Now I’m not saying this is the right way, or the only way to sketch the Hulk. This is just my way. The Man vs. Art way.  I am using a Wacom Graphire 3 Tablet and Autodesk Sketchbook Pro.

Again just like the last Demo, this is by no means  a finished piece.  Just a quick sketch with only the pencil tool and eraser tool. No fancy tools or filters or whatever. Just plain good old fashioned drawing and my thought process behind it. Enjoy!

Quick Wacom tablet Sketch of  Hulk.

1938 WALT DISNEY STUDIOS EMPLOYEE HANDBOOK!

I came a cross this old 18 PAGE Disney Studios Employee Handbook from 1938! It’s a brief outline of the Studio’s principal departments and an explanation to artists of its employment policies! The drawings are all  production drawings!

CLICK THE PIC FOR A PDF OF THE BOOKLET!

Get a load of the beautiful pencil sketches!  Look at the appeal and solid draftsmanship! The characters look alive and fun to draw don’t they!

I love this Mickey model! Right before they changed the proportions and eyes to look more “human”. To me this was the pinnacle of Mickey’s awesomeness!

Awesome with Awesome sauce!

This Goofy blows me away!  Everything in each drawing says dork! Look at how the hat follows the line of action!

The ultimate Goofy!

This is some very nice cartooning kids!  Inside the PDF of the booklet you’ll find mostly Snow White stuff and few pieces from their shorts and Silly Symphonies!  This is a great little collection of animation drawings from the Golden Age of Disney Animation!  I suggest you guys practice drawing these pics, and learn from them!

The last page is a flowchart that shows the pecking order at the studio and just how important Walt was to everyday operations! This is unreal!

If you’re hungry for more cartoon knowledge…..

Check out the right hand column under the blue Che’s Recommended  Books button for the official Man vs. Art must have book list! If you don’t have these books, you NEED to get them.

Ciao!

Raul

One of the most important lessons I ever learned in life was back in my animation school days at Rowland Animation in Rowland Heights California. The teacher Dave Master ran it more like a production than a class.

Dave Master by Chuck Jones

He has always been well connected with all the major studios, which got us a lot of nice perks!. We had people like Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnston, Chuck Jones and Tom Sito come by and lecture us.

Tom Sito came by and took us to school. L to R Raul Aguirre Jr, unknown,Tom Sito, Joseph Caro

Hanging with two legends….

Ollie Johnston, Frank Thomas, and a petite Raul Aguirre Jr. at the Rowland Animation Open House 1994

All of the equipment was donated by Dave’s connections at the studios. The best part was that the class was inexpensive and fun as hell.   IT was great!  The only catch was that you  needed to work your ass off.  Laziness was not tolerated, either you produced or you were gone.

Every year we would dust off everything and decorate the class/studio for an open house.  Parents and families and more importantly Animation industry professionals and recruiters would come by and check out our spread.  The 1994 Rowland Animation Open House was most memorable and that’s where I learned my lesson on what working in a collaborative studio environment was all about.

The Open House and Project from Hell.

That year the theme of the open house was Villains of Animation.  So the Entire place was decorated with every single villain from cartoon history you could think of!  Every student was assigned a section of the huge Rowland Studio to decorate following the design of the brilliant John Ramirez.  I ended up getting a crappy assignment shoved in a corner on top of a massive obstacle. Get this, I had to build a copy of Captain  Hook’s pirate ship from Peter Pan wrecked on some rocks. I had to cover up a big ugly wooden cabinet to boot only using cardboard, paper mache and paint!!

Everyone teased me that I would never finish, and that it would be impossible.  Or worse, that whatever I did would turn out like crap. I sucked it up like a man and got to work with only a fat little freshman kid I nicknamed “Spanky” to help me.

Lemonade from Lemons

Within a week I had a skeleton up and it was coming along nicely, and then something cool happened.  Luis Escobar’s cousin Hugo Soriano and George Benavidez jumped from the projects they were working on to help me! I guess they sensed something cool was going on in my corner!  George helped me sculpt the rocks and cannon out of paper mache and Hugo helped me with the ornate skull and bones decor on the ship’s back! We sanded and sculpted foam to form the shapes and Hugo busted out a paint sprayer and went to town! Meanwhile I had Spanky going on covert missions to jack any “supplies” we needed. Tape, brushes, paint, whatever. He may have been chubby, but Spanky was stealth!

I set up  lights in the cabin, and using a child’s toy I rigged a light behind the sail to spin around. It looked like Tinkerbell flying around! I even cut out a cardboard silhouette of Peter Pan and placed a spotlight behind it so it  would cast his shadow on the sail!  It looked AWESOME!  Plus I had finished two weeks ahead of everyone!  So I was like “Great! now I can kick back  and work on portfolio! So long Suckers!”

