The Murtah Sisters

 

I recently discovered this obscure but underrated vocal trio called The Murtah Sisters, they're very comedic and energetic. Shame they didn't get more recognition.

Alot of this stuff reminds me of what I like about Betty Hutton, it's so vibrant, and funny for some reason, they also make these weird but suitable faces from time to time when they sing, this mostly happens to Kate. The other sisters are Jean and Onriett.

When I was seeing other reactions to this particular song, people seem to hate it so much! Have no idea why! This was a different period of songs being so silly yet it's quite amusing to me. 

This is their own version of In The Mood by Glenn Miller, enjoy!

After you watched the clip, you can notice the wit and facial expressions, it's very unique, and they're not afraid to show it. While I love other girl vocal trios like The Andrews Sisters, and The Boswell Sisters, I tend to find high-spirited acting like this to be pleasent to me. If you want to know more about this group, it's fairly simple, not a ton has been said about each of the members except for Kate which back in 1955, she introduced her own syndicated one-panel comic strip called Annie and Fannie, so that's pretty cool.

Overall, this was fun to just look into this stellar group of talents, I was on Instagram, and discovered them from there. Like I already said need more acceptance.

Spookley

 

I'm sure someone like me grew up with the book version of Spookley and not the TV specials. I remember having this book as a little kid, it's nostalgic for alot of reasons. The colors, feel like autumn, it's lively and the story is quite memorable and heartwarming throughout it.

Now that we're close to October, and the Halloween season, here's some spectacular and beautiful pictures.

This is still one of the more amusing illustrations of this book in my opinion, I love the different shapes, colors given on each of the pumpkins.

Artmania Girls Drawings

 

Anchor's Aweigh Animation Sequence

 

Animation + Live Action is one of my all-time favorite tropes in film, and there's this gorgeous and fun scene in Anchor's Aweigh as a perfect example of it.

This scene happens when Joe Brady (Gene Kelly) tell as story about how he earned his medal. It opens with imaginary and lively scenery, with landforms and a castle. The effects in this movie are amazing.

The animated characters also move so gracefully, this is definitely that cutesy era the MGM cartoons were mostly forgotten for back in the late 30s-early 40s.

You really have to be professional and accurate in regards to the animated character looking directly at the live action actor.

This is beautiful. This was just decades before there was easy processes like computers and technology to make something like this work.

It was all about composition. We then get to see Jerry from of course Tom and Jerry, feeling lonely which doesn't fit his personality at all, but with a premise like this, it works.

Fun Fact, originally the producers wanted Mickey Mouse to dance but Roy Disney himself rejected it, it was a sign of World War II still happening and that time, there was no business to work for other studios. In my honest opinion, that would be extremely distracting and kinda disrespectful. It was good that Tom and Jerry got enough the recognition they deserved back then.

The conversations are also very amusing as well, they aren't trying to noticeably go for being melodramatic, that would've sucked but Gene Kelly nails this scene easily.

It's also a great scene because he's trying to make Jerry cheer up and be less isolated.

The entire process of Jerry dancing with Gene was done by actual rotoscoping and it's phenomenal.

I can think of many other examples of animation and live action not just with films but moments from those movies that just make the whole experience alot better like Mary Poppins, The Three Caballeros, and a rare short film titled Real Inside. Sure, it may not be the most flawless trope, I agree that it's become stale, and those realistic 3D versions of timeless cartoon characters are terrible, but still it can be really fun.

I made my very own storyboards of a ballerina who fell unexpectedly into a fantasy world. Enjoy!

About The Color Theory + Interesting Look At Color Schemes and Layouts

 

I've been on a blog called John K Stuff, if your curious he's the person who made Ren and Stimpy. He's a questionable person but I do like his blog on some occasions. My favorite series of posts he did was on Color Theory.

The first one I found was scenes created by the layout department from the old 50s Hanna Barbera cartoons. When I was first introduced to these cartoons, I wasn't all fond of the animation or the slapstick similar in vain to how I felt about the old Disney shorts back then, but I was always so invested in the color and the environment, it was hard for me to avoid what was going on.

In Part 3, this is where he discusses more of the opposite of good color styling. I do have to say using more common colors especially the primary colors isn't the most clever idea you can think of to creating something so I do agree with his statement.

Part 4, he talks about how greys are more colorful and lively than "dull and dingy" colors. This is a fun post, and in one of the pictures he showcases is a bunch of handsome old Disney scenes like Donald and José walking to the café, and Bambi. They were comforting. But something tells me that when it comes to the other pictures like at the beginning where he shows some dull prints of Roger in One Hundred and One Dalmatians, aren't actually the real colors of the remastered version that came afterward.

Note this is a comparison image. This is from John K's blog, compare it to blu-ray, notice anything different? Yeah the newer version is more dim, but I particularly like it even more. It fits the song and the atmosphere alot more clearer.

Part 6 he chose a Huckleberry Hound cartoon that stood out. I agree, these are fun to look at.

I cannot help as to why these backgrounds and their color scheme were natural and genius. They just know how to make the viewers amused easily.

I don't want to go all day on talking about a singular series of posts on someone else's blog, so here's my final thoughts.

I highly appreciated the opinions and critiques on every single animated film he chose to give memorable and knowledgeable examples. It's a good sign of appeal and personality into making a cartoon. His pictures in particular I have saved from time to time, and I still enjoy looking through them for reference. While I do tend to enjoy some of the modern colors and styling, you cannot beat the rich natural colors of the old stuff. I think they had it best. 

I do have to say, him nitpicking on the worst of color styling is rather dated nowadays. We see those pinks, violets and rainbow colors as a sign of appeal nowadays, and it won't stop trust me. 

