Fitzgerald Tiny Toons drawings on John K Stuff

[Peter Paltridge]

http://www.johnkstuff.blogspot.com/

I know I'm risking bringing this guy up again, but his latest post should interest everyone here. He's put up various sketches Eddie F. drew of Hamton, Buster and Plucky, and they look good.

Plus, for some reason he's nicer to the show in this post than he's been in the past.

 

[Classic Speedy]

Yeah, he didn't really bash the show in this particular post, which is quite refreshing given how he's badmouthed it in the past. I like those drawings.

Strangely, Eddie didn't direct many shorts on TTA, and many that he DID turned out either bad or uneven, unfortunately. Though much of that wasn't his fault; after all, one of them was done by the infamous Encore. Nuff said.

 

[Leviathan]

People online in general aren't as down on Tiny Toons as they are on Animaniacs, the lightning rod for most of the hatred of the WB/Spielberg shows.

Those drawings are very nice. I love the energy behind them.

(BTW, they used scripts on Mighty Mouse? Even though John admits this begrudgingly, does this mean that scripting a cartoon is a valid way of making them?)

 

[The Spectre]

John K. seems either unaware or unwilling to concede that the TTA characters were original characters aged about 12-14, inspired by the original Warner Bros. characters, rather than Bugs, Daffy etc. as "babies".

 

[FlooterFlatter]

One thing I really find interesting is that, in the comments, Eddie actually praises Glen Kennedy, saying that he did "wonderful work" on the show.

Eddie would later have Glen animate on his "What a Cartoon" short "Worm Paranoia".

I think it's more that back when Mighty Mouse came out, they were still under more strict supervision, and had more constraints to work within, one of which was apparently that there had to be scripts before storyboards. I doubt they would've used them unless they were forced to.

Pretty much. The Bakshi crew were forced to use scripts on Mighty Mouse.

I think the compromise was that the scripts were to be written by someone who can draw.

 

[Hiya Animation]

One thing I really find interesting is that, in the comments, Eddie actually praises Glen Kennedy, saying that he did "wonderful work" on the show.

Eddie doesn't seem as bitter and hateful about Tiny Toons as Krisfalusi does... hell, Eddie doesn't seem bitter and hateful about anything at all... unlike John K who is extremely bitter about just about everything.

By the way, what is with John K's obsession with "off model"? Yay, we get it... cartoons shouldn't be so strictly "on model" that they never deviate from the expressions on the model sheet.
"Off model" =/= "funny" all the time. Most of the time "Off model" = Artist who is sloppy and can't draw the character right like all the "off model" toys/ads from the 50s he's been posting lately.

 

[wiley207]

I actually liked Eddie Fitzgerald's stuff on Tiny Toons. It seems the Kennedy Cartoons episodes he was writer or director though (with the exception of "Hare Today Gone Tomorrow" and its lumpy animation). In fact, much of "One Minute To Three" is possibly the best Fitzgerald/Kennedy collaboration I've ever seen!

But besides that, Eddie draws some great looking Tiny Toons poses! His Hamton looks kinda Startoons-ish, and Plucky almost looks like he could've been drawn by Chuck Jones!

As for Eddie's praise of Glen Kennedy, I suppose that's why he hired Kennedy Cartoons to animate a good bulk of his "Tales of Worm Paranoia" short (and it actually looks pretty good!)

 

[Classic Speedy]

As for Eddie's praise of Glen Kennedy, I suppose that's why he hired Kennedy Cartoons to animate a good bulk of his "Tales of Worm Paranoia" short (and it actually looks pretty good!)

Having rewatched "Worm Paranoia", it's interesting to note the difference in animation styles. Glen seems to animate all of the first couple minutes, then it switches to Bob Jaques/Kelly Armstrong (don't know enough to differentiate their styles, sorry) when we see a close-up of Johnny's creepy smiling face and explaining his plan, and then cuts back to Glen when Johnny screams "Don't touch me!", then cuts BACK to Bob/Kelly after Johnny's accident, and finally back to Glen when Johnny says he'll apologize to the human, all the way to the end.

