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Disney Feature Animation hypes "Meet the Robinsons" at SIGGRAPH 2006

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Jim Hill

Disney Feature Animation hypes "Meet the Robinsons" at SIGGRAPH 2006

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1 Aug 2006 9:00 PM
  • Comments 26

As you can see by the photograph below ...


Photo by Nancy Stadler

... It's pretty obvious which film is in the spotlight at Disney Feature Animation's booth at SIGGRAPH 2006. Though it's still eight months before audiences will officially get a chance to "Meet the Robinsons," the folks at WDFA aren't taking any chances. With the hope that they might be able to convince some of the 25,000 CG fans & professionals who are expected to troop through the Boston Convention & Exhibition Center over the next two days to come see this Steve Anderson film, they've festooned Booth 1227 with concept art for this upcoming Walt Disney Pictures release.


Photo by Nancy Stadler

Now -- me personally -- what I found really intriguing about this display is that I got the chance to compare early concept paintings of the "Meet the Robinsons" characters with their finished maquettes. Here you see a early version of Lewis ...


Copyright 2006 Disney Enterprises

... Followed by a finished maquette of this character.


Photo by Nancy Stadler

And here's an early concept painting of Wilbur Robinson ...


Copyright 2006 Disney Enterprises

... Followed by a finished maquette of that same character.


Photo by Nancy Stadler

And take a look at this early take on the villain for "Meet the Robinsons," the Bowler Hat Guy. Pretty bizarre, don't you think?


Copyright 2006 Disney Enterprises

Now here's a maquette for that same character ....


Photo by Nancy Stadler

As well as a maquette for the Bowler Hat Guy's robotic hat, Doris.


Photo by Nancy Stadler

Mind you, Disney Feature Animation isn't just at SIGGRAPH to hype "Meet the Robinsons." WDFA is also looking to recruit some of the CG professionals who are attending this show to come make movies for the Mouse. Among the hi-tech positions that Disney Feature Animation is currently trying to fill are:

  • Senior Light/Compositor
  • Hair/Cloth Technical Directors
  • Shadewriters
  • Technical Support Engineers
  • Web Application Developer
  • Graphics Software Engineers
  • Process Tools Software Engineers

If you're interested in applying for any of these production opportunities, please upload your portfolio or reel at www.disneymouselink.com (Please note that only QuickTime, .jpg and .pdf files are accepted) or send your resume to tech.jobs@disney.com.

My apologies if today's story seems to be a bit on the slim side. But Nancy & I are still in the middle of trying to cover SIGGRAPH 2006. Once this event officially wraps up on Thursday night ... Trust me, folks. We're going to have tons of new news stories to share with you on JHM. So please hang in there, okay?

Now, if you'll excuse me, I gotta go grab a few Zs before I have to drive back into Boston tomorrow morning to meet with a few of the guys who are working on DreamWorks Animation's latest Aardman project, "Flushed Away."

Your thoughts?

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Comments
  • 3 Aug 2006 1:04 PM
    SuperGrover-- it's a bunch of internet harassment and stalking and privacy invasion and boys club antics and it's really dumb and mean as heck. And it's not just Disney. It's a group of I.T. and entertainment companies who think I am a threat to their stock prices because of my politics. I've been afraid to approach anyone with my property because of it. When I saw they thought I was a threat, I started to blog-- I tried in earnest to show them there are better ways to make the same profits. To show them better ways for men and women to treat one another. I am stretching myself thin trying to please everybody and noone is grateful because it's not enough I am teaching these clowns, I also am supposed to choose a side. And right now, the Disney company is capitalizing from a lot of my insights, and to add insult to injury, they are stealing my main character's designs for this film, because I haven't given  enough of myself already.

    All I want to do is my art. It's all I want to do. But i felt cornered and when I am cornered, I fight back how I can. I don't just lay down and die. I have kids to feed.

