THE STARTOONS ANIMATORS CLUB

MACK HAMMER Productions

2008-06-15T20:33:00.000-07:00

Jon has a new company and a new website!

Meet Lily!

2008-03-08T14:31:00.001-08:00

Hey all ... meet my granddaughter. Lily. Born to Heather and Jess on Feb. 18 of this year. Kinda looks like a Smurfette, doesn't she? Anyway Chris, Vince, and I are going out there to give the kid some well-overdue grandparent-type attention.

More staff pictures

2007-12-30T17:41:00.002-08:00

Here are a bunch of pics from Marco. Thanks for sharing!

Vince at his "ivory tower" desk

Djordge at the community internet computer. It's scary to think that this was our only connection to the WWW at the time.

Mike Feeney in his cozy cube

Kurt on the community phone. All the animators and assistants shared one line.

Doug, Andy, and Adrian. This was the layout department, where Doug did almost all our animation layouts at the time.

Caroline and Katie

Little Go Beep!

2007-09-20T22:50:00.000-07:00

If you haven't seen it in a while, you can check it out here! Fun stuff.

FAT CATS IN "CLOGGED BRAINS. "

2007-09-03T11:50:00.000-07:00

The very first project i worked on at Startoons was "THE FAT CATS." (A short done for Cartoon Network.) It was a very exciting time for me and i was thrilled to be working on an actual cartoon, assisting the fantastic animation by John McClenahan and Dave Pryor.I learned a ton and we all had alot of laughs.
Anyway,...after the first Fat Cats wrapped i thought i would pitch some concepts for a follow up in case there was to be one.One of the ideas was for Louie and Elmo to become plumbers. Lots of comedy possibilities when toilets and raw sewage are present.The episode was to be entittled "CLOGGED BRAINS." Above are a few of the sketches i did of possible trucks and a tittle card to sell the idea. Dave Pryor saw what i was doing and added his own Visual development. AH,...GOOD TIMES. Let's get "the band" back together and make this baby.

In the hall of Startoons

2007-08-29T21:44:00.000-07:00

Here's a happy picture of Me behind Kurt and Caroline - drinking (hic!). This is right outside John Griffin's office, and I like to play the game of trying to remember exactly what was up on the walls at the time. Mostly a bunch of in-jokes and caricatures of workmates getting hurt in some humorous way. I can't make out the three hanging items in the foreground on the left, but right behind them is a foam board poster for a show that Startoons Pitched called "Mixed Nutz". This was created right before I started working at Startoons in '92 or '93. It was a slew of characters with their own shows combined into one series - very much like Animaniacs in a way - like the one off Rita and Runt stuff (but way better). I think most of the characters were designed by Spike. Maybe someone can remember the names. What I remembered the most was a Ray Rayner type of dog that would have a show about building things, and a detective show featuring a Girl named Cindy and an old magician rabbit. Maybe someone can step in here and fill in the details. On the right side is a poster for the Tommy Nelson/Fancy Monkey show "Little Dogs on the Prairie". The third and unfortunately final show in the series.

West Coast Trip

2007-08-13T07:14:00.000-07:00

Just got back from the west coast where I visited some old StarTooners and made some new friends here at Pixar Studios. What an INCREDIBLE place!!! They even have a bar just like we did. Got to see Tony Cervone at WB and Heather McC at Disney. Still lookin' fine Heather!

Chicago's Wizard World

2007-08-12T09:48:00.000-07:00

Had a fun time as always this Saturday at the Wizard world convention.

Here's Startoons Alum Kurt Kanellos standing next to his new best friend from the upcoming "Bioshock" video game.

Kurt Mitchell was in the artists section - here you can see him signing for his "Cannonboy" comic.

Also spotted was Adrian Puente, and Phil Gullett was part of our mini entourage. We liked spotting really bad Hulk toys and documenting them for prosperity.

