Twice Upon A Time: The Movie That Time Forgot (Part 1)

This is Part 1 of 2. Click here for Part 2.


Image courtesy of John Baker.


If you happen to buy the most recent (and dare I say best) issue of Amid Amidi's excellent Animation Blast, you will be treated to a breezy article on the making of a forgotten animated feature that was released during the not-so-hot-for-animation year of 1983. TWICE UPON A TIME is hardly a film that rolls off the lips of animators very easily. No listing on best-of lists. No pages devoted to it in most (if any) animation books. The film will probably offer a quirky tilt of the head like a dog hearing a high pitched noise for your average Joe Q. Moviegoer. What little is remembered of this small and unassuming film is murky. Cloudy. Bordering on urban legend. "Say, didn't Lucas direct that one?" Sigh. No, he didn't. But he did have a hand in getting it produced. Interested now? I was when I found out about this odd fact. In fact, exactly how I found out about this film was murky in itself. I don't really know how I found out about TWICE, but I do remember renting it back when you rented only VHS's. The box cover was faded. It looked dated. I rented it because of two things: 1) George Lucas was involved; and 2) It was supposedly animated using an unusual process of cut paper and lit from behind. This I had to see. The problem is, I don't really remember much about it after that. Why? What happened? Did I just succumb to the fates of this poor film? Was this an alternate to that crazy videotape in the horror film, THE RING, but instead of being killed off by a black-haired spook child, anyone who watches TWICE UPON A TIME will immediately forget about it, forever keeping this quirky little film in total and complete obscurity?

Apparently, writer Taylor Jessen didn't fall prey to the fates. Jessen, who writes on occasion for AWN, has probably been the most vocal advocate for this forgotten film, first writing about it back in 2004, to mark the 20th anniversary of its airing on HBO. Featuring "where are they now" interviews and updates on the main principals of the film, the article, along with the one in the Blast, revived my curiosity. Jessen's writing is engrossing. I couldn't help but get so immersed in the story of the film's battered production, of the way it was dropped after two weeks in theatres, how mastermind and director John Korty created Lumage, an animation technique that was basically translucent cutout fabric, how cameraman (and now big-time Hollywood director) David Fincher and Henry Selick (yes, the one and the same) almost got into fisticuffs, how a house was transformed into a make-shift studio, how tons of backgrounds and artwork were practically given away after production to a complete stranger off the street, etc. TWICE is a subject that Jessen holds very near and dear to him, remembering with fervent glee the PG version with cuss words (they were exorcised in the lasderdisc version released later), and reciting favorite lines with his sister as some sort of secret animation society, population: 2. TWICE UPON A TIME has never been released on DVD. It's not on any list of upcoming releases. This movie needs a white knight. Taylor just might be that knight. He's got his work cut out for him, however. Warner Bros, the company who owns the negative, has no interest in releasing it, apparently. Why? What's wrong with it? Is it any good?

After watching it recently, I really enjoyed the film. The pacing is a bit slow, but that's to be expected from a feature film released before the proliferation of MTV's quick cuts and fast edits. The animation is quite impressive, especially when you take into account that it's all done with cut paper. It's stop-motion with effects done in camera. To make all of it look effortless is no easy task. The animators had to cut out each and every character in order for them to move. Mind numbing! Crazy technique, but I think it's worth it. There are some scenes that are really amazing to watch, with jaw-dropping backgrounds and gorgeous scenery. I couldn't stop noticing all the beautiful layouts and colorful environments. The way the light filters through the translucent paper (pellon) gives the entire film a feel of a stained glass window coming to life, with rich textures and a warm glow. The characters are lovable oddballs, possessing some great voices from actors who were known for their improvisational skills and extreme dry wit and humor. The story is paper thin, however (pun intended), and the film suffers from the dreaded "dated" syndrome. It totally reeks of early 80's, thanks to the forgotten pop tunes that are scattered throughout the film. For a movie about getting stuck in time, it literally is stuck in time.


Image courtesy of John Baker.

But that doesn't mean that TWICE UPON A TIME should be forgotten. It's a landmark film for stop-motion animation, and for animation in general. There's some great animation as well as some great visuals -- it deserves to be seen and studied by animation professionals. It boggles the mind why there's a constant flow of direct-to-DVD releases of the wretched LAND BEFORE TIME series, yet TWICE UPON A TIME sits on a shelf somewhere, probably lost in a dark warehouse. Why is there not a DVD release of TWICE? How hard would it be to get it out there, offering a chance for it to find a whole new audience?

What can be done about this? Who knows. But if you want to know more, please read Taylor Jessen's previously mentioned article online first. Then, order Animation Blast #9 to read his other article on the making of the film. And lastly, keep reading...

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I finally cornered the mad busy Taylor Jessen to talk with him about TWICE UPON A TIME, to see if there have been any updates since writing his two articles on the film.


WARD: So after your pieces on TWICE UPON A TIME on your site and in the Animation Blast, has there been any new developments with the film?

TAYLOR: Negative still collecting dust somewhere. Wikipedia entry still hopelessly inaccurate. Former TWICE UPON A TIME animators very pleased. (They’d love to get that overtime pay someday, though.)


Image courtesy of John Baker.

Has there been any talk in the industry about getting a decent print of this film released onto DVD? Anything?

None that I know of. Last year I sent copies of Animation Blast to George Feltenstein, Ronnee Sass, and George Parker at Warner Home Video. But of course it’s one thing to think that a movie’s making-of story is interesting, and it’s quite another to decide that reissuing said movie on home video would make financial sense for your corporation. Let’s be honest, the only people who know about this film are animators and a few wise-ass GenX-ers who saw it on HBO back in the day. We’re a fickle crowd. Financially, reissuing some much-beloved Astaire & Rogers musicals or a box set of The O.C. is a much safer bet, and no doubt there are many catalogue titles that are a higher priority for WHV.


Who holds the distribution rights to the film - isn't it Warner Bros.? Is there any way that Warner Bros. could be persuaded to do something about this? Online petitions, perhaps? I mean, it's just sitting on the shelf, right? Collecting dust?

I believe that Warners holds the rights, since Alan Ladd told me that if he had George Lucas’ money he’d buy it back. I don’t know that there’s any way to persuade Warner Bros. to reissue TWICE on home video. Online petitions are highly unlikely to work (witness the battle to get Vivian Stanshall’s Men Opening Umbrellas Ahead album reissued at Warners). In John Korty’s words, “All it takes is for someone with clout to get interested.”