    This is Dr.Voodoo:

    http://www.leftlanecartoons.com/tripe.jpg

    He's been seen by all the major studios, and Disney creatives know darned well he's my character. I've been an outspoken online presence for over three years now, and on all the major animation forums. I've exchanged correspondence with Lasseter and Sito and Roy Disney and Scott Adams, and Lee Nordling, and a Disney lawyer. They could just be grateful after all I've done for them for absolutely free. Because frankly, I don't need the stress.
  • 3 Aug 2006 1:14 PM
    chrlane
    I looked at the pictures of Dr. Voodoo and Bowler Hat Man looks nothing like him.  I think the point of BHM is to look like the stereotypical villain.  He looks more like Snidely Whiplash then your Dr. Voodoo.  I don't think you have much to worry about in that respect...
  • 3 Aug 2006 1:17 PM
    Mel!? I don't even drink, Sir. You're just upset because I don't want you to direct. Stop being so pushy. Get over yourself for heaven's sake.
  • 3 Aug 2006 1:35 PM
    N.T.S., Disney's B.M. design is strongly reminiscent of my character, who is, BTW, modeled after my interpretation of "the villain archetype". That was the whole idea behind Dr.Voodoo. He was conceived as an "anti-villain". It is something new I am exploring in my art; my brainchild. I have lectured extensively online on this very subject, and on archetypes and all that. It's what I am _doing_, for heaven's sake.

    http://p101.ezboard.com/fthecartooncaldron59171frm42.showMessage?topicID=14.topic

    And Snidely is very flat in his design, so that's a bit of a reach. And this bowler man has the same planar dimension and facial and physical configurations as my character, and moves similarly to Dr.Voodoo. If you squinted you'd be hard pressed to tell them apart.

    After all the good I've done FREE for Disney, they should just change it because the similarity is close enough that it bothers me. Lord knows I'd do the same for them, or even my worst enemy if the tables were turned. It's just cruel to muck with me this way. Show some darned gratitude for once, people-- save your reputation. With all that competition, you can't afford to be ripping people off. You there in Hollywood supposedly have all the best talent in the world at your disposal, for heaven's sake. Prove it by thinking for yourselves, or PAYING the people whose ideas you like.
  • 3 Aug 2006 1:41 PM
    Anyhow, if anyone has an intelligent comment to add, I am receptive to that. But I am going to ignore any more nonsense or denial here directed at me. I have no time to explain myself repeatedly to people with ulterior motives. It's just a waste of breath. Thanks for listening to those of you who still know what common decency and respect is.
  • 3 Aug 2006 3:09 PM
    I hate to say chrlane but there are COUNTLESS character designs that resemble Bowler Hat Man and your Voodoo Man. They aren't creative or unique enough to be able to notice any plagiarism. There are characters that looked like that back in Looney Toons back in the 70s, it isn’t unique at all. I just think you are fishing for a lawsuit or attention.
  • 3 Aug 2006 3:56 PM
    I actually think that Dr. Voodoo looks much more like Jafar than Bowler Hat Guy. It's really not surprising that two characters based off a villian archtype will end up looking similar. I actually think Bowler Hat Guy looks a lot like Meet the Robinsons Director Steve Anderson: http://mag.awn.com/issue10.08/10.08images/chick10_SteveAnderson.jpg

    You can't tell very much about the movie from early concept art and character maquettes. Has there been any other information released?
  • 3 Aug 2006 4:00 PM
    Warning: Intelligent Comment ahead......

    Like Dahl just suggested, there is a long tradition in both film and illustrated literature of that  stereotype, characterized by hook-nose, high cheekbones, angular chin and mustache. You certainly don't have a monopoly on that generalized type. I was about to say that your Dr. Voodoo also resembled Jafar (especially by virtue of the pointy goatee), but it seems that you chewed out someone on your blog for having made a similar observation, and pretty much implying him to be a racist to boot.

    Interestingly, Snidely Whiplash was just a Jay Wardian take on the Simon Legree character from "Uncle Tom'e Cabin", a source of inspiration for many characters, including "Wacky Races" baddie Dick Dastardly, who was likely based on Jack Lemmon's villain in "The Great Race", who in turn was just one more variation on the Simon Legree-tieing-the-damsel-to-the-traintracks type of villain. Add to the list, Conrad Veidt in "The Thief of Baghdad" (upon which Jafar is heavily influenced), Dicken's Fagin, and all the slimy mustachioed villains portrayed by the likes of Vincent Price or Terry-Thomas.