Pinky and the Brain

2007-08-07T21:27:00.000-07:00

I sure don't have much from the Warner Bros. stuff we worked on - just a couple poses or rough drawings I saved along the way. Here are a couple cute sad drawings of Pinky and the Brain from the episode Ron directed - "Brain's Apprentice"

Ron & Jon Pix

2007-08-06T08:08:00.000-07:00

Jon and Ron's cameo from "The Brain's Apprentice"

Jon and Ron at the pre-Emmy Awards show dinner in NYC

Screen Magazine (Feb 11, 1991)

2007-08-06T07:48:00.000-07:00

An article I saved from Ruth's rag... did that broad ever get anything right?

The Monkey Speaks (Part One)

2007-08-06T07:33:00.000-07:00

Hi everyone. I used to work at StarToons too... at least I thought I did until I started reading these blogs ; )

So I'm here to set the record straight... well okay, maybe just a bit crooked, because my memory ain't what it used to be, but then again what is?

I first met Jon, our fearless leader, when I was working as the Technical Director at Kinetics (1983-1990), a small but prolific animation house located in downtown Chicago. I shot and assembled the very first pencil test of "Dudley the Dinosaur" for Jon and he seemed to be impressed with my creative way of putting it all together. Kinetics was seeing its last days as most of the motion graphic stuff that we were doing was now all going to computers being rendered on a new toy called a "Paintbox". I knew that my days at Kinetics were numbered and so I tagged along with Jon and company to LA (my 1st trip there) to try to sell myself and find some work. I was in that infamous elevator ride where we coincidentally ran into Tom Ruegger which certainly changed our destiny. Some things are just meant to be I guess. Anyway, as you already know, Jon got a contract to animate some Tiny Toons bumpers and I guess that I did such a good job trying to sell myself to the LA crowd that it impressed Jon enough to hire me himself.

Hired as a Technical Director, my 1st duties were to shoot the new Tiny Toons bumpers (all shot on film under a motion-controlled Cinetron Oxberry). I also did checking, track reading, and eventually devised a creative way to shoot pencil tests on hi-con film, exposing each level one pass at a time (as opposed to backlighting multiple paper levels which resulted in distracting grain movement and blurry lower layers). I also edited one of the 1st StarToons demo reels which consisted almost entirely of Jon's previous work. In the early days we all worked out of the McClenahan's basement but our sudden growth forced a move to our Ridge Road basement headquarters (still couldn't get up above ground level, perhaps to prevent window-leaping suicides).

Ruegger was so happy with Jon's work on the Tiny Toons bumpers that he gave us an entire episode to work on, "Henny Youngman Day". I remember Jon laid out on the floor (more roomy than the minimal office furniture that we had) timing out the board for this show while I looked on, feeding him hot cups of coffee about every half hour. I've never seen anyone do anything like this before (the board slugging, not the coffee ingestion) and he seemed eager to share the process with me, which I eventually caught on to. I believe that all of the animation was sent off to LUK Films in Korea (yeah... good LUK getting it right) which was headed by a fellow named Tae Kim (later nicknamed Tae Kim out and Shoot Him!). Everything was "no problem" with these guys yet all we had were just that... problems! It was so exciting, and terrifying, getting the 1st dailies back from them which I edited together with the slugged dialogue tracks (another one of my duties along with track reading) on our newly purchased 8-plate 35mm Kem. Almost every shot needed to be redone, not because of the animation but mostly painting problems. All of the shading on the characters was wrong and almost all of the teeth were painted red (inside mouth color) making it seem like the characters had bloody mouths when they were speaking. Our rule of thumb for them became, "If you don't see a tongue, then paint the damn opening as TEETH!" Needless to say we were a bit disappointed that all of the cels were "top painted" in order to be corrected, but as the Koreans' say, "No problem." Tom and WB loved our episode and decided to give us some "special" scripts to work on, ones with a lot of cultural and comic references that would undoubtedly be lost in translation. "Thirteen Something" (a parody of the then-popular "40 Something" TV show) was one and it was actually quite funny. Our staff was growing rapidly and we finally moved above ground level to occupy the 1st floor of the building.

