Channel Frederator Blog
Archive for the ‘Backgrounds’
Tales of the Cartoon City
On his blog, Ironic Sans, photographer David Friedman has undertaken an ongoing look at how Manhattan has been depicted in animation. “Animated Manhattan” is up to Part 20, and he’s covering all the bases: TV series set in The Big Apple (The Critic, MTV Downtown); famous cartoon characters paying a visit (Tom and Jerry, The Simpsons, Family Guy); feature films (Madagascar, An American Tail); and memorable independent shorts like Jimmy Picker’s 1983 Oscar-winning musical extravaganza Sundae in New York. (Ed Koch was born to be turned into a claymation character!)
For a bonus Picker Pick, here’s Earth Angel, where an alien falls in love with the Statue of Liberty and croons 50s style to his green gal:
For some behind-the-scenes with Plasticine, go here to watch a 20-minute doc of Picker’s appearance at the Quickdraw Animation Society in Canada.
Good Luck Cap’n Thurop!

Inspired by Eric’s post, here’s a piece of Flapjack Fan Art I created for my pal and ol’ Cubicle Buddy: Thurop Van Orman, creator of The Marvelous Misadventures of Flapjack.
“Magic Trixie” Backgrounds
So with Channel Frederator showcasing Alex Kirwan’s Oh Yeah! Cartoon, “Magic Trixie”, last week, and on the heels of Jeaux’s interview with the creator, Alex lent me these two original backgrounds to scan and post. Most of the short’s bgs are scattered to the far winds, but these two were relatively handy. Emmy Award-winning Dan Krall handled the bg designing while Emmy Award-winning Seonna Hong painted the keys (these production bgs were created by someone in Korea of whose Emmy Award-winning record I’m unaware). It was Seonna’s first credited animation work. In this pair, the purple and beige colors are on the backgrounds; the Zeroxed line art on cell overlays.


