Hand-Drawn Animation Dead at Disney

[Kyle]

My hope is that by the time Tiana is ready to premiere, they will be ready to announce (and hopefully even show a tease of) their next theatrical full length hand drawn feature. And once that hits, it'll be a mostly steady stream of hand drawn projects being trickled out. They have to have been staffing their hand drawn department back up, right? I know they are training people now, but they need more than a handful of quality hand drawn artists for this to get a major project back up and running.

[Farerb]

According to the information about Once Upon a Studio, they have 5 trainees, so together with Eric Goldberg, Mark Henn and Randy Haycock, that's 8 animators. That's enough for ONE character in a full length feature, but they still need cleanup artists and inbetweeners.

Good luck with that.

[Farerb]

I'm sorry for being a downer but look at the facts. The trainees are not there to start a new hand drawn pipeline, they're there to replace the veterans because they'll retire soon (perhaps in the next 5-10 years) and they still need people to do hand drawn animation from time to time for two minutes shorts for Disney+ or for Givenchy commercials or for some supplements for their CGI films, or even to keep the pretense that they still care about hand drawn animation when it's clearly not the case anymore and hasn't been since 2011.

[Sotiris]

People are still hopeful about a hand-drawn feature at Disney after Jennifer Lee's latest comments regarding 2D animation? Okay...

[Kyle]

The trainees are not there to start a new hand drawn pipeline, they're there to replace the veterans because they'll retire soon (perhaps in the next 5-10 years)

Why would they want to replace their vets and not use them for major projects? Why spend a year training people to do some tv spots and shorts, they could have just outsourced this stuff as needed. I think even Disney has noticed that CG movies are not making the profits they used to. They're gonna need to mix things up to survive, and I think this is what they need to do, and they're realizing this.

I know the Jennifer lee interview left a bad taste in our mouths, but they're not gonna just come out an announce something before it's time.

[Farerb]

Why would they want to replace their vets and not use them for major projects? Why spend a year training people to do some tv spots and shorts, they could have just outsourced this stuff as needed. I think even Disney has noticed that CG movies are not making the profits they used to. They're gonna need to mix things up to survive, and I think this is what they need to do, and they're realizing this.

I know the Jennifer lee interview left a bad taste in our mouths, but they're not gonna just come out an announce something before it's time.

It's not that they would want to replace them as much as making sure they have people to succeed them after they retire (they are almost 70 and they are not going to work forever, you know).

[PatrickvD]

People are still hopeful about a hand-drawn feature at Disney after Jennifer Lee's latest comments regarding 2D animation? Okay...

Haha, yeah no it’s dead, but I wish we’d have more insight into what’s actually going on at WDAS.

[D23ExpoVisitor25]

People are still hopeful about a hand-drawn feature at Disney after Jennifer Lee's latest comments regarding 2D animation? Okay...

Haha, yeah no it’s dead, but I wish we’d have more insight into what’s actually going on at WDAS.

I don’t think so. She said after saying that comment that there is still the open possibility of a hand-drawn feature but it has to be the right one. Maybe that one film can be the Search for Mickey Mouse if they get it back into production for a release in the 100th Birthday of Mickey Mouse. The year 2028.

[D23ExpoVisitor25]

This tweet is where I found out that Grace Randolph said Tiana on Disney+ was delayed to 2025: https://x.com/ben3po/status/1703893748294312143?s=46.

I’ll have to find the video where she said that.

Let’s hope it is delayed to get the hand-drawn animation right with more time.

[Kyle]

It's not that they would want to replace them as much as making sure they have people to succeed them after they retire (they are almost 70 and they are not going to work forever, you know).

Thats the same thing though, the point is they want to have talent that is able to take the reins when they peace out.
But why would they want to do that for minor nothing projects like commercials and to some extent, shorts (not that they don't matter, just doesn't have the weight of a feature).

Seems to me they would only want to spend all this time and effort training new artists if it was to staff up their department for more something substantial.

Let’s hope it is delayed to get the hand-drawn animation right with more time.

I mean, maybe? but it seems more likely they are only delaying it because of the strike. Now that its mostly over, they now have a better idea of when they can release it. I dont think they want to spend more money paying for more time to animate the show than originally planned. Buy all we can do is speculate, I guess. I would love if they spent the extra time on poilish. It certainly seems like this is one of the more delayed tv projects they've worked on in a while. Lets see if that translates to the screen.

[D23ExpoVisitor25]

It's not that they would want to replace them as much as making sure they have people to succeed them after they retire (they are almost 70 and they are not going to work forever, you know).

Thats the same thing though, the point is they want to have talent that is able to take the reins when they peace out.
But why would they want to do that for minor nothing projects like commercials and to some extent, shorts (not that they don't matter, just doesn't have the weight of a feature).

Seems to me they would only want to spend all this time and effort training new artists if it was to staff up their department for more something substantial.

Let’s hope it is delayed to get the hand-drawn animation right with more time.

I mean, maybe? but it seems more likely they are only delaying it because of the strike. Now that its mostly over, they now have a better idea of when they can release it. I dont think they want to spend more money paying for more time to animate the show than originally planned. Buy all we can do is speculate, I guess. I would love if they spent the extra time on poilish. It certainly seems like this is one of the more delayed tv projects they've worked on in a while. Lets see if that translates to the screen.

