Daisy Duck

Daisy Duck is often considered a sixth member of the fab five characters. She is known as the girlfriend of Donald Duck and the best friend of Minnie Mouse. She has huge fits of rage, some say even worse than those of Donald Duck: however, as her character develops we realize her true identity. Daisy loves glamour, pretty things and is considered a fun-loving, sophisticated, fashion forward diva. She is very enthusiastic, silly and sometimes a little bit ditzy.

Daisy is always sporting her indigo eyeshadow and usually wears a v-neck blouse with puffy sleeves and a large bow sits on her head. Her shirt often times changes to any color on the rainbow, but her most common colors are pink and purple.

Daisy’s parents are shown in the 1954 short, Donald’s Diary. She is shown to have three nieces in the 1953 short, Flip Decision. Their names April, May and June and also a nephew Desmond.

Daisy Duck has been very inconsistent with her voice. For her first few appearances, she sounded extremely similar to Donald only higher pitched. But she soon changes to her glamourous smooth voice we all know today. Daisy was most extensively voiced by Tress MacNeille who took the roll in 1999, but has had many others play the part including Gloria Blondell, Ruth Clifford, Vivi Janiss, Janet Waldo, Patricia Paris and Clarence Nash who also voiced Donald.

She first appears as Donna Duck in the short Don Donald. In the short Don is planning to court Donna somewhere in Mexico. His efforts are frustrated when she finally drives away on her unicycle.

Daisy then appears as herself in the 1940 short, Mr. Duck Steps Out. In this short, Daisy goes to Donald's house for her first date with her new love interest. Huey, Dewey, and Louie interrupt their time together and cause a whole ton of rucus, but in the end Daisy still falls for Donald and showers him in kisses.

Daisy is featured in many things such as television shows, comic strips, movies, animated shorts, and is seen in the Disney Parks.

Source: http://disney.wikia.com/wiki/Daisy_Duck

Ub and Mickey

Ub is a 2 time Academy Award winner for his animations, cartoons, and special effects. He met Walt Disney in Kansas City when they both worked for the Pesman Art Studio.

Iwerks had a distinctive style which was prevalent in the early Disney Animated Cartoons. He sketched all the Alice Comedies while Disney directed them.

When the Alice Comedies started to die down, Disney asked Ub to develop a new character, this was when Oswald the Lucky Rabbit was born. Ub drew all of the two dozen Oswald shorts before the rights slipped through their fingers. Walt was devastated and again turned to Ub to create a new winning character. Ub tried everything including frogs, dogs, cats, cows and horses (the cow and horse later became Clarabelle Cow and Horace Horsecollar and were featured in many Mickey Mouse shorts) but none were good enough for Disney. Iwerks  averaged an astounding rate of 700 drawings a day. He would do his day’s work, and then stay late to work on the new character for hours. Iwerks finally found inspiration in an old picture. His fellow animator, Harman, had drawn a few sketches of a mouse around a picture of Walt. Ub combined the sketches and a few features from Oswald and created Mickey Mouse.

Ub illustrated the first Mickey Mouse and Silly Symphony cartoons. He first created the short Plane Crazy in only three weeks. The short did not impress the producers and sent Ub back to the drawing board. He then illustrated Gallopin Gaucho, but again was shut down. Neither shorts contained sound, and times were changing. Ub started fresh one more time and drew Steamboat Willie which they then synchronized with music. The short was produced and was a huge hit, being the first animated short to ever be synchronized with music. Disney was taking off in his career. The company was growing immensely. Disney wanted more and more and continued to ask Ub to provide it. After a while, Ub grew tired of Walt’s demands and their friendship faded. Iwerks left Disney’s company and joined up with a big competitor who offered Ub his own company.

Ub animated his own shorts for a few years, but the business never took off quite like Disney’s. He animated for 10 years on his own before returned back to Disney. Iwerks was tired of animation and felt as he had mastered the art.

When he returned to Disney’s company, he was hired as head of special effects. Ub invented multiple things which all were huge factors in moving Disney’s company to the top. Ub was a huge benefactor in Disney’s company and deserves much more credit for it than he has.

Sources: http://trueclassics.net/2012/01/21/pioneers-of-animation-ub-iwerks-the-early-disney-years/

http://disney.wikia.com/wiki/Ub_Iwerks#WikiaArticle

The Real Artist

The ever so famous Mickey Mouse was not drawn by Walt Disney but in fact by Ub Iwerks. Many are blinded by the myth of Walt drawing Mickey. Only specialist film historians an impassioned students of animation recall Ub’s famous works. Walt was not always famous, he first relied on his brother Roy and his great friend and partner Ub Iwerks. Ub was the one to draw and design Mickey Mouse as well as animate Plane Crazy, Gallopin’ Gaucho and Steamboat Willie. The first three Mickey cartoons. Despite Ub’s incredible efforts, all the credit went to Walt. History is lost unless we keep it alive.