Captain Hook's ship by Raul Aguirre Jr, Hugo Soriano, George Benavidez, and Spanky.

L to R Crocodile, George Benavidez, Raul Aguirre Jr, Hugo Soriano. Not pictured "Spanky"

Dave Master said, “Not so fast Raul you’re not going anywhere!” He then called a mandatory emergency meeting.  Dave ordered the tearing down of a majority of the other projects because they were crap compared to my ship. He announced that my ship had raised the bar of the entire open house  and  was now the new standard by which  everyone else’s project had to measure up to.

For the next two weeks I was assigned to take the doomed Fern Gully The Last Rain forest room and save it, plus help out others along the way! I gathered my team and believe it or not got the job done! Turns out I’m a pretty good leader and problem solver!

This open house opened up the opportunity for many Rowland students to hook up gigs in the Animation Biz! 10 of us went to Disney, (yours truly included) others went to Film Roman, Warner Bros and just about every studio out there! You can’t walk into a professional animation studio without finding at least one Rowland Alumni! A true testament to the power of the program!

I gotta say, that group of people at Rowland was the hardest working most dedicated group of artists I ever had the pleasure of working with! Bless them all! Everyone involved turned out the most amazingly fantastic exhibit ever! Rowland Animation Forever!

Capering with my creation.

And the Moral of the Story is….

Dave Master had prepared me (as well as everyone else!) for a career working  in animation studios! He taught me leadership, humility, and the dire importance of  teamwork. But most importantly Dave had taught me to be a Pro! Not  every job would be enjoyable or cool. Sometimes I would have to work on stuff that was lame, or boring, and I had  to shut up and get to work!

Thank you Dave and all the  Rowland Animation Knuckleheads too!

Sherm Cohen from cartoonsnap.com sent me an article from cartoonist Hugh Mcleod’s brilliant blog gapingvoid.com that sums up what we artists all do for each other. We inspire each other!

click here and get it directly from Hugh. And for crying out loud sign up for the gapingvoid.com mailing list!

Hola Minions! Welcome to a hopefully new feature of  Man vs. Art.  I am resurrecting the drawing demonstrations and hope to post one every other week in between podcasts! IF you guys like this sort of stuff, I’ll do more. If you would like to suggest something you want me to draw send me an email to manvsart@manvsart.com!

First up is a pin up girl demo featuring Vampirella. Now I’m not saying this is the right way, or the only way to sketch a pretty girl. This is just my way. The Man vs. Art way.  I am using a Wacom Graphire 3 Tablet and Autodesk Sketchbook Pro.

This is by no means  a finished piece.  Just a quick sketch with only the pencil tool and eraser tool. No fancy tools or filters or whatever. Just plain good old fashioned drawing and my thought process behind it. Enjoy!

quick wacom tablet sketch of a pin up girl

Too much Dana is never enough!

I swear he looks like a Bond Villain.

"Excellent!"

Performing as a Gothic Mentalist at a very private affair. Winter Solstice, 2000.

Some funny stuff from the Dana Reemes Files!

Don’t you guys hate it when this happens?!

For the benefit of the laymen, here is what a clean up artist brings to the table in animation.

An awesome parody of the classic Ripley’s cartoons by madman Dana!

Lureline Weatherly:

a self-portrait.

She is Dana’s first wife and left quite an impression on him!

Ramses II’s Great Royal Wife Nofretari and Dana –Dana is the one on the right.

The Glamorous side of being an Animator.

Filmation also made live action Saturday morning kid shows.  One of them was Space Academy!  When it tanked, the abandoned  sci fi sets were  used to house artist cubicles! Studios will literally shove artist cubicles ANYWHERE!

When I was boy vs. art this stuff was THE BOMB!

File the next two under so horrible they are  great!

Shazam is cool.  Everyone knows that!

This takes the cake! Bigfoot raises an orphan and together they fight CRIME?!!

Will the REAL Ghostbusters please stand up?

Controversy!

While working at Filmation Dana had a ringside seat to the cartoon drama between “The Original Ghostbusters” and “The Real Ghostbusters.”

In 1984  Columbia Pictures released the blockbuster film Ghostbusters.   As they raked in millions  Columbia was clueless to their huge blunder.   Apparently they did not realize the name “Ghost Busters” was taken!  Believe it or not Filmation had already produced a live-action comedy series with that same name in 1975 starring Forest Tucker and Larry Storch.