I mean the last I heard about Tiana being hand-drawn was from this man on Twitter, Kevin T. Rod a.k.a. iCritic (https://x.com/kevintrod?s=21), who said in a Twitter DM chat group that it would be hand-drawn and he reiterated that by saying he has friends who are working on Tiana telling him it would be hand-drawn.

That was back in early June.

I suggest you ask him, discreetly in DMs though, if this is still true.

[Kyle]

I wasnt really questioning if it is hand drawn or not, I'm assuming it is at this point. The question is if they are going to be using the extra time to make it better, or if progress was just stalled due to the writers strike.

[Sotiris]

‘Pencils vs Pixels’ Celebrates the Eternal Magic of 2D Animation
https://www.awn.com/animationworld/penc ... -animation

From 'Mulan' to 'Blue-Eye Samurai,' Ming-Na Wen Reflects on Working in Animation
https://collider.com/ming-na-wen-pencil ... els-mulan/

New Animation Doc “Pencils Vs. Pixels” Takes Refreshingly Candid Look At 2D Animation During The Rise Of The Computer
https://www.laughingplace.com/w/news/20 ... ls-review/

CTN Expo 2023: Attendees Treated To Special Screening of “Pencils Vs. Pixels”
https://www.laughingplace.com/w/enterta ... vs-pixels/

[D23ExpoVisitor25]

Well this weekend/week, Disney world premiered their newest original animated short on #OnceUponAStudio in movie theaters, on ABC, and on Disney+. Now in 2024, we get the 1st full-length theatrical hand-drawn animated film since 2011’s #WinnieThePooh in Sony Pictures Animation’s #Fixed and the first long-form hand-drawn animated project from Walt Disney Animation Studios in a long time w/ Disney+’s series called #Tiana.

If there’s 1 sure thing these 3 projects have in common, it is that perhaps we are seeing the return of hand-drawn animation to mainstream audiences in theatrical film and in TV after it’s been thought 2 have been lost for a long time.

For the longest time, it’s been assumed, after the domination of computer animation thanks to #ToyStory, that there would be no chance for cinema’s “lost art” as the director of Fixed, Genndy Tartatovsky refers to it as, would never return w/ a big presence to the modern mainstream general public’s media ever again.

Maybe now, there is…

[DisneyJedi]

Well, only time will tell if Fixed ends up being a critical and financial hit. I’m not saying it won’t be, of course, but we shall see.

I only hope that the movie doesn’t have the characters swearing every other line, like a certain first mainstream R-rated CGI film.

[D23ExpoVisitor25]

Well, only time will tell if Fixed ends up being a critical and financial hit. I’m not saying it won’t be, of course, but we shall see.

I only hope that the movie doesn’t have the characters swearing every other line, like a certain first mainstream R-rated CGI film.

Judging by Genndy’s comments, it won’t be about pop-culture jokes every minute at least, and he also says if you look past the balls, there is a genuinely heartwarming story in Fixed.

He likened it to Lady and the Tramp.

[The Disneynerd]

Well, only time will tell if Fixed ends up being a critical and financial hit. I’m not saying it won’t be, of course, but we shall see.

I only hope that the movie doesn’t have the characters swearing every other line, like a certain first mainstream R-rated CGI film.

Judging by Genndy’s comments, it won’t be about pop-culture jokes every minute at least, and he also says if you look past the balls, there is a genuinely heartwarming story in Fixed.

He likened it to Lady and the Tramp.

Im REALLY REALLY excited for Fixed! Sonys last few movies were bangers after bangers! And I love how they want to involve animation with adult audiences so hopefully this will officially confirm that Animation is not just for children blah blah. The only Real authentic mature Adult Animated movies I know of are from Studio Ghibli or small companies (Shrek was also really adult comedy at first) (I am obsessed with Shrek 2 ) and Sony pushing the boundaries will shake up the whole Animation Industry again like their first step with SVs Artstyle! So exciting

[D82]

After Wish, Lee teases further exploration into how hand-drawn animation works alongside CG animation, noting one of her filmmakers is already at work on such a project.

Source: https://ew.com/movies/disney-100-year-a ... -a-studio/

[DisneyJedi]

After Wish, Lee teases further exploration into how hand-drawn animation works alongside CG animation, noting one of her filmmakers is already at work on such a project.

Source: https://ew.com/movies/disney-100-year-a ... -a-studio/

I’m genuinely curious how that’d work. I’m not sure if it’d be in the same vain as Once Upon a Studio where hand drawn characters interacted with CGI characters or what.

[blackcauldron85]

Not to get too off-topic away from Disney, but I was wondering how Sony got enough artists to do a hand-drawn film:

https://www.animationmagazine.net/2023/ ... dogs-life/

Tartakovsky noted the unlikely effects that the Covid pandemic had on production in a number of ways — chiefly that the streaming boom opened up more opportunities to sell the film, and also opened the film production itself up to animators working outside of the studio since everyone was working from home regardless.

So if not for Covid and working from home, would they have had enough artists? They had flip flopped on making the film hand drawn vs CG so would they have had to keep it CG if not for Covid due to not enough artists?