I keep flirting with creating animation only in the "2D" format, primarily because I am tired out from using complex, cumbersome, overly technical 3D animation software. There just isn't a streamlined pipeline in existence that gives the average person the freedom and, more importantly, the time to actually finish anything. Not unless you stand among the few that have the patience of Job. I am ashamed to tell you how many years I have been making things without really producing anything.
Do any of you have the same experience?
I would even like to take the relatively simple process of making 2D animation and make it even simpler, faster, more fluid - fewer controls - fewer widgets - a nearly naked interface. Look at the incredible power presented at your fingertips when you drive a truly well-designed car. Or better yet, a really well made bicycle - so simple, but so powerful when compared to walking on foot, (drawing every frame by hand).
I think our overly technical culture is beginning to wear on me. I've seen too much. I've pushed too many buttons. I've simply had to create too many workarounds. Where's the straight path, anyway?
Greg Smith
Have You Switched to 2D for Reasons of Simplicity?
Moderators: Víctor Paredes, Belgarath, slowtiger
There are many responses to your musings! Firstly, animation has always been a labour-intensive (and mostly technical) activity. AS is one of the best pieces of software if you are looking to produce animations in an efficient manner. I have only ever dabbled in 3D, and I didn't go into it any further because I love 2D cartoons, and I have always loved drawing, so it wasn't an issue for me.
The straight path? Drawing on punched paper, using a lightbox. That's not obviously technical, but it's bloody hard work!
The straight path? Drawing on punched paper, using a lightbox. That's not obviously technical, but it's bloody hard work!
You can't have everything. Where would you put it?
Jahnocli:
Yes, by hand is the straightest path, but how many animators, even the best of the best, ever have the time and endurance, on their own, using this process, to finish even a modest short of notable calibre?
The machine we are sitting in front of was supposed to render the process substantially easier, faster, making it even theoretically possible for one person to finish something notable - and though it has made us more productive, I don't think we've crossed over to the realm of the one man production, yet.
Moho is the fastest, best solution for 2D animation I have found. But I wish I had the technical expertise to combine about 27 of the tools and about 7 of the palettes into one, so that I could work more productively and see less clutter on my drawing surface. One can only wait and wait and, ultimately submit to that "bloody hard work", for the time being. Some day, I would like to finish something, myself.
Greg Smith
Yes, by hand is the straightest path, but how many animators, even the best of the best, ever have the time and endurance, on their own, using this process, to finish even a modest short of notable calibre?
The machine we are sitting in front of was supposed to render the process substantially easier, faster, making it even theoretically possible for one person to finish something notable - and though it has made us more productive, I don't think we've crossed over to the realm of the one man production, yet.
Moho is the fastest, best solution for 2D animation I have found. But I wish I had the technical expertise to combine about 27 of the tools and about 7 of the palettes into one, so that I could work more productively and see less clutter on my drawing surface. One can only wait and wait and, ultimately submit to that "bloody hard work", for the time being. Some day, I would like to finish something, myself.
Greg Smith
Absolutely yes! I can't tell you how many hours I have tried to accomplish something only to wind up fighting buggy 3D (also 2D) software and having to learn workarounds, only to give up.
IMO, 3D is nice for stills, but I've never gotten any animation done with it beyond a few basic exercises.
I just switched to doing 2D animation on the computer, and I was shocked to find it's actually somewhat easier!
I guess I bought into the hype that 3D software was going to be a big work-saver. However, if you're working alone, that means you have to build all the sets, props and characters, paint them, light them, and rig them. It's like wanting a loaf of bread, but having to learn how to be a wheat farmer first!
I've found that it's just easier to draw the darn pictures...
I'm glad to know I'm not alone!
IMO, 3D is nice for stills, but I've never gotten any animation done with it beyond a few basic exercises.
I just switched to doing 2D animation on the computer, and I was shocked to find it's actually somewhat easier!
I guess I bought into the hype that 3D software was going to be a big work-saver. However, if you're working alone, that means you have to build all the sets, props and characters, paint them, light them, and rig them. It's like wanting a loaf of bread, but having to learn how to be a wheat farmer first!
I've found that it's just easier to draw the darn pictures...
I'm glad to know I'm not alone!
The reason I switched from 3D to 2D was largely because I could'nt tell a the story quick enough in 3D and Recently I have been creating 3D models of my 2D characters to use as angle references which works great to get character dimensions perfect. I have noticed in the last few years that a good story and perfect animation no longer a guarantee that people will like or watch what you create. I was watching a show the other night about a small media company who are specializing in creating animated political content for internet. They were saying that a smick style of animation is not what people want to view over the net. It's now more a case of the rougher the animation the better. Maybe the population as a whole have OD'd on Disney? I dunno but I struggle trying to come up with ideas that may work these days.
