After a trip to New York directly followed by a trip to Los Angeles, I’m a little tired. Actually, a lot tired. I’m hoping to get a little more rest in the coming days, but I was able to sit down a little and take a look at some of the various scans over these past weeks.
I’m really looking forward to having enough time to finish a bunch of the things that are on deck at the moment between everything else. Life and work have a way of making it hard to get the things you want to do actually done, but if I can hide long enough I can whittle away at one thing at a time. There’s hours and hours of stuff scanned for both special sets and official ones, and my hope is to have a Sunday morning (or any morning for that matter) to just sort things, sticking each project on its own drive, neatly finishing some of the special discs and separating all of assets for the ‘official’ sets. Maybe it will be today.
The path to finishing most of the Thunderbean things on deck right now is pretty clear; with Flip getting done, we’re honestly though most of the ‘hard’ projects and onto the ones that are a little easier, at least all things considered. While there are still a lot of things on the plate, by the and of the year there will be a lot less, with most of the special discs being finished and many others in really good shape.
Many of the major companies are releasing a lot less of their classic catalogs on Blu-ray in more recent years. Seeing any new release is a great thing these days. It’s also a good sign that many of the companies are willing to license things from their animation libraries to smaller companies. Let’s hope Thunderbean is among them!
Thunderbean has been so incredibly lucky to do the things we’ve been able to do so far. While each of these periods has its challenges, I can honestly say the path forward is exciting for me, with many of the ‘Holy Grails’ actually happening. Just knowing what we *might* be able to do makes me excited to get the stuff finished now so the new stuff happens faster. As Jerry always says, ‘Stay Tuned’.. without the pun!
Now, onto our film— or more properly, onto people scanning or watching film.
I really am amazed at how many people are scanning films these days- and more amazed at how many people are posting the things they’re doing with everything from shooting off a screen to professional scanners to do it yourself scanners printed with 3d printers. I’ve been making a collection for a while of these types of things, so I thought I’d share favorites this week. Some of these are people just watching prints, but others feature people doing their own scans. Technology!
The Cinemassacre folks are fun to watch. I found an older video (2009) of James Rolfe and Mike Matei watching 16mm cartoon prints. I think that might be my old print of Barber of Seville they’re watching too!
I think I might have mentioned Todd Tuckey last week. Here he is introducing a print he had for sale on eBay. I’m pretty sure I ended up being the one that bought this, but I didn’t see his YouTube for it until today!
Todd posted a later Little Audrey too. Wish I had won this old IB tech print!
You can really see how Disney Educational Media was stretching this in their later years from this film. Here’s someone projecting ‘Disney’s Animated Alphabet’ from 1988! I wonder if this was edited in video and imaged back to film…
Here is someone watching a Speedy Gonzales cartoon after fixing a projector. What better way to check!
Here’s Columbia’s Professor Small and Mr. Tall from Todd again. This is one I wish I had in 16mm:
And, speaking of Columbia, here’s one I’ve never seen before – have you seen this one? Snap Happy Traps (1946)
Here’s the 1969 release of ‘Fantasia’ scanned from a 35mm print:
And the trailer for Raggedy Ann and Andy – this one looks like it’s off a movie screen:
Here’s an ad for Mickey’s Birthday Party, done on a home-made scanner:
Finally, here’s a German trailer for ‘The Theif and the Cobbler’
Now, it’s *your* turn! What scans or people watching have you seen and liked on youtube?
Have a great week all!
Steve Stanchfield is an animator, educator and film archivist. He runs Thunderbean Animation, an animation studio in Ann Arbor, Michigan and has compiled over a dozen archival animation DVD collections devoted to such subjects at Private Snafu, The Little King and the infamous Cubby Bear. Steve is also a professor at the College for Creative Studies in Detroit.
“This stuff has been around since before we were born….” I think there’s stuff in my fridge that’s been around since before those boys were born.
I understand the necessity of posting samples of film prints that are up for sale, so prospective buyers can see how they look projected on a screen. I even understand why the seller might be tempted to oversell them by continually interjecting “Look at the colours!” like someone tripping on mushrooms for the first time. But aside from the extraneous noise, I honestly can’t enjoy watching any cartoon shown in a trapezoidal aspect ratio.
As for your question, I was very pleased to find a YouTube scan of a black-and-white, silent Super 8 excerpt called “Bambi Falls in Love”. It made me feel nostalgic, because it brought back memories of studying the animation frame by frame on my brother’s hand-cranked film viewer when I was about twelve, or just slightly older than the Cinemassacre lads. But all things considered, I’d much rather see that sequence in context on a fully restored deluxe home video with remastered sound.
