Spring 1986 — During production on Don Bluth’s second theatrical feature, An American Tail, Key Clean‑Up Artist Mark Pudleiner films his college friend, Junior Animator Ralph Zondag, as he explains the studio’s Animation Footage Charts. These charts, posted in the central workspace known as the “Music Room” near Don’s office, tracked the weekly footage approved by Don as the team pushed to stay on schedule. Ralph walks through how the numbers worked and even touches on what a rookie animator was earning during that spring of ’86.

ANIMATORS FOOTAGE CHARTS – 1986 Don Bluth Studios

SHOW NOTES :

Below is the list of the American Tail Character Animators that are listed on the Animation Weekly Footage Chart as shown in the video :

John Pomeroy
IMDB – LINK
LinkedIn – LINK

Dave Molina
IMDB – LINK
LinkedIn – LINK

Gary Perkovac
IMDB – LINK
LinkedIn – LINK

Jesse Cosio
IMDB – LINK

Jorgen Klubien
IMDB – LINK
LinkedIn – LINK

Dan Kuenster
IMDB – LINK

Jeff Etter
IMDB – LINK
LinkedIn – LINK

Kevin Wurzer
IMDB – LINK

Ralph Palmer
IMDB – LINK
LinkedIn – LINK

Ralph Zondag
IMDB – LINK
LinkedIn – LINK

Linda Miller
IMDB – LINK
LinkedIn – LINK

Lorna Cook
IMDB – LINK
LinkedIn – LINK

Anne Marie Bardwell
IMDB – LINK
LinkedIn – LINK

Heidi Guedel
IMDB – LINK

Dave Spafford
IMDB – LINK

Skip Jones
IMDB – LINK
LinkedIn – LINK

Dick Zondag
IMDB – LINK
LinkedIn – LINK

T Dan Hofstead
IMDB – LINK
LinkedIn – LINK

August 1986, Van Nuys — Sullivan Bluth’s Warehouse on Hart Street. This Memory Lane segment takes us back to the live‑action recording for An American Tail’s “Somewhere Out There.”

We start in the small studio room I shared with four other artists, where Rough Animator Helen Lawlor is visited by Clean‑Up Artists Julie Molina and Cathy Jones.

As we walk through the Warehouse, our other roommate EFX Artist Joey Mildenberger passes by with a friendly hello.

At the camera setup, Animation Camera crew Joe Jiuliano and David R. Ankney, together with Assistant Director David J. Steinberg, are busy focusing on the shoot, capturing the live‑action elements that would later blend into the film’s animation.

“Somewhere Out There” – Live Action Recording, August 1986

SHOW NOTES :

Original Sequence : An American Tail : ‘ Somewhere Out There ‘ > LINK

Below is the list of the American Tail animation crew members shown in the video, presented in the order they appear :

Helen Lawlor – Rough Animation Artist
IMDB – LINK

Julie Molina – Character clean-up inbetweener
IMDB – LINK

Cathy Jones – Character Key Assistant
IMDB – LINK
LinkedIn – LINK

Joe [ Joey ] [ David ] Mildenberger – Special Effects Inbetweener
IMDB – LINK
LinkedIn – LINK

David R. Ankey – Animation Camera
IMDB – LINK

Joe Jiuliano – Animation Camera
IMDB – LINK

David J. Steinberg – Assistant Director
IMDB – LINK
LinkedIn – LINK

April 9, 1998. As Disney’s Mulan approached the end of production, the animation crew gathered at the Hollywood Athletic Club for a special Appreciation Lunch. In Part 3, we follow Mark as he films his co‑workers — the artists and production staff — enjoying a few drinks, conversations, and some friendly games of pool.

