Alumni Artists of Perennial Pictures

James Workman - 1994

Andy Kuhn - 1993

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Michael J. Cole - 1997

Rackel L. Rutledge - 1986

The above studio photos feature a few of the Perennial Pictures "Alumni Artists." All of the Alumni Artists made invaluable contributions to the filmed productions and, whether they knew it or not, helped to shape the studio.

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This week we heard from "Alumni Artist" Michael J. Cole. ..Michael worked in the Ink and Paint Department as an Artist and Supervisor at Perennial Pictures Film Corporation during the late 1990s. He, along with fellow I&P artists, personally hand-painted thousands of cels for studio productions. ..Today, however, there is no Ink and Paint Department at Perennial Pictures and nary a cel to be painted. All animation art is “painted” in the computers, and it is usually done by the animators. Happily, Michael remains very active in the creative arts field and keeps busy doing book illustrations and select design work.

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Thanks for checking in, Michael J. Cole.

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To see more Perennial Pictures Artists, Alumni Artists and Staff photos, Click here.

~ Russ Harris

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Extra Details for Scene

At Perennial Pictures the CRAWFORD THE CAT project rolls along. The scene above took some extra time to create as the background and character art is more detailed than some of the other art generated for this show The scene had a unique mood to expresses and does it quite nicely. The extra time was worth it.

All of the animation in the scene was generated in FLASH. Some initial hand drawn images were scanned into the program, but then each component was duplicated, manipulated, squashed, stretched and then put into its proper position.

In this particular show, we needed to replicate a style that was set previously in the “Crawford the Cat” shorts. I think the process has been most successful. While entirely generated in FLASH, I’d say it’s pretty hard to discern it from the traditionally animated art created earlier.

The below links are clips of the scene with and without the background. I particularly enjoy the animated walk of the stork character. This super work was generated by G. Brian Reynolds.

To see the clip, Click here.

To see the character animation WITHOUT the background, Click here.

To just see the background, Click here.

Enjoy.

~Russ Harris

Animation Continues

This week at Perennial Pictures, animation continued on CRAWFORD’S CLASSICS - CINDERELLA as well as some advance work on the sound effects. The promotional trailer for the show will be done in a few weeks so other areas of production for it are starting to kick in.

The image above is a screenshot from another scene by animator Daryl D. Pyle.

Click here to see some of the ANIMATION.

Nice work Daryl!

Also this week, composer Peter Schmutte was in to discuss a song for a dance sequence in the show. The process usually goes like this: G. Brian Reynolds and he discuss, Peter makes notes, disappears for a week or so, and then come backs with some great demo of the song for us to listen to. It’s all pretty amazing to me.

More on Peter and the whole music process in an up coming post.

More "We're Floating Away" Song

Click here to see the ANIMATION

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See above IMAGE bigger

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This week – more art generated and more scenes animated.

The above 30 second clip is more from the song sequence “We’re Floating Away.” I love the little “Mary Poppin-esque” touch G. Brian Reynolds added with Crawford atop the chimney stacks.

Enjoy.

~ Russ Harris

(Scenes from "Crawford's Classic" hour-long TV Special)