D.K
D.K
I actually find it much easier (and faster) to work in 3D, but that's because I have no artistic talent, at least when it comes to actual drawing (I've said it elsewhere but for me 3D is the triumph of technology over talent).
I can (and do) create wonderful amazing 3D animations, fantastic lip sync character stuff, special effects, etc. and with a render farm I don't find the render process to be onerous (I generally do about 30 minutes per week). I don't need to know how to draw a single line as long as I can manage the software -- I'm more of a director and less of an animator.
Yet I'm drawn to 2D software (which is why I'm on this board) because of the look. I grew up with 2D animation, and nothing gets my heart going as much as seeing even simple 2D cartoons. While it's pretty certain I don't have the ability to do anything good in 2D I want to dabble in it because it does my heart good in a way 3D just doesn't.
I suspect I'll "get it out of my system" and return to doing 3D after I prove once and for all that I just can't cut it in a format that really requires motor skills I don't possess. But at least AS makes it seem like I *might* be able to do something worthwhile.
I can (and do) create wonderful amazing 3D animations, fantastic lip sync character stuff, special effects, etc. and with a render farm I don't find the render process to be onerous (I generally do about 30 minutes per week). I don't need to know how to draw a single line as long as I can manage the software -- I'm more of a director and less of an animator.
Yet I'm drawn to 2D software (which is why I'm on this board) because of the look. I grew up with 2D animation, and nothing gets my heart going as much as seeing even simple 2D cartoons. While it's pretty certain I don't have the ability to do anything good in 2D I want to dabble in it because it does my heart good in a way 3D just doesn't.
I suspect I'll "get it out of my system" and return to doing 3D after I prove once and for all that I just can't cut it in a format that really requires motor skills I don't possess. But at least AS makes it seem like I *might* be able to do something worthwhile.
Oh lordy yes yes yes!
I switched to 2D because that darn 3rd dimension was such a chore to deal with.
Also I found that I would draw characters I really liked and the translation to 3D from 2D drawings was a difficult and time consuming process. The end result often didn't capture the "spirit" of my original drawings.
When I bought Moho... WOW! I could turn my preliminary character drawings directly into animated characters without losing anything in the translation that 2D to 3D was causing me. It was that process of building characters based on sketches that I found so tedious.
Also the whole process of animation in 3D causes other concerns that have to be dealt with, the big one being "pass through". It is very difficult to have characters interact because of that. With 2D you draw/animate what you want to see. You don't have to worry so much if the arm is going to pass through his stomach when he moves it. The 3rd dimension is "there" but it can be dealt with in a more... "spontaneous" free form way than with 3D.
An example from Pixar was the kiss between Mr. Incredible and Elastigirl. They had to actually "cheat" to pull that off because of the shapes of their heads and the angle of the shot.
In the movie "Over the Hedge" the animators joked about how many times the characters were "hugging" each other. They kept telling the director to keep the hugging to a minimum because of how difficult it was to do.
2D doesn't have those issues.
-vern
I switched to 2D because that darn 3rd dimension was such a chore to deal with.
Also I found that I would draw characters I really liked and the translation to 3D from 2D drawings was a difficult and time consuming process. The end result often didn't capture the "spirit" of my original drawings.
When I bought Moho... WOW! I could turn my preliminary character drawings directly into animated characters without losing anything in the translation that 2D to 3D was causing me. It was that process of building characters based on sketches that I found so tedious.
Also the whole process of animation in 3D causes other concerns that have to be dealt with, the big one being "pass through". It is very difficult to have characters interact because of that. With 2D you draw/animate what you want to see. You don't have to worry so much if the arm is going to pass through his stomach when he moves it. The 3rd dimension is "there" but it can be dealt with in a more... "spontaneous" free form way than with 3D.
An example from Pixar was the kiss between Mr. Incredible and Elastigirl. They had to actually "cheat" to pull that off because of the shapes of their heads and the angle of the shot.
In the movie "Over the Hedge" the animators joked about how many times the characters were "hugging" each other. They kept telling the director to keep the hugging to a minimum because of how difficult it was to do.
2D doesn't have those issues.
-vern
I think audiences are also tiring of that special "3D" look. You have to go to great lengths to produce a look, when working with a 3D app, that either looks 2D or provides a unique "handmade" feel. All the 3D hits I have seen make me real tired after 2 hours - I don't have that experience when watching Disney's "Snow White".
