Pictorial Memories of Tom Scherman - Photos Courtesy of Evelyn Turner

Here are never-seen-before pictures of the great Tom Sherman that i should have posted since a long time - shame on me! - and we have to thanks Evelyn Turner who was a great friend of Tom, back in the 70's. Evelyn share with us rare pictures of Tom some shot by her, others by a friend, Kathy Sanders - as well as some artwork and she kindly sent me scans of them. Although most of the photos are not in the greatest quality - Evelyn had a cheap old point and shoot camera back in those days - i did my best to enhance the pictures which, again, have never been published anywhere before. 

Tom Scherman, for those of you who still don't know him was the greatest 20000 Leagues Nautilus specialist in the world as well as a genius modeler, a great painter, and a WDI Imagineer. It's thanks to Tom who was the last one to knew the secrets of Harper Goff's Nautilus that we have an almost real size Nautilus at Disneyland Paris' Discoveryland. Not to mention the many Nautilus models that he did and were on display inside DLP Visionarium or Epcot Living Seas. It's also thanks to Tom that Tokyo Disney Sea Mysterious Island has its look, specially the inside of the volcano, as Tom sketches done years before served as inspiration for a big part of it as you can discover on my Tom Scherman website HERE where this article is posted simultaneously.

Here is now an introduction by Evelyn Turner herself: 

"I met Tom through mutual friends around 1973 when I was living in Hollywood.  He gave me a tour of his Nautilus apartment, which was very impressive!  We started going together and stayed together a few years, through about 1977 when we grew apart and went our separate ways. He was working for WED Enterprises at the time, and I loved seeing his drawings and models. I feel very privileged that I was able to contribute in a very minor way to his cutaway Nautilus model by making miniature paintings and gilded frames.

When we were friends in the 70s, I was working for the County of Los Angeles to support myself, but then, as now, I also dabbled in art as a hobby and I was inspired by Tom and his talent.  I also took up belly dance and danced professionally for a few years.  I am now retired and getting back into art by taking some watercolor classes.  I have lots of good memories of Tom and the time we were together and am grateful for your lovely tribute site because it brings back those good old days."

Above, a nice picture of Tom according to Evelyn possibly taken at a science fiction convention. Below, a photo of Tom Scherman with Evelyn Turner at a picnic in 1974 
( the photo was shot by Kathy Sanders ).

As Tom's name is forever linked with the Nautilus, let's have a look now at great pics of Tom standing in 1974 in front of one of his Nautilus model, as well as close-up shots on the model itself.

Thanks to Evelyn we also have very rare pictures of Tom's cutaway Nautilus! Tom gave to Evelyn the 3-dimentional "sketch" - picture below - that he made before he started the full-size model. Evelyn had a small contribution to the model as well. Tom asked her to make some miniature paintings in miniature gilt frames which she did ( she made the frames from pieces cut from gold doilies!) and he used them in the model.  

Below, Tom and Evelyn standing in front of the cutaway Nautilus. Tom eventually sold the model to Disney, but Evelyn don't know what happened to it after that.

As we know Tom Scherman was also a fantastic artist and here are some pictures of artwork - paintings or "napkin" sketches - he gave to Evelyn.

The little monster below is a sketch that Tom did on a piece of CBS memo paper.

I told you that Tom was too a WDI Imagineer and here is a picture of Tom ( on the right ) shot at WDI with Disney Legend Tony Baxter ( second from the right ) and Imagineers John Olson and Jack Terry, charting concepts for what was called at that time "Epcot Oceanography Pavilion". The picture was posted in WED Enterprises ( now WDI ) newsletter called WED-WAY.

Evelyn share a fun memory for this next picture of Tom. She reminds that Tom had to shave his mustache when he took diving lessons... so he put on a false one for this photo!

Another never seen picture of Tom - a Polaroid picture - standing in front of one of his model.

Tom and Evelyn also participated to incredible events as you will see with this next piece showing a newspaper article about a dinner they attended on the Queen Mary to commemorate the Titanic: "Although our table was at the back, all the news people there took our photo because we were the only group who came in costume!"

...the second page of the article - enlarge both pictures to read the article about this memorable evening.

We will end this article with these pictures of Tom and Evelyn standing in front of Tom's incredible giant Iron Man - you can learn more about it in a special article about it with more pictures on Tom's website HERE.

Although we end today with these Iron Man pics there is more photos from Evelyn Turner to come soon in a part two article. And the pictures included in this next article are also amazing as they show Tom with one of the most famous prop in movie history that he bought in an auction and then restored : the original Time Machine from Georges Pal's legendary 1960 famous movie! Don't miss this part two!

Pictures: copyright Evelyn Turner, Kathy Sanders

A Real Wonder : The eFX Nautilus Replica

Two days ago i was able to finally open the box with the eFX Nautilus replica that arrived for me in Paris one year ago - and that i didn't open yet as i was not in France. 

Good lord, this four foot - 1m20 - long Nautilus replica is incredibly awesome! A pure masterpiece from Nautilus specialist Scott Brodeen! Unbelievable, really. The quality of details is beyond expectations and it includes miniature furniture in Nemo Grand Salon as well as everything inside the wheel house, both with lightings! 

Harper Goff and Tom Scherman would have been proud of Scott's work and i share with you below some pictures of this amazing wonder! Note that on some pictures the Nautilus hull color is a bit darker than the painting which is a beautiful dark bronze color. 

The window on the left side has the lightings and you can see through it Nemo Grand Salon with miniature furniture wonderfully done.

The other window on the other side also has lighting with the famous "iris" closed.

Scott placed dozens of thousands of rivets - the famous Nautilus rivets - which in "reality" are supposed to be there to fix metal plaques. So Scott had the genius idea to also sculpt some fine separation lines to give the feeling of these metal plaques fixed one next to another. Also, as you will see on the next pictures all Nautilus details and elements are absolutely perfect.

Scott Brodeen also designed a beautiful stand in plexiglas inspired by the Nautilus style. We cannot thank enough Scott Brodeen and Bryan Ono, eFX CEO to have produced such a wonder, a real treasure for all Nautilus fans.

As i told you the replica has a beautiful dark bronze color but Jean-Marc Deschamps, a good friend of mine who is a huge Nautilus fan and a master model maker, wanted his copy to have the rusty aspect that the submarine had in 20000 Leagues under the sea. So he did customized his copy with real rust and you can see the result below - and more pictures before/after in the article HERE. Great work of aging, may be a little bit too rusty for me...

...even if the Nautilus in 20000 Leagues under the sea is really rusty too!

Bob Martin, another Nautilus fan also owner of this amazing replica also did some changes and here is the video in which he show his work.




This eFX Nautilus replica was a 300 copies limited edition sold $1799 and is now out of stock at eFX but those of you who would like to find one can still find some brand new on eBay at "reasonable" price HERE and HERE. But if you don't live in the U.S be prepared to pay a huge shipping cost as the box is too big to be sent through regular post office and sellers can't send it in another way than with Fedex or UPS.

Pictures: copyright Alain Littaye, Jean-Marc Deschamps

Walt Disney and the Octopus Tentacle

A Rare picture of Walt Disney holding a fake octopus tentacle, probably during the preparation of 20000 Leagues under the sea.

Picture: copyright Disney