After 40 years, Don Bluth returns to Walt Disney Animation Studios. This was something for the history books. I am extremely grateful that I got to be part of these moments & talks of the future. Why was Don Bluth at Disney Animation you ask? Well, some of that must remain a SECRET! However, I can discuss some of the experiences we had and include some photos!

Let’s begin!

Upon entering the Roy E. Disney Animation Building through the Sorcerer’s Hat, we met with Steve Anderson, the director of Meet the Robinsons and Winnie the Pooh. We came upon the front desk and in huge letters it reads Walt Disney Animation Studios. In the main lobby, you see artwork from every era of the Walt Disney Company, which was amazing to see such great history.

DonBluthNewAnimationBuilding

We continued walking the halls with Steve, he showed us around the walls where they placed Disney Animation art from the past. We couldn’t spend too much time here because we had appointments, but next time I hope we can!

Don Bluth discussing Disney Art
Don Bluth discussing Disney Art

Once through, we came upon the production of Frozen 2 (we can’t show any of this, sorry!), then continued to the directors’ offices. There we met with Disney director Ron Clements. I took a picture of Ron and Don and, I just had to ask for a picture too. 🙂

Don Bluth & Ron Clements
Don Bluth & Ron Clements

LavalleLee&RonClements

After meeting with Ron Clements, we continued down the offices and ran into Burny Mattinson. It was great listening to the stories between Burny & Don and their time together working for Walt Disney himself. Burny has been at the Walt Disney company the longest out of all the animation artists. He was very humble and nice to talk with. He had to run, but said he would join us later for lunch.

We continued down the hall and met with Howard Green, Don spotted him right away and said, “Howard!”. We chatted for a bit and Howard insisted we go downstairs where they were animating “Ralph Breaks the Internet: Wreck-It Ralph 2”. None of us were going to turn down that invitation! We went downstairs through the common area (small cafeteria), to a hall where it said, “No Unauthorized People Beyond this Point”. We just walked right through with Howard & Steve and could hear all the animators clicking away at their mouses animating scenes for Wreck-It Ralph 2.

We walked down the halls to some of the offices and met Mark Henn! To our SURPRISE! Mark was working on a Disney Traditional Animation desk! This was a sight to see! Nothing makes me more happy to see hand-drawn animation still being done at Disney in some shape or form.

DonBluthMarkHennLavalleLee

We continued (I sure use this word a lot..lol) down the halls of Wreck-It Ralph 2 and went in to one of the animation rooms with some of the animators. Bert Klein the creator of “Pups of Liberty” a hand-drawn animated short series was there said, “Hey, it’s Lavalle Lee!”. To my surprise, I finally get to meet Bert in person! Bert gave Don the rundown of CG animation, and showed the scene he was working on and how they use live-action reference when animating digitally in CG.

Lavalle Lee, Bert Klein, and Don Bluth
Lavalle Lee, Bert Klein, and Don Bluth

It was time for LUNCH! So we headed over the the executive building to eat at the Rotunda surrounded by the suits. Again, being a fly on the wall listening to all the stories between Burny & Don working for Walt and being trained by the 9 Old Men. I can’t even explain how awesome this was. The waiter serving us remembered Don from his time there, which I thought was pretty funny. We all posed for a picture afterwards.

From the Left: Burny Mattinson, Steve Anderson, Don Bluth, Lavalle Lee, Howard Green
From the Left: Burny Mattinson, Steve Anderson, Don Bluth, Lavalle Lee, Howard Green

On our way out we took a photo of Burny and Don infront of “The Legends Plaza”.

Burny Mattinson & Don Bluth in front of The Legends Plaza
Burny Mattinson & Don Bluth in front of The Legends Plaza

Once we were all done with lunch, Howard invited us to take a tour of Walt Disney’s original office. Everything was in it’s original place and you could just feel in the atmosphere and the history.

