The good folks at the ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive have digitized the Disney Studios Artist’s Tryout Book from 1938 and have posted the entire manual online. The piece, which provides an overview of the production process and describes various job categories, is from the collection of Clair Weeks, who served as Marc Davis’ assistant on the classic Disney features Bambi and Peter Pan.
Disney Studios Artist’s Tryout Book was a required read for all artists hoping to land a job with the studio. The tome explains that the tryout process involved four weeks of training involving an intense study of the basic principles of animation, action analysis and drawing. After qualifying of employment in the animation department, an artist was given a salary of $13 to $18 a week.
The book stands as a reminder of how the animation business has changed over the years. It was published shortly after the historic release of Snow White, the studio’s first animated feature, and speaks of television as an emerging technology that will offer another outlet for the studio’s cartoons and create more employment opportunities. At that time, being able to draw well was a prerequisite for employment in all departments, even story, since stories were all drawn out rather than written. One notable line reads, ‘All inking and painting of celluloids, and all tracing done in the Studio is performed exclusively by a large staff of girls known as Inkers and Painters… This is the only department in the Disney Studio open to women artists.’
Photoshop was used to digitally restore the original brochure, which was torn and water-stained throughout. There is one page missing at the very end, and ASIFA is asking anyone with a complete copy to scan the lost page and send it in so the archive can be posted in its entirety.
The full text is available for viewing online by visiting the ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive Blog at http://www.animationarchive.org. The ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive is located at 2114 W. Burbank Blvd in Burbank, Calif. and is open every Tuesday and Thursday between 1pm and 9pm.
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