In 1985 Filmation sued Columbia. As part of the out-of-court settlement, any cartoon based on the Columbia Pictures property could not be called “Ghostbusters.”  That title was reserved for Filmation!  Columbia had to name their cartoon show “The Real Ghostbusters” to directly distinguish it from the Filmation show.

Filmation then proceeded to call their version “The Original Ghostbusters.”

Columbia’s “The Real Ghostbusters was produced by DIC.

The Hunchback of Notre Dame.

I worked as a clean up  Inbetweener on the Phoebus Unit on  the 1996 Disney production The Hunchback of Notre Dame.  Phoebus was the handsome soldier who falls in love with the Gypsy Esmerelda.  He was interesting to work on thanks to some great rough animation by Russ Edmonds and Dave Brewster  as well as the charming voice performance by Kevin Kline.

But the helmet and sword gave my boss the suave  Brian Clift a hard time.  Anyway,   no matter how hard he tried he couldn’t get the props right.  The sword and helmet always morphed and wiggled.    The  head of the clean up department Vera Lanpher, wisely put Dana on the case!  It turns out Dana has a real knack for metal  props and his sense of  perspective  is razor sharp! Every frame of film that shows Phoebus’s helmet and or sword was done by Dana.

Helmet by Dana Reemes.

Something from the “Q” branch!

Dana owns a custom hand made animation lightbox setup made by the same guy who made the black acrylic animation discs at Disney.  It is beyond awesome! It collapses into a briefcase and comes with top and bottom pegs!  For $300.00 Dana got himself the coolest portable animation table set up I have ever seen.  Hand made in Korea!

Coolest animation lightbox ever!

Dana Reemes: The Filmmaker

NECROMANCE, a sequence from an unfinished feature film by Dana Reemes, is provided here as a public service by ManvsArt.com.  The names of the cast aand  crew have been changed to protect the identify of  some of the most prestigious individuals in the worlds of music, fashion, entertainment and the visual arts.  This film has been recognized for its artistic merit by countless audiences and critics over the years. NECROMANCE is, to put it bluntly, a deathless classic of the cinema.

Ahem!…..

Corrections!

I goofed in the last post a few times when it came to selecting images Dana admires.  So he wrote to me and pointed my mistakes out and offered his solutions. Here I cut and pasted Dana’s emails.  Isn’t he precious?!

Hey Raul, buddy,

It’s Dana “Not Tall” Reemes, here. Know you’re a busy guy, but thought I’d offer another suggestion for Man vs. Art. I think that Swafford’s great caricature would benefit from some judicious cropping; there’s too much negative space around the image. Use the crop tool and pretend you are an art framer. That’s all for now… Back to my writing.

Dear Raul,

Hope all is well. Don’t mean to be a pain in the ass, but thought I’d write. The TUROK material that you have up is not what I found particularly inspirational. I sent you a couple of really magnificent early painted covers by Morris “Moe” Gollub, who incidentally had been an assistant at Disney and was later a very distinguished layout guy and president of the MPSC 839 animator’s union when I joined up. Of course, I didn’t know any of this when I last saw you; Sito came by for an enjoyable visit on Friday and gave me an inscribed, author’s presentation copy of his illuminating book DRAWING THE LINE: THE UNTOLD STORY OF THE ANIMATION UNIONS FROM BOSKO TO BART SIMPSON. (You would like this book, as its primary focus is “man vs. art”; artists trying to make a living doing what they like to do best, while having to deal with bullshit all the time from greedy or incompetent employers.) Sito, for his part, had an error in the book, describing the cover paintings that Mo Gollub did for Western Publishing titles like TARZAN and TUROK, SON OF STONE as being for paperback books rather than comic books. Gollub was just a guy like us (only talented) who knocked out those beautiful covers in the late ’50s when he was about your age. It was just something he did on the side as he was basically an animator. As for the interior page art, the examples you have are from the garishly colored Darkhorse reprints of one of the early issues illustrated by Rex Maxon, an old-timer that had done the TARZAN full-color Sunday newspaper strip (back when such strips were a big deal) for years starting in 1930, until it was later taken over by Burne Hogarth and the great Russ Manning (who later did MAGNUS,ROBOT FIGHTER for Western Publishing). Maxon’s Turok work looked old-fashioned at the time and while professional, always appeared to be done in great haste, mostly with brush (it’s faster). The finest draftsman ever to work on TUROK, was Alberto Gioletti (correct spelling, this time) a highly trained Italian, who later went back to Rome and established a well-respected comic book publishing firm. Considering how fast he worked and how little he was paid, his work is of a very high illustrational standard; other artists still use his drawings for reference when doing all manner of things like jungle, rocks, caves, etc. His work was always well-researched and had a real look of verisimilitude. All of the living beings, humans, cave-men, dinosaurs, etc., convey a sense of anatomical conviction. Anyway, it is factually incorrect to say that I liked the “Italian artists” that did TUROK; everyone involved with TUROK over the years was American except for Gioletti. (To complicate matters slightly, Gollub’s great covers were done early on when Rex Maxon was still doing interior page art; some other decent, but second-rate guy did the covers later on when Alberto Gioletti was doing the inside pages.)

