Tenma, on the other hand, voiced by Nicholas Cage was what I feared it would be, a non-emotional, uninspiring performance where he used the same voice inflection for every line, every situation, no matter how bad or good the action on screen was. I prefer the Tenma (Dr. Boyton) of the 1960’s American Astro Boy dub over this performance; at least he got upset when his son died and actually conveyed the “mad” part of Tenma well. Tenma, was pretty much a boring, middle of the road kind of character and I didn’t particularly care for him one way or another. I simply could not connect to him or relate to him on the level I should have. Tenma could have gotten hit by a bus and that really would not have made me feel bad for him.

Another small sticking point for me was the mixing of English and Japanese names. They decided to go with the Japanese name for Tenma, but stuck with the terrible Elephun for Ochanomizu. I think I would have preferred they use a literal translation of Ochanomizu’s name (Tea Water) than to revert to the stupid 1960’s English name. Alternately, if you are going to use Elephun, you may was well use Boyton. Just pick a side people, and stick with it. Please.

Ochanomizu (Elephun in this one) wasn’t bad. I think he more or less was what I would have expected him to be. Ochanomizu is generally a “good scientist” in Osamu Tezuka’s world and he was pretty much that. Concerned with the environment, understanding and the voice of reason, I think Tezuka would have liked this version of Ochanomizu. However, you completely lose the good/chaotic mix between the two scientists with Tenma’s sub-par performance.

The movie fell short of a chance at awesomeness by making President Stone, an almost Duke Red clone, but not actually Duke Red. If they had Duke Red play President Stone, I think this movie would have gotten a bit more interesting. However, as it stands, President Stone pretty much only shares a nose with Duke Red and lacks Duke Red’s multi-dimensional personality and cunning. So, I suppose it is just as well that they did not go with a full blown Duke Red part, as Duke Red is so much cooler than that.

One nice touch was the addition of Osamu Tezuka as a background scientist character in the Ministy of Science. Fans of Tezuka’s works will also enjoy the many “patch gourd creatures” scattered throughout the city. Mustachio (Shunsaku Ban) also makes a couple brief appearances as Toby’s teacher and a background character.

NOTE: the rest of this entry is going to focus on plot points. Anyone who is familiar to the Astro Boy series will not likely be spoiled but if you prefer to see the movie yourself before I nitpick it, then you may want to stop here. (Scroll down for more).

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The story wasn’t as horrible as it could have been, but it left out some of the subtleties that Tezuka worked into his manga and other previous installments of the Astro Boy universe. I half expected Keenan Ivory Wayans to jump up and scream “MESSAGE!” every time there was some lesson to be learned a la “Don’t Be a Menace to South Central…” They didn’t leave anything up to the viewer to figure out for themselves, they spelled out pretty much everything.

One example comes to us when Tenma straight out says to “Elephun” that he may have made a mistake and that the robot Toby is not his real son, and merely a “replacement.” Osamu Tezuka respected the reader/viewer’s intelligence enough to use the “robot boys cannot grow” metaphor to convey this same fact. In the original story Tenma rejects Astro because he “cannot grow” when in reality if the viewer digs a LITTLE deeper they can infer that this is the point when the “mad Dr. Tenma” has realized that Astro is not his son, and you cannot replace a human being. But that would be too much work for your average American audience and God forbid we let parents debate any plot points with curious children, so instead they just throw the hard facts in your face. But since Cage made such a poor Tenma anyhow who never REALLY reached the classic Tenma madness breaking point, I suppose it is just as well, as such an emotional plot point would have been hard to glean from that performance.

Cage’s performance also reflected poorly on the plot in general. In this version of the story Toby is vaporized  by a giant, “peace keeping” robot, in a military experiment gone wrong at the Ministry of Science (this robot was aptly named “Peace Keeper”, though I think Megaman fans would have howled if they named him Gamma instead XD ). Tenma didn’t seem NEARLY as upset about this as he SHOULD have been. I mean 1) his son just got VAOPRIZED and 2) it was HIS robot that vaporized him! It just, didn’t sit well with me at all. The choppy animation of the 1960’s Astro Boy “car wreck scene” was more emotional and Tenma’s ensuing madness made more sense. (Though admittedly the whole vaporization thing was problematic as it is anti-climatic by nature. You’re here one minute then “poof” you’re gone, not much room for drama and not much closure in that. I assume this move was made to make it less traumatizing for kids but it also made it less “real.”)

Tenma does not seem that upset while he spends, about oh… maybe a week making his new robot son (it took a year in the manga and other versions of the story which just emphasized how obsessed he really was). The big sticking point in this process was the fact that he did not program this version of Astro, rather he “copied” Toby’s memories into the robot, with a hair.