That “before you were born” stuff makes me laugh. I would say I was the last generation for seeing 16mm prints regularly in school. I would’ve been 11 when that “Disney’s Animated Alphabet” film was being shown in classrooms. Seeing prints like that from a projector was still common then, but was certainly on the way out. The earliest VCR’s I was seeing in school were the industrial 3/4″ U-Matic players from the 70’s.
The cinemassacre “lads” are in their 40s. That video is quite old. lol
I own lots of 16mm films and posted them on to YouTube and seeing that many people like me that collect film is really fun to know!
I’m glad of that. At least there’s still a group of us who care for these treasures.
I absolutely do agree and I have a projector and a scanning place near by so I’m living good
Why is Squidward dressed up like Hatsune Miku?
This is some interesting stuff.
I don’t know how young the first two gentlemen were, but that is possibly the attitude of a lot of collectors new to discovering the dark edges of theatrical animation, when they finally realize just how wild and surreal and jarring those old banned cartoons really are…I get film collecting in the sense that you have no real barriers to seeing the theatrical cartoon just as the artists meant you to see it–no DVNR blocking lines that are necessary in understanding the expressions on faces or speed of movement or other visual stimuli that such a digital program would block.
I wish I had gotten this far when I had the youth, but I never had the money these collectors, like yourself, put into finding such things, and I think I now understand why you collect some of these films, despite the spliciness; the promise of original titles someplace. There must be oodles of classic Warner Brothers cartoons with original titles, although the film itself is cruelly spliced! Regarding the possibility that, when physical media shuts down, the big multi-level companies will allow you access to those coveted vaults so you can distribute, well, I must admit that I am holding out hope for the same chances for you folks, because you will continue plugging until you find that missing piece, whereas the companies *never* wanted to work that hard, even when collecting on DVD was at its apex.
You do splendid work to make sure that folks are watching and listening to the very best that any gilm can be, regardless of bits of grain here and there and, if digital treatment is needed, you know exactly how much of it to use and when to stop. All those cartoons gathering dust in the vaults should rightfully be handed off to you so you can display them as if brand new prints, and I look forward to FLIP THE FROG and anything that you can get the distribution rights to. Keep up the good work!
Lastly, I’ve been checking out “playlists” of classic animated series, no matter how complete and I shout out to anyone who has the items, please upload all the “BEANY AND CECIL SHOW” materials you might have, along with any missing pieces to “LINUS THE LION-HEARTED” or early Hanna-Barbera you might have. For some reason, You Tube took down all or most of the complete “COURAGEOUS CAT AND MINUTE MOUSE” cartoons; could my acknowledgement of this availability have been the cause of that? I hope not. Despite the fact that I own the A&E Home Video set around the series, I was enjoying the heck out of that availability on You Tube.
I’d love to find a collection of “Q. T. HUSH”, the other series that aired on our ABC affiliate along with classic MGM cartoons, including most of the BOSKO shorts. These are things that people need to find and restore as best as possible.
Good luck to you, Steve and I look forward to the fruits of your continued labor. May more things fall into your hands, and I’m sorry for going on so long as usual, but I’m as passionate about this stuff as you are, although I can do nothing to help the cause along.
cartoon98100’s doing some very interesting and important work on the rediscovery of MGM shorts by collecting and uploading scans of them with original titles and sometimes dialogue-free audio sourced from European dubs.
There’s a lost Screen Song cartoon I’ve been dying to watch. It’s called “Readin, Ritin & Rhythemtic”. Do you or anybody else that you know happen to have a print of that short? Please upload it on Youtube if you do. Thanks.
That one doesn’t exist in a form that can be posted on YouTube. It only exists as a negative at the UCLA Film Archive… perhaps someday it will be restored.
Speaking of unavailable Screen Songs, I’m curious about the last one in the series, “Sing Again of Michigan”. Does UCLA have the negative to that as well? As a native Michigander, I think it might be amusing to see how my home state was depicted by cartoonists who for the most part had never ventured west of the Hudson.
The neg on SING AGAIN OF MICHIGAN is held at Paramount.. but that one isn’t so rare. Here it is on You Tube:
Click Here
Thank you, Jerry! I had read somewhere that it was a “lost” cartoon, and I’m glad to learn that it’s not true. I’ve never seen a Famous Screen Song in such excellent condition. This is the best YouTube scan I’ve seen… all day!
