Fox and the Hound fan art

Hi Mousers!

I've been working on something that has probably been THE most fun painting I've done to date and it was close to my heart for multiple reasons.  You guys all know my love of Disney and it's no secret  how much I enjoy watching the films. Well, one of my close friends is expecting a little boy in August and for his "gift", I painted a huge acrylic canvas with a scene from The Fox and The Hound which she opened at her shower a few weeks ago.

It was one of the most rewarding "jobs" I've done and I can't wait to see it in the nursery in Portland.

I spent probably about 30ish hours working on both the background and the 2 baby characters.  I was extremely lucky to find incredible background and character references as well as extra sets of experienced Disney eyes to critique for any proportion issues.  These two stole my heart and it was difficult to wrap that canvas up to give it away haha I wanted to keep it!

I'm waiting on a good quality final picture to show but here are some behind the scenes shots of the process and a quick shot of the finished piece that was taken at like 1am.

I drew out the initial illustration on the canvas with pencil. The canvas was prepped with Gesso. 

A side view to show how huge this thing was! It was about 3.5ft x 4.4ft. Took up my whole desk! 

The next step in my process was to get a base wash down to help hide the white of the canvas and to establish my darks. 

At this point it was about 6 hours into it that night and I was getting a little... Uh ...

tired. I needed to really be "one with the characters" LOL 

Even the kitten had passed out on me. 

The final shot before I wrapped it up! As you can see, the acrylic has a reflective shine to it. I'm hoping I can get a clearer image once it's up on the wall and not facing at an angle.

Here's a picture from the actual shower.

Hope you guys like it! It was just a joy to work on and I can't wait to do some more painting! 

Have a fantastic week ahead! 

Mary Blair and Mermaids!

Hey Mousers!

This blog has been a bit of a bore lately and I apologize for that.  My lack of Disney posts have been the result of too hectic a schedule for waaaay too long.  Good news is that I'm out of school (I teach at a few elementary schools) for the summer, I'm planning a multi day trip in a couple weeks AND a whole mess of new things are happening over at the  parks. Although, I'm sure that if you're reading my ramblings, you probably already know the majority of them. :)

I wanted to show you guys something that I found on Instagram this week that had me squealing with delight! If you've read previous entries on this blog, you know that I'm OBSESSED with Mermaids! I freaking love Mermaids. I have red hair, my room is seafoam, I still have my Ariel barbie doll.... get the picture? haha

Anyway, I was perusing along Instagram, (my username is Anniemcbeth! Come follow me!) and I came across Zannaland's picture of this....  *gasp*

taken from Zannaland's Instagram

I died.  I love Mary Blair and her design but to have an entire line of bags marrying both her and mermaids?! Again... I died.
(For those of you who may be reading this and aren't sure who Mary Blair is, she was the creative genius behind "Its A Small World" and many other Disney projects including concept illustration for Alice in Wonderland, Sleeping Beauty, and CInderella.) 

I had no idea where you would find such bags, so I googled "Le Sports Sac Disney" and an entire line of these gems came up in my search. Online store here. The sad part is a lot of the online stock is sold out already, but I can completely understand why! The print is adorable and that little mermaid charm.... *sigh*  I'm assuming that you could find them in the parks, but I have yet to see that nor do I have any evidence of anyone else buying it there.  I plan to investigate when I go in a couple weeks.

I'm seriously debating purchasing one of the larger bags... These are not items that come along everyday in park merchandise or even at the Disney Store.
These are my favorites I think...

small cosmetic bag $28

travel cosmetic bag #28

picture tote $128-$148

large weekender bag $138

They're all so cute!

 I'd love to have the cosmetic bag but that's one of the ones which have sold out. :( Sad Panda.  Which do you guys like the best?

The larger weekender bag would definitely get a lot of use and it doesn't have to "go" with an outfit like a regular bag would.  Of course, if you were visiting the park a lot, it would be fun to have a smaller one be your "Disneyland/World bag". So many choices! and so much cuteness!!  What's a girl to do?!