 

[The Spectre]

Glen Kennedy's animation was sometimes used appropriately, and sometimes not. In "Hare Today, Gone Tomorrow" for example, the characters are not fully defined yet, and so a more "on-model" animation style might have helped to ground them as in some way consistent characters. "One Minute Til Three" on the other hand, is almost entirely devoted to Plucky's frantic mental state -- there is very little physical movement for the characters - and so Kennedy's wild distortions really make Plucky's feelings come across visually - it would be a pretty bland segment if Plucky stayed on-model the whole time.

"Uncle" Eddie Fitzgerald's name doesn't appear very often as a TTA director, but I'm a big fan of pretty much all the segments he *wrote* (including his auteur piece, "Pluck Twacy").

 

[egfelixdcg]

I think several of those sketches were well respected. I recognize the "dying Buster" and the "looking at the audience Buster" of the first page, from "Hare Today Gone Tomorrow". I've seen several of those Elmyras and Hamtons on Kennedy's cartoons. Look the fifth Hamton's face(counting from left top to right) at "I really like Eddie's Porkys", I think I've seen him like that in some Wang Film. And the first Ham on "Eddie can draw cute" in some TMS. I don't remember any of those Pluckys though, but (correct me if I'm wrong) I think I did see the Plucky from "you can't go wrong with storyboard drawings like this" in the Spring Special (it aired several times here).

 

[Classic Speedy]

Jenny Lerew has posted the conceptual drawings of Stanley the Elephant on her blog, drawn by John K. Those look pretty good, I must say. It's a shame that the character didn't translate well to animation... sigh... I can only imagine how much better the episode had turned out had it been done by, say, TMS.

 

[FlooterFlatter]

John posted more drawings of Tiny Toons by Eddie.

Eddie Fitzgerald chimes in and defends Glen Kennedy.

Many thanks for the kind comments, but the credit for those heads should go to Glen Kennedy, whose contract studio did the best Tiny Toons animation. I just sketched his heads off a TV monitor so my unit could have them as reference.

Glen was the star animator at his own studio. He had a funny full animation style that looked like it was influenced by Scribner and Jim Tyre. I used to tell the tiny Toons management that whatever Glen cost was worth it, because we only had to pay him for journeyman animation...the unique styling was free.

I did everything I could to promote Glen at the studio, but eventually the studio soured on him. He may have had a problem with deadlines, or with quality control. Most of his artists were freelancers who were unfamiliar with his style, and the deadlines were tight.

I imagine nightmare scenarios like a freelancer coming in the night before a deadline and saying," I could only finish half, but I can't work on it anymore because I just got an offer for more pay from another studio." Poor Glen probably had to burn the midnight oil, just correcting and finishing other people's animation, then was expected to do scenes of high quality of his own. It must have been grueling. His memory of that period must be one of constant sleep deprivation.

In my book Glen is one of the true heroes of modern full animation. If he'd had an opportunity to have a year-'round studio with regular paychecks and a reliable crew, who knows what he could have accomplished? Sounds like John, doesn't it?

So did Kennedy get screwed? What do you think?

 

[Classic Speedy]

John posted more drawings of Tiny Toons by Eddie.

Eddie Fitzgerald chimes in and defends Glen Kennedy.



So did Kennedy get screwed? What do you think?

I don't know about "screwed", but there were definitely quality control issues and unfortunate circumstances. As Eddie said, Kennedy was mostly all freelancers, and with that kind of hands-off freedom, it would be difficult to keep tabs on peoples' work until it's finished, at which point it's unfixable. This also means there's more opportunities for the freelancers to follow their own character designs instead of what Glen established, due to no supervision. How many character designs and animation styles did we see in a typical Kennedy episode? Outside of "Hare Today, Gone Tomorrow" (which was mostly uniform), a lot.