The next show on our agenda was the brand new "Taz-Mania" series starring you-know-who, his family, and a cast of regulars. The 1st thing I did was shoot the kitchen-sink opening title sequence which was no small feat... definitely one of the big camera challenges of my career and I recall Jon passing me cels on one of our 1st attempts at it. This was all done as one long shot with no edits. In fact, one of my responsibilities was to shoot all of the complicated shots the overseas studios couldn't handle or just kept screwing up like the split screen shots in "Thirteen Something", bi-pack and optical shots for Taz-Mania, and so on.

We were under a terrific crunch to finish 2 Taz-Mania episodes and farmed them off to LUK films (Korea) and Philcartoons (Manilla... run by Jon's Aussie buddy Wayne Dearing) in order to get both into production at the same time. Rodney Whitham (another... cough, cough... early StarToons supervisor) was sent to Korea while I was sent to Manilla to supervise production. On the day I arrived so did Bill Hanna who brought the studio the great news that they would have work for a long time because Mr. Jane Fonda had just purchased Hannah Barberra. Bill was a terrific man who cried at the drop of a hat. The emotional crowd really set him off. For the next few days we got to know each other and I think I eventually wore him out talking about timing direction (he taught Jon his technique of using a metronome) and his history with HB. An extremely nice guy that you couldn't help but like. Besides working on Taz-Mania, the studio was also working on the original "Ren and Stimpy" episodes and I made friends with John K's overseas supervisor Howard Baker, who was also gearing up for "Rugrats". Howard invited me to work on an episode with him and we cut and called retakes on the "Untamed Wilderness" episode. Howard also gave me a couple of original cels as a thank you for my help... pretty cool stuff! Manilla was a surreal experience. Guards with automatic weapons were everywhere including fast food joints like Burger King (they also cleaned the windows) but they seemed very friendly despite the fire power. Everyone, and I mean everyone, loved the Bulls and Michael Jordan and coming from Chicago held a lot of weight. The studio itself was like a sweatshop but the kids that worked there all enjoyed what they did. The most surreal thing occurred each day when the entire studio stopped working and laid their heads down on the desks for a half hour of nap time. Wandering around the studio during this period reminded me of the surreal sci-fi film "Dark City" where all of the inhabitants fall asleep each day at midnight. On the trip home I stopped in Japan to wait for my fight connection and had the giddy notion of running through the airport screaming "Godzirra!!" at the top of my lungs. The next stop was LA where I handed off the workprint to someone from WB and then finally home to Chicago.

Jon soon entrusted me to time/slug boards for Taz-Mania as WB was sending us many boards for shows that we weren't even working on. I think I ended up doing at least a dozen shows and started earning a reputation for being a timing director as I was soon freelancing and slugging these shows for WB in my spare time.

Since I never did any of the drawings or animation I saw myself as the nuts-n-bolts (but mostly nuts) of the operation. I would time all the dialogue, slug the boards (some of the time), edit and read the track, timing direct the x-sheets (or transpose director's notes), basically feeding the hungry animators who were waiting to get started. I'd then edit together all of the dailies, synch it all up to my slugged track, ship it to LA and coordinate the retakes.

Then "Animaniacs" hit the studio and things changed once again....

(to be continued...)

Startoons at Comic Con

2007-07-30T17:28:00.000-07:00

It was great to see some of the old Startoons gang. In attendance were Spike Brandt, Tony Cervone, Kirk Tingblad, Kurt Mitchell, Kevin Barber, Jason Peltz, John Griffin, and myself. Above are some of the pictures.

Emmy Pic

2007-07-23T22:20:00.001-07:00

Here's a cool pic of Jon with his Emmy award - coutesey Doug Rice. Thanks Doug!

