little text, just lots and lots of amazing drawings.

The volunteers of Animation Resources have taken great pains to insure that Hokusai’s genius is not undermined by poor reproduction. Hundreds of hours of careful digital restoration has gone into this e-book to create the ultimate version of Hokusai’s masterwork.

SD VIDEO:
Harman Ising

Three Transitional MGM Cartoons
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“The Bookworm Turns” 1940 / “The Alley Cat” 1941 / “The Stork’s Holiday” 1943

Throughout their careers, Hugh Harman and Rudy Ising pushed to produce films with high production values to compete with Disney on his own turf. This ended up causing friction with the studios that financed their cartoons. There was no set footage limit for their shorts. Many of them run three or four minutes longer than other studios’ cartoons. The emphasis on lavish backgrounds and full animation became so much of a focus at times that entertainment value suffered. It was all eye candy and overlapping action with very little humor. Rudy Ising was once quoted as saying that he aspired to make a cartoon without a single gag… and with a couple of his films, he might have actually succeeded at that. Their cartoons were needlessly complex, over-animated and had timing that was sluggish to the point of dragging.

Clearly, this couldn’t continue. MGM fired Harman and Ising in 1937 and created an in-house animation studio. But they required the team’s experience to produce shorts on a schedule, so they hired them back the following year to work with a team of younger artists. The shorts produced in this transitional time didn’t exhibit the influence of the young blood at first, but after a year or two the humor in the shorts became more focused. In particular, the influence of Bill Hanna made a pronounced improvement on the timing. Action became snappier and the pacing of the cartoons sped up. Eventually, Hanna would partner with Joe Barbera to direct “Puss Gets The Boot”, the first Tom & Jerry cartoon, which would set the house style for the studio for the next two decades.


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SD VIDEO:
Baron Munchausen

Two Films By Hans Held
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The Troublemaker 1940 / Baron Munchausen 1944
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In previous Reference Packs, we’ve featured films by the German animator Hans Fischerkoesen. Drafted by Joseph Goebbels to produce animated films for the Nazi regime and charged with building a studio to rival Walt Disney, Fischerkoesen succeeded in making some remarkable cartoons that largely avoided straying over the line into being outright propaganda. Today we feature one of Fischerkoesen’s peers, Hans Held, who wasn’t quite as lucky or successful.

Sometimes we can learn as much from bad examples as good ones. Hans Held is an example of an artist who was skilled in the medium of live theater and live action movies, but was wrongly cast as an animator by Joseph Goebbels. These films also show that as persuasive as animation can be, there needs to be a certain core of humanity if one wants the audience to embrace the idea. The Nazis were ill suited to compete with Walt Disney, who had his finger on the pulse of middle America and strove to serve his audience, not force his audience to serve his ideology.

SD VIDEO:
Well Just You Wait

Well, Just You Wait Ep.07
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Vyacheslav Kotyonochkin / Soyuzmultfilm, Russia / 1973

We continue the Russian Wolf and Rabbit cartoons with episode 07, “Cruise Ship At Sea”.

The premise of Nu, Pogodi! (which translates into English as Well, Just You Wait!) was pitched by a writing team of satirical humorists to many directors at Soyuzmultfilm, but was rejected every time. Finally in 1969, Gennady Sokolsky agreed to direct a 2 1/2 minute pilot for the series in an omnibus film called “Happy Merry Go Round”. The general consensus at the studio was that the cartoon was “low class” and beneath the dignity of Soyuzmultfilm, but director Vyacheslav Kotyonochkin strongly believed in the concept, so the studio decided to take a chance and allow him to direct a few episodes… and then a few more… and then more.

Kotyonochkin was proven correct. The cartoons were a huge success. Between 1969 and 2006, Soyuzmultfilm ended up making 22 episodes, and in a 2014 poll of audiences all over Russia, Well, Just You Wait! was voted the most popular cartoon series of all time by a landslide. Although the series resembles both Tom & Jerry and the Roadrunner and Coyote series, the director, Kotyonochkin claimed not to have ever seen any of these Hollywood cartoons until 1987 when his son got a video tape recorder and Western tapes began to be imported.


