The Dover Boys (1942)

Apparently growing up, Jonesy, Chuck Jones that is, wasn't allowed to speak at the breakfast table and instead was forced to read novels. His most loathed reading material were pretentious sliver age detective stories like The Hardy Boys, Enid Blyton books or The Rover Boys. It was this hate that inspired The Dover Boys (1942) a story of three jerks, er-uh brothers, and their mutual fiancée, "Dainty" Dora Standpipe (a play on the name of the Rover Boy slut "Dora Stanhope").

This is an early example of Limited Animation, or, the term I prefer, Stylized Animation. Limited Animation always seemed to have a demeaning connotation, like it was a lower art form. But I digress. What ever that means.

The animation choice that stood out the most in this piece were the smears (something 3D animation hasn't really figured out yet). Keying through the animation you'll see that basically its pose-smear to pose animation throughout the entire film, giving the animation a real snappy feel.

Anyways, I'm happy to have posted atleast one item on both the Anination and the Animachine before I peaced to Honduras for a visit with my parents and south american crime lords. See you in 2 weeks and enjoy the cartoon.


SMEAR SCREEN CAPS