Magic Forces

These screenshots are taken from The Disney Family Album series, featuring animator Milt Kahl. Milt hadn't drawn in several years, but these sketches show Milt's unorthodox way of drawing. According to Andres Deja, “He throws in a light circle for the main mass of the character's head, but then goes straight for details.The order in which he puts lines on paper is completely absurd. He finished drawing Pinocchio's head, before moving left to define his finger, which is on fire. The connecting arm was drawn in much later. Milt's assistant said that Milt stared at blank paper on his desk for a very long time before then quickly animating his scene. He literally saw poses projected on paper, which he then "traced". This is truly a master at work.

Check out this amazing collage of Milt Kahl drawings. Milt is often considered to be the finest draughtsman of the Disney animators. He would often refine the characters sketches from Bill Peet with the ideas of Ken Anderson. For many years the final look for the characters in the Disney films were designed by Kahl, in his angular style inspired by Picasso. He is revered by contemporary masters of the form, such as Andreas Deja, and Brad Bird, who was his protégé at Disney in the early 1970s. In the behind-the-scenes feature "Fine Food and Film" shown on the Ratatouille DVD, Bird referred to Kahl as "tough", but in a gentle way, as he often gave Bird advice on where he could improve in animation whenever he came up short. No wonder Brad has given us treasures like The Iron Giant and The Incredibles with such enviable tutelage.

Some drawings by Milt Kahl, creator of one of the great female Disney villains--Medusa. So brilliantly animated, she was a true fright to behold because she was so real in the way she stomped around, schemed and connived. Awesome work.

This pencil test of Aurora and Prince Philip from Sleeping Beauty was drawn by two different animators; Milt Kahl and Marc Davis. It's been said that designing and animating classic protagonist characters (like princes and princesses) is a challenge since, by nature, they are perfect human specimens that lack any sort of inherently unique visual appeal or quirky personality traits. I think Marc and Milt did a fine job in spite of these challenges.

In this interview with Milt Kahl (one of the legendary Nine Old Men and widely regarded as "the best animator of all time") we get his take on a number of aspects of his career, including the animator's ego, drawing vs. performing, his notorious relationship with Walt, and his professional aspirations. Watch him sketch Pinocchio and witness his mastery of the craft in real time.

Hands are perhaps one of the most difficult things to draw consistently well and anatomically accurately. I'd say they are right behind the lips in terms of difficulty. These hands were dawn by animation legend Milt Kahl and were later used by animators as reference for Gaston in Beauty and the Beast.

Take a look at this clip from a 1977 UK TV show on Walt Disney. Three of the Nine Old Men talk about various topics. Ward Kimball reflects on Walt's personality, Milt Kahl defends the character styling of Bambi, and Frank Thomas elaborates on squash and stretch.

"Milt Kahl used a thin felt pen for his exploratory sketches during production of The Rescuers. He produced a ton of these sheets searching for the most inventive poses, expressions and acting patterns. Even if the scene is only 16 frames long, like the one shown here, Milt tried several variations on the main idea of Medusa freaking out at the sight of two mice." -Andres Deja