Leslie Iwerks, the granddaughter of Ub, wrote, directed and produced The Hand Behind The Mouse: The Ub Iwerks Story a documentary supporting her grandfather's achievements. Two years after the film’s release, Leslie published a bibliography to go with her film. Leslie tirelessly continues to promote the film and book. She screened the film at Disneyana convention in Anaheim, signed her books on Disney’s cruise ship, aired the documentary on two separate channels on television and screened the film and Pixar’s studio opening.

Leslie is the youngest of four children. Larry and John are landscape painters in Santa Barbara and her sister Tamara is a newscaster in Memphis. Leslie was only one year old when her grandfather passed. She was always asking about him and what he was like. Her father never told her much, but she was a smart girl and figured things out on her own. She did most of her first research when she went over to grandmas house and stayed in Ub’s old office. The office was full of old pictures and memorabilia from Ub and Leslie studied it all. in fourth grade she wrote a paper on Ub that stunned all the parents and excited all her classmates.  In college Leslie started her own company called Iwerks Video Productions and often worked as the director assistant for many Disney and Universal Studio projects. None of this stopped her from her research.

Ub started his own company in 1930 and after 10 years of fun returned to Disney in 1940, but not as an animator. Ub joined back in mechanical invention and special effects. Ub was the in house inventor and the go to guy with any technical problems. He invented many useful things like the traveling matte system and the 360 degrees motion picture camera. His special effects helped produce The Parent Trap, Mary Poppins, The Birds, and numerous others.

Leslie met with the head of Disney, Roy E. Disney, Walt’s only nephew. Roy agreed to fund the project because he saw the passion she had for the project. They started the documentary in 1998 with 288,000 dollars in hopes of a 60 minute production. Over review of the film Roy thought it was too sketchy and did not hold enough emotion. Roy allowed an additional 30 minutes to be added to the film and and extra 312,000 dollars to the budget. The film was premiered at the Disney theater El Captain in 1999 making it eligible for an academy award, but was not nominated. Many said it did not receive the reward because it did not bash on Walt enough. However, that was not Leslie’s goal. Leslie wanted the film to be dignified in building up Ub without tearing down Walt, and that is exactly what she did. Leslie continues to say there is always more to do and continues with her screenings and book signings. She knows she will not change all views on her grandfather, but she at least want to be able to say she tried.

 

Source: http://articles.latimes.com/2002/may/12/magazine/tm-42351/2

Disney's Company Growth Over The Years Part 2

In 1954 Disneyland anthology series began and ran on three different networks. It went through six title changes but continued to air for 29 years making it the longest running primetime television series ever.

Walt was never satisfied with his work and was always looking to make his company bigger and better. He was always interested in amusement parks so he made his own. Disneyland opened July 17, 1955 and coined the term theme park. Disneyland is now used for a pattern for every amusement park opened since.

Walt Disney died in 1966 and left his company to his brother Roy Disney. Roy was on the ball and continued production as normal with The Jungle Book, Aristocats and Love Bug which won Highest Grossing Film of the Year.

Prior to Walt’s death, he purchased 28,000 acres of land in Orlando, Florida for Disney World which then opened in his honor on October 1, 1971. Roy died later that year and the company was turned over to a team personally trained by the Disney brothers. One of Walt's final plans before death was EPCOT, Experimental Prototype Community of Tomorrow. The park started construction on 1979 and the multi-billion dollar park opened on October 1, 1982.

In 1983 Disneyland Tokyo opened. The first foreign Disney park. Just under 10 years later Disneyland Paris opened bringing in more than 11 million visitors in the first year. In 1993 Disney purchased Discover magazine and the National Hockey League team the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim.

Disney continued to amaze when they came out with The Lion King which became the Highest Grossing Film of All Time and Toy Story pioneering computer animated films. 1994 came around and Disney hit Broadway with Beauty and the Beast, The Lion King, and Aida. They then purchased the California Angels Baseball team. By 1996 Disney had the top television network, 10 television stations, 21 radio stations, 7 newspapers, and 4 cable networks. They then reached their 25 billion dollar revenue threshold. By 1998 they started two cruise ships which stopped at Disney’s island Castaway Cay in the Caribbean.

For the first time Disney opened multiple things in one year coming out with California Adventure, Downtown Disney, and DisneySea Tokyo. They then made more than 300 million dollars from Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse Of The Black Pearl and Finding Nemo. Being the first company to surpass 3 billion dollars in global box office revenue.

In the early 2000s Disney purchased The Muppets and Pixar Animation Studios. They released the next two Pirates of the Caribbean movies making them Disney’s highest grossing feature and the top grossing feature of 2007. They then released Toy Story 3 highest grossing animated film of all time. Disney continues to grow and amaze every year with new movies, cruises, hotels, and more featuring their characters and they are not going away any time soon.