Comic Con Panel

2007-07-11T09:57:00.000-07:00

Those of us going to Comic Con this year, be sure to check out this panel on Thursday July 26th. Startoon alums Spike and Tony will be there!

2:45-3:45 Hanna Barbera Retrospective—Take a look back at the lives and times of two of the greatest characters in the history of animation, Bill Hanna and Joseph Barbera. Former colleagues and friends examine the toon titans’ nearly 70 years of creating some of the world’s most beloved animated characters. Animation author/historian Tom Sito moderates a panel that includes longtime Hanna-Barbera director Andrea Romano, the renowned Gary Owens (Space Ghost), Hanna-Barbera Cartoons author Michael Mallory, plus Spike Brandt and Tony Cervone, the producer-director team of the upcoming Tom and Jerry: A Nutcracker Tale, Joe Barbera’s final animated project. Room 6B

http://www.comic-con.org/cci/cci07_prog_thu.php

Arthur T Cock

2007-07-07T07:12:00.000-07:00

Up with the Chickens was a property Jon Developed with Kevin Matthews. It was to take the form of a morning news show. The hook was that the title was a literal description, as the program was written and produced by barnyard animals. That would have been a lot of fun to work on, since animals aren't good at producing TV shows. It would have had that "little rascals" look, with improvised equipment, shoddy sets and inept personnel. Kevin Matthews was to provide most of the primary voices for the characters, including the host - pictured above - Arthur T. Cock. Additionally, there would have been a cooking segment with a cajun crocodile, also voiced by Matthews. No wait. Maybe he was a dinosaur? Anybody know? Beuhller?

Found it on my hard drive

2007-07-07T07:10:00.000-07:00

Histeria

2007-06-29T23:58:00.000-07:00

One of the last WB series that Startoons worked on, Histeria was an odd cast of characters that seemed to change personalities all the time. I believe they would even change their race if the script called for it. This image was one of the golden moments from the show - where we got to animate a classic WB character. This scene is from "The Wild West" if I'm not mistaken (judging by Miss Information's getup). Bugs Bunny was skillfully handled by Director John Griffin, delivering his classic line I'm assuming - I can hardly remember since I probably last saw this show only when it aired. I'm sure John could help fill in the details. "The Wild West" was the first Histeria show Startoons worked on, and the show that was in production when Startoons moved from 900 Ridge Road to the VFW building on Harwood.

Update: Posing by Jon McClenahan, Animation by John Griffin

The Three Stooges

2007-06-26T22:28:00.000-07:00

Here's a picture of Me, Kevin Barber, and Jay Peltz back around 1995. Kevin is as crazy as ever, and Jay just would never shut up ;) Kevin and Jay graduated from Startoons and went on to work on several feature films at Disney Orlando (Lilo and Stitch among my favorites).

I'm happy to say I work with Kevin again, and I'm looking forward to a reunion with Jay at Comic-Con this year.

Here's a picture of Jay hiding in a bowl of apples. He sure was a sneaky guy.

Steve barf

2007-06-26T11:13:00.001-07:00

Let's see if the animated GIF in my Yahoo briefcase works...

Stevebarf.gif

p

Birthday card pictures.

2007-06-25T19:05:00.001-07:00

Key People - Dave Pryor

2007-06-24T07:05:00.001-07:00

Molliter Pryzberowski (or, as he is known by those in the Tinkerer's Guild, "Old Tinkey") is, as they say in the Tinkerer's Guild, "A bit of a Tinkerer". Ever fascinated with thwarting small creatures attempts to fit through tiny holes in things, there was a small movement on the part of the Tinkerer's Guildmembers to change his monniker to "Old Strainey", but "Old Tinkey" was already embroidered on his Tinkerer's apron.

Birthed in Poland by a mother of Polish lineage and a father of German origin, he soon realized that America was where he had to go. Six weeks after his seventeenth birthday, he set sail for the New World in a boat that he built out of pamphlets. Nine months later, he set off again in a boat that he made out of trees. One and a third years later, in the fall of 1890, he was released from the Iverson Hospital in Lafayette, Maryland. He was finally an uninvited Guest of the American People!

