January 8 - Iwao Takamoto

Image courtesy of illustrationhistory.org

On this day, in 2007, Iwao Takamoto passed away from a heart attack in Los Angeles, California. Born in the same city on April 29, 1925, Iwao graduated from Thomas Jefferson High School when he was just 15. Shortly thereafter, Pearl Harbor was bombed, World War II began and Iwao's family was imprisoned in the Manzanar internment camp with tens of thousands of other Japanese Americans. Luckily for him (and for us), he learned the basics of drawing, illustration and animation from two of his fellow prisoners.

When the war ended, Iwao decided to apply for work at the only animation studio he knew the name of, Disney. He was told to submit his portfolio. Having been imprisoned for the four years prior, he of course didn't have one. He bought two notebooks and spent a weekend filling them with sketches of literally everything he saw. Those sketches did the trick and he was hired as an assistant animator in 1945. Iwao contributed to several features during his sixteen years with the company, both as animator and as character designer. He would spend a good deal of his Disney career working directly under Milt Kahl, one of Walt's Nine Old Men, on projects like Cinderella, Peter Pan, Lady and the Tramp, Sleeping Beauty and 101 Dalmatians.

Image copyright Disney

In 1961, Iwao left Disney to join Hanna-Barbera Productions. As cartoon television series seemed to bloom on every network throughout the rest of the decade, Iwao left his indelible mark on the genre. He would hold several positions at Hanna-Barbera but his work as a character designer remains the most visible and therefore most impressive. His highlights reel started with Astro, the Jetson's dog in 1962. A few years later, his next big hit was Penelope Pitstop, who starred in Wacky Races and its spinoff show, The Perils of Penelope. But his most enduring character by far is another canine, Scooby-Doo.

Image copyright Hanna-Barbera

When asked how he came up with Scooby's look, Iwao once said that a woman at the studio owned great danes and enthusiastically showed him pictures of them, pointing out all their features. He then drew every aspect of the dogs the opposite of what they were in reality. Instead of a straight back and legs and a small chin, Scooby got a hump back, bowed legs and a large mug. Iwao even purposely made him the wrong color. And yet it somehow all works. Michael Mallory, a Hanna-Barbera historian, makes the claim that if Scooby had looked any different, more like an actual Airedale say, the show probably wouldn't have lasted more than one season. Instead, because of Iwao's genius, Scooby had been on a screen, big or small, almost continuously since his creation.

Image copyright Hanna-Barbera

Iwao would eventually move into the director's chair. One of his biggest projects was the 1973 feature film, Charlotte's Web, which he co-directed with Charles Nichols. He once said one of the hardest things he ever did was creating a spider with a look that inspired people to care about it. The film, which featured songs by the Sherman Brothers, received mixed reviews, with most critics calling out the obviously quick television type animation. But, really, what else would you expect from Hanna-Barbera?

After producing series like The Smurfs, The Addams Family and Hong Kong Phooey, Iwao would settle into the role of Vice President of Creative Design. He was in charge of all of Hanna-Barbera's merchandise and oversaw all the design work going on in the Animation Art Department.  When Time-Warner merged with Hanna-Barbera's parent company, Turner Broadcasting in 1996, Iwao became Vice President of Special Projects for Warner Brothers Animation. He held this position for the remainder of his career.

Iwao received two major honors from his peers during the latter part of his life. The first came in 1996 when he was given the Windsor McCay Award, a lifetime achievement statue given out each year at the Annie Awards. The second came in 2005 when the Animation Guild bestowed upon him their Golden Award for his more than five decades in the field. The ultimate honor, though, may have happened when he passed away in 2007. For the next week, Adult Swim, on the Cartoon Network, displayed "Iwao Takamoto (1925-2007)" as one of their bumpers. I think Iwao would have approved.