Donation: David Apatoff's Boyhood Collection of Newspaper Comics

There was a time when heroes arrived on your doorstep each and every morning... Flash Gordon, Prince Valiant, Tarzan, Terry and the Pirates, and dozens of others... every day without fail. On Sundays, they were in COLOR.


It was a great time to be a kid. For a nickle, you could travel to Dogpatch or Mars or Shanghai. Kids across the country commandeered the comics page at the breakfast table and carefully clipped their favorite stories. They filled scrapbooks, pinned them up on their walls, stashed them in neat little piles under their bed until their mothers complained of the fire hazard.


Moms never understood... they'd use most amazing image of a pterodactyl attacking a sabre toothed tiger to line the birdcage and not even see the irony. Moms are like that. But kids knew that the funny papers were a treasure trove for people with the imagination to appreciate them. Especially kids who loved to draw.



Newspaper comics were an encyclopedia of cartooning styles, and the heroes weren't just the characters in the strips... there were heroes on the other side of the pen too. We've profiled a few here in the past... Milt Gross, Alex Raymond, Milton Caniff, George McManus, Al Capp, Rube Goldberg and Walt Kelly, to name just a few. These men were the direct descendants of Thomas Nast. Their drawings had power.


Some of those kids grew up and never forgot the power of cartooning. David Apatoff is one of them. His blog, Illustration Art is a terrific resource for cartoonists and illustrators interested in all aspects of the artform. David was one of those kids who carefully collected the work of his heroes. And he just donated his boyhood collection of comic strips to the ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive.


The collection includes hundreds of comic pages, mostly from the late 30s and early 40s. David collected complete Sunday sections, as well as prime examples from his favorite comic strips... Prince Valiant, Flash Gordon and Tarzan. There are also special poster size pages that ran as specials in the 60s featuring Pogo, Dick Tracy, Peanuts and Dennis the Menace.


If you'll excuse me, I have a little digression to make at this point. I want to tell you a story about something that happened to me a couple of weeks ago...

There's a boy who's a big fan of the archive. He saw the article on us in the L.A. Times and made his mom bring him in for a visit. He lives in San Francisco, but he has family in Los Angeles and visits several times a year. He's only eight or nine, but he can discuss the differences in directoral style between Freleng and Jones, he knows the true story of the creation of Bugs Bunny, and he's interested in the Ub Iwerks Mickey Mouse cartoons. On his first visit, I gave him a copy of Leonard Maltin's Of Mice and Magic as a gift. He devoured it from cover to cover, and sent me a copy of the book report he did on it for class. On his visits he never fails to impress me with his enthusiasm for animation.

Last time he was here, he asked me if we could sit down and talk. He said he had an important question to ask me, and he had asked his family and teacher, but he wasn't satisfied with their answers. He wanted my opinion. He looked me straight in the eye and asked me, "Mr. Worth, was I born too late?"

I was stunned.

That's a question that every cartoonist I've ever met has asked. That same realization hit me like a ton of bricks when I was in college. Ralph Bakshi called me the next day, and I told him what this nine year old had asked me, and all he could say was "Oh my God."

The kid was waiting for my answer. I sat quietly for a second to gather my wits. I looked back at him squarely in his eyes. "I'm not going to lie to you." I said. "The short answer to your question is 'yes'. We were both born too late. The 20th century was one of the most interesting times to live in all history. The world will never be the way it was ever again. I just got a taste of the very end of that golden age myself."

"But that doesn't mean that you can't do great things. You've got a whole life ahead of you. Study hard. Work hard. Always try to improve yourself. Learn from the past and apply it to your own work. Try to be better than the rest, and leave the world a little better than you found it. With any luck, you and people like you will build a new golden age."

That answer satisfied him. He knew it was the truth.


OK. I'm speaking to all you cartoonists out there now... Look at these amazing comics that David Apatoff so generously donated. I'll be scanning them for this blog very soon. While you study them, never forget that the dreams of a million kids resided in those yellowed pages. Compare these comics to the comics in your newspaper. What happened? Why are we cheating our audience so shamefully? Cartoonists have an obligation to go out there and give kids today new dreams that are just as great as the old ones.


