Mmzornes's List: Researching Credible Connections

• The Walt Disney Company's Board of Directors today announced that it has extended Robert Iger’s contract as Chairman and CEO through June 30, 2018.
• "I’ve had the privilege of being the CEO of this great company for nine years and am thrilled to have the opportunity to continue through June 2018,” Iger said. “I’m very excited about what lies ahead, including the release of our ‘Star Wars’ films and the launch of Shanghai Disneyland, and I’m honored to continue working with our talented management team and the 175,000 dedicated people who make this company what it is today.”
• “Bob Iger is the architect of Disney’s current success, with a proven history of delivering record financial results for the company quarter after quarter and year after year,” Orin C. Smith, Independent Lead Director of the Disney Board, said in a statement. “Under his tenure, Disney has reached unprecedented creative and financial heights, driving the stock price to record levels and creating extraordinary value for shareholders. He has transformed Disney’s culture and empowered its businesses to effectively capitalize on evolving markets and new technologies, making Disney a company that doesn’t merely embrace change, but leads it."

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• t long last, it's time to meet the missing co-star of Sleeping Beauty: The vulture.
• He didn't make the animated cut. Researchers from the Walt Disney Animation Research Library found the long-deleted vulture character among story sketches during an extensive look at the film's historical material.
• The vulture, now featured in the extras for the new Blu-Ray edition of Sleeping Beauty (out Oct. 7), was a comical henchman for the evil Maleficent
• "The vulture didn't add much to the story and also somewhat detracted from that imposing nature of the villain Maleficent," says Carney. "And this New York type of vulture didn't fit into the world of this classic medieval Europe where this film is set. So they dropped the character."

• Don Hahn, who produced the 2014 live-action film Maleficent, starring Angelina Jolie, was impressed by the vulture find.

  "I'm always fascinated by characters that are discarded, and you wonder why they didn't make it," says Hahn. "It's Darwinian what makes it on the screen. These movies are very lean. Every frame counts and some characters have to fall by the wayside."

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• A comical vulture once soared above the shoulder of "Sleeping Beauty's" Maleficent before a silent raven replaced him in the 1959 Disney animated classic.
• Researchers at the Walt Disney Animation Research Library discovered early sketches of the large bird that had gone undetected since the late 1950s
• The vulture had a New York-accent and served as a comical henchman for Maleficent, the self-proclaimed Mistress of All Evil.
• "The vulture didn't add much to the story and also somewhat detracted from that imposing nature of the villain Maleficent," Disney's Fox Carney told USA Today. "And this New York type of vulture didn't fit into the world of this classic medieval Europe where this film is set. So they dropped the character."

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• “Frozen,” its Nordic tale of two sisters and a wisecracking snowman, won two Oscars on Sunday, the same day the film crossed $1 billion at the global box office.
• multiple Disney executives became overwhelmed recalling just how far the studio had come after a harrowing transition to computer-aided filmmaking. “There was talk of closing this place,” John Lasseter, chief creative officer for Pixar and Disney animation, said through tears. “And we said: ‘Not on our watch. We will never allow that to happen.' ”
• Ever since the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences created the best animated feature prize in 2001, Pixar has dominated the category, winning seven times. Rivals including DreamWorks Animation have won all other years.
• Never winning was a humiliation for a lot of artists at Disney, the shop where the art of mainstream animation was essentially born and home to such classics as “Dumbo,” “Cinderella” and “The Lion King.”
• With “Frozen,” which also won a best song Oscar for the power ballad “Let It Go,” Walt Disney Animation can claim to be officially, absolutely and at long last back in the animation saddle.
• Two Pixar co-founders, Mr. Lasseter and Edwin E. Catmull, were put in charge of Disney’s legacy studio, where layoffs and creative misfires had resulted in a crisis of confidence.
• Disney’s hand-drawn pictures suddenly seemed hopelessly outdated as Hollywood and audiences moved toward computer animation. Disney also became unsure of its storytelling, worrying that even young moviegoers had become too cynical for the company’s signature brand of upbeat fairy tales.

• Maybe Walt Disney Animation was too broken to fix?

  Instead of pulling the plug, Robert A. Iger, who orchestrated the Pixar acquisition after he took over as Disney’s chief executive in 2005, asked Mr. Lasseter and Mr. Catmull to step in.
• the 2010 release of “Tangled” finally started to reveal some real creative spark; the operational changes that Mr. Lasseter and Mr. Catmull put into place were working.
• Disneyphiles started referring to the turnaround work of Mr. Lasseter and Mr. Catmull as a “second renaissance,” a reference to a pre-Pixar fertile period in the 1990s when Walt Disney Animation delivered megahit musicals like “Beauty and the Beast” and “The Lion King.”

• “We knew that you had it in you,” Mr. Catmull said on Monday, his voice cracking.

  “I don’t know that everybody else knew.”

  Mr. Lasseter did him one better: “Let it go,” he advised the crowd of the studio’s dark period. “We’re never going back there.”