Over the next Seven Years, Molliter (or, as he was known by legitimate citizens, "that filthy Tramp") worked his way toward the Midwest, which was, as he had been led to believe, "the heart of a booming Storm Door market," which was false. Along the way, he learned what he could about animation from the hobos, drifters, angry loners, and bums that he failed to avoid. One of the many technological developments he learned of was a thing called "Motion Picture Film." His intrigue at this news would lead him to one of his Greatest Innovations.

Falling off a train and breaking his leg in Home-Wood, Illinois, he walked to the local Physic's house using a Cane he had made from Bread. Later, he hobbled the rest of the way using Crutches he made from Shovels. There, he learned of an animated photo-play studio in Home-Wood that was in need of a screen man.

In his travels, Molliter had seen the Suspicion, Fear, and Violence with which the Public had expressed their fascination with the new science of Motion Picture films. The Terror, he reasoned, stemmed from seeing Photo-pictographs of actual Humans in Motion. Pryzberowski postulated that this Horror could be allayed with Humor. This led to his first series of Short Films produced at Star-Toones in which moving Actors were got-up in suits made of boxes and rubber steam-hoses, making them seem less Real and more Drawing-like. In fig.2, we see a drawing from his early work, "Mr. Hobart's Boomful Blast".

This technique, while a Motion-Picture Failure, proved to be a postitive boon for Animated Photo-Plays (saving the animator the troublesome drawing of Elbows and Knees), and now promises to be one of the Most-Favored Trends in the coming century of Photo-Play Entertainment.

Classic WB Characters

2007-06-23T00:12:00.000-07:00

Here are the Warners characters that everyone remembers in their glorious splendor on the sides of carnival rides. These really cracked me up when I saw them - so I had to take a picture for prosperity. What? you don't recognize your favorite character Wile E. Coyote? I love these rip-offs. Even the Animaniacs make a showing in one of the carnival games!

Feeknee

2007-06-22T06:13:00.001-07:00

Djorge / djordge / djgeordjdgjge

2007-06-22T06:01:00.000-07:00

Djorge liked to play Goldeneye. His focus while playing was like a coffee laser. When he got married, we all went in together and got him an N64, and I believe a copy of the game, but I can't be sure. Trouble is, there was no way to do deathmatch with only one player. To get his fix, Djorge would set up a 4-player match and repeatedly slaughter the unmanned characters. Apparently, that did the trick for him.

A Wild and Crazy Guy

2007-06-21T20:04:00.000-07:00

Ever since his arrival at Startoons in 1995, Artist extraordinaire Phil Gullett was a one man party machine. Sort of a John Kricfalusi of his time - you couldn't keep him away from the young bitches. Late nights drinking and smoking were the regular scene for him. Only recently, after Phil contracted an extreme case of Boneitis, did he begin to slow off of his wild ways and begin going to bed at a regular time. I'm happy to say Phil is now alive and well with a cushy job and is continuing to draw laugh scribbles to this day. Keep it real Kool Kat!

StarToons Profile: J. Watkiss Gryphon

2007-06-21T17:14:00.001-07:00

Renowned creator of "Friendly Flickers" and sundry other award-winning Shadow Plays such as "The Farmer's Mighty Blow" and "Thy Hobbled Sheep," J. Watkiss Gryphon left a successful career in Phrenology to pursue the development of Animated Photo-Plays at Star-Toones. He currently holds the title of Cine-Spool Director and is responsible for the correct assemblage of Hinges.

Mr. Gryphon was the first member of our Studio to assign cardinal numbers to the Animation Photo-Plates, thereby assuring that they will be viewed in the proper Order. He also holds several Patents for the "Kine-Mato-Mystifier", the "Shadow-Confusagig-Cylinder" and the "Squirrel-Powered Napoleonic Theatre Phantastique."