But there are several reasons to continue to think positively: First, no one who is now in charge at Warner Bros. probably cares about this film one way or the other. That’s an advantage, all things considered. Back in 1983, with Ladd Company turning into a profit sink after releasing good but profit-challenged movies like BLADE RUNNER and STAR 80 and THE RIGHT STUFF, many WB executives probably wished they could just pick up Alan Ladd’s little production shingle and dump it in the Yangtze. Now BLADE RUNNER's a classic, and TWICE UPON A TIME is just forgotten. That's a start. Second: despite the fact that Warner doesn’t have a projectable print, I think it’s very likely that the negative is safe and sound and probably very clean. You’d be amazed how good a film can look when a studio simply packs it in an airtight can and forgets about it for twenty years. Take PLAGUE DOGS, a film by the makers of WATERSHIP DOWN, which came and went in theaters in the mid-1980s. Rent that DVD tonight and prepare to be shocked – super-clean, vivid colors, looks like it was shot last week. (Also prepare to have your evening ruined, in the best possible way. You will cry buckets.)


What does Korty think about all this?

I don’t think Korty thinks about this film much anymore. He’s moved on. The latest film project of his that I know about, and I laughed helplessly at the beauty of it when he told me, involved Korty going up to people on the street with a digicam and asking them “So what’s your screenplay idea?” His interviewees would then expound their ideas over three to five minutes. He later strung them together into a feature-length documentary. Presto!


How hard was it for you to get a hold of all the people involved with the film for interviews, etc, for your articles? Was it easy for some to talk about their experiences of working on the film, hard for others?

It varied. Almost everybody was willing to talk to me until the cows came home. Animator Will Noble was a little reticent at first. Producer Sue Kennedy is a librarian now and has more or less relegated that part of her life to history. Editor Jennifer Gallagher was bloody impossible to find – my notes from trying to track her down run to four pages – but she was more than happy to talk for an hour long-distance from Germany. With David Fincher I really lucked out; he was in preproduction on Lords of Dogtown when animator Carl Willat called him up and suggested he talk to me. David phoned me up and we set up an interview in his Hollywood office, and we ended up yakking for three damned hours. How in hell could a man this busy afford to give some animation writer three hours of his time to talk about a movie on which he was basically a camera assistant? Simple – there was someone on the production of Dogtown who wanted him for a meeting and David wanted to avoid that meeting. I was his excuse.

Actually there is one person on the crew that the crew and I particularly wanted to re-connect with whom we never found, and her name is KERRY PETERSON. If anyone out there knows what became of Kerry, if she has a new last name, or where she may be, PLEASE let me know at Ironybread at Earthlink dot Net.


Image courtesy of John Baker.

Did you find any obstacles in writing your articles on TWICE?

I wish George Lucas had talked to me. I queried his office about an interview several times over several years, both while he was in production on Episode III and after it was released. He passed. And I wish I had been able to find that super-collector who went up to Korty when Korty Films was closing up shop and took so much animation art off of Korty’s hands. He still hasn’t come forward.


In your articles, you mention that there's stuff that was filmed but never made it in the movie. Care to go into more detail?

There are a lot of shots that the animators described that didn't make the final cut. Some of them got saved on various animators' demo reels. There's Greensleeves' death scene, which was originally meant to play right before Ralph gives the last unused dime back to FGM. There's an early scene with Ralph done when he was still voiced by Bud Cort. And Korty talked about a live action sequence that had to be cut: When Ralph and Mum are futzing with the hands of The Clock and time is fast-forwarding and rewinding, you can see just a few frames of what looks like a struggle involving some nuns in an elevator. What's actually going on there is that they're battling an inflatable woman. In a two-and-a-half-minute scene that was shot but didn't make the final cut, there are some nuns in an elevator, and a man enters carrying sex doll in his briefcase. And slowly it starts to self-inflate. The man with the suitcase is a talented pantomime named Geoff Hoyle.

Mark West animated a scene that was supposed to be inserted right after the nightmare with Ralph and Mum in the office: In the original cut, the paper cutter blade comes down on Mum, and Ralph can't find him after the nightmare is over. He thinks Mum's been shredded. He spends the next part of the movie really down, and he's wandering around the frozen landscape when he sees the Balloon guy in the park. Ralph goes into his ear, and starts wandering through the memories in the guy's head. He used to be a pilot, and his head is full of images of planes and flight, and at the end of the tunnel there's a child's drawing of a plane - and Ralph finds Mum there.

There's other footage and audio that may still exist. Brian Narelle says Entertainment Tonight came to the studio at one point, and later they broadcast a four-minute piece about the production. There's probably a demo version of the song "Twice Upon a Time" with vocals by Michael McDonald in one of Michael's storage units. And we hope somewhere there's a tape of the sessions at Abbey Road with the London Symphony Orchestra, because Maureen McDonald describes how the complete version of "Life Is But a Dream" does something we never knew about: "The amazing part comes right where they faded it out [after the lyric "...like dreams do", before the Fig is attacked by the vulture], which always bummed us out, because there was this huge bridge section that Mike wrote that really is a great moment."


Is it crazy to think that maybe some of this footage could be put in a Special Features section if TWICE gets released on DVD?

Licensing the outtakes would probably be a breeze, because it’s all Korty Films copyright. It all depends on what the animators kept for their demo reels. The Korty Films archives on TWICE UPON A TIME is very very small because of what happened when the studio closed, but a lot of animators kept workprint footage as resume material. Which is yet another example of how, in the end, the artist is usually his/her own best archivist. The bigger the company, the more likely the thing will be saved. On Lilo and Stitch, they animated a very funny Big Chase Scene Finale where an airliner did a 90-degree barrel roll between a row of buildings and knocked the ice cream off a pedestrian’s ice cream cone. That footage still exists, because there is a Disney Archives. On the other hand Harley made all those great translight backgrounds for TWICE UPON A TIME. Those don’t exist, because there was a garage sale. When we catch ourselves thinking “Boy, I hope somebody’s keeping this footage/artwork/music” it’s probably a sure sign that the answer is no, so when in doubt, we must always remember to pony up the cash for that DigiBeta/hi-res scan/CD dupe and make that digital clone and take it home and wrap it in plastic and KEEP IT!


After watching the film, I couldn't help but notice how, um, dated it felt, mostly with the songs. Do you think that this could be one of the reasons why TWICE UPON A TIME is not high priority in WB's eyes to release the film on DVD?

Definitely. Actually as we know the equation is very complicated but in this case that may be the variable that counts most. Every studio would like every film in its catalogue to be a revenue stream, but every DVD title is an investment in terms of restoration/authoring/art direction – so before they make it the home video department has to figure out how to sell it. Popular titles sell. Historically important titles get made even if they don’t sell because they generate prestige. TWICE UPON A TIME is a tough sell because it’s not popular and not everyone is convinced it’s historically important.

Let’s line up TWICE UPON A TIME against, say, OUTLAND. They’re both Warner Bros. / Ladd Company films, and they’re both still not in profit. OUTLAND stars Sean Connery – major audience draw. It had a wide theatrical release and has been recycled endlessly on TV, so lots of people have seen it. Plus the movie is still not in profit. Three really good incentives to squeeze some more blood from that stone and get it out on DVD. Result: yes, it’s available on DVD.

