In this book, Original Cartoons, the Frederator Studios Postcards 1998-2005, Fred Seibert has always gathered around him some of the most uniquely talented artists in animation, and in this book you’ll see their work expressed in the medium of postcards. The Frederator postcards are one of animation’s closely held secrets. Not just anyone got sent one of these cards. Seibert is a promoter, and, first of all, these cards were sent out to ballyhoo his studio. The fact that they are a nice design reference when put together into a book is just another indication that the man really knows talent.

Yeah, I know, you’ve got dozens of design references on your shelves for when your head runs dry, but these are funny (or funny drawings), most of them. Some are just good design. They are divided by year, series 1 through 5 from 1998 to 2005 and then the posters. All of the artists’ art is fully credited, and listed on the back of the book as well. Seibert says in his introduction that, “the postcards (and posters) in this book are also part of our attempt to bring attention to the indisputable gifts of our team… Of course, the outpouring of positive response to our cards led us to be completely full of ourselves…”

Postcard collecting is the third-largest collectables hobby, according to Eric Homan, vp of creative affairs for Frederator, who, in a short intro, gives you a taste of why people collect things like postcards and why these particular postcards are worth collecting — they communicate.

Seibert started Frederator Studios in 1998 when he left Hanna-Barbera, where he is credited with turning the then tired studio around. Before that, he had been a jazz & blues record producer, an ad man for a country music station, and then created a bunch of wild animated spot promotions for a brand new cable network called MTV that helped make it a household name.

Jerry Beck, in another introduction, says that this book is a rare piece of animation history, “a time capsule of an amazing period of animation creativity.” He also says he is grateful to be able to look at the postcards in this book because that saves wear and tear on his originals.

Then there is a terrific interview of Seibert by Joe Strike (originally published in Animation World Magazine on July 15, 2003 and Aug. 15, 2003). It gives a history of how he got H&B out of its rut and where he gives full credit to other people for being “an awesome spotter of talent.” His method of producing sounds like the forerunner of the current studio system of having show talent be a unit, rather than the old standard of assigning artists to a production from separate background, color, layout, etc. departments. Seibert says he got this idea from Berry Gordy’s Motown system of recording.