Heyvern: Do you think 2D will make a popular comeback any time soon? Do you think there will be enough demand that companies that market 2D solutions will start upgrading their software? On another note: can scripting within AS handle large chores like combining several tools into one - multi-tool, or substantially changing things like palettes?
There are still a few hurdles to jump when dealing with curve-based animation programs, though. We have the "pass through" problem when curves cross each other and overlap - (a finger on a hand moving behind another one, when both are part of the same filled area), or when surfaces controlled by bones start out on one side of a figure and need to end up on the other side, (as happens in a body turn). No simple, elegant solutions for these things that I have found, (although the promised update seems to provide a solution for this last case).
What would really make 2D animation take off is to make it even simpler, faster and more fun to create - for one person, I mean. 2D productions still seem to require a whole crew to get anything finished. I haven't got a crew at my disposal, and not many of us do. Also, 2D productions have always had a certain whimsical or fantastical feel about them - even those composed of the simplest artwork - providing escape, and ultimately, entertainment. And that is what the whole exercise should be about.
Greg Smith
Heyvern: Do you think 2D will make a popular comeback any time soon? Do you think there will be enough demand that companies that market 2D solutions will start upgrading their software? On another note: can scripting within AS handle large chores like combining several tools into one - multi-tool, or substantially changing things like palettes?
There are still a few hurdles to jump when dealing with curve-based animation programs, though. We have the "pass through" problem when curves cross each other and overlap - (a finger on a hand moving behind another one, when both are part of the same filled area), or when surfaces controlled by bones start out on one side of a figure and need to end up on the other side, (as happens in a body turn). No simple, elegant solutions for these things that I have found, (although the promised update seems to provide a solution for this last case).
What would really make 2D animation take off is to make it even simpler, faster and more fun to create - for one person, I mean. 2D productions still seem to require a whole crew to get anything finished. I haven't got a crew at my disposal, and not many of us do. Also, 2D productions have always had a certain whimsical or fantastical feel about them - even those composed of the simplest artwork - providing escape, and ultimately, entertainment. And that is what the whole exercise should be about.
Greg Smith
Translation: "popular comeback" = "adoption by a large audience"GregSmith wrote:Do you think 2D will make a popular comeback any time soon?
Unless we're making a hobbyist animation to amuse our grandkids, then every atom of effort we make has to be informed by the question of adoption by an audience.
Put yourself in the place of your audience and I think you'll agree there's a more fundamental problem than the relative charms of a given animation genre.
Your audience is already being entertained by an unending torrent of media:
- theatrical releases
- cable offerings
- DVDs
- video games
- music media such as radio and CDs
- streaming video
- blogs and social webs
((sarcasm) Fortunately, you can cross books and plays off the list. Only clueless old fogies read books or attend live theater today. (/sarcasm))
In any event. this looks like pretty scary odds to me. It ought to scare the daylights out of any artist.
But how does your local family restaurant manage to compete against the spreading cancer of McDoodles, Whopper Kings, Missouri Fried Sicken, Hairy Queens, and Burrito Hells?
Answer: Your local chef doesn't buy industrial-size drums of trans fats. Doesn't stock crates of frozen carcasses from factory farms. Doesn't feed its customers greasy, sugary, artificial concoctions. He or she uses honest, natural ingredients that have real flavor, even though they cost a lot more.
If your local chef tried to compete with Big Food on their terms, he or she would go under. Their economies of scale don't help him. He survives only because his customers want real nourishment.
Worrying over whether an audience wants brilliant 3D or brilliant 2D animation is like worrying whether customers want authentic Cuban or Greek food.
A customer who is tired of watching his waistline bulge and who can't abide another raunchy morsel of McFood is going to be thrilled with both fresh choices.
The only thing to add is that if you think *I* think a dream-maker like Pixar -- for all its critical and box-office success -- completely breaks out of the Big Food model of storytelling, you are mistaken. Pixar is a much better story crafter than any of its competitors, but that's damning with faint praise.
You simply cannot compete against Pixar for an audience that wants endlessly dazzling surrealism with a lightweight message. I think that the only alternative is to nourish an audience hungry for a real message.
Human:
Very salient points, all of them.
As far as an artist, trying to make a living, the daylights were scared out of me many years ago. I don't even want or plan to try to compete with McDoogles or Kernal Tuckies, and I surely don't want to work for any of them.
But I do plan to eat every day, if I can. When you love to make some kind of art and hope that it may provide a way to eat, what then is the avenue of dispensing and collecting for it? Maybe, as far as dispensing quality animation goes, we need to revive many local "Bijou Theatres" and Nickleodeon animation houses.