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SD VIDEO:
Pies Kot I

Dog, Cat And… Ep 06
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Jaroslaw Jakubiec & Jan Siupik / 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 "Vacuum Cleaner".

This series is a different sort of take on the Tom & Jerry model, with the opponents outsmarting each other instead of just chasing each other out of hate or hunger. There is more to the relationship between the characters than just rivalry. The relationship of the characters makes it easy to see how it relates to slapstick comedy teams like Laurel & Hardy and Fatty Arbuckle and Buster Keaton. The dog and cat are not just generic animals, but individual personalities with a dynamic relationship that is much more engaging than most “cat and mouse” or “dog and cat” cartoons.

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:
Monkey King

Goku no Daiboken Ep. 1 & 11
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Giasaburo Sugii / Japan / 1967

Goku no Daiboken (aka Adventures Of The Monkey King) was an animated series released in 1967 made by Mushi Productions. It was supervised by Giasaburo Sugii, and directed by several artists including Osamu Dezaki, Hideaki Kitao and Sad Tsukioka, among others. The 39 episodes were loosely based on the 16th century Chinese epic tale, Journey to the West. Ostensibly, Osamu Tezuka was the creator of the series, but he had very little to do with the production of the series, since he was completing the final episodes of Mighty Atom (Astro Boy) while Goku no Daiboken was in production at Sugii’s studio. Tezuka had published a manga comic based on Journey To The West, but this animated version is quite different in tone.

Sugii’s take on the characters was more “rough and tumble”. The focus was on the animation, with extreme takes and reflexive gags. Pay attention to the design as well. There are some very attractive layouts and color schemes. One scene even references Hanna Barbera’s The Flintstones!


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HD VIDEO:
Canova

Canova
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Francesco Invernizi / Galleria Borghese / 2019
Download this article

Animators are called upon to animate the human figure in motion. They need to know how the body flexes and contracts, they have to be able to turn the masses in three dimensions, and they need to be able to convey personality through posing and gesture. There is no better way to develop these skills than figure drawing.

The nicest thing about drawing from sculpture is that the model is more patient and doesn’t get tired of holding a pose. The student has all the time he needs to capture all the planes and masses that make up the human figure. But it has to be a very special kind of sculpture to directly relate to live human models. Antonio Canova is one of the greatest sculptors for this purpose. His knowledge of musculature and skeletal structure is encyclopedic. His figures exude life and energy from all angles and all distances. A lifetime could be spent studying his work.

HD VIDEO:
Breakdowns

Crowd Shots
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Curated By David Eisman
Download this article

Crowd shot animation is a topic that should almost always be approached under the lens of scale, cost, and resources. Take the following two examples. In Example A, the animator decides to animate a crowd, wherein each member of the crowd has their own separate, distinguishable character design, and is animated with their own bespoke movements.

Ultimately, as demonstrated by the variety of crowd shots, there are many different methods by which an animator can design such a sequence. They may choose to limit the number of characters, but design them in such a way that each is unique and moves in a unique way. They may instead choose to design a scene with dozens of identical characters, but with a wide variety of different motions. Or the animator may choose to design a scene that suggests the existence of a large crowd where one does not actually exist, instead generating the effect through tricks of perspective and background. There is no one right way to design a crowd shot. What is important is allocating resources effectively and in such a way as to trick the audience into thinking the shot is more elaborate than it actually is.


MEMBERS LOGIN To Download

JOIN TODAY To Access Members Only Content


Bonus Download

As a special thank you to our annual General and Student members, we have created a special page where we will archive past Reference Packs. There will be a new rerun of a complete RefPack between the new ones.