He came to America from Hogansherosvald, Austria in 1892, where he studied "Der Artishkness Mit Scriben Unt Shtunten" or "The Drawing Trick" under Professor Joseph Mesmer at the Gymnasium Der Optikvasser-schloss. Upon graduation, his entire class was congratulated and/or attacked as demons for their "strange new powers" by the townspeople. Fully thirty-two Animators were killed, skinned and eaten by the members of the local church.

Watkiss escaped by clinging to the underside of a Dog as it ran from the Melee. He then made his way to the Coast by clinging to the underside of a Horse, a Chicken, and then a Goat. Vowing never to return to the shores of his most beloved and devout homeland, he clutched the very barnacles on the hull of a fishing boat and sailed to the Great Lakes in search of a new life, eventually finding work as a sketch-demon in Whitewater, Wisconsin. Although here he received numerous Accolades and a Papal Pardon, it was his love for Animation and quality Weatherstripping that led him to Home-Wood where he signed a writ that bound him in servitude to Star-Toones until the moon turns to blood.

Birthday Card #1

2007-06-20T11:43:00.000-07:00

This drawing by Vince Proce and Tyrue Jones adorned the cover of my favorite birthday card of all the infamous Startoons-production killling-birthday cards. Apparently I drank a lot back then.

VinceTye

Wall Ad

2007-06-19T22:21:00.000-07:00

During the "Non-TV" years, we picked up a slew of odd commercials. Some were pretty cool - Like a campaign of Charlie the Tuna commercials where Charlie would show up in real life situations - rotoscoped into shots with loving detail. There were lots of Toy ads too - Chicken Limbo, Gooey Louie, and Mousetrap are clear in my head.

Then there were some local ads, like this one for Homemakers furniture. I almost forgot about this one - and rightfully so. But I know those are my drawings of two very plain yellow walls with faces on them. Wally and Wanda are their names as I relearned from this article. All I remember is they slide apart and talk to each other - pretty easy stuff - which probably fit into their budget.

Now from the silent end of this peanut gallery...

2007-06-19T21:25:00.000-07:00

I am very pleased to see this blog page in full effect. It's good to see you are all doing well within this field or others. To all you whom I have either missed talking to, neglected to talk to, scorned in some way or another or simply not kept track of, I apologize and wish to say I hope we might all still be friends and remain in contact in the future.
That being said there's a couple of things I want to point out. First off, that is a very bad picture of me behind Caroline and Jen in that post below. It is a small reminder not to eat a huge bowl of pasta every other day.
Also I ask that you remember this: Despite Andy and his usual tendencies, lest we forget Trevor and his inadequacies for animation and life as we know it. If he should ever read this blog, I shall be the one to break it to him that he simply did not fit in. I still remember the way he pronounces "anime" as "a-nee-muh." That wacky guy...

Well, I do have some photos from back in the day around somewhere. Once they've been located, they shall be posted and the reminiscing can continue. Until then, keep on trucking!

Ty and Doc

2007-06-18T21:27:00.000-07:00

When Startoons hired staff to handle the shows we worked on for Animaniacs season four, the full time staff doubled almost overnight. Here is a shot taken in the assistant's room at the 900 ridge road building of Ty Jones and Mike "Doc" Reidy. This little room housed about maybe 5 guys when it really fit about 3. As I remember, they shared the space with Mike Feeney, Mike Fritz, and Vince Proce. It also fit a slop sink for the BG department paints, although we were moving to digital production for our commercial work so it didn't get much use other than to clean some coffee cups :)

Ty worked for Startoons on two separate occasions, and was doing animation for Startoons on his second tour of duty. The character I most remember Ty animating was the Lion in Tommy Nelson's "The Crippled Lamb" special, voiced by Mark Hamill. I also remeber Ty being pretty darn good at the video game Tekken on Playstation 1. Doc did a lot of assisting at Startoons. He worked through the Animaniacs and Histeria shows, and I believe some of the one-off shows like "Bingo" and "Watts on your Mind". Interesting fact, Doc was a model for Alex Ross' Uncle Sam character. After Startoons, I remeber Doc working for Chicago's Calabash animation and Cartoon Network in Atlanta.