…

I think anyone over the age of 10 knows that your memories are recorded in your BRAIN not your DNA. I guess they couldn’t very well have Dr. Tenma walking around with a chunk of Toby’s brain that somehow survived the vaporization, but COME ON. They could have had a flash back sequence where he and his son used some kind of mind-to-computer recording device to download his memories… or maybe he could have supplemented programming with old digital photos and video of them… but to extract memories from hair? I’m not sure if I should be annoyed at the bad science or impressed with Tenma’s mad skillz ;p

This story also touched on Osamu Tezuka’s environmental messages. The story begins in Metro City, a floating city in the sky which was raised to escape the garbage pile they created on earth. Metro City is shiny, new, clean, and is maintained largely by servant robots. This also felt a little like Wall-e in that respect. Ochanomizu has a dream of cleaning up the pollution they left behind on the ground below and returning to their old life.

The people dwelling on the surface at least in the immediate area, seem to spend most of their time sifting through Metro City’s trash that they throw out of the city quite literally. They never really explain why there are so many ORPHANS on the surface. Ham Egg has a collection of these orphans who he sends out in search of robots and robot parts that can be salvaged and rebuilt into working robots. (It is later revealed that he does this to win money at the “Robot Games” which are similar to the “Robotting” tournaments from the manga).

This is where some of the robot right’s elements of the Astro Boy story start to play out, but do not make much progress in this movie. On the Earth’s surface, Astro encounters a rag-tag band of 3 robots calling themselves the “Robot Revolutionary Front” (RRF). This band of communist-worker-party style revolutionaries who have posters of Lenin and Trotsky’s name glued all over their hideout, are hardly likely leaders in a movement to win robots the right to be free from human ownership. This freedom is granted relatively early in the original Astro Boy narrative, partly due to Ochanomizu’s efforts. However, in this movie the robots are granted little more than a brief show of appreciation at the very end of the film. As readers of the manga know, granting one freedom is not the solution to the problem of changing the minds and hearts of humans. So, perhaps this was a bit too much information (or too much thinking) for your average viewer of PG rated movies.

They also used the RRF to briefly mention Asimov’s laws of robotics, and there was a minor suggestion that Astro may be free of those laws due to his human memories. But other than that, they didn’t go much beyond referencing the first law and avoided the complexities and issues that the other laws suggest.

One final thing that was somewhat annoying was the fact that Astro “gives his life” to save the city, and is promptly revived. Which made the whole self-sacrifice thing a bit pointless… I also could have done without the stupid random alien attack at the end to further ram home the point that the world needs Astro and he’s a !HERO!.

Overall, the story was ok, though I didn’t need to be beaten over the head with the obvious all the time. It certainly was better than I expected. However, that didn’t stop me and my husband (and later my friends) from listing all the actors we would RATHER have seen playing Dr. Tenma. We eventually concluded that they would have been well advised to have cast just about ANYONE in Hollywood to be Tenma except: Nicholas Cage and Keanu Reeves because they both suffer from the same problem, one-dimensional, non-emotional, uninspiring characters.

In general, the movie didn’t really add anything special to the Astro Boy universe, but I don’t think Tezuka is spinning in his grave over it. However, I think Dr. Tenma was easily the worst part of the movie and they would have done better with the traditional zany Dr. Tenma than “unemotional, awkward, but somewhat loving father Tenma.” But I guess having Tenma outright reject Astro would be “too traumatizing for kids,” and pressure from American censors was probably partly to blame for that 9_9 Though, I never thought much good comes from sheltering kids TOO much, and his rejection of him was perfectly acceptable in the US 1960’s version. Tenma never really HURT Astro (just chased him with a broom in the manga). He simply sold him, and being a robot this was an acceptable practice in their universe. So, I think someone wussed out on that one.

Go see it… see what you think. The animation was nice, Nathan Lane was entertaining, Nicholas Cage was not. There are enough amusing bits to keep you interested, even if they are beating you senseless with the obvious sometimes.

Well, ok it’s not DOS compatible… buuut…

I finally had some time to do a complete webiste overhaul. I have not changed the layout in over 2 years and I was still using tables. So, I figured it was about time I made the full jump to CSS.

I reworked one or two pages but essentially all the previous content is still intact. I’m hoping to update with some pictures from Cambodia soon, but I have not finished going through all my photos yet.

I also ought to post some art work that I have been posting to Deviant Art, but not including here.

I just never feel like I have the time…

But I’m glad I updated the old site, it really needed the makeover.

However, not every school can afford a site license for Photoshop, and even a personal copy of a new Photoshop program (such as the new CS3) can run you $650 or more!