ANNUAL MEMBER BONUS ARCHIVE
Download Page
Available to Student and General Members

REFPACK027: April / May 2019

DVD QUALITY VIDEO:
Momotaro

Momotaro’s Sacred Sailors
Download Page
Seo Mitsuyo / 1945

In 1939, due to the outbreak of WWII, Japan banned all foreign movies. This provided a boon for the Japanese film business, which stepped into the gap and ramped up production of domestic wartime training films and propaganda. The Japanese Navy contracted with Director Seo Mitsuyo to create a feature length animated film to promote the draft, and give support and encouragement to children whose fathers had been taken up into military service.

However, Momotaro’s Sacred Sailors failed to accomplish its goals. By the time it was completed most Japanese men of age to serve had already been drafted. The movie was finally released immediately following a series of allied bombings that had effectively destroyed movie exhibition in Tokyo. Within a few months, almost nothing remained from the making of the film. Allied bombers had destroyed both the studio building where the film was produced, and the home of the director where thousands of production sketches were being stored. In September, the Japanese surrendered, and a purge was undertaken to destroy all traces of propaganda before the US occupying force arrived. The prints of this film, and many others were shredded and burned. The film was effectively wiped out of existence.

In the years one solitary print of the film lay hidden in the warehouse, while animation in Japan flourished and grew and became an important part of Japanese culture. When the dusty film cans were discovered in the back of a warehouse in 1984, they were restored and exhibited. But this time, instead of being dubbed a creative and commercial failure, Momotaro’s Sacred Sailors was recognized as the first of a long line of Japanese animated features, and as the film that established the animation business in Japan.

Click to access the…

Annual Member Bonus Archive
Download Page
Downloads expire after April 2024

HD QUALITY VIDEO:
Rhapsody of Steel

“Rhapsody Of Steel”
John Sutherland / 1959

John Sutherland’s studio was very influential in the mid-1950s, employing some of the best designers in the business. This film is no exception. Legendary stylists Eyvind Earle (Sleeping Beauty, Pigs is Pigs) and Maurice Noble (Duck Dodgers, How The Grinch Stole Christmas) collaborated on Rhapsody of Steel, and you can see evidence of both of their hands everywhere in this film. (Earle in the landscapes and textures, Noble in the bold primary and secondary colors…)

Rhapsody of Steel

Time Magazine said of this film…

Rhapsody of Steel, a 23-minute animated cartoon that cost $300,000, is one of those rare industrial films with enough specific quality and general interest to play the commercial circuits. In the next few months it will be shown as an added attraction in several thousand U.S. movie houses. Made by former Disney Staffer John Sutherland, Rhapsody sets out to tell a sort of child’s history of steel from the first meteor that ever hit the earth to the first manned rocket that leaves it, and most of the time Moviemaker Sutherland proves a slick entertainer and a painless pedagogue. Unhappily, the music of Oscar-Winning Dmitri Tiomkin, who is probably the world’s loudest composer, bangs away on the sound track like a trip hammer. But the picture’s pace is brisk, its tricks of animation are better than cute, and the plug, when the sponsor slips it in on the final frame, is modestly understated: “A presentation of U.S. Steel.”

As always, many thanks to Steve Stanchfield for sharing his treasures with us. If you haven’t already, check out the videos at his Thunderbean Animation Store at Amazon.

Click to access the…

Annual Member Bonus Archive
Download Page
Downloads expire after June 2024

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…

Download Page
membership@animationresources.org

…and we will credit your membership with the additional time. These bonus downloads expire after January 1st, 2024.


MEMBERS LOGIN To Download

JOIN TODAY To Access Members Only Content


Whew! That is an amazing collection of treasures! 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.

THIS IS JUST THE TIP OF THE ICEBERG!