TWICE UPON A TIME has no star name attached except George Lucas, and he skews sci-fi, NOT animated comedy, so already you’re confusing people if you put his name on the box. TWICE is not in heavy rotation on TV so very few people have seen it – Ralph, Mum, and Botch are not familiar faces. There will not be high demand for this DVD. So already Warners is taking a chance on making their costs back just by paying to put it out.

In the end you’re left with a movie that has no cultural baggage, because it’s just a complete blank to almost everyone. A lot of the motivation behind a DVD reissue could simply come from whether or not the decision-makers at Warner Home Video like it – or think their kids would. I don’t think they do, and yes, the music is probably a big reason why not. The movie suffers that terrible Pop Disease where you put what you know is a sure-fire hit song in your movie, and then you wake up in ten years and realize that you ended THE ADDAMS FAMILY with a song by MC Hammer. WHEN THE WIND BLOWS also has the Pop Disease. Those original songs by Roger Waters and David Bowie simply screamed NOW! in 1986, and now they just scream THEN!

Of course you can take all this theorizing and COMPLETELY DISREGARD IT, because ROCK AND RULE got its own two-disc special edition, and there’s even a DVD of THE LAST UNICORN. If THE LAST UNICORN can get its own DVD, anything can.


Do you think that hey, since Lucas has tinkered with his baby, the original STAR WARS films, that maybe, just maybe, he would be willing to do the same with TWICE UPON A TIME?

Somebody might want to tinker with it, but Lucas won’t. He couldn’t even find the motivation to sit for a one-hour phone interview about TWICE UPON A TIME.


What was it like connecting with people who worked on a film that made such an impression on you when you were young?

This was nothing short of magic. I relate to this film first of all as a fan. By making this film, this crew made me laugh. I respect that a lot. So connecting with the crew, the actors and the animators and the creators who made this film so damned funny, was like meeting Rod Rescueman.


Since CG hasn't entirely made stop-motion obsolete, do you think that there are people out there willing to give Lumage a try? Or has technology made it virtually moot? Or do you think that it's not really worth all the trouble?

There are two reasons to do traditional Lumage animation: one, to do Lumage animation, and two, to produce animation in a Lumage style. If you consider only the second reason, there’s no practical reason to do traditional Lumage at all. Lumage has three basic parameters: The characters are made of Pellon. The backgrounds are translucent and lit from behind. The animation is performed in cut-out. So consider the Pellon first: Use acrylics and it looks X. Dip it in a bucket of paint and it looks Y. Dab at it selectively with watercolors and it looks Z. Add movement from frame-to-frame and it can take on any quality from a solid block of color to a wild boil. But all of that can be simulated in CGI. Despite all its complexity as a physical object with light shining through it, when you simulate it Pellon becomes just another texture whose behavior is more or less predictable. Even that watercolor boil can be simulated if you introduce a defined randomness. Then there’s the backgrounds – at Korty Films they used huge transparencies with blown-up photos or painted designs. Again, easy to simulate in CGI. Then there’s the cut-out style, with that signature funky, jerky movement. South Park has been doing that digitally for years. So if your goal is simply to create something that looks like Lumage, you don’t need to do traditional Lumage. You can do it in the computer. No fuss, no mess.

What worries me is that no one’s doing Lumage for the first reason, which is to do Lumage. Animating in coiled wire requires a unique skill set. Animating in sand requires a unique skill set. Flash, After Effects, cotton balls, Lumage, Maya, all these animation techniques require unique skill sets. And I don’t think it behooves us to decide that we have nothing left to learn from Lumage. The more skills you know, the better an artist you are, no matter what your medium. And everyone who’s transitioned from traditional animation to 3D knows that even though they’re very different skill sets, there’s always thing A that the animator learned over there in the Traditional world that helped enormously when it came time to do thing B over here in CGI. Imagine what we still can learn from Lumage. And the materials are certainly there. We still have Pellon, we still have transparencies, we still have light boxes, we still have big planes of glass. Animators can do it, so animators probably should do it, because a good artist never stops learning. That’s the personal enrichment angle. Which is to say nothing of the aesthetic angle. I love how Lumage looks, and I want more. And it doesn’t have to look like it did when Korty did it – the field is wide open. Here’s this amazing technique that one American studio used for twenty years, and then they stopped, and that was it. Think of all the copper left down in that mine!


What's next for the film?

What’s next is, an animation producer or director who grew up with TWICE UPON A TIME and loved it needs to bite the bullet and do another film just like it. We need a new animated feature done in exactly the same style. Or maybe something that looks like Lorenzo. Or Toot Whistle Plunk & Boom. Something where you can tell the designers have cast off the shackles and are having the time of their lives. It must come from an established animation studio who can sell it based on the performance of their previous features, but it can’t look or sound like any of those features. It has to get that visual style and that improv sensibility out there in one film, and this film must look and sound as unlike Shrek as possible. The voice direction has to be improv-driven, which means it has to be guided by animation people who’ve already worked in that milieu. Tom Snyder’s Soup2Nuts team could do it, or maybe Christopher Guest could do it using his repertory company, Shearer and O'Hara and Levy et al, who as a group have logged some impressive hours as animation voice-over professionals.

The point is, a production entity with an established brand has to take TWICE UPON A TIME into its hearts and RIP IT OFF, MERCILESSLY. We need another movie with all the glee and all the memorable characterizations and all the beautiful oddball design sense of TWICE. Once that happens, and audiences learn to read the style, the TWICE UPON A TIME DVD reissue will take care of itself.


For the uninitiated, where can one go to view TWICE? What's the best possible copy out there?

For optimum viewing, purchase a laserdisc player (very possible) and the TWICE UPON A TIME laserdisc (very impossible). If you don’t want to get that involved, buy the VHS. Five copies are currently available for $42 and under from the big webseller with the river in the title.


Thanks, Taylor, for taking the time to answer my questions about TWICE UPON A TIME. Let's hope that we'll be seeing this lost animated gem available again one day.

Thanks for asking. Skål! And remember everybody: KERRY PETERSON. First person to find her gets a copy of Animation Blast and a free can of Buzz Cola. Email me at ironybread at earthlink dot net.

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Thanks to Taylor, I've got some images from various sources about the making of the film. (Click on each image to view it larger.)

From ASIFA-Hollywood's GRAFFITI newsletter, 1981:



The following images were from American Cinematographer, May 1983:

This is a great shot of animators' hands carefully preparing nightmare bombs on cut-out images of workers in the office scene:


Camera set-up of the office scene:


Various sequential cut-outs of Mum:



Here's a storyboard sequence with some potential gags by Kai Pindal:


Frivoli character cut-outs:

Below are some screengrabs of the film. Oh, and a word or two about these screengrabs before you see them: they were taken from a VHS copy of a VHS copy of the film. So, we're talking not the best quality here. And I apologize for that. But it's some way for you all to get some sense of what this film looks like, to excite and inspire you. More will be posted with Part Two. Again, click on each image to view larger:




















This is the end of Part One. What's in store for Part Two? Why, an interview with the art director of TWICE UPON A TIME, Harley Jessup! Expect that, along with some more screengrabs soon.

