Wah Ming Chang

Wah Ming Chang, an animator and Carmel artist, died Monday. He was 86.

Mr. Chang worked as an artist for more than seven decades. He worked on three Walt Disney films and as a Hollywood costume designer and sculptor.

Mr. Chang was born in Honolulu to two artists, and moved to San Francisco with his family in the early 1920s. In San Francisco, they managed the Ho Ho Tea Room, a hangout for bohemian artists. Artists and journalist Blanding Sloan, a regular customer, took an interest in Mr. Chang, then 6, after he found him sketching portraits on the back of his mother ' s menus.

By the age of 9, Mr. Chang had a show at a downtown San Francisco art gallery. After his mother died, Mr. Chang moved with Sloan and his wife to their Hollywood home and started creating film sets for the Hollywood Bowl at age 16.

Mr. Chang met his wife, Glenella Taylor, while working with Sloan in Dallas on " The Cavalcade of Texas, " a show celebrating the Texas Centennial, in 1936. When Mr. Chang started working for Anaheim-based Disney in 1939 at age 21, he was the youngest member of Disney ' s Effects and Model Department.

Mr. Chang developed polio and lost the use of his legs shortly after starting at Disney but recovered after a 21-day hospitalization. He married Taylor in Texas in 1941. California law at the time didn ' t allow marriage between Chinese and Caucasians.

Some of his more notable works include a stop-motion animation production of " The Three Bears. " Mr. Chang created wooden models of Pinocchio and Bambi so Disney animators could study body movements. He also contributed to " Bozo the Clown, " " Tom Thumb, " " The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm " and " The Seven Faces of Dr. Lao. "

Mr. Chang designed costumes for the film " The King and I " starring Yul Brenner, created masks for " The Planet of the Apes " and made Elizabeth Taylor ' s headdress in " Cleopatra. "

He sculpted a series of heads to animate the first Pillsbury Doughboy and made creatures for the television series " The Outer Limits " and " Star Trek. " It was his work on " The Time Machine " that earned him an Oscar for special effects.

Mr. Chang is survived by a half sister, Lana Price of Carmel; and several nieces and nephews. His wife of nearly 60 years died in 1997.