Ground Hog - Character Design

The 1930 Silly Symphony "Winter," CS-14, was laid out in September 15 to 27, animated September 16 to October 10, with backgrounds by the gentlemen in my previous post. It was delivered 10/22/30.

A central character in the film is the ground hog, animated first by Jack King, then dancing by Tom Palmer.
Groundhog by Jack KingGroundhog by Tom Palmer
Jack KingTom Palmer

Here is a drawing I aquired a year ago: it was among the amazing documents that the film's director Burt Gillett gave to "little Jeannie" when he moved to New York back in 1934...
Three Groundhogs for CS-14 Winter<< Click to enlarge!

A note about the coloring of drawings of this period: it was the convention to paint areas indicated in blue pencil with #1 Grey, in red pencil with #2 Grey, unless a number was written in the red color...

Comments

  1. Michael SpornApril 22, 2009 at 4:45 AM

    That drawing is a treasure. Most of my favorite animation art comes from that period.

    ReplyDelete
  2. rosscomposeDecember 9, 2015 at 1:22 PM

    Again, great drawings! I could not agree more with Mike. Are there any drawings of the first Ugly Duckling?

    ReplyDelete
  3. Hans PerkDecember 9, 2015 at 2:03 PM

    Ross, I don't have anything from that first Ugly Duckling. (Sadly, Mike isn't around anymore to spring surprises on us. After we lost him, blog posting wasn't as fun...)

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Prod. CM8 - The Picnic

Image
Directed by Burt Gillett. Released 10/23/30, this FINAL draft dated 9/13/30. Animation by Dave Hand, Jack King, Charlie Byrne, Norm Ferguson, Dick Lundy, Johnny Cannon, Les Clark, Ben Sharpsteen, Tom Palmer, Wilfred Jackson, Jack Cutting and Frenchy de Trémaudan. Found on the Treasures DVD Mickey Mouse in Black and White, Vol. 2 Disk 1 or on YouTube, though in very low quality here . A cute little film, this is actually a landmark in animation history. "Can I bring Rover?" Little Rover is, of course, none other than Pluto! Fergy's scene 27 is often "quoted" when discussing the origins of this the most famous of cartoon canines. It is very interesting to see the difference in drawing styles. Fergy tries to draw a dog and mostly does a very nice job. Compare this with e.g. Palmer's attempt in the final scene. It is a "funny cartoon balloon animal," a much more simplistic and symbolic way of drawing. Palmer, Cannon and Lundy seem not to be quite up to...
Read more

Prod. 2074 - Peter Pan (XVII)  - Seq. 15.0 - Voyage Home -- Ending

Image
Directed by Wilfred "JAXON" Jackson, laid out by Maclaren Stewart. Assistant director Mike Holoboff, secretary Toby (Tobelmann). This FINAL draft dated 11/3/52. Animation by Marvin Woodward (Lost Boys, John, Michael), Eric Larson (Peter), Harvey Toombs (Wendy), Don Lusk (Tink), Norm Ferguson (Nana), Jack Campbell (Father), Art Stevens, Milt Kahl (Father, Mother, Wendy), Marc Davis (Mother), Hal King (John), George Rowley (anchor chain, pixie dust, sail, ship), Josh Meador (cloud-ship). And that concludes the draft for Peter Pan, the fourteenth complete feature film draft on this blog! (Ok, you smart-alecks, we still need to see the last page of the Pink Elephant sequence...) As always, I feel the need to stress that these documents were kept to keep track of the responsible person, and as such it may not reflect precisely the specific directing animators who worked on the sequences. If e.g. an inker or checker needed to find out who animated the scene because of some question...
Read more

Prod. CM20 - Mickey Cuts Up

Image
Mickey Cuts Up was directed by Burt Gillett and released 11/30/1931. It is found on Disney Treasures DVD: Mickey Mouse in Black & White Volume 1 disc 1. You may still find it here on YouTube. Have a look, if you need a clearer understanding of the following documents! Gillett left some documents pertaining Mickey Cuts Up behind, and I would like here to show a few of these that I recently lucked into. It is interesting to speculate in which order these were written - they seem to all be in Gillett's own handwriting and would probably date to late August or early September 1931. First we have two pages, numbered 1 & 2, with ideas linked to names, Otto and Webb, which to me seems to mean that the ideas were originally thought out by either Otto Englander or Webb Smith. There are interesting ideas that did not make the film - they are crossed out: "mower bumps up and down on hedge - trick cuts." Some were not crossed out and made it in the film: "Cuts down tre...
Read more