2/23/35 - marks a landmark transition for everyone's favorite mouse in color! Mickey Mouse's 1935 short The Band Concert introduced audiences to Mickey and friends in their full Technicolor glory! Color had been well established within Disney animation, but relegated to the successful Silly Symphonies shorts. Early tinted film stocks were utilized on Night (1930) and Frolicking Fish (1930) to expand the believability of the animated worlds the artists were creating. Hand-painted full color animation was first explored in the Silly Symphony Flowers & Trees (1932) short, which became the very first animation to win an Academy Award, thanks to the advent of color. The women of Walt Disney's I
A number of remarkable women are cause for celebration in the month of February! Here are a few notables and their extraordinary accomplishments... Feb 3, 1965 – Sculptor Geraldine McCullough wins the Widener Gold Medal Award for her copper and steel structure, Phoenix. Feb 4, 1913 – Activist and Civil Rights icon Rosa Parks (Rosa Louise McCauley) is born. While not the first to defy bus segregation, Parks resistance sparked the Montgomery Bus Boycott. Feb 8, 1986 – Oprah Winfrey becomes the first African American woman to host a nationally syndicated talk show. Feb 12, 1948 – First Lt. Nancy C. Leftneant is the first African American accepted in the regular Army Nursing Corps. Feb 16, 1923
Valentine's Day seems a fitting time to celebrate a couple of rarely explored segments from the Disney anthology films of the late 1940s. Transitioning out of WWII, Disney Studios was left with a number of unfinished story ideas. To keep the studio functioning, various unrelated ideas were completed and 'packaged' into films for theatrical release. The various segments within these films also provided an opportunity to experiment with new processes. Make Mine Music released in theaters, Spring of 1946. Featured within this film were two visual Valentines which offered the artists of Disney the opportunity to experiment with new techniques and providing a foray with these advances into the a
Final Frame of Tinker Bell from Peter Pan 2/5/53 – On this day, a particular imp made her animated motion picture debut! After nearly 15 years of development and exploration, Walt Disney's animated-take on J.M. Barrie's tiny Tinker Bell underwent a wide range of possible permutations: a dazzling redhead; a demure brunette; a dainty bell-bustled ballerina; and more — Miss Bell finally found her final form thanks to a perky blonde-bobbed member of the Walt Disney Studio's Ink & Paint Department. Early Tinker Bell Concept Designs As an artist, Ginni Mack painted on many films from the mid-1940s thru the debut of Peter Pan in early 1953. When asked to pose for animators as inspiration for a 'pi