One last thing, Sito right away knew the cartoonist who did that “Out of the way, swine, a cartoonist is coming!” panel; it is New York artist Bernard “Hap” Kliban, usually known as B. Kliban, and remembered now mostly for his goofy cartoon cats. He died sometime in the ’90s. You need to give him credit for that panel which so perfectly summarizes the way we cartoonists deal with our perpetually shattered dreams and frustrated aspirations. CARTOONISTS RULE!

B. Kliban

Well, I’m getting back to work on my doctoral dissertation now… Good being back in touch with you.

Your pal,
Dana

Also….

Also, with regard to the MAGNUS material you posted, you should say that this was the work of the great Russ Manning, as some of your fan-boy minions will no doubt know this and wonder at the oversight. Check out the way Manning does Magnus’ girlfriend in the finely-pleated, partly transparent mini-dress–very sexy, yet demure.  Don’t think he ever did the cover art though.

Here’s some random pages of Russ Manning MAGNUS art for you to pick through. Looked really good to me when I was a teenager!

Oh yeah, before I forget!

Also get a load of the latest Ghettomation Podcast! A fun and crazy animation round table discussion I take part in with Jim Lujan and Kevin Cross!

One last thing….

ManvsArt.com’s  Subcommandante  Jim Lujan has just released his first DVD Ghettomation Garden.  If you like stuff that is different, innovative, and funny then this is for you.

The reviews are in!

“I gushed my chonies….in a good way!”

The Che Guevara T-Shirt.

“I couldn’t stop laughing for hours!  And that was just while trying to get the shrink wrap off the DVD case!”

Raul Aguirre Jr.

Total with shipping: $13.00 USD

For less than a 12 pack of Dos Equis! ($13.49)

But just as fun and twice as intoxicating!

Thanks for dropping by!

Ciao.

R.

Dearest Minions!

Before we get going on today’s guest, I have a special cartoon my guest found a while ago,  and gave me.  This made me laugh so hard, milk came out my nose.  I wasn’t even drinking milk at the time!

Probably one of Funniest Cartoons I have ever seen!

Here is a film I mentioned at the beginning of the podcast that you guys HAVE to see.  The 1965 film The Agony and the Ecstasy directed by Carol Reed, starring Charlton Heston as Michelangelo and Rex Harrison as Pope Julius II.  A raging era of titans, popes and princes… of conspiracy and conflict… of turmoil and transgressions… of a man among men… of magnificence!

Pope Julius is eager to leave behind works by which he will be remembered. To this end he muscles Michelangelo into painting the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. When not on the battlefield, the Pope constantly nags the crap out of Michelangelo to speed up his painful work on the frescoes.

The main Course.

Today I am going to introduce to you a very special friend of mine from way back in my Disney days.  His name is Dana Reemes and he is the cat’s pajamas!

I used to stay late at the studio every night and work on my own animation projects.  You know me, I’m always trying to better myself.  I figured I wasn’t going to be at Disney forever and wanted to take full advantage of my time there.  Dana worked nights as well and we became friends.

Professor Dana Reemes.

This is Dana in his study.  Animator, Film maker, Egyptologist, Professor, Cartoonist, Published Writer, Explorer, and good buddy!

Earliest work.

Dana’s “Artism” manifested itself at age two. Check out the choo choo!

Comic Resume.

This is Dana’s clever as hell resume he used to get his first animation job at Filmation in 1979. He just walked in and showed them this.  He was hired on the spot! No portfolio or nuthin’!

Remember Atomic Sit ups in middle school?

Person 1 is conned into performing “the hardest sit-up ever” an Atomic sit up. Person 1 then lies on their back and are told to cross hands on their chest. Person 2 then holds a towel over the face of person 1 covering the eyes telling him sit up quickly with all his strength when he says to.  Meanwhile person 3 has removed their pants and is squatting over person 1′s face with out him knowing. Person 2 then tells person 1 to sit up and quickly  removes the towel as soon as the sit up begins. The result has person 1′s nose  planted into person 3′s ass.

