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Hola Minions!

On today’s podcast I have a nice long chat with Animation Great Tom Sito! He’s an artist, animator, director writer, teacher and historian! He has more cartoon knowledge and experience in one fingernail than any of us have collectively!

Tom Sito at the Smithsonian

Tom has been in the biz for a long time and is fun as hell! He’s seen and done it all and continues to be a totally awesome advocate of toons!

Tom was trained by some notable animation artists of Hollywood’s Golden Age as well as cartoonist legends like Harvey Kurtzman  and Shamus Culhane. He has worked in almost all sides animation production- Feature films, television, titles, industrials and commercial advertising.

Tom was a regular at the Walt Disney Studio during it’s renaissance in the late 1980′s and 1990′s.  He works in traditional pencil animation as well as 3D Maya and FLASH.

What a character!

Tom has taught animation at several major universities for over  twenty years and has lectured, done seminars and judged festival competitions around the world. He has donated much time to non-profit projects to aid the cartooning/animation community and its workers as a whole, like ASIFA, the National Cartoonists Society, the Motion Picture Academy of Arts & Sciences and the Animation Guild.

Tom’s  goals are to keep working on projects that interest him, keep writing and hopefully fulfill the pledge of his generation to ensure the legacy of quality personality animation is passed on from Classic Hollywood to future generations, and not lost due to corporate indifference and slipping standards.

Here is Tom Sito (center) with yours truly (left) when he went to lecture my class during the production of Beauty and the beast!

Holy crap this was twenty years ago! Suddenly I feel very old.

Tom Sito Rules!

You can check out Tom’s website here!

Check out Tom’s Book

click the pic to get your book!

As cartoons and animated features became an increasingly important part of the entertainment business, the production of cartoons industrialized to meet growing demands for the new global media. Artists adopted traditional union models to protect their jobs and working conditions, and a unique set of unions was born.

Drawing the Line is the first labor history of an industry whose principle figures–Walt Disney, Chuck Jones, and Max Fleischer–helped define American entertainment. Author Tom Sito, Disney animator and former president of the Hollywood Animation Guild, draws on oral histories, archival information, and firsthand knowledge of the animation process to create an insider’s history of a colorful set of labor unions.

Sito describes the history and fiery personalities behind the formation of the Screen Cartoonists Union, the strikes and walk-outs, the effects of Hollywood blacklisting, and the battles at the bargaining tables. He closes with a look at the changing nature of animation and the way in which current giants Disney and Dreamworks are again reshaping the relationship between studios and animators. Well illustrated with never-before-seen images from the backstage of classic Hollywood, Drawing the Line will change basic assumptions about animation history and its place in the story of American labor.

I hope you guys enjoy my visit with Mr. Tom Sito!

The 2010  San Gabriel Valley Comics Fest

Man I had a blast at this comics jamboree!

The Man at the MAn vs. Art Table!

The Lovely and Vivacious Hortencia rode shotgun on this job!

Occasionally brooding and Lovely and vivacious!

Hortencia and Graciella Rodriguez. BTW Graciella spearheaded this whole event! She did a knockout bad ass job! Way to go Gras!

Sherm Cohen and his wife Doris busting out the Sherm Swag big time!

The Sherminator!

Who would have thought the Lord of Darkness Geo Brawn IV would be engaged to someone named Nancy?  What a great couple though eh?

His evil darkness and Nancy.

Javier Hernandez hooked me up with a Citizen Sanchez Doll! How @%#!!ing awesome is this?

Pretty damned awesome if you ask me!

Sanchez Doll by Javier. El Muerto mask by Hortencia.

I even went up and did a half hour seminar on drawing for cartoons! I actually filled up the seating area. Should have charged man!

Me talking about what else? Cartooning!

Jim Lujan Ghettomation Station!

Jim Lujan at the Ghettomation table.

The white grease board behind Jim is courtesy of me. Every couple of hours or so I changed the image to something stupider and stupider! I called it the evolving poster!

Check  out two of the incarnations.

Steve Sievers from the hit animated web series Supa Pirate Booty Hunt was on site too! The guys in the white coats with the net were close behind!

Arrrrrr! Matey! Shiver me timbers!

A couple of my Artist pals decided the time was right to let me have it. With ink that is.  And so they did.

Fist up Geo drew me up as a ZOMBIE!!! Niiiiiice!

Raul by Geo!

then Jim Lujan drew me up as his fantasy or something.  I dunno. Am I that sexy?

In Jim Lujan's Dreams.

Finally Sherm sketched me while I was sketching.

I was Sherminated!

Looking at these pictures and drawings of myself I realize that I need a freakin’ haircut BIG TIME!

Ciao!

R