A Blackwing Experience at the Chuck Jones Center

This must be from "The White Seal".

Tonight I'm participating in a swell shindig down in Costa Mesa, "The Blackwing Experience", arranged by Palomino, the people who've brought back the title character of this blog, the redoubtable Blackwing 602, in new and elegant versions. It's taking place at the Chuck Jones Center for Creativity in Costa Mesa, an apropos venue as the 602 was reputedly Chuck's drawing implement of choice.  I'll be part of a panel discussing the "evolution of the creative process in animation". Quite a subject, and should be fun.


To mark the occasion, here are the two drawings by Chuck that I own, bought for a few bucks at Collectors Bookshop in Hollywood in the late 70s. I believe a Blackwing figures prominently here.

Detail of a layout from "Rikki Tikki Tavi"

The larger layout. It's been a long time since I watched these specials, and I'd like to look them up again. 

The Blackwing Returns

Some of my Blackwing pencils

NOTE Today I heard from two story artists simultaneously with exciting news via Mark Frauenfelder at boingboing.net: apparently that mighty elegant instrument, the extinct Blackwing pencil, is soon going to resume production. I wrote the post below ("Why My Blog Is Titled As It Is') in November, 2005, and it seems like a good time to give it an encore.

They don't make them like this anymore. Really--they don't make these at all; production ceased in 1998, apparently.
I love these pencils--they're a joy to draw with, although I rarely use them now (dwindling supply), but their real attraction is the association they can't shake for me--that of the Disney studio of the 50s, of sketch artists and draughstmen and designers working on immortal projects, not only at Disney feature animation but all over Los Angeles: the maitre'd at Musso's taking a reservation for four in 1933; a script supervisor working alongside Preston Sturges making notes during takes of "Sullivan's Travels"; a student at Chouinard toiling on a design project in 1961; Henry Miller, or Bob Clampett, or Clarence Darrow or Ward Kimball or Ernie Kovacs or Raymond Chandler. Who knows how many yet remain in the musty drawers of retired writers and artists all over the city, from Arcadia to Malibu?

I first saw one of these on the desk of an animator at Disney's in the early 80s, and later on the desk of Cecil B. DeMille, untouched since his death in the 60s; there were some among T. Hee's studio ephemera, given to us at CalArts after his death. I ordered an entire box from the redoubtable Cartoon Colour Company of Culver City, many years ago. Little dreaming of its eventual demise, I recklessly scrawled away, and now my Blackwings constitute barely a fistful, from stubs to pristine unsharpened.

It's a thoroughly romantic instrument: sleek and silvery, fast-moving and easy to sharpen, with a curious back end--a golden holder encasing a silver clasp cradling a removable eraser, the better to extract, flip and so extend its usefulness.

Among both pencil enthusiasts and stubborn pencil-wielding animators, it fights for prominience with the fat, round, green Blaisdell Layout, most famous as the longtime-preferred pencil of Glen Keane. I have a stub of a Blaisdell somewhere--really, a stub, barely two inches long. It's easy to see why it's so appealing, as it skates smoothly over the paper--best used as a blunt instrument with its wide smear of soft lead.
But I still swoon for Blackwings--surely the only pencil which bears its own motto--in quotes, no less--across its length: "Half the pressure, twice the speed". And it certainly seems to be so. A sorry world where such treasure is allowed to pass away. I am old enough to know it's the little things in life--particularly in an artist's life--that immeasurably enhance the day to day grind.

So, the Blackwing: I look over my shoulder and admire the gleam of the golden lettering on my desk. A glorious instrument with all the possibilities that art provides at its tip. And thus the blog moniker.

There's an excellent review of an "old" Blackwing here. Very much worth a click.

Bid on a box of Blackwing Pencils-and more-and help the Hodges

David Nethery provided this fantastic coup to the Hodge auction-yours if you're the lucky bidder

Want to buy a perfect and unused box of 12 Blackwing #602s? You'll have a shot at scoring them this week.

I don't know Tim Hodge personally. I know he's worked as an animator and story artist at Disney, and I know his icon well from comments he's left on blogs I've visited...and I also know him from hearing about the auction organized by friends to help defray some of the costs of medical care for his son, Matthew.
Matthew had a horrible accident last August that has left him in a deep coma. The Hodge family is doing everything they can to care for Matthew and bring him back to full consciousness. Obviously the expense involved is tremendous.

The Hodge's story is detailed on the site Help The Hodges. The site and the auction was conceived by their friends and colleagues in the artistic community who wanted to help the family, and it's quite a list. A lot of great stuff donated by many, many of animation's best-not only as regards skill but most importantly, heart.