Many thanks to David Apatoff for this incredibly generous and thoughtful gift. I'm sure it will inspire great things.

Stephen Worth
Director
ASIFA-Hollywood
Animation Archive
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Cartooning: How To Draw Funny Pictures

This post is just the tip of the iceberg... see reason number 8 on our The Top Ten Reasons To Support The A-HAA for links to more great info on the history of animation told through the careers of great cartoonists.


Last week, I discussed Zim's Cartoons and Caricatures. Here are some more examples of the genius of Zim from another vintage "how to" book... How To Draw Funny Pictures by E.C. Matthews. This chapter deals with a topic that is widely discussed today, racial stereotyping.

Ethnic humor was Zim's stock-in-trade. He once joked that he and his fellow cartoonists at Puck magazine treated the various races and creeds that made up America with gloves... the kind boxers wear. Perhaps this is why he is virtually unknown today. But it's unfair to sit like an armchair quarterback a century later judging an entirely different time by our own standards. Zim approached every person as a peer. He made fun of all of them equally.

Stereotypes are still part and parcel of caricature and cartooning. Pirates have eye patches and parrots on their shoulders. Surfer dudes wear baggy shorts and have long blonde hair. These are the generally understood symbols that represent specific types of people. How does a cartoonist utilize these common perceptions to communicate clearly while still remaining honest? Here is an important first-hand document of how Zim himself explained the purpose and limits of ethnic caricature in the "melting pot" of the early 1920s.















Take note of this advice from the conclusion of this chapter...

Greatness makes one tolerant. Great men are not ashamed to stop on the street and talk to the man in overalls. They recognize the bond of friendship between the common people and themselves. The social sheik who feels above talking to a mere laborer is fooling only himself.

Take this little sermon to heart and treat every man as your equal; it will help you get ahead. How truly the Bible says, "The greatest among you shall be the servant of all."

If you found this post to be interesting, see the... W. L. Evans Cartooning and Caricature Course Brochure, Lesson One and Lesson Two, Preston Blair and John K's $100K Animation Drawing Course, Gene Byrnes' Complete Guide To Cartooning Part One: The Men Behind The Newspaper Comics, Part Two: How To Get Ideas / Studies of Comic Strips, Part Three: Single Panel and Sports Cartoonists, Part Four: Editorial Cartoons & Comic Books, Part Five: Sketching, Part Six: Magazine Cartooning and Part Seven: Magazine Cartooning (continued); Nat Falk's "How To Make Animated Cartoons" Part One: The History of Animation, Part Two: The Cartoon Studios, Part Three: How Cartoons Are Made, Part Four: How To Draw Cartoons and Part Five: How To Animate, Willard Mullin on Animals.

Stephen Worth
Director
ASIFA-Hollywood
Animation Archive
.

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Cartooning: Zim's Cartoons and Caricatures

This post is just the tip of the iceberg... see reason number 8 on our The Top Ten Reasons To Support The A-HAA for links to more great info on the history of animation told through the careers of great cartoonists.



Eugene "Zim" Zimmerman was born in 1862 in Switzerland, and his family emigrated to the United States when he was seven. As a poor immigrant, Zim witnessed the "melting pot" of American culture first hand. His depictions of ethnic minorities were pointed, but honest and well observed. Although he is pretty much forgotten today, he was very well known in his time, and his humor captured the essence of turn-of-the-century America.


Zim was the founder of the so-called "Grotesque" school of caricature, and was the first caricaturist to incorporate exaggerated cartooniness not only in the faces of his subjects, but in the bodies as well. Zim worked for Puck and Judge, the two top humor magazines of their day. Along with caricatures by George McManus and Frederick Burr Opper, Zim's caricature of a moon faced grinning kid (an example of which appears on page 3 of this book) was said to be one of the earliest inspirations for Mad magazine's mascot character, Alfred E. Neuman.


Zim was a prolific artist, with more than 40,000 illustrations published in his lifetime. He retired from Judge in 1897 and founded the American Association of Cartoonists and Caricaturists. He was also a writer and teacher. His columns ran in Cartoons magazine during the early years of the century, as did ads for his correspondence course in cartooning.