So, if you are looking for a free image manipulation tool with a lot of options, you might want to try GIMP.

GIMP: the GNU Image Manipulation Program 

http://www.gimp.org/

GIMP stands for the GNU Image Manipulation Tool and is a popular art program for those who are into open source programming. The general belief of open source groups is that software should be distributed for free and its code should be distributed freely so that anyone should be able to peer review it, add to it, and improve it. Open source programs are programs that are usually developed by a collection of people who work on the program in their spare time and often they develop the program for free UNIX systems such as Linux.

http://www.linux.org/

The Open Source Initiative has a longer definition of what “open source” means:

http://www.opensource.org/docs/osd

Basically GIMP is a freeware, open source program that has some options that are similar to Photoshop. It supports layers and has many familiar tools. It can even open Photoshop files.

Although ideally, an open source program like GIMP would be run in a totally open source environment (such as Linux), the good people at gimp.org thought about the rest of us and created versions of GIMP that not only run in Linux, but Windows and Mac OSX and they even made versions in different languages!

The program itself takes some getting used to. If you already know Photoshop and are expecting to just dive in and use GIMP, it’s probably not going to happen. The tool set is a little different. Naturally, all the icons are different and some functions have other names. 

But like Photoshop you still have access to things like channels and layers.

GIMP has gone through several revisions and is always getting better. I have had some difficulty running previous versions of it in the past (as well as some other open source programs). However, my computer did work with the most recent version of GIMP so maybe some of the old bugs have been worked out.

I think the only thing that really irritates me about the program is that you have three windows open: the layers/channels, the tools and the image. If you made the image window full screen, every time you click on the image the other two windows end up behind it, and then you have to click on the other windows from the task bar to bring them back. I didn’t see any options that set those windows to be “always on top” so this may be something they may pursue in the future (or maybe someday I’ll figure out how to make them float on top, if that is possible).

For someone who is looking for a free alternative for photo and image manipulation, GIMP is a great find. However, if you decide to introduce your classroom or school to GIMP, you should contact your ETs first and make sure that your district will allow it. One problem with any open source program is that anyone has access to the source code, which means that it is easier for people to find and exploit loopholes in the programming. Although most hackers tend to leave open source people alone (because most computers in the world use Windows, and if you want to hurt a lot of people real fast you write a virus for the most popular OS) it still poses a potential risk and it should be discussed with the technology team before it is implemented.

When running any classroom website, teachers often want to find ways to show off student work and achievement. On my own classroom website, I provide an online art gallery of the best art work from each grade level that was produced that school year. My art gallery has evolved and is now set up as JavaScript slide shows.

But if you’re new to classroom websites and using HTML, then you might want to consider a simpler gallery using tables and clickable thumbnails. The best part about doing an image gallery this way is that there are freeware programs online that can instantly change a folder of images into a set of images, thumbnails, and sometimes even write html pages that can be uploaded on your website without you doing any of the image linking!

Utility: HNM Freeware’s EasyPeg Thumbnail Creator

In the past I have used HNM Freeware’s EasyPeg. However, it seems that HNM Freeware’s web site is no more and finding this program has become a bit more difficult. For the time being, Internet Archive is keeping a copy of the program up for download:

http://www.archive.org/details/tucows_325074_EasyPeg

Easy Peg isn’t the easiest program to use because it has an unusual interface. Basically, to go to the Thumbnail creator portion you need to click on:

File—> Go to Thumbnail Creator

You will see lots of options in this window. For now, let’s start with the left side.

The Left Side

Here you can select the directories where you want to save the html file(s) that EasyPeg will automatically generate as well as name the html files that it will produce. You can choose how many rows or columns you want in your pre-generated table. You can also choose what quality and size you want the thumbnails to be.

Note: if you have more pictures than spaces in your table (rows x columns) EasyPeg will automatically create a second (or third, or fourth) page for you with your desired table dimensions and place the excess files there. The program will even link the pages for you with “previous” and “next” hyperlinks!)

The Right Side

This is the side you will add your pictures. You can also add “hints” in case your image does not load. It even allows you to enter a description for each of your pictures that will appear right below it in the finished html document!

When you are all done putting your pictures in order and adding descriptions you can click the “Let’s Go” button at the bottom (and don’t worry if you don’t like how your html page looks, you can always undo it in the Edit menu and try again!)

The finished html document will open automatically displaying your images lined up neatly in a table with their descriptions.

You can then take this html code and copy/paste it into your own website template to make an instant gallery! 