M7

2007-06-18T09:50:00.000-07:00

Hey guys. Having a lot of fun reading through these entries. Especially the old photos and such. At any rate, I know most of the guys here have seen this, but I threw M7 up on YouTube awhile back, and figured I'd embed it here for the older guys who didn't work at the new office to see. Apologies for the audio getting out of synch. When I made the DivX edit of it ages ago the audio somehow got out of synch. I can't find my original huge .avi of it anywhere to re-rip it. It's probably in a box in my basement.

The guys who helped work on it (that I remember) are:

Kurt: animation/character concept
Djordje: animation
Thor: assisting
Chad: assisting
Phil: BGs
Doug: layout concept/layouts

Speak up if I missed anyone.

Startoon's Animaniacs in Screen Magazine

2007-06-17T22:41:00.000-07:00

Here is an inspiring article from the Startoons heydays. What an exciting time it was back then - getting so many shows to work on at once for a boutique studio. This article came out August 2, 1993. Click on the pictures to enlarge. Enjoy!

More on Drivers License Frizbee Golf

2007-06-17T11:10:00.000-07:00

To add to Phil's pics, here's another. This "game" is one that we often discuss as one of the most memorable moments in Startoons history. Here you can see Steve Bowler (orange hat) giving his license a toss.

We really did try to get Andy's license out of the wall. We looked pretty darn hard for it - but it was gone for good.

If you look on the back wall, those pictures hanging are Warner Bros. painted cels featuring their famous characters on different amusement park rides. This was a project Startoons did. I think it was Kevin Barber who did most of it (correct me if I'm wrong). The art was sold at the Six Flags amusement parks as limited edition art.

Exmas party pickshurs.

2007-06-17T07:15:00.001-07:00

I don't know why I have these pictures. I'm sure I didn't take them. They seem to be from StarToons' final Christmas party... the one we had at the office. The one where we played "drivers' license frisbee golf" - a game in which the victims /players throw their license from target to target around the office. The winner is any player who doesn't have to visit the DMV the next day. This time, everyone won but Andy (top picture on the right. Not Andy VanDalsem, with the Batman shirt on). His license wound up inside the wall of one of the "offices", I think it was Dave Pryor's. I say "office" because three walls and no ceiling do not an office make. Apparently, the gap between the sheets of wallboard was open at the top, so it really seems as if those walls were very optimistic about having a ceiling some day.

Andy never got his license out. He left the country not long after, returning to the Great White North. I hope someone invited him to "take off you hoser". I think it was about 8 months later when StarToons imploded. Conceivably, one of us could have stopped by when Bamboo Blue was tearing out the walls, to search for the artifact (let "tearing out" = "leaning on them for a minute"). Also conceivably, at the time, we were all very much occupied with "What the hell do I do now?", leaving very little room in our brains for "Gee I wonder if I can get Andy's license back?"

I used to have everybody over on occasional Friday nights to watch a movie or to play video games. I recall Andy only coming along once. I had a the electronics arranged so that not only would you hear the sound from the video game through my stereo, but I could also play music through the same speakers. It made the games funnier when you listened to wildly inappropriate music. Anyway, Andy had drunk a few of my beers, then chose to complain about the lameness of my musical choices for the night. I tried to explain that I knew it was lame and that, indeed, that's what I liked about it. I told him it made me laugh, demonstrating a little bit for him: "huh huh!" He wouldn't be deterred. He insisted that "No , man. Bad music is just BAD! There's no such thing as 'so bad it's good!'" He seemed really angry about it. For a smallish sort of guy, he had a big loud voice. My guests began to look concerned. I tried to brush off the subject: "Well, I like it and everyone else seems to be laughing (until he started shouting up the place), so you'll just have to tolerate it." Before I was required to throw the surly kanuk out of my house, I think it was Caroline (bottom photo, middle person) who got him to simmer down and give up the fight. I think he decided to leave shortly thereafter, which was no bad thing.