Archive supporter Marc Schirmeister has been searching high and low for a copy of Zim's early educational materials with no luck. But recently this 1910 book, packed with tips for the aspiring cartoonist, turned up in a used bookstore in Arizona...


It's worth noting that the price tag on the cover is an important clue to the value of these lessons to contemporary artists. According to the Consumer Price Index, $5 in 1910 is equivalent to $116 today. Five dollars represented a full day's labor to many of the cartoonists who bought this book. Zim's name in gold letters on the cover was the selling point that made so many aspiring cartoonists part with the "five plunks (in real Money)" as Zim so colorfully puts it in his introduction.


These 100 pages are packed with great cartoons, helpful drawing tips, technical information and business advice for the aspiring cartoonist. Most importantly, Zim passes along his unique philosophy of life, and offers a shining example of how an artistic career as a caricaturist can be incorporated into a person's lifestyle. At the time this book was written, Zim had twenty years of experience under his belt, and had attained the highest level in his field.

Here are just a few choice snippets from this great book...





Guess who?
If you are a fan of caricature, check out Will Finn's latest post and the blog of my favorite caricaturist, Marlo Meekins.

If you found this post to be interesting, see the... W. L. Evans Cartooning and Caricature Course Brochure, Lesson One and Lesson Two, Preston Blair and John K's $100K Animation Drawing Course, Gene Byrnes' Complete Guide To Cartooning Part One: The Men Behind The Newspaper Comics, Part Two: How To Get Ideas / Studies of Comic Strips, Part Three: Single Panel and Sports Cartoonists, Part Four: Editorial Cartoons & Comic Books, Part Five: Sketching, Part Six: Magazine Cartooning and Part Seven: Magazine Cartooning (continued); Nat Falk's "How To Make Animated Cartoons" Part One: The History of Animation, Part Two: The Cartoon Studios, Part Three: How Cartoons Are Made, Part Four: How To Draw Cartoons and Part Five: How To Animate, Willard Mullin on Animals.

Stephen Worth
Director
ASIFA-Hollywood
Animation Archive
.

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A Gift From The Los Angeles Film Festival

The holiday spirit is working wonders! We just received a Christmas present from Miles Flanagan of The Los Angeles Animation Festival... A giant box packed full of wonderful software! Final Cut Studio 2...

We're working on upgrading our ability to capture and process broadcast quality video. For the last couple of months, we've been limping along with outdated software, but thanks to Miles and LAAF, we will be working with the best software available.

We're currently saving our pennies for a digitizing station dedicated to video capture. If you can help out, please donate through the PayPal link or mail us a donation. The ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive is a 501(c)(3) non profit, so your donation may be tax deductible. (See your tax accountant for details.) For more information on donating to the ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive, see our CONTRIBUTIONS Page.

All of us at the ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive send our thanks and wishes for a wonderful holiday to Miles Flanagan and all of the folks at LAAF!
Stephen Worth
Director
ASIFA-Hollywood
Animation Archive

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A Gift From Anime Weekend Atlanta

Today, we received a Christmas present from Lloyd Carter of Anime Weekend Atlanta... Four Maxtor One Touch III Turbo Edition 1TB 7200RPM Firewire/USB Hard Drives...

Lloyd visited the Archive a little over a month ago, and he asked if there was anything we needed to help take the project to the next level. I explained that up to now, everything we digitize is backed up to two DVD-R copies. This is inexpensive, but consumes a tremendous amount of volunteer time. If we had enough hard drives, we could load the drives with images and movie files quickly and not spend hours and hours burning and verifying DVDs. Lloyd remembered us and put us on his Christmas list. The four drives he donated will get us started backing up to drives instead of DVDs, and will free up the volunteers to work on building the database, instead of running backups.

We still need a dozen more of these drives to back up all the material we've digitized so far. If you can help out, please donate through the PayPal link, mail us a donation, or arrange to have this particular model of hard drive sent to us. The ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive is a 501(c)(3) non profit, so your donation may be tax deductible. (See your tax accountant for details.) For more information on donating to the ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive, see our CONTRIBUTIONS Page.