UPDATE: Click here for Part 2.

False alarm?

Ah, well, all is not lost. Our ol' trusty computer is still alive and kicking it seems. Now the impetus in getting a new one is twice as a strong. You know, just in case.

if i cussed i would be doing that right now

Our computer is on the fritz. We knew that this day would come. It's a sputtering Powerbook G4 that's seen better days. Oh well. I'm in the process of retrieving our Mail folders, which seems to be one positive. And we had just backed up all our photos the other day. So we got that going for us. But it's not looking good in the long run for that little computer. Right now, Andrea's headed over to the Mac store to see what we can afford, if anything at all. Jeez. I hate this.

Just bear with us.

Portland's calling

On CNN.com today there's a nice write-up on Portland in the Travel section. Seems like Portland is the place to be at the moment, especially when the NY Times has been singing the Rose City's praises for some time now (read this, this, this, and, oh, yeah...this).


The magnificent Hollywood Theatre on NE Sandy Blvd. Photo by Andrea.

All of it is deserving. Portland is, indeed, a "nice" city. With five quadrants (NW, N, NE, SE & SW) the city's layout is easy to understand and easy to navigate. The people are nice, especially while driving. Need convincing? Read this. A welcome change from Atlanta's heated cesspool, otherwise known as traffic. For an Atlantan, the nice drivers can be a bit "too" nice, however, especially when you're in a hurry. But I digress....


At Oaks Amusement Park. Photo by Andrea.

It's been so easy to love this new city of mine, with what seems to be TONS of things to do with kids in tow. We just recently checked out the Oaks Amusement Park this past Friday, and, even though it wasn't like good ol' Six Flags Over Georgia (Monster Plantation, anyone?), it still had the wonder and awe that only old skool rides can make for summer memories. They even had a roller rink, which I SWEAR had the exact smell of the 1970's -- they should somehow bottle it up and sell it on the street corners of America. I'd buy it. Ava and Ezra were loving the kiddie rides, all of which bordered on the "carny" side. In fact, the entire park screamed CARNY -- they just never left town. (The park's been a staple of SE Portland since 1905!) It was the perfect ending to a great summer.

So, yeah, Portland's been a great experience for us this year so far. I know that we're right in the middle of the best part of the year: summer and early autumn, where the temperature is perfect and hardly a hint of rain or humidity (which is unheard of for me, a true Southern boy). I might be singing a different tune come February, but I think that I can handle the drizzle of the NW better than the downpours of the South. (Fun fact: did you know that average rainfall for Portland is LESS than Atlanta's? Portland's 44 inches to Atlanta's 50.2.)

I'm not an outdoorsman, but I can easily slip into that role after living here for several years. There's so much to do in the city and in the surrounding area, I can't even begin to list it here. I love having the stately Mt. Hood hovering in the background, like a gentle brother overlooking you. We live two houses down from a very scenic view of the dormant volcano and I can't help but take the kids for a walk to capture a glimpse of this incredible mountain. And never does it look the same with each viewing. I love that. Northwesterners love their Cascades, and Portlanders certainly love their volcanoes. (Mt. St. Helens is right around the corner, too.)

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I've been getting more and more emails and comments from people lately asking me about the job situation at Laika and whether or not if we've gotten their resumé or portfolio or demo reel that they've sent, etc. Honestly, I don't know. I'm simply a director for the /house division. More often than not, most of you who've contacted me are doing so for positions in the Entertainment division. That's the feature film and development side. /house does commercials and short films. I don't mind pointing you in the right direction, but most of it requires getting in touch with someone in recruitment. In case you didn't know, there's a (recently updated) recruitment page on the LAIKA site, with a link to the current list of job openings. They are always hiring, with two features in the works (CORALINE and JACK & BEN) and a plethora of commercials that are always being produced. They recently hit the 425 mark in total employees -- and still hiring! Just letting ya know.

So, I understand that I'm an actual face that you can identify with and it seems a lot easier to just get in touch with me, but really? I'm a busy boy and I might not be able to pass along your requests in time! And if I do end up remembering, all I'll do is pass the requests along to recruitment. They'll be of more service than I'll ever be.




CORALINE is looking fantastic. We got to check out the footage that was shown at Comic Con this year, and, boy -- I was blown away. Man, I love stop-motion animation. I love the hand crafted look to all the sets and props, to the characters and how sometimes you can make out the quirks and oddities to the puppets, etc. Something about it that snaps you into the realness of it all, very grounded and true, yet somehow you can still go along with the fantasy of it all. The scene we got to see was of Coraline first finding the secret door and then, later on, going through it and meeting her 'other' mother for the first time. Exquisite animation and nice camera angles. I've read on other blogs and sites where there were questions regarding Henry Selick's ability as a director -- MONKEYBONE is often sited as his 'slip up', but if you've had the opportunity to hear Henry's story about all that, (he spoke at PLATFORM this year) he mentions how, with each feature, there were more and more studio involvement, mostly on the creative side. It culminated with MONKEYBONE, giving the director no room to offer his opinion, creatively. Ironically, that's the movie that made Coraline's author, Neil Gaiman, want him for the movie adaptation in the first place. And after watching this early footage of the film, it looks like a perfect match. Henry seems to be enjoying his new found freedom at LAIKA, and I'm not saying that because I work here. (Although I would be remiss if I didn't mention that that was one of the many reasons LAIKA was so appealing to me: creative freedom and opportunities.)

There ya go. Some updates for you all. By the way, the anniversary weekend was a blast. We finally got the pics transferred into our Powerbook last night, so expect some pics on our Flickr accounts soon.

Ava Thursday: Birdie & Froggie

I know that this is a little late, but since it's an Ava Thursday post, I can't help it!

Something different for Ava Thursday: little creatures made by Ava during an after school art class she was going to for awhile back in May. On the left, a little bird with a nice red crest. If you look closely, there are a couple of eggs in the nest. On the right, a bright green tree frog. Ava chose the colors herself, thanks to a big chart that the instructor had with all the color glazes marked out so you can see what they would look like when they were fired up in the kiln. If you notice, there's some dark speckles in the blue for the bird here:



Here on the frog, I love the little nose and mouth, along with the red eyes. She chose red because she saw a tree frog in a magazine once:



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It's Labor Day weekend, so that means our anniversary is nigh. Hitting the big 1-3 mark. Thirteen years! I can't believe it. We've been dating since 1990, which would bring us up to 17 years that Andrea and I have been together. She was 19, I was 21. Ah, but we were wee bairns, weren't we? Planning a surprise trip for the family today. I'll be sure to post some pics when we get back.

Have a great Labor Day people!

Photobooth Friday

My Mom came to Portland for the first time last week. Of course, she was only here for the grand-kiddies, not me. I'm not hurt. I understand completely. Andrea and I are only the parental units who've begot two adorable human beings that our parents get to lavish their love and affection (and gifts and sweets) upon. It don't bother me a tall.

