I'M BACK!

HELLOOOOO EVERYONE! And welcome back, me! I have just returned from my vacation and it was a hoot! Tiring as all get out but a hoot all the same! I'll have pics and a review at a later date.
I came back to find an old nemisis of mine having a hissy fit over my pelosi entry.
There really isnt too much to say about it so I wont waste alot of space on it. But countsy, let me just say,,,,It was obviously meant as a jab at YOUR entry. Comon now. You cant be that stupid to think it was meant as anything BUT a slap at you.
Anyone could see that. I simply found it funny that you raised all this bluster about ratings and impeachment for them (Bush and Cheney), but neglected to say that the dem congress was 12 points BELOW Bush. The reason for your leaving it out? Because its truth and dems are allergic to truth. I guess you could even call it....and 'inconvenient truth'. (But a REAL one).
And then you would have to answer the question "should congress be impeached for low poll ratings? I mean at least Bushes ratings are for the war (without demorats help of course), congress ratings are for what? Doing nothing?

sigh...So I am NOT ripping you off, lil miss. I'm mocking you. Jeeze! Even 'robo' coulda looked at that and said "yeah man...He's making fun of you."

(((so much to teach...so much. And yet -I am but one man..sigh))))

Anywhoo! More fun coming up folks. Vacation stuff, mockery, industry stuff, mockery,Art junk, Its going to be a lollypulloooooooooooooza! And your palie Handel is the capn driving the SUV.

See ya on tuesday nite.


EDIT: HAHA!! I just looked at the comments on countsy's lil hissy fit post..Someone says to him.."You're tone is a little vague here. What is it you're trying to say?"

And countsy says, and I QUOTE: "I know, I know. I have problem with clarity."

You are a story guy 'countsy', Dont you think that having a problem with clarity is a little spooky? Well...I've said it once, I'll say it again....state of the industry.

Maybe put in on some lil panels and tack it to a wall----go over it a few times while pointing at it with a long stick, BEFORE typing it on your bloggy. mmmkay?

14%!!!!!

""Americans' Confidence in Congress at All-Time Low""

by Frank Newport

GALLUP NEWS SERVICE

""PRINCETON,
NJ -- The percentage of Americans with a "great deal" or "quite a lot"
of confidence in Congress is at 14%, the lowest in Gallup's history of
this measure -- and the lowest of any of the 16 institutions tested in
this year's Confidence in Institutions survey. It is also one of the
lowest confidence ratings for any institution tested over the last
three decades.""

WOW!! Just had to place this pose in. While the Bush administration is at a low as well, he is STILL higher in ratings than the nancy pelosi congress! By about 12 points!
nancy and the dems...America do hate you. Do NOT like what you stand for, and think your doing a lousy job. Even more so than they dislike of the Bush administration, which has largely to do with the war in Iraq, which will prove to turn out OK.
Poor dems...if America didn't hate them so, the only emotion that they would have for them would be pity.

http://www.galluppoll.com/content/default.aspx?ci=27946

VACATION

Taking a little ole' VACATION,baby!
Thats right. Even us fantastic uber handsome devious geniuses have to take a lil 'R N R
now and then.
Next post will be next saturday (30th).
Or about then. So come on back then. Not before, unless you want to see that beaut of a pic of Will Finn that I have up. Isnt he a gangsta?
Yo.

See ya in a week or so.

HaNdEl

A NOTE TO WILL FINN

Dearest Willifred,

Hello! I limped onto your site once again and saw that you had a June 17th post ("A sore for site heads"-or sumpin like that).
You said that " Handel hasn't said anything that you couldn't handle". I was glad to hear you say that. Although I couldn't help but to think that perhaps you enabling your comment moderation option was because of me. Made me think that by now, some hiney sniffing, know nothing, industry panty waist gave you a little warning about me.
IF that is indeed the case, let me assure you that I have nothing but the
highest of respect for you. You have always seemed like an amiable
bloke with a youthful energy and a love for the artform that is both sweet and admirable.
Who knows, Maybe you and I could have had a beer in the past at the local pub and swapped bluth
stories from yesteryear. Maybe, maybe not. But in either case...I think
your keen. And even when the inevitable time comes when you say
something stupid, (as we are all prone to do-some more than others,
right, robo?)....I will probably still like the cut of your jib..