Thanks to Anime Weekend Atlanta for their generous support!
Stephen Worth
Director
ASIFA-Hollywood
Animation Archive

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Meta: It's Time To Support The Archive

WARNING! This post contains concentrated cartoon goodness! Link to it from your website or blog. Tell your friends!

ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive / 2114 W Burbank Bl. Burbank, CA 91506 / 818.842.4691 / Office Hours: Tuesday through Friday 1pm to 9pm





IT'S TIME TO SUPPORT THE ARCHIVE
The Archive has been in operation now for a year and a half. Every six months, we recap and look back on everything we have accomplished to date and remind you that this is all possible because of your support. We hope that you will appreciate the work being done here and find value in it. If that's the case, you will want to contribute so we can accomplish even more.

So far, we have digitized well over 7,000 images and 2,500 animated films. There are over 300 articles hosted here on the Archive blog covering a wide range of subjects. The blog is followed by readers all over the world, and our traffic is averaging 150,000 articles a month. We've mounted three major exhibits in the archive space. The animation database is now up and operating, and volunteers are working nearly every day to enter and cross link all the movie files, images and data. Most importantly, we have brought a wealth of information to you... information you can use, like the $100K Drawing Course... information about the history of the medium we all love... and perhaps most importantly, information about the pioneering artists to whom we owe our gratitude for creating the art form of animation.



As you browse through these links, keep in mind that the material presented on this website is just the tip of the iceberg... for every image or cartoon you see here, we have digitized a hundred more just as amazing. The amount that has been accomplished in the past year and a half is impressive. It's time to roll up our sleeves and take it to the next level. To do that, we need your support.

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Here are the top ten reasons the ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive deserves your support...

10.) Special Exhibits At The Archive



The ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive has mounted several major exhibits. At our facility in Burbank, you can see a collection of animation drawings from the Fleischer Studios, including Grim Natwick's first character designs for Betty Boop. Also on display is the desk that Les Clark used at Disney's Hyperion studio from 1927 to 1938... from Oswald the Lucky Rabbit to Steamboat Willie to Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs... they were all animated on this desk. Come down any day between Tuesday and Friday and take the tour...

DISNEY DRAWINGS (ending soon!)

THE ART OF THE STORYBOARD
(See also... John K's Stimpy's Invention Part One and Part Two, Ren & Stimpy in Big House Blues Part One, Part Two and Part Three; and Alvin Show: The Whistler)

THE GOLDEN AGE OF MEXICAN LOBBY CARDS
(See also... Ernesto Garcia Cabral Part One / Part Two / Sci-Fi and Horror Lobby Cards / Mexican Lobby Card Fiesta)

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9.) Features On Playboy Cartoonists



In the 1950s and 60s, Playboy magazine employed many of the most talented cartoonists of the day. There's a lot to learn from these beautiful and deceptively simple cartoons. Many of them are models of color harmony, composition and staging. There's also a wide variety of styles, from the fast watercolor washes of Eldon Dedini to the carefully rendered airbrush work of Alberto Vargas. Style is something sadly lacking in theatrical animation today. These cartoons have style in abundance. We were lucky enough to be able to digitize a collection of vintage magazines courtesy of Archive supporters, Mike Fontanelli and Chad Coyle. Here are some of the artists we've profiled so far...

Eldon Dedini Part One / Eldon Dedini's Satyr's & Nymphs / Early Erich Sokol Cartoons / More Erich Sokol / Jack Cole And More Great 50s Playboy Cartoonists / Doug Sneyd - Phil Interlandi / More Phil Interlandi Playboy Cartoons / Alberto Vargas / Harvey Kurtzman & Will Elder's Little Annie Fanny (See also... George Petty's Ridgid Tools Calendars & his 1947 Calendar / John Held Jr's Flappers)

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8.) Art Instruction Materials



Founded by Norman Rockwell and Albert Dorne in the early 1950s, Famous Artists had three courses... Painting, Illustration/Design and Cartooning. Each course consisted of 24 lessons in three oversized binders covering a wide variety of subjects. To design the courses, Rockwell brought together the top artists of the day... Albert Dorne, Stevan Dohanos, Rube Goldberg, Milton Caniff, Al Capp, Willard Mullen, Virgil Partch, and Whitney Darrow Jr, among others. The result was a correspondence course that puts many current university programs to shame. ASIFA-Hollywood has been digitizing these powerful lessons and sharing some of them with you on this website. In addition, we have provided a wealth of educational material written by top cartoonist educators like Grim Natwick and Gene Byrnes; as well as invaluable articles on art theory.