My only word of caution with using EasyPeg is I have noticed that it degrades the quality of your .jpg images when it creates copies of them in the new image folder with the thumbnails. My suggestion is when you are done using EasyPeg, go back to your original picture folder and copy your source images into the new folder that was created and overwrite the ones that EasyPeg created (Don’t worry EasyPeg won’t overwrite your originals if you saved your thumbnails in a different folder).

Utility: Easy Thumbnails

I came across another program that is similar and since EasyPeg is aging, it might not be a bad time to start thinking about other options (oh how we love to hang on to our old familiar utilities)!

Easy Thumbnails is a free utility that allows you to prepare thumbnail images of your pictures. It is a little easier to use and is more straight forward than EasyPeg. Easy Thumbnails is available from Fookes Software:

http://www.fookes.com/ezthumbs/index.php

The program makes nice thumbnails. Alas, unlike EasyPeg Thumbnail Creator, it does not make the lovely tabled html code with pre-linked images for you. All you get is the pictures and the thumbnails.

For now, I think I’ll stick with EasyPeg. It may not be pretty, but it still saves a lot of time!

There are other things you can do with this besides make cartoon characters. One project you can do with your students is create Andy Warhol style Pop Art self-portraits.

If you are looking to introduce an art lesson on Andy Warhol, The Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh, PA has some online teaching materials.

http://www.warhol.org/education/index.html

To make your life easy when preparing a lesson on Warhol, they even have some Power Point Presentations about Pop art and the life of Andy Warhol available for download.

Basically, the project is simple. After presenting students with a brief lesson on Andy Warhol and his art, the students can draw a self-portrait that they will scan and color in Photoshop using the transparent line art techniques we previously talked about.

However, Andy Warhol’s Pop art was partly about the repetition that comes with industrialization and mass production and many of his portrait pieces were repeated on the same canvas, or were part of a series of canvases. Many people remember his portraits of famous movie and rock stars such as Marilyn Monroe and Mick Jagger in bright silk screened colors:

Marilyn Monroe (Marilyn), 1967
Screen print on paper, 36 x 36 in.
Courtesy of the Andy Warhol Museum Collection

So, likewise, the students can create a series of self-portraits in many colors very easily by saving an uncolored copy of their line art, coloring the line art, saving it under a new name (to prevent saving over the original line art) and then starting a new one.

Once they have about four self-portrait color scheme variations, they can put the pictures together into one finished pop-art piece.

This is a really simple sample of a finished project. Older or more experienced students may want to do more with their portraits.  

The really nice thing about using Photoshop for this assignment is there is no risk involved. The students can experiment with different fill colors or even shading and other fill effects without fear of “botching” their art work. They can always undo, or use Photoshop’s “step backwards” option to erase mistakes or if they made a lot of errors, they can always “revert” to their last save. The only problem is they must make sure they do not save over their prototype line art!

Once the students scan and create their transparent line art it would be wise if they gave it an unmistakable name such as “Uncolored Transparent Line Art.psd” to keep them from accidentally saving over it! You may even consider making them save it in a different folder, or keep a separate “teacher” folder of their original scans to help avoid accidents!

In the classroom Photoshop can be used to do many kinds of art projects. In the first few entries we talked about animation history. Students like to draw cartoons and there is a way to prepare hand drawn line art for coloring that may be useful to students who are interested in coloring their projects in Photoshop. However, the process of making transparent line art is not immediately obvious.

Artist Onezumi of Onezumi Studios http://www.onezumi.com has written a number of Photoshop Tutorials for how she draws her web comics. The original tutorials can be found here:

http://www.onezumi.com/oni/html/modules.php?name=Content&pa=showpage&pid=10

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Note: Not all content on Onezumi.com is suitable for younger students, but the tutorials are excellent. Use caution if you are planning on having students access the website directly.

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Making Your Line Art Transparent

Under Basic Art Tutorials, “Tutorial 5: Making Your Lineart Transparent” is an excellent resource for preparing a scanned line art picture for coloring. I asked Onezumi if I could reproduce the steps here, (thanks Onezumi!):

The first thing you need to do is make sure that your image is set to grayscale by going to:

Image > Mode > Grayscale

Next, you go to the Channels Palette (Right behind the Layers Palette) and select the channel as shown below. (i.e. click on the little button that looks like a dotted-line circle)

 Go to Select > Inverse

Go back to Layers Palette and create a new layer. Ctrl+Shift+N [Shift+Command+N on the Mac] (Or, you click the little button that looks like a page being turned).

Hit Alt-Backspace to fill the selection on the new layer and your lineart will transfer over onto the layer you have selected. Deselect the lineart. Ctrl+D [Command+D on the Mac]

(Note: make sure you have the right “fill color” selected. The line art will fill in whatever color you chose for your regular drawing/filling tool–in grayscale that is).