I also do have to point out a serious flaw, he does mention that even some of the worst of color palettes, he mentions the "s" word. So don't ever feel like you have to listen to everything he says.

And like I said about some of the posts I mentioned, the images like the Disney ones are probably from VHS or old DVD screencaps and the blu-ray and Disney+ remasters are more pleasent.

Here's links to my favorite post + the ones I mentioned. 

https://johnkstuff.blogspot.com/2006/10/color-theory-look-at-sky-before-you.html?m=1

https://johnkstuff.blogspot.com/2006/11/color-theory-art-lozzi-interview-early.html?m=1

https://johnkstuff.blogspot.com/2006/10/color-theory-neutral-or-natural-colors.html?m=1

https://johnkstuff.blogspot.com/2006/10/color-theory-pee-and-poo-colors-versus.html?m=1

https://johnkstuff.blogspot.com/2006/12/color-theory-montealegre-lion-hearted.html?m=1

I felt inspired so here's my color styling choices.

Robin Hoodwinked (1958) has some incredible backgrounds at the start. The color scheme with the castle and skies in particular are nice.

I would love to mention painters as a position for use of Color Theory. Here is an example of one of my favorite painters Albert Bierstadt, he makes the most beautiful paintings I ever saw and this one here is called A Storm In The Rocky Mountains, Mt. Rosalie c. 1866, just stunning!

The Pluto cartoons had some nasty and awful color remasters throughout the years where they look so bright and fake it hurts my poor eyes, but a GOOD Pluto cartoon with GOOD color styling is from a great title name, The Legend Of Coyote Rock (1945). I love the sunset, the interesting colors of the grassy textures and feels normal and almost resembles the original cels and layouts.

In my opinion, Disney has had alot of immense color schemes to their feature films. A great one is Snow White. The shot sequence of the cottage is just beautiful. 

The Seven Dwarfs have an incredibly accurate color style to the backgrounds as well. They're immediately recognizable and iconic.

Unlike some of the dreaded live action remakes we have today, the layouts and atmosphere feel more natural and there isn't too much gloomy darkness and seriousness to them, and to me that hardly ever works.

There's this Donald Duck cartoon called Fall Out Fall In (1943) with the best sunsets painted. I adore this. I actually talked about the full cartoon in the link below.

https://sngexplorationblog.blogspot.com/2025/07/fall-out-fall-in-1943.html?m=1

Bad Ol' Putty Tat (1949) is a Looney Tunes cartoon that could've been included on the list of Color Theory posts but those are almost a near 2 decades old. This is still very appealing and pleasurable. I don't enjoy a Sylvester and Tweety cartoon but I recommend at least one of their first few solid hits.

When I gave Peter Pan (1953) a second chance, I just loved the different colors and landscapes in each of the opening credits. 

J.C Leyendecker is my favorite magazine artists, he makes alot of elegant and stylish art. The palette is the best of limited color schemes. It uses only black, red orange, brown and beige colors. 

For my final choice is not particularly animated but it's very useful and is a part of life. The seasons, Spring, Summer, Autumn and Winter. This is like those Instagram/Pinterest posts you see of different aesthetics.

Anyways I hoped you like something a little more different than what I usually post, if there's any other blog websites I should check out, then I'll gladly visit them, so far I liked Michael Sporn's, Deja View and Yowp. They're fantastic check them out.

http://www.michaelspornanimation.com/splog/

https://andreasdeja.blogspot.com/?m=1

https://yowpyowp.blogspot.com/?m=1

I can thank all of these bloggers. They inspire me so much!

Bacall To Arms (1946) Cartoon Insanity

 

The title of the post is not a joke. Cartoon Insanity will be a series of posts throughout the upcoming future. 

There's this cartoon I've been thinking about for months. The animation is so rubbery and vivid that I need to talk about it.

It's called Bacall to Arms (1946) it's a Looney Tunes short planned by Bob Clampett, but was finished by Art Davis. As you can tell by what might be happening well...

Right away we get our first reference to Metro Goldwyn Mayer, one of the kings of Golden Age animation. What is this?! The lion is screeching while I guess his baby cub is biting onto his tail. What is he doing with his foot? This is definitely something Clampett or either Art Davis would approve.

 

Various other gags appear before the feature film starts in the movie theater. After that is some stellar frame shots of actress Lauren Bacall and Humphrey Bogart.

This was an attempt to reenact To Have and Have Not (1944).

I like the colors scheme in these scenes. It's not the usual typical clean black and white colors we get in the actual real movies.

The best moments are The Wolf's reactions. He's in similar vain to the wolf in Red Hot Riding Hood (1943) directed by Tex Avery. I'm highly sure that Clampett and possibly Davis loved Avery's MGM cartoons. 

Incredible drawings!

 

I would've loved to see a fully length short film of these two characters, maybe even just the art style, that would've been cool and inspiring. 

There's this walk cycle I admire of Bacall with her cigar and there's flames in her heels.

We get to see more funny and janky movements of the wolf's reactions. I'm definitely thinking Rod Scribner did alot of these scenes.

When The Wolf acts more enthusiastic, there's these simple linear gradient backgrounds. 

 

And also a ton of smears.

While I love the comedic energy, the designs and the more toned-down scenes of the live action style characters, the rest of it is not as great or thrilling as I hoped it would be. This may be just a standard cartoon with not much cohesion but it's still got some funny moments, despite the re-used animation from another Looney Tunes short almost a decade prior.

Seriously it feels like the movie theater is packed with 1930s style characters and 1940s characters at the same time.