Vault Disney Presents Disney Legends - Freddy Moore (1997)

Freddy Moore was hailed by Walt Disney's Nine Old Men as the most master animator who ever lived.

He was hired as a teenager as a mostly self-taught natural animator, but Walt supplied him with formal art training, as he did with all of his artists. Freddy perfected or invented many of the animation techniques that the previous generation of animators had developed and then taught the up-and-coming animators what he'd learned. Those animators would eventually surpass Moore in abilities, but he was still revered by all of them.

Freddy Moore is the artist who's most responsible for developing what we think of as the Walt Disney design style. He worked on such breakthrough films as the Three Little Pigs, Snow White & the Seven Dwarfs, Pinocchio, Fantasia, and others. He also redesigned Mickey Mouse from Ub Iwerks' pie-eye design to the Mickey Mouse we know today. Around the studio Fred was known for his pinup drawings of young women referred to as "Freddy Moore Girls." Many of the female characters in the Walt Disney cartoons of the 1940's and early 1950's are inspired by Moore's approach to the feminine form. He can be seen in the film the Reluctant Dragon.

In the 1940's, when Moore became an alcoholic, many of the animators covered for him by doing his animation in Moore's place. When Walt finally let him go over his alcoholism, Moore found work at other studios where he redesigned other characters like Woody Woodpeck and Andy Panda just as he'd redesigned Mickey Mouse. After a few years Walt hired Moore back where he continued to animate in Ward Kimball's unit until he died in a car accident in 1952 at age 41. (His wife was driving the car making a U-turn when a truck hit them.)

Without Freddy Moore, the look and personality we think of as a Walt Disney character animation may look very different from what we know. It's Moore's updated Mickey Mouse design first used for Fantasia that's the Mickey we still know today. His animation principles and fundamentals are also still used in GOOD CGI animation.

Freddy Moore was made a Disney Legend in 1995.

Posted for historical purposes. This channel is not affiliated with the Walt Disney Company.