My Mickey Mouse Degree

Hanna-Barbera Amongst Other Things.

1 09 2007

Bleh, been in a bit of a slump recently, I dunno what it is, I think I’m getting impatient with the rate of my skill development as I tend to every so often. Still struggling with anything bordering on realism as usual, and I’m not happy with the poses I’m putting out in my cartoon sketches.

I’ll get over it soon enough.

So today I’ve been looking at some cartoons that I haven’t really checked out since I was a kid. Generally speaking since starting my degree I’ve pretty much ignored most television animation that I grew up with, assuming it all would be disappointingly cheap and nasty looking if I saw them now, but today I had the sudden urge to take a look at Alvin and the Chipmunks (the 1980’s series) on YouTube and was pleasantly surprised by the opening titles.

It wasn’t superb, certainly, but it was compared to a lot of the stuff that was about in the 80s, and it leant much more towards Disney than it did the limited stylings of Hanna-Barbera.

As often happens when I get suitably impressed by an animation, I’m now on the lookout for a DVD of the show, but it looks like I’m going to have to delve into Region 1 because I can’t seem to find an R2 release.

Anyways,

here’s the intro that set me off.

Moving on to Hanna-Barbera, I really, really like their character designs and drawing style. I remember in my first year I was not on board with their studio output at all, despite loving their shows as a kid (and by studio output, I mean their TV work, MGM’s Tom & Jerry shorts are my favourite cartoons, ever).

The limited animation put me off, and honestly I don’t really find much of their stuff that funny as an adult, and I hated it when they put laugh tracks in their shows. Good Lord I hate laugh tracks.

But having said all this, dammit they have some appealing looking characters. Yogi Bear is such a wonderful, confidently drawn character, yet I don’t think I even liked that show as a kid. I think I’m going to give the Hanna-Barbera studio another chance as of today and try and pick up a few of their old shows, just to make sure I haven’t dismissed one of the giants of TV animation for no good reason.

After all that, here’s some selected output from the last couple of days.

Alvin Sketch

From today’s Chipmunk realisation.

Street Scene

I wanted to see what I came out with without using any construction lines (how I used to draw).

Yogi

The one on the left is copied, so don’t give me credit for the nice pose. The one on the right is all mine.

And this final sketch is part of some concept sketches for what should become my final year project at university, I’m putting it up here in good faith, so please don’t rob me blind, as it were.