Advice: Bakshi On Surviving Tough Times

At this year's San Diego Comic-Con, I had the honor of hosting an interview with Ralph Bakshi. He had some important things to say to the animators in the crowd. Watch Ralph take my question and hit it out of the park...



Many thanks to the Bakshi family for their helpfulness and generosity, and to our fantastic videographer, JD Mata.

Feel free to embed the YouTube on your own website. Spread the word! Educators may download a higher resolution copy of this video to burn to DVD for viewing in their classroom.

Read the comments about this video at YouTube, Cartoon Brew, CGI Society Part One, CGI Society Part Two, Animation Nation and Weirdo's blog on Newgrounds.

UPDATE: I just spoke to Ralph on the phone. He says that he regularly checks the ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive site, and was surprised to see his clip posted. He's reading your comments and he's happy that you find his message inspiring. He's promised to do more interviews with me for the Archive soon. Thanks, Ralph!

If you found this article interesting, see... Bakshi's Phone Doodles, Bakshi Speaks To CGI Animators Part One and Part Two, Louise Zingarelli's Cool World Storyboards, Bakshi Meltdown Comics Party Pictures

See also... Imitation vs. Inspiration: Chaplin's Shadow, The Application Of Inspiration, How To Properly Use Reference, Incorporating Natural Forms, (Visual) Literacy, Why Do We Need An Animation Archive?, Parody: Whack! Comics

UNFILTERED: The Complete Ralph Bakshi isn't one of those "art books" with postage stamp sized pictures floating in oceans of tasteful white space and huge text blocks of scholarly blather that crowds out the images. It's just pictures, pictures and more pictures... along with just enough text to put them in context. The book is organized to show Ralph's career from his earliest days at Terry-Toons, to his groundbreaking features, to his revolutionary TV work, to his most recent fine art paintings. Even if you think you know all there is to know about Bakshi, this book will grab you by the lapels and shake you and show you things you've never seen the likes of before. Click through the link to pick up the Bakshi book at Amazon.

Stephen Worth
Director
ASIFA-Hollywood
Animation Archive
.

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Drawing: John K Advice Letter and Eddie's Boney Finger

Good drawing is more important than anything else in animation. More than ideas, style, stories. Everything starts with good drawing. -- John K

I remember when we were hot in production on the George Liquor web cartoons at Spumco in 1998, a package came in the mail from a kid who was a fan of the Spumco website. He sent some of his own comics and funny drawings, so I took them to John K to look over. John took time out to sit down and carefully compose a letter back to the kid, giving him many of the same tips he shares with you in the $100K Animation Drawing Course here at the Archive.

Almost a decade has passed and that kid has grown up and is attending Sheridan College studying to be an animator. His name is Amir Avni. Amir posted the letter that John sent him in the hopes that it can help others like it helped him.

Toonamir: Time to give a lil' sumpin' back

It's a good week for advice for animation students, cartoonist Eddie Fitzgerald throws his hat in the ring in his inimitable style...


Uncle Eddie: THE DIRTY OLD BONEY FINGER

Read the comments on Eddie's post too.

See also... The $100K Animation Drawing Course and Will Finn's Letter From Ward Kimball.

Stephen Worth
Director
ASIFA-Hollywood
Animation Archive
.

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