So Long, Eggman

 

I first learned of Ralph Eggleston's death in James Baker's wonderful tribute post. I didn't know he'd been ill, so it came as quite a shock.   

I first met Ralph at CalArts in 1983.  He was a 17 year-old incoming freshman.  I was a know-it-all junior with no interest in the freshmen.   However, it didn't take long for Ralph's name to get bantered about among my classmates.  Apparently, he had animated 30 seconds of full animation in his first weekend at school.  We all scoffed at this, and couldn't wait to see what kind of awfulness this kid cranked out.  

In the A-113 suite of the Character Animation Department, we shared a Lyon/Lamb video recorder to shoot our pencil tests (there were two, actually, but only one of them worked at any given time).  We crammed into the small pencil test room to see Ralph's opus, like wolves waiting for raw meat.  

We watched.  

Huh! 

Not bad!  

Now we had to meet this guy!  Ralph was best described as a feral nerd - skinny, shaggy, with a wild energy that was a bit hard to be around.  He was madly passionate about animation. 

Cut to 1987.  I led a small crew of mostly Americans working on "Duck Tales" in Taiwan.   Among them were CalArts alum Brian Pimental, Gregg Vanzo, Chris Wahl, Carlos Baeza, and 'The Egg Man'.   

Ralph was now a feral nerd in a foreign land.  Having sushi with the crew, he scarfed plate after plate of wasabi - just wasabi- for laughs.  His face would turn red, he'd twitch, his eyes bulge and tear up.  He'd grab our water glasses, guzzling them down.  The more we laughed, the more he'd eat.  He kept this up until the waitress cut him off.  Feral.  But funny! 

Cut to 1992.  I ran into Ralph in San Francisco.  I was working on "The Nightmare Before Christmas", and he was dating one of the young ladies on the crew.  His manner had changed drastically.  He was still Ralph, but calm, at ease, like he'd learned to harness that feral nerd energy, saving it for his work. 

I would see him sporadically over the next 30 years - usually at Sue and Bill Kroyer's Christmas parties.  We'd exchange Christmas cards, and I just assumed that he'd grow old with the rest of the CalArts gang.  He was robbed of that privilege, and we were robbed of his creativity and humanity.   There's an old Taoist saying that surely applies here, "The candle that burns twice as bright burns half as long."   

So long, Eggman!

-Steve

Sweet Dreams, Katie

 

Kathleen Quaife, one of the best 2D effects animators that ever lived, passed away in her sleep last week, way too young.  I first met Katie in the late eighties, doing commercials for Duck Soup Produckions in Santa Monica.  We would work together again on the feature Rover Dangerfield, on which she headed the effects department.  Katie was the adult in the room full of goofy animators.  Did she enjoy our antics, or did she just tolerate us patiently?  There was a little glint in her eye that makes me think the former was the truth.

After Rover, I would run into her now and then, either at Dave Spafford's Friday night house parties, or Bill and Sue Kroyer's Christmas parties.  She was part of my animation family, back when the industry was small and everyone knew each other.   I last saw her in 2018, at Rebecca Rees' art show at the Animation Guild.  She was there with her boyfriend, Mike Cedeno, and she seemed so happy, still with that little glint in her eye.   

My condolences to Mike.  And godspeed, Katie.  

 -Steve 

Dumpster Diving with Bill Kroyer

Whenever I run into Bill Kroyer, our dumpster diving story inevitably surfaces.

In the summer of 1984, I was working one of my first animation jobs, on an animated Star Wars knockoff called Starchaser: The Legend of Orin, a forgettable film except that it used a lot of early computer generated animation.    Most of the production was done at Steve Hahn's Korean studio, Mihahn, but when they also had a  crew of Americans working in an office complex in Woodland Hills, California.  Bill Kroyer was the head of that crew, which included Chris Bailey, Craig Clarke, Darrell Rooney, Tom Sito, newbies Greg Manwaring and Eric Pighors, and old timer John Sparey.  I learned years later that the writer, Jeffrey Scott, is the grandson of Moe Howard of The Three Stooges.   

Tom Sito's History of Computer Animation

Ivan Sutherland demonstrates Sketchpad, 1963.

Being of a generation for which computers represented the future, it is a bit unsettling that a book on the history of computer animation could be written. Like I need another reminder of my aging. Tom Sito has done it, with Moving Innovation, A History of Computer Animation, to be released next month. FLIP asked Tom a few questions, via computer......

FLIP: What the hell does Tom Sito know about Computer Animation?

TS: Hah! You’re right. My name is not the first to come to mind when you think CG. When I was completing Drawing the Line, I included a chapter on the Digital Revolution. I needed to explain about CG’s origins to show how it affected the animation community and how it changed the traditional animation production pipeline, which had been sacred since J.R. Bray in 1913. The chapter grew so large that my editor cut it by two-thirds, and told me “ You have another book here.”

Darlie Brewster talks about life, gender and cartoons

Darlie Brewster

Darlie Brewster is an animator with a vast wealth of experience in Hollywood. Her film credits include Fern Gully, The Prince of Egypt, The Road to El Dorado, and Brave. Some years ago she made a huge change in her life and underwent gender reassignment. FLIP asked her about her remarkable journey.

TRON 30th: Memories From the Grid (and Beyond!)

by Jerry Rees

TRON dropped audiences into a glowing realm of Bits, Programs, Systems and Game Grids – the unseen computer world manipulated by its Users. As one of the Users on the original crew I still feel that glow in memories that refuse to fade.