This was the first time that my Mother and I got to be in a photobooth together. In fact, Mom tells me that this was only her second time in one altogether. Funny, isn't it? I mean, I guess we weren't the photobooth kind of family. Andrea's family has been doing the photobooth thing for years, decades even. I guess when you don't have one in close proximity then it's not a big deal. So could this be the start of an annual thing? I hope so. It was so funny when we took this strip. Right before, Mom got all nervous. "Why?" I asked her. "Oh, I don't know. I'm just nervous." I reassured her that there's nothing to be worried about. It's just us. As we sat in the booth, we worked out our plan for each shot. The first one, we did the basic smiling shot. The second one features our infamous "twisted smile" -- a strange quirk that's been passed down from, what I would like to believe, generation to generation in my Mom's family. As far as I know, all my aunts do this diagonal smile. (And I just found out that Ava can do it, too!) (Bonus points if you can do it both ways.)

It was so fun to have my Mom here. We had a blast showing her around the city, checking out the great downtown, the streetcar, Multnomah Falls, Cannon Beach. One of my favorite excursions with her was to the Portland Art Museum where they had a Rembrandt exhibit. She's a big fan of Rembrandt, so it was only fitting that we brave the massive crowds on the weekend and get a chance to see these incredible works of art up close. I couldn't help but remember back when my sister and I were very young, when Mom took us to the art museum to look at the classics. We would stand there with her, all of us with mouths agape, taking in all the centuries of figures and self portraits and landscapes and colors and shapes. Art and the act of looking at art is open game for my Mom. And I'm proud to say that she's bestowed this opportunistic trait along to me.

It's come full circle now: while at the Rembrandt exhibit, I stood in front of a huge painting and held Ava up so she could have a better look at the details in the clothing of the figures before her and my Mom was right there beside me.

Long overdue sketches

Geez, has it really been since December when I last posted some drawings? I'm a terrible art/animation blogger guy. Sorry. I promise not to do that again.

Well, I started a project for myself awhile back: draw something on a daily basis. Yes, I draw every day at work, but as those who work in the animation biz know very well is that that doesn't count. That's drawing because you're supposed to draw. Which isn't that much fun, is it? (Well, sometimes. Okay, most of the time.) I promised myself that I would find the time each and every day to draw something in my sketchbook. I wanted to do something like this because it's supposed to make me a better artist, the idea that if you're constantly looking at things with an artistic eye and force yourself to put it onto paper (even if it's not looking good in your eyes), then eventually you'll have a better grasp on capturing your world around you.

It started out pretty well, but then... well, I faltered. But that happens. And I'm... okay with it. Really, I am. But hey -- I try not to focus on it. I just pick up a pencil and my Moleskine, and I do a sketch. It so easy when I take the morning bus ride into work. It's so difficult when I don't.

There's no "right" way to do this. I just start drawing. And I have several approaches as to how and what I draw. If you notice in these sketches I'm about to post for you, I have three distinctive approaches of drawing my subjects:

1. Draw from real life.
2. Draw from images (like from a magazine or photos)
3. Draw off the dome (from my head; freestyling)

Sometimes it's a combination of the two: I see a person walking by and since I can't capture them perfectly because of the short amount of time I have, I take some elements or characteristics that stuck out in my head and then go from there, creating an entirely different person. Doesn't have to be perfect. It gives me a chance to work on my imagination.

So here are some of my daily sketches. Most of them are small here, but you can view them larger by clicking on the image which takes you to its Flickr page. From there, you can click on "All sizes." (Also, you can see all of these, plus more in My Art photoset on Flickr. Sweet.)




























The following were done before I decided to do daily sketches:





Bus ridin' gives me endless possibilities of subjects to draw from:








One last thing. I'd like to revisit some of my old sketches and breathe new life to them. Here's one guy I drew back in September of '06:



And here he is with color:



Okay, that should tide you over for awhile! More to come, I promise.

8 Things

There's a meme going around. List 8 random things about yourself that others might not know about you. Here's my 8 for you all to laugh and poke fun at:

1. One of my favorite shows of all time is Sunday Morning on CBS. I try to catch it as often as I can. I enjoy the longer-than-normal editing and the gentle approach on human interest subjects, culture and the arts. Lulled into a joyful state by Charles Kuralt's smooth-as-molasses voice and long, lingering codas that focused on nature, I was more than eager to get up and watch a program that felt more like a radio show than TV. It's a welcome change from your typical news program. I'm having a harder time catching it ever since I moved to Portland, however; it airs at 9am for most of the country, but at (gulp) 6 on the west coast. Even though Kuralt has passed away, his successor, Charles Osgood, has done a tremendous job in keeping the integrity of the show intact.

2. I had a fear of using public bathrooms when I was a child. It stemmed from when I was in preschool and the toilet I just flushed started to overflow. I was so terrified by the rising mixture of urine and water that I high-tailed it out of the bathroom, hoping no one would figure it out it was me. Unfortunately, the bathroom was right in the middle of the room and I couldn't escape the water that was slowly spreading from underneath the door and out into our classroom. Having this fear provided me with several incredibly embarrassing moments during grade school. For one, my mother was called in to pick me up from school early because I was "feeling ill." Actually, I had an accident in my britches because I wouldn't go #2 at school during the day. I never let on to my teacher that that was what was wrong with me, but I'll never forget the bratty tomboy who sat two seats behind me whispering as I was lead out of the room by my mom, "I bet he pooped his pants!"

3. I get on kicks when it comes to favorite drinks. In high school, it was Mr. Pibb. I rediscovered it when it had a revival during the 90's and I drank nothing else until about 7 years ago. It suddenly tasted too sweet for me. When I was young, I loved Shasta Cream Soda. Oh momma. It was pure gold. Currently, I'm really getting into A&W's Cream Soda. I'll let you know how that pans out.

4. I've broken only one bone in my body: my collarbone. Playing tackle football with some friends one Sunday afternoon, I got bombarded by opposing players after a catch, all of them falling on top of me. I had to wear a brace for six weeks. You know that collarbones never really set after you break them?

5. I'm a different person behind the wheel.

6. I proposed to Andrea going up the glass elevator of the Westin Peachtree Plaza Hotel, on the evening of December 11th, 1991. It was magical.

7. I'm extremely allergic to poison ivy. I swear, I don't even have to touch it, I'll get it. Somehow. It's in my blood, or something.

8. I was an avid runner from about 1977 until 1984. It was the height of jogging popularity. During that time, I ran a marathon, but never finished it, almost collapsing around the 23rd mile post. (Once I sat down, I wanted to sleep I was so tired.) I did, however, finish several half-marathons and many 15-, 10-, and 5K's. Near the end of my running stint, I ran an average of a 6 minute mile. My dad got me into it -- it was through running that we were able to establish a strong bond. The number crunching, the pre-race carb stuffing, the early road trips to various North Georgia towns, the constant stench of sweat -- all of this is still very strong in my memory banks and I look back on it with fondness. On these road trips we would talk about things like school and soccer, all the while listening to the local AOR station play the latest tunes. I swear to this day can't hear "Baker Street" without thinking of Dolfin shorts and Nike Terra TC's. I stopped running when I became more interested in girls. My dad still kept at it, often doing bi- and triathalons for many years. He still runs to this day, but has found the healing powers of golf, I'm afraid, right around the time he retired. I plan on making a running comeback soon. I wonder if Dolfin is still around?