For just two examples-apart from the eponymous pencils mentioned above-how about a drawing by Pete Docter of Carl and Kevin the bird from "Up"-signed by Pete--and Ed Asner?








Another beauty: Vicky Jenson donated not one but three items-among them, two of her own gouache paintings, visdev art done for "Road to El Dorado". I still have old color copies of some of her remarkable paintings for that film(sadly much crumpled from frequent pinning and repinning on my various office walls). These are really rare.
And there's much, much more. It's all detailed at the auction website.

So have a go at bidding on fantastic, one of a kind art and collectible goodness while helping the Hodges.

The auction is going to go live on Ebay starting this coming Thursday, January 21st .

The Blackwing is dead....long live the Blackwing?

...the pencil, that is, not the blog.

Animation Podcast's Clay Kaytis was kind enough to forward this swell blog post, wherein another afficionado of the great gray pencil(and a much more dedicated one)posts his discovery--after personal experimenting--of a possible successor to the discontinued Blackwing.

Here it is: The Search For the Wild Blackwing.

tags technorati : pencils, blackwing, writing instruments, drawing

Free Blackwings...join the hunt!

If you're clever, and you're around Burbank, you can find it! GO NOW!
The first clues are up!

These babies cost at least 25 bucks per on Ebay IF you can find one and win it--so get going! Believe me, it'll be worth it. They're sublime writing instruments.

Blackwing Scavenger Hunt...

So it seems a fellow story artist(who judging from his profile is a dead ringer for Gary Busey)has announced a truly worthy scavenger hunt: a search for hidden Blackwing pencils. To participate, one need be in or around Burbank, California, alas--but what a concept!

In one of my earliest posts I waxed rhapsodic on my eponymous writing instrument, the Blackwing: "Half the pressure, Twice the speed" is the motto punched in gold against the grey wood. If you go back to my first month's posts you can find it, if interested. It's a special pencil, long discontinued, and always sought-after; a favorite of animators back in the day, and to the present. I can't wait till Mr. Bread gets his first clues up.

I'm going to recuse myself from actually hunting, as I already have what I think is a fair share of these babies, but the rest of you so inclined--good luck!

tags technorati : blackwing, pencil, artist, scavenger hunt

why my blog is titled as it is

a flock of Blackwing pencils

They don't make them like this anymore. Really--they don't make these at all; production ceased in 1998, apparently.
I love these pencils--they're a joy to draw with, although I rarely use them now(a good 2B or 4B will do the job)...but their real attraction is the association they can't shake for me--that of the Disney studio of the 50s, of sketch artists and draughstmen and designers working on immortal projects, not only at Disney feature animation but all over Los Angeles: the maitre'd at Musso's taking a reservation for four in 1933; a script supervisor working alongside Preston Sturges making notes during takes of "Sullivan's Travels"; a student at Chouinard toiling on a design project in 1961; Henry Miller, or Bob Clampett, or Clarence Darrow or Ward Kimball or Ernie Kovacs or Raymond Chandler. Who knows how many yet remain in the musty drawers of retired writers and artists all over the city, from Arcadia to Malibu?

I first saw one of these on the desk of an animator at Disney's in the early 80s, and later on the desk of Cecil B. DeMille(untouched since his death in the 60s); there were some among T. Hee's studio ephemera, given to us at CalArts after his death. I ordered an entire box from the redoubtable Cartoon Colour Company of Culver City, many years ago. Little dreaming of its eventual demise, I recklessly scrawled away, and now my Blackwings constitute barely a fistful(none to share or sell, sorry).

It's a thoroughly romantic instrument: sleek and silvery, fast-moving and easy to sharpen, with a curious back end--a golden holder encasing a silver clasp cradling a removable eraser, the better to extract, flip and so extend its usefulness.

Among both pencil enthusiasts and stubborn pencil-wielding animators, it fights for prominience with the fat, round, green Blaisdell Layout, most famous as the longtime-preferred pencil of Glen Keane. I have a stub of a Blaisdell somewhere--really, a stub, barely two inches long. It's easy to see why it's so appealing, as it skates smoothly over the paper--best used as a blunt instrument with its wide smear of soft lead.
But I still swoon for Blackwings--surely the only pencil which bears its own motto--in quotes, no less--across its length: "Half the pressure, twice the speed". And it certainly seems to be so. A sorry world where such treasure is allowed to pass away. I am old enough to know it's the little things in life--particularly in an artist's life--that immeasurably enhance the day to day grind.

So, the Blackwing: I look over my shoulder and admire the gleam of the golden lettering on my desk. A glorious instrument with all the possibilities that art provides at its tip. And thus the blog moniker.