Animation Resources has been sharing treasures from the Animation Archive with its members for over a decade. Every other month, our members get access to a downloadable Reference Pack, full of information, inspiration and animation. The RefPacks consist of e-books jam packed with high resolution scans of great art, still framable animated films from around the world, documentaries, podcasts, seminars and MORE! The best part is that all of this material has been selected and curated by our Board of professionals to aid you in your self study. Our goal is to help you be a greater artist. Why wouldn’t you want to be a member of a group like that?

Membership comes in three levels. General Members get access to a bi-monthly Reference Pack as well as a Bonus RefPack from past offerings in the in-between months. We offer a discounted Student Membership for full time students and educators. And if you want to try out being a member, there is a Quarterly Membership that runs for three months.


JOIN TODAY!
https://animationresources.org/membership/levels/

FREE SAMPLES!

Not Convinced Yet? Check out this SAMPLE REFERENCE PACK! It will give you a taste of what Animation Resources members get to download every other month! That’s 560 pages of great high resolution images and nearly an hour of rare animation available to everyone to download for FREE! https://animationresources.org/join-us-sample-reference-pack/

Sample RefPack

PayPalAnimationAnimation Resources depends on your contributions to support its projects. Even if you can’t afford to join our group right now, please click the button below to donate whatever you can afford using PayPal.


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Posted by Stephen Worth @ 1:45 pm

May 27th, 2024

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REFPACK057: A Peek At The International Downloads

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People who aren’t members of Animation Resources don’t understand how comprehensive our Reference Packs are. Over the next couple of weeks, we will be posting what each section of our current RefPack looks like. If you are a member of Animation Resources, click on this post to go to the Members Only page. If you aren’t a member yet, today is the perfect time to join! Our current Reference Pack is one of our best yet, and General and Student Members get access to a special Bonus Archive with even more material from past Reference Packs.

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International Animation

The world of animation is much bigger than it might appear to us at first glance. We are all familiar with the films we grew up with, but Hollywood wasn’t the only place that produced great cartoons… Poland, Japan, Russia, China and Europe all have their own traditions and a rich history of animated film making. Animation Resources’ archive contains many foreign films that are rarely seen in the United States. We feature a sampling of interesting animation from around the world in each Reference Pack.


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Baron Munchausen

Two Films By Hans Held
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The Troublemaker 1940 / Baron Munchausen 1944
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In previous Reference Packs, we’ve featured films by the German animator Hans Fischerkoesen. Drafted by Joseph Goebbels to produce animated films for the Nazi regime and charged with building a studio to rival Walt Disney, Fischerkoesen succeeded in making some remarkable cartoons that largely avoided straying over the line into being outright propaganda. Today we feature one of Fischerkoesen’s peers, Hans Held, who wasn’t quite as lucky or successful.

Held was born in Bavaria in 1910 and worked at the Brandenberger Theater as a designer when the Nazis rose to power. He was drafted by Goebbels to work at UFA as a design and color consultant and assistant director for live action films. Because of Goebbels’ and Hitler’s interest in animation, Held established an animation studio in Bavaria. He produced several films, but none were as execrable in their propaganda content as “The Troublemaker”.

The Troublemaker

The story is simple and blunt in its purpose. A magpie spots a fox lurking in the forest and notifies the police and her rabbit neighbors. A group of hedgehog soldiers alerts a squadron of wasps and war erupts. The fox threatens a rabbit girl, but is eventually killed by a catapult. The animals of the forest rejoice at the fox’s death. Held rams home the analogy to the Nazi militarism of the time, by making characters run in a goose-step and by using the sound of contemporary fighter aircraft for the wasps. I don’t need to point out what group of people the fox is meant to represent.

Held’s experience in the theater is a limiting factor here. The entire film is constructed of medium long shots that are stagey and devoid of any cinematic interest. The backgrounds are painted like theatrical backdrops, and the character movement is blocked without expressing any personality. Goebbels learned from his mistake. After this first attempt, he instructed the animators he supervised to focus on core cultural virtues, rather than direct propaganda. The films that followed, specifically those by Fischerkoesen were much more successful.

