Here is another insight into Milt Kahl's working method.
He would look at the storyboard and then fine tune the staging for a particular scene, trying to plus it as he went along. During the first pass, done with a felt pen small scale, Milt also worked out the continuity for several scenes.
By the time it got to animation, he drew rough layouts in pencil of the characters in their environments.
In this scene Medusa is forcing Penny to go down the hole to find a diamond.
The staging is beautiful, a lot of the line work points down toward the hole to emphasize the story point.
Yet a few things actually look better in the first version, like Penny's head angle or Medusa's lean toward the girl. I remember Milt saying:" I often have the hardest time capturing the life of my thumbnail drawings into the large animation sketches."
Yet a few things actually look better in the first version, like Penny's head angle or Medusa's lean toward the girl. I remember Milt saying:" I often have the hardest time capturing the life of my thumbnail drawings into the large animation sketches."
Still…Milt's drawings never fail to amaze you.