Chad's Design For Television / Willard Mullin On How To Draw Animals / Clair Weeks' Disney Animal Studies 1940 / Fundamentals Of Composition: Part One and Part Two / Bill Nolan: Cartooning Self Taught / Grim Natwick on Animation Design / A Drawing Lesson From Walter Lantz / Owen Jones' The Grammar of Ornament Part One, Part Two and Part Three / Musical Timing Rediscovered / Originality vs. Imitation: Chaplin's Shadow / Incorporating Natural Forms: Haeckel's Art Forms In Nature / Nat Falk's How To Draw Animated Cartoons Part Three: How Cartoons Are Made, Part Four: How To Draw Animated Cartoons and Part Five: How To Animate / 1938 Disney Artitst Tryout Book / Gene Byrnes' Complete Guide To Cartooning Part One: Newspaper Strip Cartoonists, Part Two: Studying Comic Strips, Part Three: Single Panel and Sports Cartoons, Part Four: Editorial Cartoons and Comic Books

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7.) Classic Cartoons To Study



Through our Film Preservation Program ASIFA-Hollywood has rescued dozens of cartoons in danger of being lost to nitrate deterioration. The volunteers at the Animation Archive are hard at work digitizing cartoons for inclusion in our database. This will allow students and cartoonists to instantly access animated films that are not available commercially. To date, we have digitized over 2,500 cartoons... Fleischer Popeyes, Bouncing Ball Cartoons, Terrytoons and many more that haven't been seen in decades. Here are just a few of the cartoons in our collection...

Fleischer Studios: Swing, You Sinners, Mariutch, Betty Boop in Snow White & You're Driving Me Crazy / Famous Studios: Chiquita Banana / Terrytoons: Barnyard Actor, Farmer Al Falfa's Prize Package, Pink Elephants, The Temperamental Lion (1940) & Catnip Capers, Bill Tytla's Mighty Mouse Meets Jekyll & Hyde Cat / H-B's The Bodyguard and Avery's Bad Luck Blackie / Uproar In Heaven (China/1961) Part One, Part Two / Ruff and Reddy and Pinky the Pint-Sized Pachyderm

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6.) Golden Age Illustration



One of the goals of the ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive is to gather together the material that provided inspiration to animators in the 30s and 40s. Artists like Kay Nielsen and Gustaf Tenggren made the trip to California and ended up working for Disney. These books contain a wealth of inspiration for color, design and technique. We are also archiving the work of great illustrators from the 40s and 50s, like Arthur Szyk and Boris Artzybasheff. Click on a few of these links and be amazed at what you see...

Bland Tomtar Och Troll: John Bauer 1915 / Einar Norelius 1929, Einar Norelius 1934, Bauer & Norelius 1944/1949 / Kay Nielsen: East of the Sun and West of the Moon, Twelve Dancing Princesses & Hansel & Gretel / Gustaf Tenggren: Small Fry And The Winged Horse, Heidi - Wonderbook - Juan & Juanita & Grimms Fairy Tales / Edmund Dulac: Hans Christian Anderson, Poe's Poetical Works & Tanglewood Tales / Maxfield Parrish's Arabian Nights (1909) / N. C. Wyeth's Legends of Charlemagne / Frank Reynolds Paints Pickwick / Artzybasheff: Neurotica, Machinalia & Diablerie / Arthur Szyk: The New Order / Mid-1930s Colliers Illustrations / Late 40s Colliers Illustrations / Lawson Wood- The Monkey Painter

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5.) Historical Info & Interviews



We are in the process of publishing an important interview with three of animation's pioneers... Bill Hanna, Joe Barbera and Friz Freleng. Interviewed by cartoon director, John Kricfalusi, they speak with candor about their careers and the state of animation in the modern age. The interview is illustrated extensively with pictures and videos of cartoons so you can instantly see what they are talking about. This sort of interactive presentation takes full advantage of the power of the internet as a learning tool. There are two installments now online, with more to come in the near future. We also posted an interesting audio clip of Grim Natwick discussing his friend and former boss, Ub Iwerks, a fascinating article on Bill Tytla by animation historian John Canemaker, and a documentary on China's pioneer animators, the Wan Brothers...