Commercial Pet Peeves

Watching TV is one of my favorite time wasters and heckling commercials is my second favorite. There are many, many irritating things in almost all of the commercials that we are inundated with on a daily basis. Things that defy logic, are ridiculous, or are just plain stoopid that I have no choice but to say something about it. Good thing these blog things were made or else I would explode keeping all this in. (Actually, my wife is happy that I have an outlet for this. She's getting pretty tired hearing me talk back to the TV day in and day out.)

Here are some of my recent commercial pet peeves (I'm willing to make this a reoccurring thing if this goes well):


For the longest time the slogan for Dippin' Dots was "The Ice Cream of the Future." They used that slogan for years, ever since they were created 20 years ago. Umm...it's 2007. I think the future is here and it's now a thing of the past. Their new slogan should be: "The Ice Cream Fad of the 80's."

I DESPISE the Transitions commercials. Allow me to tell you why:

1. In the past, NOT the future, (the 60's to be exact) Corning first developed photochromic lenses. They were made of glass at first, but I just had to say this because I remember people having these special glasses back in the 70's. So when I saw these commercials with their "In the future..." opening line, I cried foul.



2. All the actors sport the ever-present "smug look". For some reason, ad agencies think that we want to see yuppie-ish hipsters walking around with consumer items that we can't afford with smack-worthy, "aren't I the coolest thing since sliced bread for having something that no one else has" look on their faces. Please stop, people.

Here is the most recent Transitions spot. Here is another one. Hatred is such a soft word when describing these things.

I've come to loathe with a passion KFC's use of "Sweet Home Alabama" in their commercials. It's just a small snippet, but just enough for you to hate the song even more than before. I know that it shouldn't bother me here, but it just doesn't add up. Most songs that you hear on commercials these days have a certain reason, whether it's the song title, or theme. This particular use of a pop song does not have any rhyme or reason. Also, you have to ask yourself, why? Why use a song celebrating Alabama for a restaurant chain that hails from Kentucky (remember that the original name was "Kentucky Fried Chicken")? Just because it's Southern doesn't mean you can lump it into the same category.

Have you seen the latest GLAD ForceFlex commercial where two guys rob a bank and have the cashier stuff as much as she can in the bags? The joke is that the bags stretch and she ends up taking so long that they get caught. Ha ha ha. Next time you see it, notice these things:

They do not have ski masks or anything covering their faces.
They do not use any sort of firearms.
They do not use a note, they just ask the cashier to fill the bag.

This is all very deliberate on the client's part for fear of getting sued by banks, in case some idiot(s) might get some big ideas because they saw it on a commercial. One pet peeve of mine about this spot: there's no way that that cashier would run out of money to put in their bag with the bank being as big as that one. I know it's part of the joke, but I'm not buying it.


Ad campaigns that need to stop:

Energizer and that confounded Bunny. Okay, we get it. It keeps going.

The Gatorade "Is it in you?" campaign -- It doesn't look like they're sweating Gatorade, guys. It looks like someone just dumped the drink on them. It's an okay concept that probably sounded great on paper, but just doesn't come off that well on TV. Bottom line: you're paying way too much for all that post work.

Chick-Fil-A's Eat Mor Chiken -- the cows are tired. Put them to rest. Please. (Oh, before you do that, Mr. Fil-A -- could you please open up a restaurant in Portland? Please? There's none up here in the Northwest! That's a crime right there. Just one, please? Thank you.)


On a lighter note:

Peep this All-Bran commercial and watch the wonderful tongue-in-butt-cheek visual jokes going on in the background. This spot was pointed out to me by my wife. (Me thinks she's trying to tell me something.)

Click here for the director's "cut."

4am

It was 4am and I was driving in my car with the front windows down in the dead of winter. I had to in order to have a clear shot when I flung bagged up newspapers to their respective owners. Throwing papers seemed like such a meager task, something that you see only 12 year-old boys do on a bike in their neighborhood, toting a canvas sack full of rolled-up morning editions, ready to be tossed by hand. But here I was, 22, in college, tossing papers out the windows of my Datsun B210, with a mountain of Atlanta Constitutions piled high in my backseat.

It was good money, that's why I did it. They paid by the volume, not by hour, so the more I threw, the more I was paid. And they paid according to the type of route that was assigned me:

1 - meant that it was an easy route, never having to get out of the car
2 - meant that there were some getting out because of apartments, condos, etc.
3 - was all footwork; all apartments

I took on two routes, a "2" and a "3". I loved the "3" route because I enjoyed getting out and running around with all those papers in my arms, listening to the flap the paper made as it made contact with the floor, the sign of mission accomplished. I took great satisfaction in knowing that my customers were getting what they asked for each and every morning. It was pretty easy, this running around. And after memorizing who got what, I had it down to a science: I'd double-check my notebook, grab the correct amount of papers, get out of my car, lock the door (I had two keys, keeping the car running with the second key), run through the building, deliver the goods, get back into my car, move onto the next building. It became a dance, a carefully choreographed performance each and every morning, starting at 2am and lasting until around 6.

Sometimes I'd run into an early morning riser, startling them with my hurried motions as I wove my way through their apartment complex. I'd apologize for my presence and move on. No time for chit chat. Gotta deliver the papers. Oftentimes, I'd fret about getting mugged. There were stories told at the main warehouse where we put the papers together during the first part of our shift of deliverers being approached by desperate thieves with gun in hand and asking for their money. I was told to carry some cash with me, just a little bit, to appease the mugger. Because if I didn't have anything to give them, they'd get upset. And you don't want to upset a mugger. I was always aware of my surroundings. I checked and double-checked my route each night, poking my head down passageways before traversing them, carefully going around corners with bushes, cautious of hidden nooks and crannies. We worked during the dead of night so I couldn't be complacent. Any slip up could mean being a potential victim.