Here Dana has drawn a gag cartoon showing off a automatic atomic sit-up machine!

Caricature of Dana Reemes by Michael Swafford.

I knew Michael Swafford while I was working on Disney’s Hercules in 1997.    Mike  supervised the animation of Hermes and was truly one of the most talented animators I had ever seen!  I mean look at this caricature of Dana he did!  EXCELLENT!

Robert Crumb!

Dana met Robert Crumb in 1969 in the flea bag Miramonte  Hotel on Mission Street where Robert was staying at the time.  Dana brought his sketchbook and Robert kindly went over it with him!  Not only that, Crumb gave some sage advice as well as a Crowquill Penpoint!  Believe it or not Dana still has it! Behold!

Minions! I got to hold a pen Crumb gave Dana in 1969!

Robert also handed Dana a gel capsule of high grade LSD called Owsley’s White Lightning.

One of the first underground chemists to mass produce high-quality LSD in the 1960′s was Owsley Stanley.  .

Owsley produced his LSD in Los Angeles and once he had a huge batch,  he drove to the bay area where he supplied LSD to Ken Kesey and the Merry Pranksters for their acid tests. Through them he also met the Grateful Dead in 1966 and began supporting them both financially and as a sound man.

Owsley’s best-known acid was “White Lightning” (300,000 doses) made in 1966-1967.

Robert Crumb’s  music!

Dana Also turned me on to Robert Crumb’s band “The Cheap Suit Serenaders”

They play covers of 1920′s Tin Pan Alley Jazz! Holy cow what find!  Highly recommended!  A new Man vs. Art favorite!

Here is one of my favorite songs “The Fine Artist Blues” from the album Chasin’ Rainbows.

I dedicate this song to all the Man vs. Art Minions out there!

Thanks Dana for turning me onto these jams!  And thanks Robert Crumb for your cartoons and now your music!!

Twinkle Toes Dana the Ballet Pirate!

Okay guys, here are two pics of Dana in a pirate costume from the Sacramento Junior Ballet’s 1962 all-ballet production of Peter Pan! This is how he  looked when the teen bathing-beauty nymphets threw his butt  in the deep end of the pool.  You’ve seen the pictures!  You CAN’T unsee them!

My doesn’t he look fierce and manly?  ARRRRRRRRR!!!!

Dana’s fave Comics.

Dana really enjoyed Curt Swan’s Lois Lane for it’s elegance and theatrical posing.

Dana Also dug the Italian artists who drew Turok! Son of Stone!

This is beautiful work!  Nothing fancy, just good solid drawing!  I love these!

Magnus Robot Fighter was another of Dana’s choices!

This is some really good stuff!  I love the way he draws the girls!  The panel flow is really smooth and each composition is tight!

Filmation!

This is a clean up pencil test of Skeletor from the 1980′s Filmation Cartoon He Man and the Masters of the Universe. My friend Dana Reemes provided the clean up assistant animation on this scene. I just took the photocopies he loaned me, scanned them, and put together this animation test.

Filmation’s early stuff!

Believe it or not Filmation’s first gigs were doing the opening credit sequences for  Italian Giallo  which were the first  sexual thrillers.

Although they did not do the titles for this particular Giallo film, I wanted to share it with you guys because it is just so insanely awesome! Blood and Black Lace Directed by the Great Mario Bava!

Check out the trailer! In bleeding COLOR!

Here are the opening Credits.

The 2010 Geeks Con!

Here is your Man vs. Art probably talking about art.  Probably!

Getting some sugar from my babe, The Lovely and Vivacious Hortencia.

Melissa admires the display Hortencia put together for Man vs. Art!

Hortencia did an exceptional job of putting together my display! She matted my prints, bagged the cards and books, and dug up the vertical display things!  My stuff looked rad!

Sherm Cohen and I hammed it up big time!  It was great to meet him and his wife! Sherm is quite a talented fellow!  The poor dude has a bone spur in his foot and hobbled in on crutches! What a trooper! The kids gushed their chonies with his Sponge Bob stuff which looked friggin’ awesome!  Get Well Sherm!

John Narcomey is a bigger ham than Sherm and I put together.

The super talented Rafael Navarro is always a stud!

Ted Seko buffed and talented!  Dig that sketch guys!

Geo Brawn IV and Nancy.  What a nice couple!  Love the jewelry Geo! The dark one Geo had the kids gushing their chonies as well, only out of fear!

Javier Hernandez and Jim Lujan, now this is what I call studs!

Geeks Con 2010 was a blast and I can’t wait until next year!

That’s enough for now!

Ciao!

R