Transitioning Tex

Tex Avery is known for his gags, but his career at Warner Bros. shows him interested in cinematic effects, too. You’ll see overhead layouts, montages, double exposures, and so on.

In I Wanna Be a Sailor (1937), he changes backgrounds on Petey Parrot as he is still walking.

Tex also liked overlays. Above, you can see Petey walking behind a chair on a separate cel.



Below are a few cels from Petey’s walk cycle. You can see how the living room background fades out and an outside background fades in.



Below, notice where the picket on the fence is in relation to the drainpipe compared with the frame above.



The fence, “sup” can, flower and ground are on a cel underlay that’s being moved by the cameraman (Manny Corral?) while the house in the background is stationery. It gives a feeling of depth. Avery would have to plan all this movement.

My favourite “depth” shots of Avery’s are when he starts a cartoon with a pan over some scenery, with underlays or overlays shot at different rates while a long background painting remains in place. He did this both at Warners and MGM.

The background artist wasn’t credited. It doesn’t look like Johnny Johnsen to me. I suspect Paul J. Smith got the rotating animation credit.