Bill-Joe-Friz Interview Pt. 1 / Bill-Joe-Friz Interview Pt. 2 / Natwick on Iwerks / Three Interesting Documents / Berny Wolf (1911-2006) / Louise Zingarelli: Cool World / Biography: The Wan Brothers- Cinese Animation Pioneers / Nat Falk's "How To Make Animated Cartoons Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four and Part Five / Life Magazine: Disney Studios at War / John Canemaker on Bill Tytla / Lotte Reiniger's Adventures of Prince Achmed (1926) Part One and Part Two / Clair Weeks' Goodbye Book (Disney/1952) / Bob Clampett's Swimming Pool 1962 / Building Of The Disney Studio In Burbank

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4.) The Cartoon Hall Of Fame



ASIFA-Hollywood has been recognizing the important figures in the history of animation for over three decades with the Annie Awards. We continue that tradition with our online biographical wiki, the Cartoon Hall Of Fame. Thanks to the hard work of the students in Charlie Lawing and Larry Loc's animation classes, the Hall Of Fame is beginning to take shape. We still need volunteers to help us edit and format the entries, as well as people to draft the biographical sketches of their favorite artists. If you would like to help, please email me at sworth@animationarchive.org. In the meantime, check out the wonderful biographies of these greats...

James Stuart Blackton (See also... Animation Centennial 1906-2006) / Carlo Vinci / Art Babbitt (See also... Pencil Test of Art's Best Scene) / Shamus Culhane / John Kricfalusi / Ralph Bakshi (See also... Bakshi Phone Doodles) / Oskar Fischinger / Ollie Johnston / Osamu Tezuka

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3.) Classic Golden Books



We've collected and digitized an amazing library of images from the classic Golden Books of the 1940s through the 60s. Some of the finest artists in the business worked for Western Publishing on this series, including Gustaf Tenggren, Mel Crawford, Mary Blair and J.P. Miller. We are still working on digitizing the collection donated to us by John Kricfalusi, but so far, we have scanned the following books...

Tibor Gergely: A Day In The Jungle / Gustaf Tenggren: The Little Trapper / Mary Blair's Baby's House, Little Verses Part One and Part Two, The New Golden Song Book Part One, Part Two & Part Three / Al White: Rocky & His Friends & Huck Hound Builds A House / Mel Crawford: Rootie Kazootie Joins The Circus / 50s & 60s Album Covers Part One and Part Two / Early 50s Disney Christmas Cards / Disney's Uncle Remus Stories Part One and Part Two / Rojankovsky's Frog Went A-Courtin'

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2.) Vintage Newspaper Cartoons And Comics



Along with our Archive Alliance member, Digital Funnies, comic collector Kent Butterworth and the Milton Caniff Estate, we've brought you some wonderful newspaper strips, magazine cartoons, and comic books, many of which have never been reprinted. Here is just a small sampling of the material we've added to the archive database...

The Father of Cartooning: T. S. Sullivant / Virgil Partch: Here We Go Again & Man The Beast / Milt Gross: Cartoon Tour of New York, Sunday Pages Part One, Part Two and Part Three / Cliff Sterrett: Polly And Her Pals Part One, Part Two and Part Three / Hanna-Barbera: Huckleberry Hound Weekly / Harrison Cady: Bird's Eye Views / Jim Tyer: Funny Animal Comics / Basil Wolverton: Powerhouse Pepper / Boody Rogers: Babe Comics Part One, Part Two & Part Three / Rube Goldberg's Side Show / Milt Stein's Supermouse Comics No. 4 / Dan Gordon's Superkatt / Parody: Whack Comics (1953) / Milton Knight's Great Brown-Pericord Motor / Harvey Eisenberg's Foxy Fagan 1946 / Milton Caniff's Steve Canyon / Walt Kelly's Pogo / People on Paper (MGM/1945)