• Ms. Lee, who based her “Frozen” screenplay on Hans Christian Andersen’s “Snow Queen,” summed up her feelings on the matter by quoting from a “Frozen” song.

  “People make bad choices if they’re mad, or scared, or stressed,” she recited. “Throw a little love their way, and you’ll bring out their best.”

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• Walt Disney Animation Studios musical that collected two Oscar nominations Thursday, is about a kingdom trapped in an endless winter.
• For the 90-year-old Burbank company, which has often suffered from a creative chill in recent decades, the movie represents a major thaw.
• "Frozen" has grossed $713 million worldwide since it opened in November, making it the studio's biggest hit since 1994's "The Lion King."

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• Artists band together to use their creative talents to revive a seemingly lost art form. It’s a style of artistry that once captivated untold millions but now is seen as passé at best or even downright uninspired at worst.
• Yet these artists know that, if they just have a chance, they can use this art form to reach a new generation through the magic of filmmaking, even if the moneyed interests of the studios say otherwise. In the process of saving the animation art from obscurity, these artists know they have a chance to also inspire young people, particularly girls, to excel in their pursuit of scientific endeavors.
• But for a collection of animators, some of whom worked on Disney animated film classics such as “The Lion King,” “Pocahontas,” “Hercules” and more, it could be a reality if they succeed. And judging by their public-funding campaign efforts, success awaits – as it does in most animated classics – at the end of our heroes’ journey.
• The animators want to create a hand-drawn, steampunk-themed film called “Hullabaloo.” Besides the entertainment value in such a project, the animators have a dual goal with their film. They want to help preserve the dying art of hand-drawn – or so-called 2D – animation, and they also want to help encourage young girls to explore science.

• Question: Why are you trying to work in a 2D medium when so many animated films today seem to embrace CG?

  Answer: As an animator, I am an artist. Artists feel the need to fully express themself. So, they choose what they consider to be the best tools or medium that will allow them to do so.  When I think about how I want to share my artist expression, 2D animation allows me to express myself to the fullest.

• Q. What does 2D animation give the audience that CG animation does not?

  A. When my friends try to describe the difference, the word they most commonly use is that it has “soul.” When I see something that is hand-crafted, there’s a feeling and sense of character that surrounds it as opposed to something that is machine-made. I believe that we can identify with it and embrace something that is hand-made much easier.

• Q. What does 2D allow the artist to do that CG does not?

  A. In CG, it starts with a pre-made default pose, then the animator clicks and drags the various parts of the character to eventually, over time, form a pose. It’s calculated.

  In 2D, it starts with a blank piece of paper and the animator quickly lays down a gesture-like form in a free-spirited way to create a similar pose. It’s spontaneous.

  In CG, I am somewhat bound by what the computer allows me to do, but in 2d, I am only bound by my own imagination.

• Q. Do you think that 2D animation helps storytelling better than CG animation? For example, is it easier to lose the focus of the story in the visual presentation of CG animation, or is this a risk for 2D animation, as well?

  A. I believe you can tell just as good of a story using either medium. I suppose it’s easy, when not checked, to choose style over substance. Both methods require a certain amount of discipline on behalf of the filmmakers in order to be told well.
• Performance is, in part, the key to good storytelling. As 2D animators, we are trained to caricature what we see. Caricature is an exaggerated point-of view of what we perceive and it exists in varied degrees ranging from the mild to extreme. Knowing the right degree that is required is what helps to create a solid performance and so that is why, typically, 2D animation or animators with 2D animation experience have the upper-hand.

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• Disney’s last traditionally animated films were 2009′s “The Princess and the Frog” and 2011′s “Winnie the Pooh.” Before that, decades of history allowed artists to put pencil to paper and create life on the big screen. Now, while computer animation certainly still requires the talent of animators, 2D hand-drawn animation is fading away.

   

  A group of longtime Disney animators is aiming to prevent that from happening.
• “Hullabaloo” is described as “a 2D (hand-drawn) animated steampunk film that hopes to help preserve the dying art of 2D animation.” It’s helmed by James Lopez, veteran Disney animator whose 25-year career has included credits such as “The Lion King,” “The Princess and the Frog,” “Pocahontas,” “Hercules,” and the recent short “Paperman,” among many others. He’s currently a teacher at CalArts and has also worked for other studios including Warner Bros. and Dreamworks.
• It’s a film that not only aims to keep hand-drawn animation alive, but also features two female leads acting as role models, encouraging girls to enter into the worlds of science and adventure. And on top of all that, it’s drawn with steampunk flair.
• Lopez hopes to initially create the “Hullabaloo” short film and, depending on how their fundraising goes, produce more shorts, a web series, and possibly a feature length animated film.
• Their indiegogo campaign

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• But it's not Disney! Hullabaloo is an original creation by a collection of Disney veterans who have a dream to make a beautiful steampunk, (hand-drawn) line animated film.