Now you can delete your original sketch. I would duplicate the transparent lineart and lock the top one so that you don’t mess it up. Keep the second one beneath it to color on. Finally, add a background layer below it all.

(Note: Locked layers have a little padlock on them. In this picture I have now selected the “color” layer, which is highlighted in blue, so I can start my coloring).

The last thing you need to do before you can color is put your image back into RGB mode! Right now if you start coloring, it will all be different shades of gray because we put our picture in Grayscale!

To do this you will go to:

Image > Mode > RGB

When it asks you if you want to merge, say “Don’t Merge!” Or you will lose all those layers you just made!

Coloring

Now you are ready to color! This section contains some information from Onezumi’s 6th Tutorial, Coloring: Basic Flat Colors.

http://www.onezumi.com/oni/html/modules.php?name=Content&pa=showpage&pid=17

1. If your lineart is made up of closed shapes (like most of mine) you can select each area that you want to color by pressing (W) and using the Magic Wand.

Once you see the marching ants around your selection go to Select > Modify > Expand > 2 pixels. Expanding by this much should help you fill the area cleanly so that there are not many areas that do not get filled in. If the marching ants annoy you, you can toggle invisibility by hitting CRTL-H [Command-H on the Mac].

Now you can fill the selection by hitting Alt-backspace (or using the paint bucket tool), and deselect by hitting Ctrl+D [Command+D on the Mac] (or click on it again with the wand tool). Do this for all of the flats. If there are some blank areas left, just color them in with the paintbrush tool.

While coloring, you may need to make some minor adjustments if you have any lines that are not closed. You can do this with the pencil or brush tool by drawing a little line where you need your fill color to stop. You can smooth this line out with the blur tool if you need to.

Find the Cartoon on Another Website

Many of the cartoons we viewed are in the public domain. It’s possible you could try searching for alternate websites that host the same animations in another format (such as .mov, or .avi or .wmv).

Daily Motion.com

While many people block major sites like YouTube, sometimes they forget to block the minor sites. One site that is similar to YouTube is Daily Motion.

http://www.dailymotion.com/us

Daily Motion has many of the videos discussed in this blog and may be an alternate site for viewing this material or finding alternate files. (Unfortunately, my school blocks this one too on the grounds of content).

Problems with Accessing Links on Websites

As anyone who has used the internet for more than a few years knows, websites disappear. The biggest problem with using YouTube and searching online for video files is that the sites are only there as long as someone feels like maintaining them and providing space for them. Favorite websites can disappear overnight, making planning with the internet a bit frustrating at times.

Alternatives to Accessing Cartoons Online:

Buy Classic Cartoons on DVD

You could invest in some cheap DVD collections that may have the cartoons you need. WalMart has many $1-$5 DVDs that have classic Cartoons on them, and Amazon.com stocks many classic cartoons too. On some of these collections you can get 60 cartoons at a time. This is probably the best way to make sure you always have what you need.

Downloading From YouTube, Keeping Your Own Archive of Cartoons:

It is possible to download from the YouTube website. However, it is a little tricky and you will need a special player to read the files you download or you will need a conversion utility to change them into a different format (YouTube uses a special flash format called .flv it is not quite the same as a regular flash object and will not automatically play in your internet browser directly from your computer).

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Note: Many of the cartoons we viewed in this blog have been public domain cartoons. There are no copyright problems with hosting public domain cartoons temporarily on a school computer or server for educational purposes (however you should delete them when you are done). You should always check to make sure that you are not saving or hosting cartoons that are not in the public domain. The information contained in this post can be used for “evil” so use good judgment when downloading from the internet to avoid copyright infringements.

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There are two ways to copy a file from YouTube: The hard way, by going through the html code to find a direct link to download from, or the easy way with an external website.

The Hard Way:

If you now anything about html, this “hard way” isn’t really that hard a summary of the steps is included here:

1) Wait until video has completely downloaded into YouTube player

2) View Source on player page:

What you need to do is go your web browser and click on:

MS Internet Explorer: “view—> Source”
Mozilla Firefox: “view—> Page source”

When the source pops up find line that looks like:

SWFObject(”/player2.swf?video_id= [lots of numbers/letters]

3) Paste the letters and numbers part onto this URL:

http://youtube.com/get_video.php?video_id=[lots of numbers/letters]

4) This should prompt you to save the FLV file

(Thanks to my brother Bob for finding this one online for me at http://www.tian.cc/2006/04/howto-save-videos-from-youtube-updated.html).