Animation Building Don Bluth & Lavalle Lee
Animation Building Don Bluth & Lavalle Lee

I will just place these here:

Walt's Office Guestbook
Walt’s Office Guestbook
Walt's Awards
Walt’s Awards
Walt's Secretary
Walt’s Secretary
Walt's Ashtray
Walt’s Ashtray
Walt Disney's Original Desk
Walt Disney’s Original Desk
Walt's Office Piano
Walt’s Office Piano
Walt's Office Bookshelf
Walt’s Office Bookshelf
Don Bluth & Lavalle Lee in front of Walt Disney's Desk
Don Bluth & Lavalle Lee in front of Walt Disney’s Desk
From Left: Howard Green, Burny Mattinson, Don Bluth, Steve Anderson, Lavalle Lee
From Left: Howard Green, Burny Mattinson, Don Bluth, Steve Anderson, Lavalle Lee
Walt's Desk Statuettes
Walt’s Desk Statuettes
Don Bluth & Burny Mattinson in front of Walt's Bar
Don Bluth & Burny Mattinson in front of Walt’s Bar
Item's on Walt's Desk
Item’s on Walt’s Desk
Walt's Second Back Office
Walt’s Second Back Office
Don Bluth & Lavalle Lee in Walt's Second Back Office
Don Bluth & Lavalle Lee in Walt’s Second Back Office
Ed Wynn Photo
Ed Wynn Photo
Walt's Report
Walt’s Report
Production Staff Model Sheet
Production Staff Model Sheet

Now I must tell you, if you ever and I mean EVER get a change to visit Walt Disney’s original office. DO IT! To think this was the office where Walt met with so many talented people, made decisions that changed American history and so much more. This is something I will never forget and always cherish.

Once we finished visiting Walt Disney’s office, we had a few very important things left to do. But we will save that for another time.

Executive Building
Executive Building

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The Author

Lavalle Lee

Lavalle Lee

Lavalle Lee has been creating animated cartoons online since 1999/2000 for his website flashcartoons.org. Many cartoons on the site have gained viral video status reaching millions of viewers online. In 2009, Lavalle started learning hand drawn animation from Don Bluth in his animation classes, as well as attending his Masterclasses in Arizona. He has also personally studied animation and visual effects from Veteran Disney animators in Orlando, FL.

Lavalle is widely known in the animation industry as the creator of the TraditionalAnimation.com website. After seeing that most animation sites were about all types of animation, not any specific to classical hand drawn animation, Lavalle knew Traditional Animation needed to be represented online. TraditionalAnimation.com has become the leading website and social media account for all things 2D. The website served as inspiration for “The Traditional Animation Show” in which Lavalle was both producer and host.

His partnership with Don Bluth began when he championed the Dragon's Lair Indiegogo campaign as lead project manager, editor, voice actor and in-betweener. The campaign reached $730,000 dollars to produce a 7-minute pitch video. In 2017, Lavalle brought the idea of creating a school to Don Bluth, and Don Bluth University was born. After a decade of learning from Don Bluth and working together on multiple pitches and business ventures, Lavalle accepted the position as Vice President of Don Bluth's new company Don Bluth Studios.

14 Comments

  1. July 17, 2018 at 5:19 pm — Reply

    Wow! What a great time you both must have had. I know Burny did animation of Rabbit on “Winnie the Pooh and Tigger too” and Don did as well. Beautiful stuff! I hope Don felt some of that old Disney magic.

  2. Philip Kaplan
    July 17, 2018 at 9:50 pm — Reply

    That is terrific. I love it that Don had a chance to go back and take a walk down memory lane…literally.

  3. Refael Adir
    July 18, 2018 at 3:26 pm — Reply

    Very excited to see this wonderful man there.
    Don had given him a lot of creativity in this place

  4. Gaye Smith Zezulka
    July 18, 2018 at 7:17 pm — Reply

    A trip down memory lane! Disney was very fortunate to have you as part of their team. You have been blessed with Incredible talent.
    Thank you for sharing the tour.

