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• Jerry Beck to be honored at this year's Annie Awards

  Jim Hill pays tribute to this noted author & historian, who will receive the June Foray Award next week for the positive impact that he's had on the animation industry Read More... Posted Wednesday, January 30, 2008 12:00 AM | 5 Comments Filed under: animation, book, DreamWorks, CG, DreamWorks Animation, Nickelodeon, television, Jerry Seinfeld, ASIFA-Hollywood, animated character, Jerry Beck, "The Hanna-Barbera Treasury", October, comedian , animated feature, 2007, feature film , Chronicle Books, cartoons, coffee table book, hardcover, animated short, short, animated features, animators , books, article, articles, magazine article, magazine articles , Cartoon Brew , Amid Amidi , writer , historian , animation community, animation industry, June Foray award, June Foray, spotlight , November, Insight Editions, Saturday morning cartoons , Saturday morning cartoon, HB, Hanna-Barbera, William Hanna, Joseph Barbera, model sheets, model sheet, comic book, comic books , tchotchke , high profile project, movers , shakers , jaded, animation fan, Viacom International, Viacom, DK Adult, DK, Nickelodeon Studios, animated series , "SpongeBob SquarePants" , "Rugrats", "Not Just Cartoons: Nicktoons!", process , production phases, ironic , detail , character , show business , household name, Hollywood history, library, 12, James Brown, the hardest working man in show business, hardest working man in show business , store shelves, 20th, 25th , "The Art of Bee Movie" , production history , CG feature, feature films, shorts, gaming, UCLA, Royce Hall , 35th , Annie Awards

• "Dream Worlds" offers look at abandoned Disney animated features

  Jim Hill reviews Hans Bacher's new "Production Design for Animation" book. Which features visual development art from "My Peoples," "Fraidy Cat" and "Wild Life" Read More... Posted Wednesday, January 23, 2008 12:00 AM | 6 Comments Filed under: animation, book, Disney, Broadway, Andreas Deja, Disney Theatrical, "Beauty & the Beast", "101 Dalmatians", "Aladdin", "Dinosaur", Walt Disney Animation Studios, France, WDAS, "The Lion King", the New World, "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs", LA, Germany, film, Broadway musical, stage version, animated feature, 2007, Disneyana fans, Walt Disney Feature Animation, "Mulan", Hans Bacher , logo, visual development, visual development artist , production designer, paintings, drawings , inspirational material , artists , animators , "Dream Worlds: Production Design for Animation" , Focal Press, December , canvases , "China Doll", emperor, Shang, "My Peoples" , "Elgin's Peoples" , "Angel and Her No Good Sister", "Once in a Blue Moon" , "A Few Good Ghosts", "Fraidy Cat" , Alfred Hitchcock , crime story , London, development art , "Wild Life", The Secret Lab, urban, hipster, George Bernard Shaw, "Pygmalion", story points, BS-free , edited, massaged , Disney Publicity , production notes, European version, Loire , generic-looking , Mulan

• Tons of Toontown's secrets revealed in "Animation Magazine: 20 Year Collection"

  Jim Hill reviews this new coffee table table that commemorates the 20th anniversary of this very popular publication. Which includes some great behind-the-scenes stories from animation industry vets Read More... Posted Wednesday, January 09, 2008 12:00 AM | 2 Comments Filed under: animation, book, Disney, Walt Disney, John Lasseter, "Ratatouille", Walt Disney Animation Studios, coffee table book

• "To Infinity and Beyond!" is an entertaining look back at Pixar's first two decades

  Jim Hill reviews Karen Paik's inspired (more importantly, inspiring) new history of Pixar Animation Studios. Which offers a lot of insight about how John Lasseter became the Big Kahuna of the CG world Read More... Posted Thursday, November 29, 2007 12:00 AM | 4 Comments Filed under: animation, book, Disney, movies, Pixar, computer animation, CG, John Lasseter, John Musker, "The Little Mermaid", "Cars", "Ratatouille", Leslie Iwerks, Brad Bird, "Aladdin", Walt Disney Animation Studios, Pixar Animation Studios, Ron Miller, "Toy Story", "Toy Story 2", WDAS, featurette, "Monsters Inc.", "The Pixar Story", "To Infinity and Beyond: The Story of Pixar Animation Studios", Karen Paik, Ed Catmull, Steve Jobs, Walt Disney Studios, film, movie, Mouse, Disney / Pixar, 2007, "Tis the season" , feature film , Chronicle Books, "The Art of Animation", Bob Thomas, cartoons, epiphany, coffee table book, hardcover, church, pew, gourd, sermon, pencil, pencil time, award, The Headless Horseman, "The Adventures of Ichabod & Mr Toad", station wagon, Casper the Friendly Ghost, California Institute of the Arts, CalArts, character animation, Walt Disney Feature Animation, Disney Feature Animation, calcified, middle management, "The Fox and the Hound", old guard, Tom Wilhite, Maurice Sendak, picture book, "Where the Wild Things Are", Thomas M Disch, "The Brave Little Toaster", Marin, Lucasfilm, "The Adventures of Andre & Wally B", SIGGRAPH, animated short, short, character comedy, cutting-edge technology, money pit, Jane Eisner, Roald Dahl, "James and the Giant Peach", human costs, keyboard, repetitive-stress injury, "The Art of Ratatouille", aspiring animator, holiday shopping list

• "Walt Disney's Cinderella" is a picture-perfect picture book

  Jim Hill reviews this new hardcover from Disney Press. Which features a spectacular selection of Mary Blair's concept art for Walt Disney Productions' 1950 release Read More... Posted Thursday, October 04, 2007 12:00 AM | 4 Comments Filed under: animation, book, Disney, DVD / Video, movies, Walt Disney, traditional animation, Disney Press, "Peter Pan", Walt Disney Animation Studios, Walt Disney Productions, "Walt Disney's Cinderella", "Cinderella", "Alice in Wonderland", Mary Blair, concept art, Newbury Medal, Cynthia Rylant, Animation Research Library, ARL, Jon Scieszka, WDAS

• Was "Brother Bear" really put into production because Michael Eisner thought that the Disney Store would then be able to sell more plush ?