The Easy Way:

Many people have written scripts, plugins and other utilities for downloading from YouTube. Every once in a while YouTube changes the way it embeds its movies so some of these utilities go in an out of style. However, there are several websites that help you download YouTube files. One Website is “KeepVid.”

http://keepvid.com/

Using this website is easy. You copy the URL of the video you want to download and paste it into the field at the top of the KeepVid homepage. KeepVid then provides you with a link that allows you to download the file directly to your computer (NOTE: you will have to give the file a title and you will have to add the extension .flv when you save it, otherwise it won’t show up as an FLV).

Playing YouTube Videos on Your Computer

The next problem is finding a way to either play the FLV files or convert them.

One free player that I have used is simply called “FLV Player” it can be found here:

http://www.download.com/FLV-Player/3000-2139_4-10467081.html

This one is a simple drag and drop player. It does not convert FLVs or anything fancy like that. But it is Spyware/Adware free.

Vixy.net

If you do a short Google search you can find other programs that can turn FLVs into other video formats so that they can be played on any computer without a special player.

One is a website called “vixy.net Online FLV Converter” which works similar to Keep Vid, except it turns FLVs into movie files:

http://vixy.net/

However, in the Windows .avi format it uses the DivX codec, so if you do not have that codec installed on your computer (and likely your school will not) it won’t work. In that case it may be better to try the .mov option and hope that the school supports MPG4. The other formats are primarily for portable devices and may not work on your computer. Conversion takes a pretty long time and once the file is converted you need to download the finished conversion, so this might not be the most practical converter (you also cannot navigate away from the page while you are converting and downloading).

Another thing you can do is download a program to convert the files for you. Some programs are free but others you need to pay for, some paid programs offer a trial period.

Whenever you download a free program from the internet, be sure to investigate it thoroughly, read user comments and make sure it does not contain any malware.

And remember, if you ever want to install any programs (such as “FLV Player”) on a school computer, check with your ETs first!

Osamu Tezuka is often referred to as “manga no kami” or the god of manga (comics) in Japan. During his lifetime he wrote over 150,000 pages of manga. Primarily a comic artist, Tezuka is also responsible for opening Japan’s first major animation studio “Mushi Productions” which produced the first Japanese anime cartoon “Tetsuwan Atomu” (Mighty Atom) which came to be known as Astro Boy in the US and abroad. Tezuka also created “Kimba the White Lion,” (“Jungle Emperor Leo” in Japan) and he was also responsible for creating the first shojo manga (girl’s comic) “The Princess Knight.”

When he was a boy, Osamu Tezuka’s father owned a movie projector and held family movie nights. Tezuka grew up watching American cartoons (mainly those by Disney and Fleischer) and was fascinated by them. He and his sister used to have drawing competitions. He was bullied as a kid but when the other kids at school found out that he could draw, they stopped picking on him.

He was also into nature and spent much of his time outdoors. His favorite insect was the ground beetle. Because his name was similar to the name of the beetle (osamushi) when he signed his name on comics he actually signed it, “Osamushi” after his favorite insect.

Osamu Tezuka grew up during WWII. He was only in middle school at the time and although he was too young to fight he had to work in factories just like everyone else. His experiences during the war would help shape his anti-war attitude later in life.

Tezuka originally wanted to be a doctor, but when he started medical school he also got a part time job drawing comics. He quickly realized that he could not do both. He eventually decided to quit medical school and become a manga artist full time.

At the time, being a manga artist was not considered a respectable job. However, Osamu Tezuka would soon be responsible for creating a culture that elevated manga to not only an art form but a way of discussing important topics.

Osamu Tezuka’s works all have underlying lessons. He wrote comics that were not only for children but on topics for teenagers and adults too. By doing this he was able to reach a wider audience and he set the pattern for future Japanese manga artists and animators. He felt that the things he had to say were important and the mangas gave him a way of expressing his feelings and ideas. Tezuka was very concerned about such topics as: war, slavery, the environment, ethics, and questions about life and death. Although his works often discussed serious topics, Tezuka would often break up the seriousness with silly panels to keep the mood light (and sometimes make the comic come off as a bit surreal).

Osamu Tezuka trained other Japanese artists and gave them advice. He also traveled the world giving lectures about his work. His most famous cartoon “Astro Boy” (based on his popular Astro Boy manga) was translated into many different languages and has been seen by children around the world. There have been 3 “Astro Boy” series. The first one, created by Tezuka, was made in the 1960’s and was originally black and white. A second, color series, was made in the 1980’s and recently a high budget new Astro Boy series was made in 2003.

Unfortunately, Tezuka died at the age of 60 from stomach cancer in 1989. Still his messages and his work continue to inspire. Today many Japanese animes borrow ideas from Tezuka’s work such as the small noses, big eyes and wild hairstyles.