Welcome to the blog woild.

PS: I hope you dont mind, but I could'nt find a pic of you that I liked. So I opted for something that brings out your spirit. Something that says ESSENCE OF "FINN".
I think that I have succeeded. Don't you agree?


Will's bloggy:

http://willfinn.blogspot.com/

RESPONSE TO PEET POST'S

The responses to my posts on Bill Peet may have stirred up a little hissy
fit amongst some "story" people. Some going as far as saying that I
'HATE story people'. Believe me, NOTHING could be further from the
truth. I have nothing but the HIGHEST of respect for story people. GOOD
story people. Just as I have the highest of respect for GOOD animators.
But I have oodles and oodles to say about those jackasses in both
camps, that are just a waste of space. For that matter, I have lots to
say about the entire industry. And I'm going to tell it to you! The
truth about it.

Take my Peet posts. IF you are an industry goof.
Working in any creative aspect (producers need not apply), can you say
that what I have said in the 'Peet posts', is NOT true? If your honest, you'll say of course its true.
And
if you are NOT an animation industry 'person', but are hoping to be so
in the future; well...that might be what will keep bringing you back..
Because its true.
(Just to clarify, SOME of it will just be my 'opinion', but THAT'S true too.:)

So tune in laters, theres
going to be some really really interesting stuff coming down the pike.
But that will be within a few weeks as I will be going on a bit of a
vacation soon. Looking forward to it...not the 9 hour flight, but the
trip itself should rock.

outta here...

BILL PEET (Part Two-long post)

As I said before. Bill Peet is nothing short of the most amazing story guy to ever live.

The
interview that I found and have been going over some of the quotes, is
a fun read. As I said, it shows a guy that loved what he did, And didn't care what people thought about him. Which is refreshing as all git out. A very far cry from the 'clickiness' of today's
animation crowd. But what the interview also showed was the foundations
of what I call the 'animation civil war'. Its a resentment, sometimes
loud, sometimes quiet. But definitely present- between the story departments and the animation departments.
For those of you who aren't in the animation industry, the resentment felt is from 'story' people who don't
feel as if they get enough credit for the films. The feel as if the
glory goes primarily to the animators. And well...their right.
Much of the glory and credit DOES go to the animators. BUT...there is also a down side to this. If a film does absolutely awful,
the first thing to get the blame IS the fact that its...ANIMATED. Not
that its the same mediocre story done by the same mindless drones for
the past 15 years. So while they get little CREDIT, they also get very
little BLAME. Therefore very little consequence as well. Which is in
the end...just not good for thisart form called...Animation.

But Handel. All of this is exxxxxtreeeeeeemelly interesting and I'm utterly RIVETED, but what prey tell does this have to do with Billy (ponchito) Peet? Well drop your trousers, pull up your socks and read on lil punkins.

PEET WHEN ASKED ABOUT THE AMAZING ANIMATOR, BILL TYTLA

"People were always amazed at Bill Tytla,
that he could draw the giant devil for "Night On Bald Mountain," and
the giant in "Brave Little Tailor;" these ponderous, muscled
characters, and then do this little elephant. After he got his first
scene on Dumbo, he passed me in the hall and said, "Y'know, Bill, I can't draw these goddamned little elephants. If I send Nick [his assistant] up with the scene, would you see if you could work it out?
...
Nick brought up this stack of drawings, Bill's scene where the
elephants first appear was just a mess. So I went over every one of
them, probably a couple of hundred drawings, every damned frame in the
picture, and redrew the whole scene. They shot the pencil test and
showed it to Walt. He was ecstatic! Nick came up and told me, "Walt
loved that thing, and I want to shake your hand!" Well, Bill never
bothered to thank me, Walt either."

