There’s some all-CG, and some with hand-drawn cels, and some with handdrawn keyframes and computer generated inbetweens. Inbetweening is really thankless work, especially for some of the insane Disney works like Bambi– most Japanese anime, including Miyazaki’s work, doesn’t include nearly as much going on in the background as many of the Disney classics.

There are very 3D CG looking shows, like the Incredibles. There are also lots of animation that uses computer aided drawing but looks very similar to hand-drawn cels. Studio Ghibli’s latest works definitely used computers to do at least inbetween cels.

You are right. It’s nostalgia and it’s fear of the new. The strange thing is that some of what passes for art, pure garbage produced with old techniques is lauded as visionary but the new tools are ignored before they have been examined fully. I love history, I lean towards the traditional in my taste in art, and nostalgia is my default position. But the new tools should be allowed to bear fruit before they are rejected out of hand. I am sure that the puppet community was laughing at the first attempts at animation. Their seems to be a growing market for cells from animated films and I imagine the art will survive in some form.

Kevin Peters

I’m sorry. Really, shouldn’t have brought you into my screed at all. please forgive.

This is simply an area that hits all my buttons and I go off. Any trigger will do, imagined or not.

There is fierce resistance to all things digital by the mainstream of ‘traditional’ artists. To the point they dismiss the output as not art at all and claim it was ‘computer generated’. When someone I know actually gets prints of his artwork included in a local show, it makes news in our community because it’s so rare.

They seem to think it’s a turf battle and are fiercely defensive. Traditional art is not going away, a new form has come along to sit beside it.

I think we have to wait for new generations of artists who embrace the new possibilities from childhood before the questions ‘Is it art?’, ‘Is it good enough?’ will end.

This artist lives in a monastery in Brazil. He uses Bryce, Poser, and Photoshop. I’ll let his artwork speak for itself:

http://www.renderosity.com/gallery.ez?ByArtist=Yes&Artist=gevidal

I never said that quality could not be produced with the new techniques. I said that if from some reason they couldn’t the old form would come back. When I said that I was ignoring my habit to distrust new techniques because of the numerous times I had been wrong I was saying that I would be suprised if the talent and imagination of the artist could not use the new methods and produce quality art. I only mentioned the possibility of it’s failure by saying if that was the case the old form would return, in other words, I think the new form will work out just fine.

Thanks for the link!

Chromatism

And now I am going into hiding until the mushroom cloud dissipates a little and I can leave the bunker without getting radiation burns.

See you.

At the same time those who invent a new style, a new manner of representation are often the least likely to innovate using it. The drawings are flat and two-dimensional in theatrical anime because drawings are flat and two dimensional in tv anime. Often it takes an outsider to see a style in a new way, and bring that new way to light.

Consider the cover for Privateer Press’ Iron Kingdoms: World Guide. The artist is a fellow by the name of Matt Wilson. His style is heavily influenced by anime and manga. It is also three dimensional. It has depth.

It is also a work that tells you much of the world it represents. A world of contradictions and change. A world in transition. Matt Wilson takes the tropes of manga and anime and makes them more effective.

Right now the West is using digital animation, because it’s new and exciting. Japan (and Korea) use hand drawn animation in the Japanese style because their audience expects it, and its affordable. In the future we could see the West returning to hand drawn animation, incorporating Japanese anime with innovations by artists such as Matt Wilson. However it works out, it would change the world of animation.

As you may have surmised from my post above, I couldn’t agree with you more.