The Osamu Tezuka Museum 

A museum was opened in his honor in Osaka, Japan (where he was originally from). The Osamu Tezuka museum has a wonderful website: http://www.tezuka.co.jp/ it includes information about the artist as well as a database on all of his comics and information about all of his characters. The site is available in English and Japanese.

On the website they also have an excellent interactive Flash animation about his life story:

http://en-f.tezuka.co.jp/osamu/story/index.html

Osamu Tezuka’s Actors

Osamu Tezuka had a unique way of writing his comics. His characters were treated more like actors. His various characters would appear in many different stories playing different roles. So, just as when an actor “dies” in a movie, that actor goes on to play more roles, so too did Tezuka’s characters.

This created a dialogue with Tezuka’s audience, a sort of series of in-jokes that helps even non-Japanese speakers understand his work. Tezuka’s comics were often drawn or written in such a way that even if you did not speak Japanese, if you have an idea about what sort of characters Tezuka’s “actor” played then you could figure out the story. In recent years there has been a renewed interest in his work and several companies have begun to translate some of his works into English.

Some of my favorite characters are:

Astro Boy (Atom): The little boy robot with 7 powers and a 100,000 horsepower engine.
http://en.tezuka.co.jp/studio/character/c001/c001.html

Kenichi Shikishima: Kenichi always plays a polite, young, hero character. Kenichi is the sort of character who always did the right thing and was the star of many of Tezuka’s early works.
http://en.tezuka.co.jp/studio/character/c005/c005.html

Ban Shunsaku: Always plays a hot tempered detective. He also frequently appears as Astro Boy’s teacher.
http://en.tezuka.co.jp/studio/character/c003/c003.html

Rock Homes: Rock, who started out as a child similar to Kenichi, is one of the few Tezuka characters that “grew up.” Although Kenichi was always the hero who did things right, things rarely worked out for Rock in the role of “hero.” In mangas where Rock appears as an adult he is often selfish, narcissistic and most often ends up dead by the end of the story. Rock often reflects the darker side of human nature, hidden behind a handsome face.
http://en.tezuka.co.jp/studio/character/c004/c004.html

Duke Red: Duke Red often plays a classy villain. He appears as a businessman, diplomat, and politician and in other similar roles. Duke Red’s large nose and cockatiel hairstyle make him easily identifiable.
http://en.tezuka.co.jp/studio/character/c018/c018.html

Tezuka had many more characters. They can be explored at the “The Osamu Tezuka Museum” website.

Tezuka and Experimental Animation:

Experimental animation is any kind of animation that is unusual or considered non-traditional. Many times experimental shorts are shown at film festivals and studios often create them to try new ideas or to show off their talent. Osamu Tezuka did create a number of very short experimental animation pieces. Some of them can be found on YouTube.

“Memory” (1964)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pqKD_BZT_6M

A humorous piece on human memory, forgetfulness, and what will be remembered about us. NOTE: This one has some brief nudity.

“Jumping” (1984)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=45_8ejTGAw8

This is a cartoon that is drawn from the perspective of someone who is jumping. This one would have been incredibly hard to execute. NOTE: This one has some brief nudity.

“Broken Down Film” (1985)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tWYCRquSUKY

An amusing cartoon that spoofs the problems of old films and projectors such as dirt, dust, hairs, bad cuts, broken film etc.

Watching these cartoons gives one a small window into his sense of humor and his art style as well as the bigger messages he was trying to convey about war.

Questions for Discussion and Reflection:

1. When Tezuka was a boy the cartoons he watched were primarily for entertainment. How were his similar? How were they different?

2. Can you see any similarities between Tezuka’s character designs and the American cartoons that influenced him?

3. Today Japanese animation and characters can be seen everywhere. Can you think of any characters that reflect aspects of Tezuka’s art style or sense of humor?

Art Vocabulary and Terms to Remember:

Osamu Tezuka, anime, manga, Astro Boy, Mushi Productions, experimental animation

Cartoons have been banned from television for a number of reasons. Some cartoons received a lot of heat even in their own time periods. Here are just a few cartoons that have been “banned” or censored at different times.

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Note: Like the previous entry, the teacher should preview all material and assess if this lesson would be appropriate for their students before trying it out.

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Warner Bros.

Many Warner Bros. cartoons have been banned from TV or censored because of stereotypical or insensitive depictions of people of different races.

Gold Diggers of ‘49 (1935)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=onlbNFk9BK4

This colorized early Porky (and Beans) cartoon has stereotypical depictions of Chinese people and a black face joke.

Jungle Jitters (1938)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Im27FD077zk

A sterotypical cannibalistic African tribe is visited by a slow witted travelling salesman.