I entered the quote in its entirety, because I thought that it was important to do so, to get the full 'feel' of his mindset.

first of all, Let me see if I have this straight. Bill Tytla, one of the all time greatest animators COULDN'T draw an elephant. Yeah...I'm a'buying that. So Bill Peet, a really really great story guy went over the drawings. "redrew" the entire scene.
Let me tell ya, if a story guy (unless it was someone like Ed Gombert or Glen Keane that IS ALSO an animator) went over ANY scene that I did, I would have to put a blackwing
pencil right through his left temple. Its not just a matter of drawing
'A' DRAWING. First off, the drawings have to RELATE to one another. In
some scenes, the slightest little tweak can ruin an entire 'FEEL' of
the scene. PLUS the drawings have to also LOOK good. Now I know thatPeet is a wonderful artist. But the art and draughtsmanship for a good finished ANIMATED scene is much MUCH different for a finished board. So..I don't buy that Peet "REDREW" the entire scene. And the reason Tytla never thanked you Mr. Peet, was simply because....It never happened.

PEET ON FREDDIE MOORE:

INTERVIEWER: " Fred Moore is often
described as the boy genius of the studio."

PEET:
"There's nobody that good. He was a great Mickey Mouse artist. Freddy
just couldn't draw a mouse that didn't look like Mickey. It was so
ingrained in him after drawing just thousands of them. The nose was too
round, so I went over Freddy's things including the storyboards. Freddy
did a fine animation job on it, but I refined his drawings so they
looked like Timothy. That was the last thing he ever did and it turned
out to be one of his best jobs."


Again...sounds pretty silly. As if each drawing is supposed to stand on its own in animation. That's the way it is in illustration. That's the way it is with boards. That's NOT the way it is in A N I M A T I O N.
OOOOH if only Bill Tytla and Freddie Moore knew how to draw. If only...indeed.

INTERVIEWER: "What kind of relationship
did you have with the "Nine Old Men"?

PEET:"That name has always bugged me because it gives people the idea that
there were only nine animators and that they did everything. There sure
weren't nine oldstory men because it's the most precarious job in the
business. When I left the studio, I was the only one left from the
story department from Pinocchio.

Yet the Nine Old Men were
there the entire time and they could do no wrong. They knew Walt wasn't
going to fire them because of some piece of animation that didn't work.
But astory man was only as good as his last story. Walt always figured he could get a story man
, but he respected the animators and didn't want to mess with them. He
figured they were the special talents. They had been there the longest,
but that didn't mean they were great. There were two or three that were
pretty mediocre, but they carried the load on the features. Thestory men
aren't given any credit or seen as being important in any of the Disney
books. They never gave me any credit for any of my work on The Jungle
Book."

Again, I thought that the entire paragraph should be quoted. Remember what I said at the beginning of this post. About the 'animation civil war'.
The
"story man was only as good as
his last story"? Well.....Duh! One has to go back and look
at the history of the Great Disney classics. Yes we love them and they
are truly incredible works. But if the audience for WHATEVER reason isn't embracing the story and ISN'T going to the shows...What else is the boss of a studio to think? I mean really! It isn't
the ANIMATION that is flawed. Ironically, its the animation that drew
the audiences into the theater.They (the audience)would cast aside anything and all
things NOT Disney in the 90's and early 2000's, KEEP going back to the
Disney feature only to leaveEXTREMELY disappointed . And return in
fewer and fewer numbers. Until Animation just about went under. We are
STILL at a low point because of that. But I do digress.
"They were there the longest and could do no wrong..."
This is another thing that underlines why I think that hes full of poo when he says that he 'redrew' Tytla's and Moores scenes. He has NO idea about what it is that these 'Nine Old Men' actually DID for animation the art form. The very "PRINCIPALS OF ANIMATION" that are always in the back of our minds.
Obviously they weren't
the ONLY animators. But, boy were they THE nine kings of animation. And
when we as animators of today, with all of our technology and all of
our youth and energy, can still not produce anything that even comes
close to a Kahl or Thomas or Johnston quality and STILL study those scenes...well.....thats saying something about those Nine Old Men.

""They had been there the longest, but
that didn't mean they were great. There were two or three that were
pretty mediocre,..""

Who? WHICH of the nine was
mediocre? MEDIOCRE? Wow....In what way? I assume that he's talking
about the animation because for any story guy to criticize draughtsmanship would be downright HILARIOUS. So which of the Nine old Men's animation was 'mediocre'.
I'll let you the audience ponder this question. And reel at both the absurdity AND the stupidity of it.
Forward....