Of course, time is the issue and if you've got to spend your time doing something other than art to feed yourself and your family, making animation, regardless of how much the computer increases your production rates, might have to take the very back seat - which immediately translates into unfinished work - unless you are a kind of Methusela.
Greg Smith
Very salient points, all of them.
As far as an artist, trying to make a living, the daylights were scared out of me many years ago. I don't even want or plan to try to compete with McDoogles or Kernal Tuckies, and I surely don't want to work for any of them.
But I do plan to eat every day, if I can. When you love to make some kind of art and hope that it may provide a way to eat, what then is the avenue of dispensing and collecting for it? Maybe, as far as dispensing quality animation goes, we need to revive many local "Bijou Theatres" and Nickleodeon animation houses.
Of course, time is the issue and if you've got to spend your time doing something other than art to feed yourself and your family, making animation, regardless of how much the computer increases your production rates, might have to take the very back seat - which immediately translates into unfinished work - unless you are a kind of Methusela.
Greg Smith
I think it already has actually.Do you think 2D will make a popular comeback any time soon?
Don't look at the "movie" industry. Hollywood is dead or dying as a distribution method, plus it costs so much money that it is prohibitive. Look to the internet. More new content everyday from "one" person or small groups... and a ton of it is 2D.
Yes. Recently you have seen more new programs popping up for 2D animation. Programs like AS that aren't that old. Think about it... there have been 3D programs for ages and ages... why suddenly in the last few years has there been an explosion of 2D applications? 2D animation has always been easier for a computer yet for a very long time Flash was the only option.Do you think there will be enough demand that companies that market 2D solutions will start upgrading their software?
When 3D was first seen it was so cool and new. The shine has worn off. 2D animation on the other hand has been around as long as film making has... longer actually if you go back to those old animation gizmos with the spinning wheels and hand drawn images and optical animation gizmos they made before film making existed. The expectations for 2D are much less than for 3D. If your 3D film isn't "perfect" people complain about the "quality". 2D doesn't have that problem, you can animate at 12 fps with limited motion and if it's good people love it.
You can't build palettes... easily... with scripting and you can't modify existing palettes. You can't create "tools" with a "custom palette" either. I wanted to try it sometime but it would be limited to single "click" palette buttons the same as you have now with buttons in the tool palette. The scripting options for a pop up type "pseudo" palette are limited.can scripting within AS handle large chores like combining several tools into one - multi-tool, or substantially changing things like palettes?
GregSmith? Do you have the pro version of AS? If so you need to download and try out Fazek's tools in the scripting forum. His versions combine many tools into one... like the point selection/translation tools.
(EDIT: I don't know but maybe you can replace or add custom tools with the standard version of AS)
And speaking of scripting, I just finished 2 new menu scripts (look at my sticky thread at the top of the scripting forum). One will copy bones on one side and paste them flipped on the other side. Great for skeleton rigs.
The other one allows you to rename groups of selected bones, for adding extensions like "rt" or "lft" (which... er... coincidentally is needed for the copy/flip bone script which is why I had to create it in the first place.
)-vern
Heyvern:
I upgraded my Mac version to AS Pro, but, when I saw it was just Moho with nothing new that I needed, I went back to using Moho on my newer PC laptop. It's fine.
My main wish is for less screen clutter - therefore the expressed desire for combining tools. I haven't looked into just how many keyboard shortcuts can be put into action, but maybe using a kind of "Blender" approach where it's primarily mouse movements accompanied by single keystrokes is the way to go.
Seems like there could be a need for demonstration of complex, (made simple), workflow technique using AS. I like presenting straightforward working techniques in the video/text/narration format that get right to the point of things, saving much time. I've made some revolutionary discoveries using Moho, but I've yet to chronicle any of them. If things change very substantially with the next release, however, it sort of makes these kinds of training materials obsolete in a hurry - hence my hesitation.
Greg Smith a.k.a. brucegregory
I upgraded my Mac version to AS Pro, but, when I saw it was just Moho with nothing new that I needed, I went back to using Moho on my newer PC laptop. It's fine.
My main wish is for less screen clutter - therefore the expressed desire for combining tools. I haven't looked into just how many keyboard shortcuts can be put into action, but maybe using a kind of "Blender" approach where it's primarily mouse movements accompanied by single keystrokes is the way to go.
Seems like there could be a need for demonstration of complex, (made simple), workflow technique using AS. I like presenting straightforward working techniques in the video/text/narration format that get right to the point of things, saving much time. I've made some revolutionary discoveries using Moho, but I've yet to chronicle any of them. If things change very substantially with the next release, however, it sort of makes these kinds of training materials obsolete in a hurry - hence my hesitation.
Greg Smith a.k.a. brucegregory