The Troublemaker

In 1943, the UFA studio released a large scale color live action film, designed to compete with MGM’s lavish musicals and adventure films like Alexander Korda’s “The Thief of Bagdad”. No expense as spared to make this film the biggest and most elaborate film Germany had ever produced. Because of his relationship with UFA, Goebbels called on Hans Held to make an animated short featuring the character with an eye to perhaps create a series of animated Munchausen adventures. The result was an abject failure. The war effort had drained the resources of Held’s studio and the Nazi regime was beginning to crack. Held had learned very little since “The Troublemaker”, and “The Adventures of Baron Munchausen” succeeded in being even more stiff and devoid of personality than its predecessor.

Sometimes we can learn as much from bad examples as good ones. Hans Held is an example of an artist who was skilled in the medium of live theater and live action movies, but was wrongly cast as an animator by Goebbels. These films also show that as persuasive as animation can be, there needs to be a certain core of humanity if one wants the audience to embrace the idea. The Nazis were ill suited to compete with Walt Disney, who had his finger on the pulse of middle America and strove to serve his audience, not force his audience to serve his ideology.

Baron Munchausen

REFPACK057: The Troublemaker 1940
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MP4 Video File / SD / 12:06 / 402 MB Download

REFPACK057: Baron Munchausen 1944
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MP4 Video File / SD / 07:11 / 98 MB Download


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Well Just You Wait

Well, Just You Wait Ep.07
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Vyacheslav Kotyonochkin / Soyuzmultfilm, Russia / 1973

We continue the Russian Wolf and Rabbit cartoons with episode 07, “Cruise Ship At Sea”.

The premise of Nu, Pogodi! (which translates into English as Well, Just You Wait!) was pitched by a writing team of satirical humorists to many directors at Soyuzmultfilm, but was rejected every time. Finally in 1969, Gennady Sokolsky agreed to direct a 2 1/2 minute pilot for the series in an omnibus film called “Happy Merry Go Round”. The general consensus at the studio was that the cartoon was “low class” and beneath the dignity of Soyuzmultfilm, but director Vyacheslav Kotyonochkin strongly believed in the concept, so the studio decided to take a chance and allow him to direct a few episodes… and then a few more… and then more.

Well Just You Wait

Kotyonochkin was proven correct. The cartoons were a huge success. Between 1969 and 2006, Soyuzmultfilm ended up making 22 episodes, and in a 2014 poll of audiences all over Russia, Well, Just You Wait! was voted the most popular cartoon series of all time by a landslide. Although the series resembles both Tom & Jerry and the Roadrunner and Coyote series, the director, Kotyonochkin claimed not to have ever seen any of these Hollywood cartoons until 1987 when his son got a video tape recorder and Western tapes began to be imported.

Well Just You Wait

In these Russian cartoons, there’s almost no dialogue, and the action almost always occurs on screen. Static tableaux are rare, as are detailed backgrounds and “on model” drawings. These cartoons focus on expressive poses and movement, and save time and expense by avoiding the careful cleanup required for character model details and overlapping action. The theory here is, if it moves funny, it’s funny… and they are right about that.

Shamus Culhane once lamented that television animation consisted of mostly lip-sync animation. He would have preferred to do away with lip-sync entirely and just have simple drawings that really move. Well, Just You Wait proves that he was correct.

We will have more Wolf and Rabbit cartoons in upcoming Reference Packs.

REFPACK057: Well Just You Wait Ep. 07
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MP4 Video File / SD / 09:32 / 116 MB Download


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Pies Kot I

Dog, Cat And… Ep 06
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Jaroslaw Jakubiec & Jan Siupik / 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 "Vacuum Cleaner".

This series is a different sort of take on the Tom & Jerry model, with the opponents outsmarting each other instead of just chasing each other out of hate or hunger. There is more to the relationship between the characters than just rivalry. The relationship of the characters makes it easy to see how it relates to slapstick comedy teams like Laurel & Hardy and Fatty Arbuckle and Buster Keaton. The dog and cat are not just generic animals, but individual personalities with a dynamic relationship that is much more engaging than most “cat and mouse” or “dog and cat” cartoons.