During my "2" route, I was happy to hop into my car and roll through neighborhoods, flinging bagged newspapers out the window, left and right. Hanging off my rear view mirror by an altered wire hanger was my route notebook. In it, cryptic directions and a full list of all the addresses that were to receive a paper for each and every street for my route. Some numbers were circled which meant that they only subscribed for the weekend edition. After a while, I could do my route without looking at the notebook, having memorized each and every address listed for each route. If you were to open up my route notebook, it would read something like this:

Left on Indian Creek

1233

                     1242
                     1248
                     1250
1251

Right on Taylor

                     1067

1072

There was a pattern to the numbering, of course: odds on one side, evens on the other. For apartments, my notebook would have notes on a particular building, like this:

2200:

12
17, 18, 19
21

Basically, my schedule was pretty much the same:

1. Sleep from 10 or 11pm until 1:30am.

2. Get to the AJC (Atlanta Journal & Constitution) warehouse by 2am.

3. Receive my "mail": pieces of paper that tells me if there are any changes to my route, like new subscriptions or cancellations. At the bottom of the page would tell me if there were any mistakes from the previous night. Mostly, this would involve papers being stolen, which, at that point, I would go over to an area in the warehouse that had papers from previous nights and grab the necessary amount in order to make my customers happy. My goal for each night was to receive a "0": no mistakes or missing papers.

4. The truck arrives around 2:30 (sometimes later if any important news break forces the printing to be delayed).

5. Grab the necessary amount of bundles of paper and start putting the paper together, slipping in ads or various promotional items. (We were forced to do this. Sorry.)

6. Bag the papers.

7. Fill car up with papers.

8. Off I go to deliver the papers.

It was a fun job, repetitious and routine that it was. I enjoyed making my way through streets and neighborhoods that I soon became familiar with, imagining who lived in these homes, since I never really saw any of my customers. I was able to play my music loud (I seem to remember listening to U2's "Actung Baby" a lot) and I enjoyed the fact that I didn't have any boss hovering over me, telling me what to do. My superiors were back at the warehouse, going over the numbers, far away from the drivers. Far away from me and my little world, papers and all. I could do whatever I wanted, as long as I made the deliveries, and was done before 7am. If I finished up by 5, then I was free to go home and get some rest. No need to go back to the warehouse. 3 hours and I was done. That's it.

Sometimes the elements came into play. We double bagged the papers if it was raining, and we still had to deliver if there was snow or ice.

On this particular morning, it was freezing cold. I had a big coat on, with a hoodie that was pulled tight. I wasn't wearing any gloves because I couldn't grab the papers in time to throw. My fingers were starting to turn red. I could see my breath in the air. It didn't help that I had my two front windows rolled down, but how else was I going to toss the papers out on each side of the street?

I was slowly making my way through the neighborhood when I caught a glimpse of headlights coming down the street. Nothing too serious, but since it was 4 in the morning, it did seem odd. Cars are a rare thing at that hour, so I kept a mental note on it while I continued with my route. Perhaps it was a cop? Doing a neighborhood check? Yes, perhaps.

Oh, crap. I missed a house. I'll have to go back.

I pulled into a driveway to turn around and as I was about to put it in reverse, I noticed that the slow moving car was getting near. So, I paused and waited for it to pass by. The car stopped. I waited. Nothing. Okay, I thought. I'll just go ahead and back out. Maybe I'm in their driveway? I backed out and shifted it into drive and made my way towards the house that I had missed. Going the opposite way of my route jilted me somewhat and I almost felt lost. I was so used to going one way, it was like a completely different environment going the other direction. Like I was in an entirely different neighborhood. As I approached the missed house, I paused and then noticed that the car was still behind me. Odd. Why won't they go around me? I turned on my hazard lights. Nothing. As I looked through the rear view mirror, I stuck my left arm out the window and motioned the car to pass. It didn't move. For pete's sake. Maybe they're confused by my actions? I moved over to the left of the street and tossed out a paper really high, giving a nice big arch on my throw, so whoever it was behind me would have no problem seeing that I was delivering the papers. Again, nothing. Just two bright lights behind me. I felt like Roy Neary in CLOSE ENCOUNTERS for a moment. Only this time, I wasn't dealing with aliens.

At that point, I had enough. So, I pulled up a bit, shifted it into reverse, backed into the driveway of the house I just delivered a paper to and sat and waited for the car to drive by. You have the street all to yourself now, buddy, I thought. I looked closely and realized that it was not a cop, but a small, white pickup truck. Probably a Toyota. It slowly pulled forward and then stopped once it cleared the driveway I was sitting in. The truck was to my left now, so I leaned my head out the window to see if they needed help or something. Maybe they were lost?

Suddenly, a small flash of light and a chHHKK!!!

It was a pop, like a crack of a bat, only it wasn't wood. It was metal. Like a gun.

The truck peeled out and took off down the road and immediately, the synapses in my brain fired up and began to register what just happened. I, too, peeled out of the driveway and took off down the road, in the opposite direction. As I roared down the neighborhood, my emotions caught up with me and I started to yell out loud, "OH NO OH NO OH NO!!!" My voice had a deeper sound to it, as if my throat suddenly opened up and I was now yelling from the inner depths of my soul. The sound that came out of me that cold, frozen morning was not me, but it was me. A truer me. A me that I had not met before. A me filled with adrenaline and fear. A me that was foreign. The sound was almost guttural, animal-like. I sounded like I reached another stage of puberty, although this time I wasn't looking forward to it.

I just got shot at.

The severity of the moment clung to me like a wet towel. I was shaking, trying to catch my wits about me as I flung the car around the turns and bends of this claustrophobic suburban maze, frantically searching for the main road. I had no idea what to do next. I couldn't think straight. I kept saying to myself, I just got shot at I just got shot at I just got shot at... Finally, I reached civilization, or a reasonable facsimile of it, since it was still 4 in the morning. I pulled up to a phonebooth and called my superior at the warehouse.

"Ken, this is Ward. I just got shot at."

"What?"

"I was doing my route and some guy just shot at me."

"Are you serious?"

"Yes!"

"Are you okay, hurt?"

"I'm fine, I think. What should I do?"

"Did you call the police?"

"No, not yet."

"Did you finish your route?"

"No."

"Well, can you finish the route?"

Now I'm thinking: Is he serious? I just got shot at by some dude WITH A GUN and he wants me to finish my stupid route? The nerve of the guy.

"I don't know. I'll try."

I hung up, opened the door to my car and sank into my seat. I was a ball of nerves, a weary, shaking wreck. And I still had to finish my route. Still tingling from adrenaline, I drove over to the Police Department which was a block or two down the street. I got a hold of an unsuspecting officer and told him my story. "Why didn't you call it in?" A blank stare. "I don't know, I was scared. I didn't know what to do." He reluctantly headed back into an office, wrote up a report, and then came back out to tell me that he put a call out to all units in the area to look for a small, white pickup truck, possibly a Toyota. I then sauntered over to my car with a feeling of having absolutely nothing accomplished. That was a waste of time.

I sank into my seat again. I turned the key and...nothing. My car sputtered, trying to turn over but nothing was happening. Oh no, what NOW? I tried again and again. Finally, my trusty Datsun came to life, albeit, very feebly. As I was heading over toward the neighborhood where the scene of the crime was, I noticed steam coming out from under the hood. The car then conked out while sitting at the next stop light. Nervously, I got it started up again, but now, the car was lunging erratically, moving in fits and starts. I found my way over to the same phonebooth where I had called my boss before, and once I stopped, my poor car then dies on me. I tried to turn the engine over and over again. Nothing. I got out of the car and walked up to the front of it to open the hood. But before I opened it, I happened to see a gaping hole in the black plastic grill. With steam engulfing me upon lifting up the hood, I noticed a hole the size of a bullet in the radiator. Oh great. This is just PERFECT.