    So, sorry Chrlane, but your Dr. Voodoo is merely a close cousin of all of these tall, gaunt, mustachioed and sinister fellows. I really don't think you should be suggesting plagiarism here.
  • 3 Aug 2006 6:51 PM
    Let me put it to you this way.

    Way back in primary school, I used to draw a lot. I wasn't that competitive in the school yard but the teachers liked me, because I got good grades and I was gentle and honest. And I was real shy.

    Well, there was this girl in my class called, Caroline. Caroline had lots of boyfriends at a really young age, and she knew how to dish the dirt. She was what you'd call, "popular".

    One day, in art class, I was minding my business, drawing a pretty green caterpillar. It was a good caterpillar because I practiced a lot while the other kids ran around outside. My Grandma used to chase them out of our storage locker-- they were in there reading porn mags they had stolen from their dads. They used to grab eachother's crotches in the school yard, but I was frightened so I just had a couple of good friends I'd talk to. I never much cared for rough play.

    Caroline, who always picked on me with her friends, was sitting opposite me that day in art class. Nobody said anything about my caterpillar. They all ignored me, because they knew the teacher liked my work, and I used to let them all copy off my tests so they'd pass their French classes, so they'd leave me alone. But when Caroline, who could barely draw, drew the exact same thing minutes after I did, all her friends, who saw that I had drawn mine first, well they all made this big stink about how wonderful her caterpillar was, just to hurt my feelings. We all knew they were just making sport of me, but because they played dirty, and Caroline was a bully, she got credit from the other kids.

    Notice I never said I was the only one to ever draw a caterpillar.

    Well later on, when high school rolled around, I heard a couple of things about that Caroline girl. She'd gotten knocked up at fifteen, and flunked out of school. She was always in trouble. Everyone who used to be her friend told me how bad she'd gotten, and nobody wanted to know her anymore. But they all liked me just fine, because she was no longer calling the shots. And you want to know something, I wasn't happy to hear of her demise. There was a stirring of vindication in my heart, but mostly, I felt sad for Caroline. I don't know how to take pleasure from someone else's misery.

    Take what you like from the story. I've seen that pattern play out countless times in my life. I'm all grown up now, and I'm one of the cool kids. And you know, I still don't know how to enjoy it. Most likely never will. But alas, there it is.

  • 4 Aug 2006 7:03 AM
    Chrlane --

    Jim Hill here. Let me see if there's a polite way to say this ... Your posts in this particular TalkBack at JHM? They've been kind of off the grid.  Especially the one directly above this note. Where you attempt to make it sound as if Caroline actually got what was coming to her. All because she dared to copy a caterpillar that you drew back in primary school.

    When I read a post like that (Which resurrects childhood grievances. Rather than dealing with the topic at hand. Which is "Meet the Robinsons") ... I begin to think that maybe it might be time for you to take your ball and go home.

    Again, I'm not trying to rude here. I'm just saying that -- once you turned this TalkBack into a protracted discussion about how the Walt Disney Company allegedly stole the design of your Dr. VooDoo character -- this thread became rather self-serving. Which I was willing to tolerate for a while. Until you posted your Caroline story.

    At that point, I felt that it was necessary to step in and shut you down. To suggest (again, politely) that this matter might be better suited for your own blog. I mean, you're not really winning JHM readers to your world view, Chrlane, by suggesting that a girl got "knocked up at fifteen" because she dared to copy your caterpillar. That's just (Again, I'm trying to be polite here) crazy talk.

    So how's about you take a break from noting in this particular TalkBack, Chrlane? I'm asking nice. Okay?

  • Meet the Robinsons en SIGGRAPH 2006 « Anima2
    5 Oct 2006 11:43 AM
    PingBack from http://anima2.wordpress.com/2006/08/02/meet-the-robinsons-en-siggraph-2006/
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