Coal Black and de Sebben Dwarfs (1943)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UgGkabYW1Mk

I shouldn’t even have to explain why this WWII Warner Bros. cartoon is banned. The title should say it all. But just so no one blames me for not warning them — it’s filled with racist depictions of African Americans. It follows the “Snow White” plotline.

Walt Disney

“The Story of one of Hitler`s Children: Education For Death”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ASW3UCc17AI&feature=related

This is a strange WWII period piece where you follow the birth and education of a child in Hitler’s Germany. Obviously, this was banned from television today for the negative depictions of Germany in general and the loss of context.

Fleischer

Betty Boop

Censorship plagued Fleischer’s Betty Boop cartoons, not for racial depictions but for Betty’s racy attire. After years of complaints from film censors, Betty’s outfit was eventually altered.

Minnie the Moocher (1932)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HKWVMfrsUpo

This cartoon features a very awesome rotoscoped Cab Calloway as a ghost walrus (and Betty’s garter).

Questions for Discussion and Reflection:

1. a. Some of the cartoons we viewed were banned for stereotypical racial depictions, and many of these cartoons were banned following the civil rights movement. How have people’s attitudes changed since the 1930’s and 1940’s?

b. Do you still see instances of prejudice today? Do you ever see it in cartoons on TV?

2. Betty Boop was censored because of her attire. Today it is not uncommon to see people dressed in short skirts and low tops. Do you think that if Betty were on TV today, people would be lobbying for her to be censored or banned?

During WWII the whole country mobilized to show its support. Many cartoons were used as propaganda in the US and abroad.

Warner Bros. had many memorable ones, many now banned for the racial depictions of the Japanese.

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Note: This lesson would certainly be for older, mature students. Many old war time cartoons are racially charged and some include insensitive, stereotypical depictions of African Americans as well as the Japanese. However, banned cartoons, censorship as well as the changes in attitudes after the civil rights movement are all topics that have value. It is important to understand why these cartoons are now considered inappropriate and degrading (but were acceptable when they were made).

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Cartoons from the WWII era give us a small window into the past to see how the whole country pulled together against a common enemy. It also established cartoons as a media that can be used to sway public opinion.

Warner Bros.

“The Ducktators” (1942) (banned)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cSvs_mHJ3so

A US wartime propaganda film featuring animals portraying the Axis powers during WWII. Bad egg Hitler appears as a duck, Mussolini as a “gullible” goose that follows him, and a racial caricature of Hirohito as a squinty eyed, big toothed, duck. Eventually the dove of peace gets even with them for walking all over him, literally.

“Any Bonds Today?” (1942) (banned/censored)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nh_oc5hQt-A

Bugs Bunny, Porky and Elmer get together to promote the purchase of US Savings Bonds to support the war effort. Bugs appears in “black face” to do an Al Jolson impression which is why this cartoon was banned in later years (though sometimes that part is simply edited out).

“Bugs Bunny Nips the Nips” (1944) (banned)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-w2F3planCk

Bugs Bunny fights the Japanese on an island in the Pacific. This one is filled with racial caricatures as well as racial slurs. “Nips” is a derogatory term for anyone who is from Nippon (Japan).

“Scrap Happy Daffy” (1943)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bnpdwn1mR6c

Nazis declare war on Daffy’s scrap pile/war recycling efforts.

Disney

Disney also got in on the war effort producing some propaganda films as well.

Donald Duck: “The Spirit Of ‘43″

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FZOdXg3zhlI

This cartoon promotes paying your income tax on time to support the war effort.

Donald Duck: “Der Fuehrer’s Face”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=62RiUfi-MhE

In a nightmare sequence Donald finds himself trapped in Nazi Germany where he is bombarded by propaganda and finds himself working for a German bomb plant.

Fleischer

Max Fleischer produced many educational cartoons for the US military.

However, he made a few cartoons for Paramount involving war time topics too. A couple of Fleischer’s Superman Cartoons feature Superman fighting the Japanese.

“Eleventh Hour” (1942)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6M5WUiJkH-E

Superman single handedly takes on the entire Japanese port of Yokohama. (This one has some Japanese stereotypes in it as well).

Questions for Discussion and Reflection:

1. Do you think animators were showing their support by creating cartoons that promoted the US fighting in WWII or do you think they were just adding to the war propaganda?

2. Many of the cartoons in WWII used stereotypes to make fun of the Japanese. How did this compare to when they were making fun of the Germans?

3. Today relations between the US and Japan are friendly and Japanese cartoons dominate US TV. When a country is at war it is not uncommon for them to make fun of their enemy and many years later become friends with that enemy once the conflict is over. Can you think of any instances today where this is still going on?