Source: https://d23.com/disney-history/

Disney Company Growth Over The Years Part 1

Walt arrived in California in 1923. In October, M.J. Winkler contracted the Alice Comedies. Disney then made his own company, Disney Brothers Cartoon Studio, with his brother Roy. They soon changed the name to Walt Disney Studio on the request of Roy. In 1927 Walt started the Oswald The Lucky Rabbit cartoons. Oswald was a huge hit, in just one year Walt had produced 26 Oswald shorts. Walt was thrilled with his progress and tried to sign another year but found his distributor had signed other animators behind his back in hopes to continue the franchise without Walt.

Disney then moved his studio to the back of a real estate office in Hollywood for just a few months, then moved to a whole studio in 1926 across the street for just a few years. Walt then made Mickey to replace Oswald. Ub animated two Mickey cartoons, but they could not sell due to the fact they had no sound and were behind in the recent film advancements. To compensate they made Steamboat Willie, fully synchronized with sound. The show released in New York on November 18, 1928. Walt’s studio then produced the series Silly Symphonies to support Mickey’s growing fame. The shorts became a training ground for animators. They would animate the shorts before moving on to the animated feature films. The short Flowers and Trees won an Academy Award in 1932 for Best Cartoon. The short was the first full-color cartoon and the first to win such an award. Disney returned to win that Oscar for the rest of the decade.

Walt received 300 dollars from a man who wanted to put Mickey Mouse on his merchandise, Walt did the deal because he was in need of the 300 dollars. This was the start of Disney’s Merchandise.

The first Mickey Mouse comic strip and book were released in 1930. Productions on Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs started in 1934 and the film was released in 1937 with the title Highest Grossing Film of All Time and held it up to the release of the film Gone With The Wind.

With wars raging, Disney lost many foreign customers and struggled to make much revenue on his films. But still released Pinocchio, Fantasia, Dumbo and Bambi.

In 1950 Disney released its first live action film Treasure Island and the company began to move forward again.

 

Source: https://d23.com/disney-history/

Walt Disney Studio History

Disney’s company started in 1923 in Los Angeles. Walt started his company in a small office in the back of the Holly-Vermont Realty building. They payed only 10 dollars a month in rent. They created the Alice Comedies in this office and got so big they moved into a larger office in just four months. In 1925 the company moved into the Hyperion Avenue lot in the Silver Lake district.

In 1928 Mickey Mouse was born shortly followed by Minnie, Pluto, Goofy, Donald, Daisy and the rest of the gang. In 1937, Disney released their first full length film Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.

To cope with the extreme growth of the company, Disney purchased a 51 acre lot called Burbank which he designed specifically for the nature of his company. Burbank was set up in a campus like setting. There were many buildings connected by underground tunnels so their work would never be disturbed by the weather. In the 1940s and 1950s they made movies like Fantasia, Bambi, Cinderella, Alice in Wonderland, and Peter Pan in Burbank.

At the beginning of the 1940s Disney began filming live action.

In the 1950s, Burbank was expanded to add sound stages.They produced many movies in these stages like Mary Poppins, The Love Bug, Pete’s Dragon, Bedknobs and Broomsticks, National Treasure, and Pirates of the Caribbean 1-3. Across the street now stands the Feature Animation Building.

Walt originally wanted to build Mickey Mouse park, but soon realized he need much more space. He purchased 200 acres of orange tree orchards in Anaheim, California.

The back lot of Burbank was full of exterior sets. Golden Oak Ranch was made in 1959. The ranch is 700 acres of a variety of natural settings. It had many different settings such as farm houses, barns, fields, tree groves, forest areas, creek beds, and waterfalls. The ranch was used by the entire industry for many different movies like Princess Diaries 2, Pirates of the Caribbean 2 and 3, Old Yeller, The Shaggy Dog, and The Santa Clause.

The Imaging building was originally called the Process Lab and was a motion picture laboratory. It was primarily used as photo and visual effects facilities. 1950s was paramount in combining complex optical effects with miniatures and matte painting. In the 1960s and 1970s the building was renamed Photo Effects and then Visual Effects. In the 1980’s it was renamed Buena Vista and the Motion Controlling Stage. Today it's photo-optical and digital-imaging services with a black and white lab, digital work stations, film recorders and scanners, optical printers and title graphics.

The next building was Post Production Sound building. This building is a mock movie theater. The theater has extra padding in the seats as to make the simulation as close as they can to the environment when the film is finally released. In this building they blend together the dialogue, music, and sound effects and ensure each is at the right levels. This theater was first used to mix the sound for Fantasia. There are then three stages within the building.

Stage A was originally used for scoring. Music for innumerable films were recorded in this stage. In 1985 the stage was converted to a dubbing stage and theater.

Stage B is the dialogue stage. This is where each of the characters voices are recorded. This stage was used for many films like Alice in Wonderland, Lady and the Tramp, Peter Pan, The Jungle Book, Toy Story, Monsters Incorporated, Beauty and the Beast, Bugs Life, and Lion King.

Stage C was originally used for creating sound effects. Many of the sound makers were invented by Disney technicians. Today the stage is used as a dubbing stage for films and television.

All of the stages are state of the art high quality equipment. Disney never settled for anything less than the best.
Source: http://studioservices.go.com/disneystudios/history.html