Hand-Drawn Animation Dead at Disney

[Sotiris]

This is a trailer for Mamoru Hosoda's newest film, BELLE. While American studios seem to have lost faith in 2D animation, the Japanese have not.

I enjoyed all of Hosoda's films, so I was looking forward to this anyway, but I'm even more excited about it now that I've learned Jin Kim worked on it as a character designer and Cartoon Saloon is doing background art for it. It'll be fascinating to see the result of this rare East-meets-West collaboration.

I enjoyed the 2D animated bits in the trailer, but my biggest problem is that WB didn't show enough of it. I'll still go see it just to show my love of 2D, but I wish WB had a bit more guts rather than playing it too safe. Nonetheless, a bit of 2D animation is better than none at all. Here's hoping we can build that bridge back to its relevance.

I thought the 2D animation was subpar. It looked quite vector-based, probably due to the use of Toon Boom. The quality of 2D here is drastically lower to that in the first Space Jam or Looney Tunes: Back in Action. It's frustrating how they went all out with the quality of the CG animation, but 2D was treated as an afterthought.

[unprincess]

That animation is freaking beautiful! Love the song, too.

Here's some more info on that film:

Mamoru Hosoda Teams Up With Cartoon Saloon And Disney Vet Jin Kim For New Film ‘Belle’
https://www.cartoonbrew.com/feature-fil ... 03731.html

oh that looks great! and I loved Wolf Children!

[Farerb]

James Baxter Animation Demo and Speaker Event:
https://youtu.be/rG2UJ2kcdlE

He teaches how to use TVPaint Animation.

[blackcauldron85]

This is not Disney-related, but you guys are more knowledgeable about animation techniques than I am!

Rick and Morty: Animation Challenges
https://youtu.be/xvdaD8rHMu4?t=79

It's "vector-based animation," and while it's hand-drawn, they are rotating wrists and things in the computer. Can someone explain this to me in layman's terms, please? (Also, has Disney used this technique?)

[Kyle]

What part confuses you? I think they did a good job of putting it in laymens terms already. ANd yes, disney uses this technique, every one pretty much does.

[blackcauldron85]

I don't understand...well, it's hand-drawn, but they used the computer to rotate the wrists and things. Are they animating wrists, limbs, separately and then combining them to the body? Like animating the body in pieces, vs traditional drawing on paper- you'd draw and rotate the hand/wrist/arm, or whatever body part on each frame, as a whole...

Sorry if it sounds like a dumb question- I just don't understand the blending of hand-drawn and computer that they are using.

[Kyle]

Yeah, they animate the hands on their own, so they can have a pack of hands in various poses/gestures, and swap them in and out as needed. Some things can be swapped, other times they may need something more specific and they can do it more like the old fashioned way, but its all about maximizing efficiency. A lot of gestures are common though so much of the standard banter between characters animation is practically automated, with a puppeteer guiding them. Its vector, so the line is never set in stone, you can play with the shapes after you lay them down, pull and stretch, or even change the thickness without having to redraw them. Its just some studios are better at hiding them than others. Many of them get lazy and it shows.

[blackcauldron85]

^ That's interesting- thank you very much for explaining it more!

[estefan]

Barry Sonnenfeld is directing a hand-drawn animated movie based on "Perestroika in Paris"

Producer Frank Marshall and director Barry Sonnenfeld have teamed up to adapt Perestroika in Paris, the latest novel from Pulitzer Prize-winning author Jane Smiley.

Sonnenfeld is attached to direct while Marshall, the producer behind the Jurassic World and Bourne Identity franchises, will produce via his banner, the Kennedy/Marshall Company.

The intent is to adapt the novel, which features a stable’s worth of talking animals, into a traditional, 2D animated feature a la The Triplets of Belleville.

Perestoika, a screwball comedic satire, tells the story of a curious 3-year-old filly thoroughbred named Perestroika who leaves her stall and finds herself wandering the City of Light's Eiffel Tower region. Soon, she finds company with Frida, a canny German shorthaired pointer whose owner, a vagabond busker, has recently died; Raoul, a sage raven who keeps a perch on a Benjamin Franklin statue, and a pair of squabbling mallards, Sid and Nancy. But the question of just how long a racehorse can remain ambling in Paris gets more complicated when the animals befriend a young boy living with a very ill, blind and deaf great-grandmother in an old mansion, and authorities begin to close in.

A search for a writer to adapt the material will commence shortly.

Marshall produced the English dubs on some of the Studio Ghibli movies as well as the animated movies Amblin produced back in the day, including Who Framed Roger Rabbit. So it's good to see at least one big Hollywood producer who sees the value in hand-drawn animated features.

[JTurner]

Barry Sonnenfeld is directing a hand-drawn animated movie based on "Perestroika in Paris"

Producer Frank Marshall and director Barry Sonnenfeld have teamed up to adapt Perestroika in Paris, the latest novel from Pulitzer Prize-winning author Jane Smiley.

Sonnenfeld is attached to direct while Marshall, the producer behind the Jurassic World and Bourne Identity franchises, will produce via his banner, the Kennedy/Marshall Company.