SHOW NOTES :

Below is the list of Mulan animation crew members shown in the video, presented in the order they appear :

If you know any names of other crew members shown on this video, please send a message here on our contact page or post on the YouTube Video channel and we will update the list below – ty – Mark

Marianne Tucker  –   key assistant clean-up animator: “Mulan”
IMDB – LINK

Kathleen M.Bailey  –   lead key clean-up animator: “The Matchmaker”
IMDB – LINK

Bert Klein  –  animator: “Chien-Po” and “Ling”
IMDB – LINK
LinkedIn – LINK

Tom Gately  –  animator: “Mulan” and “Fa Zhou”
IMDB – LINK

Flynn Falcone  –  production assistant: California
IMDB – LINK
LinkedIn – LINK

Bob Persichetti    –    inbetweener: additional clean-up animation 
IMDB – LINK

Bill Recinos – Additional Animation
IMDB – LINK
LinkedIn – LINK

Scott Anderson – lead key clean-up animator: “Chi Fu”
IMDB – LINK

Brian Ferguson – Additional Animation
IMDB – LINK
LinkedIn – LINK

Rebecca Huntley   production manager: Los Angeles
IMDB – LINK
LinkedIn – LINK

The Background Dept. – ‘ An American Tail ‘ production
Sullivan Bluth Studios – Van Nuys California
In this episode, BG Artist Barry Atkinson guides us through the BG Department during a typical casual Saturday in the Spring of 1986. We visit the work space of BG Supervisor Don Moore and meet BG trainee David McCamley. Barry then points out several of Don Moore’s BG paintings and Color Keys giving a quick snapshot of how a traditional animation background team was during the era.

The Background Dept – BG Artist Barry Atkinson – Don Bluth Studio 1986

Show Notes :

BARRY ATKINSON
IMDB > LINK
Linkedin > LINK
Instagram > LINK

Barry Atkinson is a graphic and digital artist who is employed by Walt Disney Television Studios and Mercury Filmworks production companies. He has gained notoriety through his efforts a background artist on many Disney television series and movies. His notable film work includes Big Hero 6 (2014), Atlantis: The Lost Empire (2001), Pocahontas (1995), The Lion King (1994), and the Lion Guard (2016) television series. He has recently retired and is busy on his own creative personal projects.


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DAVID McCAMLEY
IMDB > LINK
Linkedin > LINK

David is a Seven time Emmy nominated director and producer with over 30 years’ experience in feature animated films, TV animation and short films as director, art director, production designer and writer. He has also created and directed two original children’s TV series.

Recent projects include Production designer and Co-Director on Emmy and Annie award winning ‘Ada Twisty’ for Netflix’s , Production design on ‘Lets get rolling with Otis’ for Apple TV+/ Brown Bag films and production design on ‘Eva the Owlet’ Apple TV+/Scholastic/Brown bag films.

Supervising directing on all three seasons of Beatrix Potter’s ‘Peter Rabbit’, a Brown Bag Films production for Nick Junior which went on to win SIX Emmy awards and a further ten nominations. And he was Supervising Director of the Annie ,BAFTA and Emmy nominated CGI series “The Stinky and Dirty Show; season 1 & 2 for Amazon Studio’s.

He began his career on ‘An American Tail’ at Sullivan Bluth studios, where he was fortunate enough to be trained by some of the top industry professionals. In 1990, David moved to Los Angeles where he worked on numerous features and in 1992 joined Walt Disney Feature Animation contributing his talents to award winning films such as the ‘The Lion King’, ‘Pocahontas’, ‘Hunchback’ and ‘Hercules’. On ‘Tarzan’ he held the position of ‘Supervising Digital Background Artist’ pioneering digital background painting for the studio and was a key member in the development of a new 3D Painting system called Deep Canvas.

In 2000 he returned to Ireland to create and direct the TV series The Island of Inis Cool. The series used CGI characters combined with miniature sets to give it the look and feel of clay-animation. Grabby-Bag, a CGI preschool series for RTE, was his second series, which he created, directed and co-produced with Brown Bag Films. He then went on to direct a new CGI series of Noddy in Toyland, and the pilot episode of Doc Mc Stuffins for Disney Junior.