INTERVIEWER:
"Marc Davis has personally
described you to me as the best story man in the business."

PEET:
"Well, that's OK, but I wish he would tell someone else. All the
publicity went to those people. The biggest problem for me was that I
was so creative, and other people would grab hold of my stuff. When
Illusion of Life came out, I called Ollie [Johnston] and gave him hell.
I told him it seems strange to me that he never mentioned that there's
astory man and a creative end to this thing.

The public
probably thinks the animators sits down and starts doing it from
scratch. I did storyboards, thousands of them, and character design; I
would direct the voice recordings.

Then guys like Marc Davis, Ken Anderson7 and Woolie Reitherman would take credit for my Cruella deVille
and all of the personalities. Those personalities were delineated in
drawings, and believe me - I can draw them as well or better than any
of them.

HILARIOUS!! 'Marc Davis says your the greatest story guy ever!' and Peet says "I draw better than him"??
Too funny. Sorry Mr Peet. I've seen your boards for Cruella. You draw great boards. But you do not draw better than Marc Davis. Not even close.
For Peet to get angry at Ollie Johnston
about the title "Illusion Of Life" is a bit on the petty side. Its a
book about ANIMATION. The animated character, and moving him to a point
where you believe its a real being. Written by TWO ANIMATORS!!! You
want a book about story guys? WRITE ONE.
Truly, I would love to see it. WRITE ONE.
Unfortunately Peet
passed away a few years back. And did NOT write a book about story and
story guys, apparently content to merely bitch about it instead.

There was more, but that's pretty much the gist of it. Look....again, I can understand that there are sooo many good people in animation, that don't get the acknowledgment that they deserve. Way more so in Peets day than now. But to let it drive you to the point of ego craziness is just sad. It is great though that he left to do children's
books. A place where he could be the Walt Disney of his own world. He
truly is one of the legends. And the animation world has greatly benefited for having him.
BILL PEET. Thanks for the story's.



The link to the interview:

http://cagle.msnbc.com/hogan/interviews/peet.asp

Bill Peet: Master storyman and teller of Tall Tales (part one)

Bill Peet for those of you out there that aren't familiar with any one
BEFORE Glen Keane, Is probably the best story man to ever, EVER LIVE.
He is. I recently found a fantastic interview with Peet circa 1988 I believe. In this interview Peet doesn't mintz words. He's direct, bold, in your face, and he's a cranky old coot. Its quite wonderful. He has lots of extremely
interesting insight about Disney the studio, Disney the man, the many
personalities that worked in the studio (famous and not so famous),and
the things that were going on at the time like the strike of the
forties.
He has some fabulous truth telling in here of which MUCH of it I'm right there with him!
But...he
also has some tall tales, of which are as laughable as anything he's
ever put on a story board. So much so that I was kinda embarrassed for him.
So lets go over some of both.

PEET ON DUMBO:

I was one of the "poor boys." They put all the rich boys, the top
animators making the big salaries, working on Bambi. They wanted to
make it a gem. Originally Dumbo was going to be only a half-hour, sort
of a special. When Walt saw what we were doing with it, he said it
might make a good feature. Well, Dumbo made money. In fact, it was the
only Disney film to make money until Cinderella.


This is one of the things that has
always bothered me about animated features. The thinking that the damn
thing has to cost 110 million to be good. A film, does not have to cost
that much. If you have a GOOD director that hasn't lost his mind or
bought into a studio mentality, and has a grasp of his own damn movie,
you can make it for much much less. You just strangle your story people
to get it right and forget all the crap that they've
'learned', nail your story on TIME, So that you don't
have high caliber animators sitting on their thumbs till the story
people can be re-taught that underwear gags are kinda played out.
That and pointless special effects...equals waste.
THAT'S why Disney's 'Tarzan' cost 130 million to make.
Now
contrast that to Brad Birds tight, streamlined and lean, "Iron Giant".
whose Budget was 50 million in comparison. Made in half the time, with
half the people of a Disneyflik.
Which is the better film? No doubt some will say Tarzan. The smart people will say 'Giant'.

