So Dear To My Heart

I stole these from Hans Bacher's fine blog.
They're from a hard to find Disney movie that's mostly live action.
The cartoon in it though is quintessential Disney. It boasts a massive contrast between its content and execution.
The layouts, color styling, painting, smooth animation are all incredible. The character designs are all stock generic Disney and so is the acting and story.

Someone some day has to finally explain how there can be such a difference in the levels of quality between the ideas and the execution at Disney's. Walt seems to be the cartoon counterpart of David O. Selznick. A gross combination of spectacle and mind-numbing sap.

The First Realistic TV cartoons

It's funny that the very first so-called "realistic" cartoons were drawn better than everything that came after.
I mean, they're still stiff as hell, but at least they had some solidity and a bit of design.

Probably because they used actual comic artists to draw them and didn't try to animate them.



In the production process that came later, they would just design the realistic characters on model sheets, then get artists who couldn't draw well to lay them out. Then animators who couldn't draw in this style either had a hell of a time trying to not only move them, but even pose them naturally. Then assistants would trace the already awkward poses and stiff animation and they'd lose another generation.

I did like Jonny Quest when it came out - for the same reason: Doug Wildey was a realistic comic artist and he did most of the layouts, and they inked them in comic book style. I think they found out that this wasn't a very efficient or cost effective way to make cartoons, so all the HB realistic cartoons that followed weren't even as good as Quest.

http://www.cartoonbrew.com/classic/tv-guide-on-clutch-cargo.html

Smokey Fun

They should have a funny animal character for all antisocial behaviors. "Knuckly" the "Don't Mug Old Ladies Gnu would make a good role model. "Bad Tastey" the don't wear your pants below your underwear waistband Wildebeest.

The Inverted Curves Theory

A while ago Rex and I were discussing how ugly modern animation design had become and why. We discussed what the ugliest of ugly styles was.

We decided that Dreamworks wouldn't count because everyone pretty much agrees that they make the ugliest "toons', - even the folks who subscribe to other modern animation styles.

I suggested one modern style that drives me nuts - the inverted curves theory of cartoon design. I don't know where it came from, but I started noticing it about 10 years ago. It's the theory that all objects-even characters- need to look like they are made from apple cores. Or--they look like they are made of play-dough that has been squeezed by sweaty gorilla hands.

I was in Meltdown the other day and I found a huge section of books teaching you all the mistakes you can get away with in animation today. There were a zillion "How To Be A Character Designer" books - more of them than there are pimples at the SDCC. And they are filled with anti-construction applecore inverted curves characters. These imploded characters are very hard to read at one glance because they have so many awkward dents breaking up their silhouettes. It's like taking a cheese grater to your eyes. I'd love to know who started this trend. I wonder if his anatomy bends inwards instead of outwards like the actual world of forms.

It seems that everything current is the opposite of what makes sense. It's cool to be backwards.Pretty soon I'll overhear kids arguing about what the best flavor of ice cream is- armpit or gym socks.

The inverted curves theory is especially popular in Canada. That means it must be at least 15 years later than when it was cool here.

There is only one thing nastier than an inverted curves character, and that's a "toon" with inverted curves and 'tude.

Girl Doodles

Dong Kingman