I saw the original 1973 trailer for Disney’s Robin Hood on Youtube in 16mm. I hadn’t seen it since the movie’s first release.
But you haven’t seen this one.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_v0IjtwRg_U
It always interests me to see theatrical film prints from old movies, particularly because they can carry certain things that are often cut out of home video reissues, particularly MPAA ratings cards. Call me a weirdo, but I’ve been looking at the evolution of the ratings cards at trailers, which can be tricky with so many online copies of trailers cutting them out, especially in recent years. At the very least, there are a few Disney releases that make it comparatively easier; the One Hundred and One Dalmatians DVD from the mid-2000s, for example, had the rating cards for the 1969 and 1979 reissues (though the latter one used a variant rather than the usual card, which ran from 1977 to 1979), which is the first time I saw both versions. That original ’68 to ’70 was totally new to me, and I was surprised to see that Disney kept it in their TV spots all the way to 1977. The Fantasia trailer posted here has the 1977-1979 rating card. I’m not sure why, considering the reissue was from 1969, and thus should’ve had the original 1968 bumper with the different design. Maybe some sprocket jockey put them in at random, like a more innocent version of that scene from Fight Club. Who knows?
Bit of a nitpick here: the Raggedy Ann and Andy trailer put here isn’t the original. Some guy just recorded it off a computer screen. The original video, which did indeed come off of a 35mm reel, is here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sD4jIXa4z64
I might call you “Madman”, Adam, but never a weirdo! Bravo for paying attention to details that most people ignore.
My exposure to most old cartoons in my kid days was via black and white TV, and it’s almost astonishing to run across something on YouTube or DailyMotion I hadn’t seen in decades. Things I recognize, some I may have seen only once or twice but somehow are lodged in some dim corner of my consciousness, testimony to the impact these weird shorts had on a young mind. There’s also lots I have fragmentary memories of that I wish I could see now, oh, and lots more I don’t care if I never see again.
I’m glad YouTube exists, and also annoyed at the poor quality uploads I have to wade thtough to find something that, if not pristine is at least no worse than the sometimes scratchy or splicey prints Rex Trailer or Big Brother Bob Emery used to project.
Steve,
Almost all the 16mm prints in Mike Matei’s video were purchased from me. Don’t think that BARBER OF SEVILLE originated from you – I think it came from Fat Frank.
I gratefully enjoy it when someone posts a fragment of a 16mm projector video of an I.B. Tech Disney reel. Of course, you’d really have to see it in person to see the colors ooze out!
These folks are doing an amazing job scanning old film reels. Some pretty fun animated stuff too! https://www.youtube.com/FTDepot
I’m personally quite fond of “Snap Happy Traps”. When I was in college, Screen Gems animator Ed Henderson gifted me a stack of drawings from the final scene and I treasure them to this day.
That Mickey trailer was from MY collection! I donated it to the uploader to be scanned.
The Raggedy Ann and Andy trailer in this post has a video maker effect. Here is a clean version. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sD4jIXa4z64
I do not lament 16mm nor 35mm nor 70mm. Faded color, cuts, splices, tears, emulsion scratches, torn sprocket holes, accordion jams of film in the gate. All those things go hand in hand with 16mm. My digital projectors are way brighter. Properly set they not only meet the best analogue could offer, they surpass it.
2001, A SPACE ODYSSEY went beet red in first run in the theatres. That does not happen with digital. I gave up the ghost on 16mm when I could not get my projectors serviced. DVD had just come in. I was astounded by the quality difference both in terms of picture and sound.
If someone out there has an unbowdlerized 35mm Technicolor print of FANTASIA please do animation history the favor folks with SONG OF THE SOUTH did. It’s a shame we can’t see this film as Walt Disney himself approved it.
Wow, the 1969 Fantasia trailer is cool!
I dig the theatre auditorium echo on the audio.
Who is the announcer?
He did Disney trailer voice-overs for many years.
The announcer in that Fantasia spot is Dick Tufeld (best know for being the Robot on LOST IN SPACE). Tufeld was ABC-TV’s house announcer in the 1950s and it seems Disney picked him to be “the voice of Disney” on trailers after using him on the Disneyland TV show for intros and coming attractions.
I’d love to pinpoint his first narration for Disney… and his last (I suspect somewhere around 1975 to so)
You can hear the complete song of “Down On the Farm” in Laurel and Hardy’s first feature, PARDON US (1931) as well.