This is just a theory of mine, but I believe that when Kennedy moved to Disney, they actually set up a sister studio in the Phillippines where the artists would actually come into work, not mail it in. No more freelancing, thus more ability to supervise the work being done. That's why Kennedy's work for Disney appears a bit more consistent and on-model. Of course, I could be completely wrong on this, but that's my understanding of how things went down.

It should also be mentioned that the reason the later TTA episodes by KC look so questionable is because most of the crew was concentrating on their new assignment, Darkwing Duck. A TTA animator I spoke to a while back mentioned during this time, he would often work 60-80 hour weeks. Yikes.

All that said, I've actually softened on my dislike of KC over the years. I appreciate Glen's philosophy of wanting to keep things domestic and how he embraced the rubbery animation that was more common in the golden age of movie animation (for instance, this style was practically unheard of in TV cartoons from the '60s to '80s). And Eddie's right in that he was one of the few doing full animation on TV, which is no easy feat.

However, I disagree with Eddie saying that Kennedy was the best TTA studio. That honor still goes to TMS. They set such a high standard and could do cartoony while still looking professional, and kept the designs uniform. Kennedy had its moments but that was just it: Moments. TMS looked good all the time. (although they got less consistently solid on Animaniacs)

 

[The Spectre]

I mentioned the Jim Tyer / Stanley connection on my blog. Does anyone know if there *was* any Glen animation in that episode?

 

[wiley207]

When it comes to Glen Kennedy, I like his work best on "A Pup Named Scooby-Doo." (FYI, this show was animated by Wang, but Glen Kennedy was an animation supervisor there at the time, so naturally his stuff would show up.) Sure, it wasn't that smooth, but at least the characters were on-model most of the time, and they weren't often jumping up and floating through the air (unless they were yelling or doing a wild take), and they'd only dance when the script would call for it (mostly during the musical chase sequences). Besides, I always thought Glen's Scooby-Doo looked VERY cute

But as others said, by 1988 it was rare to see full animation in a non-Disney TV cartoon (by this time, Disney's stuff was handled by TMS, but that's for another story). So in some episodes of the Scooby series, it would be a tad jarring when it would suddenly cut from the flat mid-1980s H-B cartoon style to a fuller, bouncier "late-1980s creator-driven parody" cartoon, in terms of animation style. Other episodes (especially the pilot) did a good job blending the different styles.

As for Kennedy's work on "Darkwing Duck," I agree it looks more uniform and consistent. But I can still tell Glen Kennedy's work apart from the other animators; it has that smooth bouncy "Pup Named Scooby-Doo"-esque look to it. But at least the characters stayed on model! (If I recall, this and "Raw Toonage" were the only Disney shows where Glen Kennedy actually did some animation.)

 

[Jonny Mack]

I mentioned the Jim Tyer / Stanley connection on my blog. Does anyone know if there *was* any Glen animation in that episode?

I don't know for absolute certain that Glen worked on it, but I would bet money that he did. Because I had to do a few of the scenes with Stanley, they sent me some early rough line tests for reference, and it looked like Glen's stuff. Usually when reference footage was sent out it came from Glen.

 

[Mcready]

Now that looked great there, John K could have had some nice potential on different takes on the show.

 

[Goldstar!]

Now that looked great there, John K could have had some nice potential on different takes on the show.

No. Please keep John K as far away from Looney Tunes as possible. I saw John's take on Yogi Bear and The Jetsons, and I like Looney Tunes, so, no thanks.

 

[Hiya Animation]

Urrgh... more modern animation bashing on his blog... and it looks like there's a big post coming with more (probably bashing Princess and the Frog).

I love how John complains about how modern animation sucks but he's not DOING anything about it. He knows how to use Flash... MAKE A DAMN CARTOON ALREADY! With the technology we have today, it's not hard to make cartoons at home with little or no money.

Hell, John doesn't even think inbetweens are important. Just make a cartoon without inbetweens! Do SOMETHING! Then when you're actually making cartoons you can complain about how crappy animation is today.

 

[MattieShoe]

Please, Guys. The last thing we need is another "I hate John K" thread. This really isn't the place, and posts like that don't beget anything but further misunderstanding.