The intent is to adapt the novel, which features a stable’s worth of talking animals, into a traditional, 2D animated feature a la The Triplets of Belleville.

Perestoika, a screwball comedic satire, tells the story of a curious 3-year-old filly thoroughbred named Perestroika who leaves her stall and finds herself wandering the City of Light's Eiffel Tower region. Soon, she finds company with Frida, a canny German shorthaired pointer whose owner, a vagabond busker, has recently died; Raoul, a sage raven who keeps a perch on a Benjamin Franklin statue, and a pair of squabbling mallards, Sid and Nancy. But the question of just how long a racehorse can remain ambling in Paris gets more complicated when the animals befriend a young boy living with a very ill, blind and deaf great-grandmother in an old mansion, and authorities begin to close in.

A search for a writer to adapt the material will commence shortly.

Marshall produced the English dubs on some of the Studio Ghibli movies as well as the animated movies Amblin produced back in the day, including Who Framed Roger Rabbit. So it's good to see at least one big Hollywood producer who sees the value in hand-drawn animated features.

Very interesting. This should be well worth looking into. Efforts like this should be successful so that 2D animation can be revitalized in cinemas here in America.

I thought the 2D animation was subpar. It looked quite vector-based, probably due to the use of Toon Boom. The quality of 2D here is drastically lower to that in the first Space Jam or Looney Tunes: Back in Action. It's frustrating how they went all out with the quality of the CG animation, but 2D was treated as an afterthought.

I'm not saying I thought the 2D animation was as good as the first Space Jam. I was just glad to see any at all, especially considering the state of things here in America. (I'm glad I became an Anime fan, though; at least the Japanese still see 2D as a form of art worth preserving.)

[Sotiris]

Mercury Filmworks is working on a 2D-animated feature.

Mercury Filmworks gets to work on its first feature film
https://kidscreen.com/2021/04/26/mercur ... ture-film/

[Farerb]

Sony's VIVO is in 2D!!!!

Good news! Carlos Zaragoza on the Team Deakins podcast (ep 22, ~25:30) has shared that Vivo's animation will be done in a style of "flat 2D illustration".

https://twitter.com/MJHtv23/status/1320173448451141633

So I guess that turned out to be false...

[D82]

^Yeah, it doesn't look any different than Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, for instance, which is from the same studio.

Mercury Filmworks is working on a 2D-animated feature.

Mercury Filmworks gets to work on its first feature film
https://kidscreen.com/2021/04/26/mercur ... ture-film/

That's great news!

[Sotiris]

In an upcoming episode of DC's Legends of Tomorrow, there will be a 2D-animated sequence that was supposedly done by former Disney animators.

As the trailer reveals, one of the season's episodes will feature Disney-style animation and music and was directed by Lotz. "There are some beautiful songs and Astra, played by Olivia Swann, gets to be our version of a Disney princess," says Klemmer, explaining how the episode's concept began as a joke. "The reason we did that originally is that we broke it as live-action, and then there's a point in the story where it becomes so outlandish that I was really having a difficult time seeing it in my head as live-action. I was like, 'Guys, this feels like a '90s Disney movie.' It was sort of a joke. 'What if we hired a bunch of Disney animators from the '90s who have all retired and did a '90s feature thing?'"

Source: https://ew.com/tv/legends-of-tomorrow-season-6-trailer/

[blackcauldron85]

I don't know if this is the best thread for this, since it's not current news, but I didn't know what other thread to put this in.

I just finished watching Winnie the Pooh (2011), a movie that I've seen many times- I'm in the credits right now- and I noticed that the credits say "Partner Studio" -> "Yowza Animation Inc." Among a bunch of other films (some Disney, some not), they worked on How to Hook Up Your Home Theater, The Princess and the Frog, The Ballad of Nessie, and Winnie the Pooh. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yowza!_Animation) I don't know if I never previously noticed the credit, or if I never thought to ask you guys about it...I am completely shocked that WDAS projects had outsourced animation. Did you guys know about this?

[Jules]

Amy, as far as I know, after WDAS got back to 2D in 2007, they did so but with limited manpower.

So, the core character and effects animation was indeed done in-house at WDAS Burbank, but inbetweening and clean-up animation had to be carried out overseas.

I don't think it was ever made clear that 2D unit at WDAS in the late 2000s was actually much smaller than it was pre-2005.

If someone can add more to this explanation, or correct any inaccuracies, please do so.

[Farerb]

As far as I know, the clean-up animation, digital ink-and-paint, and compositing were outsourced to different studios.

[blackcauldron85]

My mind is blown- thanks, guys! I mean, it makes sense I suppose that they'd want to save $ while getting back into hand-drawn, but I was just completely unaware (unless I knew years ago and just forgot!).

[Farerb]

Have you seen the WIP of The Princess and the Frog? I think it might be the film before it was outsourced if I'm not mistaken.

[blackcauldron85]

I feel like I have seen clips of work-in-progress, but that might just be clips shown on the making-of documentaries...I just checked my Blu-ray, and there's no WIP on that. Unless it's secretly hidden. (The DVDizzy review of the original Blu does mention WIP...I don't have the original Blu.)