I'm not spiritual, but throwing his license inside a wall was not only an amazing shot, should he have been trying to, which I know he wasn't. It was also a piece of glorious karmic realignment.

p

For those of you who didn't get to attend Heather's wedding ...

2007-06-16T09:39:00.000-07:00

Marco was there ... Bowler was there ... can't remember who all else was able to come. Anyway, this was the dance we did for her: me, my two sons, and Rachael's husband.

Whaddaya doin' ya nut

2007-06-16T00:26:00.000-07:00

This pic looks like it could be in the 900 Ridge Road building. I don't know the history of how many Startoons offices had standard white walls. It's a picture not taken at Jon's "ivory tower" animation desk, so I'm assuming it's a publicity shoot.

2007-06-15T19:32:00.001-07:00

Go Team

2007-06-15T12:10:00.001-07:00

I was The Keeper Of The Graphics, and I see it as my job to surrender them to this blog in a painfully gradual manner.

Hello my name is...

2007-06-15T01:14:00.000-07:00

Mike.
I was the long haired guy who often slept under his desk when he missed the last train back to Chicago,the dancing idiot at every wedding, and the overseas studio guinea pig. Occasionally I animated.

If you asked me 10 years ago if I would be waxing nostalgic for Homewood IL, I would have laughed and gone outside for a cigarette. But I have to admit, my time at Startoons were some of the best years of my life. I have yet to work with a group of people I enjoyed more.

I'm looking forward to what this blog can do. My first suggestion is to start posting the birthday cards and remebering how much productivity was lost during their creation. I will post what I have when it's not 4am and when I'm not catching a plane to Chicago in the morning. Hopefully I will see some of you while I am in town for the Chewbone animation screening.

Hello!

2007-06-14T22:28:00.000-07:00

I sent out some invites, so If you are a Startoons Alumni and you are looking at this page, please e-Mail me, Dave Pryor, @ langston72@aol.com. I'm looking for more Startoons folks, so if you have a list of e-mail addresses, please send them to me. Some of my info could be a bit dusty, so hopefully I can get the latest and grow the members to the full staff again :)

Kitchen Sink Gang - Concept

2007-06-13T23:26:00.000-07:00

This is a concept image from Phil Gullett's "Kitchen Sink Gang". The characters were based on Phil's designs of some unused one-off characters that got cut from another show. Startoons funded 2 minutes of animation that was used to pitch the idea to the networks. The characters turned out more refined than how they look in this concept. The sketchy BG approach was retained as one of the style elements of the show.

At My Desk

2007-06-13T22:52:00.000-07:00

Here I am at my animation desk from when Startoons was at 18147 Harwood Ave. in Homewood - sometime in the late '90s. Like most workspaces, it's a bit messy, and overrun with toys. Some of my favorites here are Banana Splits figures that I picked up on a family trip to King's Island amusement park in 1982. You can see a hint of them in the top right corner on the shelf. You can see on my desk that I'm working on a scene with Englishman from "Kitchen Sink Gang". There's a great turnaround for Spaceman up on my board.

OUR FOUNDER

2007-06-13T00:43:00.000-07:00

This is the man. JON McCLENAHAN is responsible for giving so many animators their first break and truly believing in them. He taught me the value of hard work, and how you could accomplish any animation task with the proper planning and execution. The nose to the grindstone approach enabled Jon and Startoons to compete with the growing competition of overseas studios and keep more home grown animation penciled by the hands of local animators. Thanks buddy. My 9+ years at Startoons were filled with ups and downs, but whenever I look back, all I remember are the good times.