  5. Kip Zartman
    July 19, 2018 at 10:55 am — Reply

    It is nice to see some pictures where Walt Disney and Roy Disney worked. Also Don Blyth and his return I would love to go see the studios and some your art work and get met you guys. I just to say thank you for sharing and seeing great people and what you people do to bring happiness in all are lives. Thank you Don

  6. July 21, 2018 at 5:17 pm — Reply

    This was awesome!

  7. Kevin D Cummings
    July 25, 2018 at 6:47 am — Reply

    I can’t imagine how much you couldn’t wait to let your readers know of your amazing tour. To take in all that majesty had to be fulfilling. What an era Walt hath wrought! Thanks for sharing.

  8. August 15, 2018 at 7:46 pm — Reply

    I wish Eric Goldberg should quit Disney just like Glen Keane.

  9. August 27, 2018 at 11:27 am — Reply

    Lavalle, so great to see this happen as you might recall that Don reconnecting with Disney was one of my desires from our days online in the Don Bluth forums. The break away from Disney was historic and so very important to animation but to be able to see the loop close like this… perhaps even more important. I’m glad you were there as witness to the event. Keep up the great work.

  10. Rob Sojkowski
    October 29, 2018 at 4:16 pm — Reply

    I have a feeling he’s going to try to form some sort of partnership with Disney to restart the 2d animation industry, and the 1st project will be Dragon’s Lair : The Movie.
    As it is a classic fairy tale, it may very well be the start of a new beginning, Like Snow White (1937), The Little Mermaid (1989) and hopefully Dragon’s Lair will be the catalyst for a new generation of animation.
    Of course, that’s what I’m hoping for, it’s only a guess, but who better to help produce this?

  11. Small One Fan
    December 21, 2018 at 8:43 am — Reply

    I love Don’s the Small One!

  12. Naomi
    February 28, 2019 at 9:14 am — Reply

    @ROB SOJKOWSKI: My god, I hope so! I find cu to be joyless both in the creation and viewing, and pray every day that 2d will come back despite all the efforts of corporate America to bury it! Everywhere I go, I hear more and more people clamoring for hand drawn animation, while being told by corporate fanbases and cgi professionals that “literally no one wants to see that crap”. When they’re not disingenuously portraying it as an art lost to the ages, and they’d just love to bring it back but there’s simply not a single person left alive who knows how to do it!

    Getting rid of hand drawn was the biggest mistake Disney ever made (I was going to make “torpedoing Treasure Planet” as the second, but since they very clearly did that as an investment to justify dropping 2d (seriously, it got nominated for an award but no one ever heard of it? this is Disney, the kings of saturation marketing, they don’t fail to advertise their products by accident), it fits in with the first biggest mistake.). It lost them their branding. Back in the day, you could tell exactly what studio did what by the artists they hired. I knew at a glance whether it was Disney, Dreamworks, Don Bluth or WB. There was no mistaking Disney for anything but Disney. Now I can’t tell their work apart from any other studio. I was stunned to find that Coco was Disney, as I thought it was Dreamworks, I thought Ferdinand was Dreamworks but it was really Blue Sky Studio, and that is par for the course now! And by losing their visual branding, they lost their dominance–used to be only Disney could really make money with movies, with the only real challenge coming from Don Bluth. Then they went to 100% cg and now there are tons of studios able to keep pace with them. It’s also why I forgettable frantically buying up everything under the sun–if they can’t bury the competition (anymore), may as well own them.

    Walt Disney was a businessman, but he was a good enough businessman to understand that he was in the business of making art. His successors chose instead to buy into the untrue old adage “it’s not an art, it’s a business” and ruined their branding and their monopoly.

  13. Naomi
    February 28, 2019 at 9:15 am — Reply

    Btw, by “corporate fanbase” I mean fans of corporate America and all it does or says, not canvases of corporate brands.

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