Friday, October 11, 2013

Disney in 1946



Here is a magazine article from Picture Post, March 23, 1946. The studio was in production on a variety of short films to be included in the feature length movie Make Mine Music.
The writing is very odd, the author keeps wondering wether Walt Disney can be considered to be an artist or not. There is some misinformation, too. 
Who knew that an animator draws every 10th drawing? And that in-betweeners are relatively unskilled?
Much more interesting are the photos here. On the page featuring the animators, you see Kimball working on the section called The Whale Who Wanted to Sing at the Met. Great drawings. To his left hangs an early model sheet of the Siamese Cats from Lady and the Tramp, a film that wouldn't be in theaters until almost a decade later. Ollie Johnston is credited as Disney's top animator, while Milt Kahl, in the last image, doesn't get mentioned at all. (I don't know why Ollie is drawing tortoises, but Milt is studying dance moves in preparation for animating the lead couple in The Martins And the Coys section).
It's always great to discover behind the scenes photos like these.