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1.) The $100,000 Animation Drawing Course



How much would it be worth to you to learn to draw for animation from two masters... one from the "golden age" of animation, and one of the top talents in the industry today? Well, you can do that right here on the ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive Blog with our online drawing course. Overseen by Ren & Stimpy creator, John Kricfalusi and using the long out-of-print original edition of Preston Blair's handbook on animation techniques, you can't find a better resource for honing your drawing skills. The individual lessons are in the sidebar of this site, but start out with the...

Introduction to the $100K Drawing Course
Preston Blair's Animation 1st Edition Part One / Part Two

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And That's Not All Folks...



Not surprisingly, the ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive has one of the most extensive collections of animation artwork in the world- material from every studio and era, from the earliest silent cartoons all the way through current television productions. Our focus is on artwork not archived elsewhere... drawings and cels from 1950s commercial animation houses, extinct New York studios and obscure cartoon producers from the golden age of cartoons. Here is just a small sampling of our collection...

Mike Lah and Quartet Films / Ray Patin Studios Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four, Part Five, Part Six / Vincent Waller Spumco Drawings / Herb Klynn's Unmade Animated Feature / Ralph Bakshi Phone Doodles / Katie Rice's Designs / Chuck Jones Layouts / Grim Natwick's Post UPA Commercials / Early 50s UPA Model Sheets / Reluctant Dragon and Pinocchio Model Sheets / Jules Engel's Alvin Show Color Keys / Model Sheets by Hurter and Thorson, Mice and Duck Model Sheets, and More Disney Model Sheets / Artwork from Disney's Bambi / Terrytoons Model Sheets / Herb Klynn's Pitch For The Shrimp / MGM Animation Drawings / Alex Toth Model Sheets

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Please donate whatever you can to support this important project. Your generosity is what keeps the ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive going. If you aren't financially able to contribute or if you already made a donation, please tell your friends about the Archive Project Blog. Link to this post from your website or blog, tell everyone you know about the ten good reasons to contribute to the ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive.

Thanks for all of your support and encouragement.

Stephen Worth
Director
ASIFA-Hollywood
Animation Archive

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Meta: How To Contribute

Our goal for a sustaining annual budget for the ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive is $250,000 a year. Although this may seem at first glance to be a difficult goal to achieve, it isn't impossible if all supporters of the project would pull together and contribute to the cause. If every member of ASIFA-Hollywood and every regular reader of this blog became a Project Partner, the goal would be reached and the project would be fully funded.

You can donate right now with a credit card using PayPal...

If you would like to donate by mail, please make your check payable to ASIFA-HOLLYWOOD, write "Animation Archive Project" on the note line, and mail it to...

ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive
2114 W Burbank Bl
Burbank, CA 91506

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Donor Categories

We ask all members of ASIFA-Hollywood to contribute. We have created an annual donation structure that will fit any member's budget.

BENEFACTOR ($25,000 and up)
Credit and logo appear with primary positioning on all publications and press releases regarding the Animation Archive Project for one year.

CORPORATE SPONSOR ($10,000)
Credit and logo appear on all publications and press releases regarding the Animation Archive Project for one year.

PROJECT SPONSOR ($5,000 and up)
Credit and thanks appear on all publications and press releases regarding the Animation Archive Project for one year.

PROJECT ANGEL ($500)
Credit and thanks appear on the ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive webpage and in the next Annie Awards Program.

PROJECT HERO ($100)
Credit and thanks appear on the ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive webpage.

PROJECT PARTNER ($50)
We are asking all members of ASIFA-Hollywood and everyone who follows the blog regularly to contribute $50 a year to help us expand our offerings. If everyone who uses this resource contributed in this way, we would be fully funded for the entire year.

PROJECT SUPPORTER (any amount)
Any donation, large or small is greatly appreciated and all funds collected will be used exclusively to establish the ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive.

You can donate right now with a credit card using PayPal...

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