PEET ON DISNEY PAYMENT ETHICS:

Peet:
"I felt Walt had been damned unfair regarding the fact that since it was
his studio, he only wanted to pay his favorites. Years later he told me
how he hated like hell to have to pay non-creative people. But that's
the nature of the business. Animation requires an array of manpower
with a minimum of talent... You can't just pay the talent at the top
and say to hell with all the others. No matter how third-rate, you need
them, too."

Man...the thing that bums me out is that you just KNOW that this is true. It always makes me wince abit
when I watch those old Disney movies. Those beautiful old classics,
that if you go by the credits, you would think that 30 people created
the entire thing!
I've often wondered who those other animators, story people, inbetweeners,
colorists etc WERE. They went to work that day, did their 16 hours, went home to
their families only to someday 60 years later say "yeah I worked on a
classic"....but never have any credit to it. yes 'CREDIT'. The one
thing that is MORE important than money. Credit. Without the 'credit',
you have nothing to help you get that NEXT gig. Nothing to point to in
the future to show that you worked on--something that you were proud to have
worked on.
And so many of those people. Forgotten. Never to be known. Almost as if they were ghosts.
In some ways they are the "unknown soldiers" of animation. Those old artist from Disney, Fleicher, MGM, etc.
Criminal.

BILL PEET ON THE STRIKE OF 41'


"When they found out there might be a strike, they called us into the
theater. Roy Disney addressed us and said that Walt Disney himself only
made $500 a week and that they tried to be fair with everybody. He said
if everyone would take a 10 percent pay cut, they could keep 400 people
and not have to fire them. Okay, we all cheered and took the cut, even
though I'd just gotten my raise.
...There was great applause. It
was settled. One week later they started taking the cut and fired the
400 people anyway. When I went out, some friends told me, "Bill, you're
making the mistake of your life. You're going to ruin your career, and
you're just starting to take off." I couldn't help it. I could not
honestly go back in there and ever feel right again."

Ouchy. Man, that stings. And you just know its true. It has that bite of truth to it.
And that kinda crap happens to this day. I cant remember if it was the Disney Florida
studio, I think it was, but I heard a story that the entire studio went
in to work thinking it was going to be like any other work day and they
were greeted with pink slips on their desks.
OHHHHHHHHH!
I find
any information on the animation strike of 1941 fascinating. I always
have. I WISH that someone would do a book on it. I'd love to hear some
REAL non whitewashed truth about it.
I don't know if we'll ever have
another one of those big time strikes. Not on that level. There is just
a wealth of other options that weren't
available at that time. Live action, children's books, video, games,
TV. Sadly, I think we're too self centered to give a crap now a days.
Lets face it. We'reabit
spoiled. Animation is and has been in the crapper for some time now.And
yet, people are blessed to have other options to go to. So when the
industry tanks or you just get sick of the same old movie over and over
and over again...You can move on, or in some cases, grow out of it.

BILL PEET ON THE SUCCESS OF HIS CHILDRENS BOOKS:

"There's life after Disney! I've gotten good reviews on my autobiography in all the big newspapers
I
just went to signings at nine bookstores but that's all, just to get it
off the ground. I have 34 storybooks published, many of them in foreign
languages."

I have nothing, NOTHING but the highest of respect for anyone who dares to do their
own thing. To go against the grain. Someone who, for whatever reason,
decides to just fly away from the 'pack' and do that something that is
just for the sheer love of it.
I'm not talking about a hobby while
you do your day or night job. Although doing that is also respectable
because its a love. But that's too damn safe. No kudo's for you there.
I'm talking about taking the pliers yourself and cutting that umbilical
chord and pursuing that passion. With every ounce of fat that you have
surrounding that bulbous, pulsating,gelatin, rhubarb you call a heart.
That takes guts. Real true guts. And Peety had em'. In spades.

In this interview, Peet is a crusty old coot who doesn't really give a poot
what others think of him. I love that. I admire that. Because of that,
You can really, REALLY tell when hes hitting you with a hammer of
truth. BUT, you can also tell when he's just overstepping into old man
zone and handing you a poo poo piglet, hoping that you think its a
chocolate bunny.
Next post, we'll yap about some of his silliness, and how 1)its in its own way, endearing.
2)How its sad to see a truly legendary man- feel for some reason, that he has to fib a little out of.......ego?