"Ken, it's Ward again. My car is dead. I can't get it started."

"What? Your car is dead?"

"Yeah. There's a hole in the radiator where the bullet hit my car. What should I do?"

(Sighing) "Well, I'll send Track out to help you finish your route."

"Alright. I'll wait."

The sky was turning blue. I was exhausted. I went back to my car and waited for Track. Track. Track was an interesting character, to say the least. Track was pretty much a fixture at that particular AJC warehouse. An older guy, probably in his late 40's, Track acted as my guide on my very first outing, to make sure that I knew the ropes to delivering the papers and how to go about my route. I use the term "acted" because all Track did on my inaugural night was sleep in the back seat with all the papers. "Hey, Track, is this right?" "Mmmuh huh...zzzzz..." (He was given the nickname Track because he liked to bet at the Alabama dog tracks.) He had this whatever attitude about himself. Easy going and just didn't give a stink about what anyone thought of him. I liked the guy.

But when Track finally came to help me finish up my route, he grumbled and complained the entire time. This apparently was forcing him to do some actual work and he wasn't too happy about it. It didn't help when he downplayed my whole shooting ordeal, too. "Oh, those were just some kids having fun. Nothing to it, man." Kids? Playing with guns? At four in the morning? I don't think so. Maybe gunshots in your neighborhood might mean kids having fun, but in my book, it's something FATAL. Track apparently could care less about my life being threatened. Nice. Good to see that you got my back, Track.

As the sun was starting to come up (it was so rare to see it during my route), I stared off into the distance, my mind wandering, trying to gather up what was left of any thoughts I had about the night.

The following day, I went up to Ken and asked him to transfer me to the day shift.

The Versatile (and Unknown) Lou Peters

 

 Matt, of Scrubbles fame reminded me recently of an artist that I had planned on writing about several years ago but completely forgot, thanks to the many gaps in my aging brain. Back when I was just starting to collect vintage cookbooks and booklets for all the fun and whimsical artwork that filled their pages, I noticed that I'd find some of the same books over and over again. And the Good Housekeeping Cookbook series was a big repeat offender. Like Ray Conniff albums at a thrift store, you'd see them everywhere. I began to wonder about these cookbooks: were they incredibly popular or complete duds? Surpisingly, they possessed some of the more engaging illustrations you could find within this sub-culture of art. They must've offered some mighty good money back then to the artists because each volume (there's over 20) is covered from front to back in wonderful two-color illustrations, all completely different, and -- here's the kicker for me -- all with artist credit! Unbelievable. As I began to collect this particular series, I noticed that a few had similar styles and, upon further investigating, found out that three were illustrated by the same guy: Lou Peters. These three GHK volumes have always been high on my list of favorites in this series, mainly for the sophistication that Lou put into each cookbook. And what's even more interesting for me is that each were done in a style wildly different from the other. There were some similarities as to how he posed the characters, the way that he would draw the female figure (in your typical glamorous atomic housewife way), that were unmistakable to my eye. But for the most part, the overall feel and style of each of these cookbooks were unique and original unto themselves. So who was this Lou Peters? I wish I could tell you. No one knows. Doing a Google search on the man will bring up nada. Was he a member of any illustrator society or organization? If so, there's a good chance that there'll be a bio on him. But finding this out requires time and energy -- both of which is in short supply for me. If anyone out there could help me out here, that'd be great. I'd love to know more about the guy. In the meantime, enjoy Lou's artwork for the Good Housekeeping Cookbook series in my Lou Peters Illustrations Flickr set. Here's a glance at the three Good Housekeeping cookbooks he illustrated: Click on each image to view larger. The Summertime Cook Book was the more fun of the three. The characters are more cartoony and stylized, but still infused with Lou's sophistication:

Quick 'N' Easy was the more outlandish one, with bold black used against bold colors. The lines were bigger and more harsh, in an attempt to have a more "modern" feel to the cookbook. If you notice, there's a definite attitude being expressed in the look of the women. In fact, that's Lou's stronghold -- the way he depicts the female figure in all these illustrations. There's a possible chance that he did some fashion illustration at one point?

   

 Last, but not least, is the Appetizer Book, with Lou taking a more elegant and polished approach here. His brush strokes are simple, yet refined. The colors are not as harsh in this cookbook, softened by being sponged on and set against a light gray. And every single woman looks as if they stepped out of a swank fashion magazine. The guys can't compare to the glitzy housewives in this cookbook!

 

There's more that I scanned, so check out the entire set. Check out Matt's Flickr set of The New England Cookbook that Lou illustrated. Here's a great example of how Lou expertly utilized the entire page -- great composition and excellent use of the two-color press. Also, be sure to check out fellow mid-century illustration lover Carol's Flickr -- there's more from Lou's GHK cookbooks in her Illustration/Advertising set. And please, if anyone has more information about Lou Peters, let me know. You would make me a very happy man. UPDATE: Nothing on the guy, yet. But my own mother has done some detective work, even going so far as to calling Good Housekeeping in New York. (They said that anyone who worked at GHK during the 50's and 60's wouldn't be here anymore. Umm, duh.) She also contacted the Society of Illustrators, and they don't have anything on the guy. (Thanks for the sleuth work, Mama!) There are a few more venues to try out. Does anyone have a copy of Walt Reed's Illustrator in America? If so, let me know if Lou Peters is listed. (Probably not, at this rate.) Another option: does anyone have a copy of the latest Who's Who of American Art? See if he's in that volume as well. (Again, probably not, but worth a shot.) Thanks!

Ava Thursday: Spider-Man Revealed!

This makes me laugh every time I look at it. These two drawings by Ava are on the same yellow sheet of construction paper; the top one being on the front. Obvious a dig at Ezra's favorite superhero, Ava decided to draw a couple of scenarios exposing Spider-Man as a sham, a charlatan, a fraud!

Here, Ava writes: "Spider-Man isn't really strong, he just puts balls in his sleeves."

You know, when you look at that one sticker there of Spider-Man, it does look like he puts stuff in his sleeves to puff himself out. At least, to a 7 year old.

Here's the back:



"Spider-Man doesn't really have designs on his red suit just draws them."

What I find especially funny in these drawings is the direct poking of fun at a particular figure that her brother is especially fond of. It's her way of getting to Ezra without him picking up on this fact. I can imagine that it's satisfying for Ava to rip on something that her brother loves. Typical sibling ribbing, of course.

Ava gets all giggly when I talk about these drawings. She knows how silly she was being when she drew them. Silly girl.

I love the poses of Spider-Man here: the legs, the arms, how he's trying to draw on his costume, the shoving of the balls into his sleeves. Very expressive. And very funny.