Pies Kot I

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.

Well, Just You Wait!, and Dog, Cat And… both are very efficient at what they do. They could easily serve as a model for internet animation. The internet encourages repeat viewing more than television does. When you watch a dialogue driven cartoon on TV, once you’ve heard the jokes, you don’t need to watch it again. However, a short cartoon that looks and moves funny is entertaining no matter how many times you watch it. And for the animator who is making the cartoon, it’s a lot more fun to animate simple funny characters than it is to animated a lot of tedious lip-sync.

Pies Kot I

Dog, Cat And… looks like it was a lot of fun to make. The film makers at Studio Miniatur Filmowych didn’t feel constrained by the ordinary lives of animals. Their characters can drive cars, build their own houses and go to exotic places. That freedom allowed the animators to keep their series fresh, and gave them the opportunity to experiment within a 10 minute format. Simple drawings, funny movement and no rules… these are the kinds of series that would work well as episodic internet cartoons.

We will have more episodes from this series in upcoming Reference Packs.

REFPACK057: Dog Cat And… Ep06
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MP4 Video File / SD / 09:16 / 212 MB Download


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Monkey King

Goku no Daiboken Ep. 1 & 11
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Giasaburo Sugii / Japan / 1967

Goku no Daiboken (aka Adventures Of The Monkey King) was an animated series released in 1967 made by Mushi Productions. It was supervised by Giasaburo Sugii, and directed by several artists including Osamu Dezaki, Hideaki Kitao and Sad Tsukioka, among others. The 39 episodes were loosely based on the 16th century Chinese epic tale, Journey to the West. Ostensibly, Osamu Tezuka was the creator of the series, but he had very little to do with the production of the series, since he was completing the final episodes of Mighty Atom (Astro Boy) while Goku no Daiboken was in production at Sugii’s studio. Tezuka had published a manga comic based on Journey To The West, but this animated version is quite different in tone.

Monkey King

Sugii’s take on the characters was more “rough and tumble”. The focus was on the animation, with extreme takes and reflexive gags. Pay attention to the design as well. There are some very attractive layouts and color schemes. One scene even references Hanna Barbera’s The Flintstones!

The main character, Goku wasn’t portrayed as the eager student like in the manga; instead he was an obnoxious brat. In fact, the show received so many complaints from teachers, the character had to be toned down in later episodes. Along with Goku, the cartoons star his girlfriend Tatsuko, Hakkai the pig and Sha Gojo, the monk. The series debuted as a replacement for Astro Boy which had just completed its final season.

Monkey King

In the first episode, Goku is born at Mt. Kaka. He becomes a bratty pest and decides to take over the local castle just for fun. In episode 11, the characters visit a town where an election is taking place. Two political parties are facing off, the votes of Goku and his friends look like they will decide the election, but the campaigning gets out of hand.

We will bring you more early anime in upcoming Reference Packs.

REFPACK057: Monkey King Ep. 1
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MP4 Video File / SD / 26:59 / 374 MB Download

REFPACK057: Monkey King Ep. 11
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MP4 Video File / SD / 26:04 / 329 MB Download

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THIS IS JUST THE TIP OF THE ICEBERG!

Animation Resources has been sharing treasures from the Animation Archive with its members for over a decade. Every other month, our members get access to a downloadable Reference Pack, full of information, inspiration and animation. The RefPacks consist of e-books jam packed with high resolution scans of great art, still framable animated films from around the world, documentaries, podcasts, seminars and MORE! The best part is that all of this material has been selected and curated by our Board of professionals to aid you in your self study. Our goal is to help you be a greater artist. Why wouldn’t you want to be a member of a group like that?

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Posted by Stephen Worth @ 12:36 pm