Alright, enough drooling over handbags hahaha that'll do it for this post!

I hope you guys enjoy some other types of posts as well as some park info, I know there are a lot of blogs and huge online resources (ie Mice chat and Dateline Disneyland) that can give you better information than I.  I hope this helps fill in a little bit along the way :)

Hope you all have a fantastic rest of your week!


*I've discovered a bit more information regarding the bags. Check out Part II of this here!*

Disneyland's Soundsational Parade!

The newest parade at Disneyland Park was designed by the Illustrator team of Kevin Kidney and Jody Daily.  Both have an extensive amount of previous work that has been available at the park.  Besides the parade they've had a lot of acknowledgment for their sculptures of past Disneyland merchandise and attractions. The parade floats you'll see in the pictures below were designed first as paper sculptures! That's right... no clay, no plaster... only paper! Then obviously they were built to full size after "fine tuning" (haha!) everything.

The whole of the parade is based off of percussion instruments mostly. It kicks off with a drumline doing all kinds of tricks and beats as they walk down the route. Most of the performers in this part were actually in the film "Drumline" that came out a bit ago.  You can also see in the picture below that Mickey has a set of drums too! Disney hired professional musicians for a lot of this parade.

drumline, Mickey & Minnie

Aladdin comes up next, which is pretty much the typical float and belly dancers, I didn't get a very good shot of it. But the best part is the little monkey Abu who follows behind. He clashes his symbols in time to the music.  I don't think Abu has been a part of any Aladdin attractions before.

Abu

Then Ariel appears behind her floating sea creature dancers! Her float is so pretty with all the bright colors.  She actually spins around 360 degrees so everyone on each side can see her and what under the sea float would be without bubbles! The octopus has all sorts of movement up there on the top.

Ariel and Friends

This little guy was cracking me up! He was so random and was just chilling towards the back of the float haha I don't know if he has a counterpart on the other side or if there is a similar awkward type character but I had to show you guys.

Next up was a tribute to The Three Caballeros! They haven't been a part of a Disney attraction in a really long time. I love their costumes and little bubble butts with tail feathers! (is that weird? ... probably...)

Then came the token Princess float. The only real difference I saw in the float design was the addition of Rupunzel's tower.  But really, how many princess floats can one design before they all start to flow together? (I was always secretly glad Ariel gets her own float ;P)

Simba followed suit with his entourage of African dancers, Turk, and King Louie.  It was fairly simple in this section, but cool to see a throwback to the Lion King parade.  Simba's drum float is similar to the one you'll see Tinkerbell has in a bit.

Tiana and her showboat came right behind.  This one was pretty cool! The boat is modeled after the Mark Twain and included musical instruments in the architecture. The "water" reflected on the underside of the boat too.

Next up was Tinkerbell and some generic fairies.  Peter Pan, Captain Hook, Smee, and some pirates also danced around her float.  Tinkerbell, I'm pretty sure was a drummer too. She had some bongo type looking mushrooms at the top of her drum.

Last, but not least, comes my favorite float of them all! Which probably is exactly why its the big finale section.  Mary Poppins comes through with her gang of Chimney Sweeps and the most magnificently designed float I've ever seen.  It's so intricate and amazing.
The Chimney sweeps come through with their dance number and then Mary and Bert ride around on their carousel horses!

it's a BIKE!

Ok, now remember how at the beginning I told you guys that this was all originally designed with PAPER?

Here's the rest of Mary Poppins's float .....

It was so good!  Some parades are hit and miss (the ones you run to the attractions during) but this one definitely works for me.  I wouldn't mind standing and watching it more than once.

Now after all this, it makes me laugh about how many times uninformed people automatically think "books" when the word Illustrator comes up in conversation.  Now you can add "parade float design" to the list of examples to give them ;)

If you would like to see more pictures i took of the parade, here's a public link to the album on my facebook:
Soundsational Parade