  Jim Hill shares an excerpt from Jeffery Stepakoff's "Billion-Dollar Kiss," in which this industry veteran talks about the two years that he spent at Disney Feature Animation working on "Brother Bear" and "Tarzan" Read More... Posted Wednesday, August 22, 2007 12:00 AM | 11 Comments Filed under: animation, book, Disney, toys, traditional animation, Walt Disney Animation Studios, Rita Hsiao, Jeffrey Stepakoff, "Brother Bear", "Tarzan", "Dawson's Creek", Disney Store, "Northern Exposure", "The Wonder Years", The Animation Guild

• "Walt's People -- Volume 5" is an entertaining addition to this ongoing Disney history series

  Jim Hill reviews Didier Ghez's latest book, which features a fascinating collection of interviews with various Disney Legends Read More... Posted Wednesday, July 25, 2007 12:00 AM | 1 Comments Filed under: animation, book, Disney, movies, other, theme park, Walt Disney, Visual Effects, Imagineering, traditional animation, Walt Disney Pictures, WED, Disneyland, Walt Disney World, Ron Clements, John Musker, Ward Kimball, Marc Davis, "The Little Mermaid"

• "Disney's Lost Chords" showcases long-hidden treasures from the studio's musical archives

  Jim Hill just raves about this self-published hardcover, which features 225 rarely-seen pieces of development art as well as 77 songs that were cut from Walt Disney Productions' pictures in the 1940s, 1950s & 1960s Read More... Posted Wednesday, July 18, 2007 12:00 AM | 10 Comments Filed under: animation, book, Disney, music, musical, Walt Disney, traditional animation

• "The Art of Ratatouille" gives its readers a glimpse of the picture that Pixar Animation Studios almost made

  Jim Hill reviews this handsome new hardcover from Chronicle Books. Which features a surprising amount of artwork from Jan Pinkava's version of "Ratatouille" Read More... Posted Wednesday, June 27, 2007 12:00 AM | 24 Comments Filed under: animation, book, Disney, movies, Pixar, computer animation, CG

• "Cartoon Modern" takes a witty & informed look back at animation's not-so-distant past

  Jim Hill reviews Amid Amidi's award-winning book. Which pays tribute to the many studios as well as individual artists that helped to revolutionize the look & style of 1950s-era animation Read More... Posted Wednesday, June 06, 2007 12:00 AM | 6 Comments Filed under: animation, book, Disney, movies, other, TV, Broadway, musical, Walt Disney, traditional animation

• "The Dream Team" serves up some intriguing insights about how the New Hollywood really operates

  Jim Hill reviews Daniel M. Kimmel's new book. Which tracks the rise & fall of DreamWorks SKG, that ambitious entertainment company that Steven Spielberg, David Geffen and Jeffrey Katzenberg founded back in October of 1994 Read More... Posted Wednesday, April 18, 2007 12:00 AM | 11 Comments Filed under: animation, book, Disney, movies, TV, Pixar, DreamWorks, ABC, traditional animation, computer animation

• "The Animated Man" offers an intimate, more immediate look at the life of Walt Disney

  Jim Hill weighs in on the "Which is better: Neal Gabler's "Walt Disney: The Triumph of the American Imagination" or Michael Barrier's "The Animated Man: A Life of Walt Disney" controversy. And finds that Barrier's bio touches on a number of stories that the Gabler book seems to have missed Read More... Posted Wednesday, April 11, 2007 12:00 AM | 6 Comments Filed under: animation, book, Disney, DVD / Video, movies, Walt Disney

• A special behind-the-scenes version of Why For

  Jeff Lange shares photos of a bizarre WDW structure that few Disneyana fans ever got the chance to see. Plus Jim Hill talks up some fun Disney-related events that will be happening around the country over the next few days Read More... Posted Friday, March 30, 2007 12:00 AM | 7 Comments Filed under: animation, book, Disney, DVD / Video, movies, theme park, TV, Why For

• Walt Disney Pictures plans cheesy promotional stunt for "Ratatouille"

  Jim Hill shares the Gouda news about how the Mouse is going to get the word out about Pixar's next release. Would you believe a 25-foot-tall wedge of cheese that you can actually walk through? Read More... Posted Tuesday, March 27, 2007 12:00 AM | 6 Comments Filed under: animation, book, Disney, DVD / Video, TV, Pixar, Visual Effects, Pirates of the Caribbean

• "The Art of Meet the Robinsons" puts preproduction artwork in the spotlight

  Jim Hill reviews this new hardcover from Disney Editions. Which highlights a number of the drawings that were done during the developmental phase of WDFA's next theatrical release. WARNING !! This review contains minor spoilers Read More... Posted Wednesday, March 21, 2007 12:00 AM | 24 Comments Filed under: animation, book, Disney, movies, Pixar