One thing I found...

Thanks so much for the kind messages in the comments of my last message. I have been archiving stuff on a new hard drive and found a whole bunch of unfinished Medicated Life stuff that I never posted and thought I may as well put some up for you to see.

This is a few pages of a full-on story based on the time I discovered Flash animation quite a few years ago. You should be able to click on them for larger versions. It sort of went like the above images.

The last panel is unfinished but I decided that, as he had discovered some sort of mystical ability to make cartoons in an hour, he deserved a superhero outfit.

He didn't like it.

Maybe at some stage, when my career comes to a crashing halt, I'll do a little graphic novel about my experiences in animation. Not saying it will be any good but it will pass the time. There's more where this came from so I may put up a few oldies as I find them.

Blogday Week Favourite - Bleak Future of Animation Part 3

On the 23rd of September, My Medicated Cartoon Life is two years old. So I thought, as I have never reposted anything so far and I have a few favourites, it might be a good excuse to repost some oldies.

Over at John K's blog recently, he made a post asking will traditional cartoon principals survive? Well, I had given my answer to that close to a year ago in my 4-part post - the bleak future of animation. My answer was no.

Here is Part 1.
And this is Part 2.
Part 3.
And Part 4.

But, for my repost, I've gone for Part 3. Firstly, I just like the doodle that goes with it. I can really see this scenario playing out in a couple of generations time. And, secondly, it marks the birth of my child. One of them.

Here it is -




I meant to get to this post yesterday but ended up having to attend the birth of my child. Live blogging would have been seen as bad form. So where was I?

7,000 drawings a year. Possibly a little less. Possibly much more. That's how much a traditional animator or would-be animator could rack up in just the normal course of their day. That doesn't include personal studies or sketches or little thumbnails that they would do along with those drawings. That's 7,000 finished approved drawings.

You don't get this from Flash animation.

Nope, really. You just don't.

Seriously.

In Flash, with most working methods, it is about manipulation of libraries, often totally flat and completely predefined. Drawing within Flash is for two things - to rough out a piece on the timeline so you have an idea of what you're doing (and some animators skip this, at their peril), or to make a missing symbol or hide a join, and some studios discourage or completely disallow this for fear of loss of control. The good Flash animators will likely (hopefully) have doodles of poses and expressions around their desk from the scenes they are working on. But that's not the same or even close to what is expected from a traditional inbetween, clean-up or animation drawing. And certainly doesn't approach the same numbers in volume.

But Flash animation isn't the same thing, is it? So does it matter?

You also don't get this from 3D. In 3D animation you are manipulating marionettes effectively. It's about posing them. It's an art in itself of course so not really all that directly comparible to traditional. But, like Flash, good animators will often have poses roughed out in pencil first. Again, not close to what is expected from a traditional finished drawing.

3D animation is a whole different form though, more like stop-motion. So does it matter?

Some of the best Flash animators learned traditionally and then were trained in Flash. Some of the best 3D animators learned traditionally and then were trained in 3D. In both methods, traditional animators have a massive advantage, are often the people directors seek out first and can have a great positive influence in studios.

Those are the 7,000-a-year drawing people.

Could it happen the other way around? Could someone spend five years animating on a Flash show and then produce a great piece of 2D animation? Or even 3D?

Not the way the 7,000-a-year people could.

Yes, I'd say it matters.

The most-excellent Cold Hard Flash reported on something Brad Bird said about a Marky Maypo spot. He said "I sometimes worry that people whose knowledge is limited to Flash tricks will never be able to reach the level of skill demonstrated in these little demonstrations of genius." Personally, I think he's right. How could he be wrong? We're comparing with the 7,000-a-year people.

But what happens when those animators retire or die? What happens when their influence is gone? What happens when you take away the people who were practicing to the tune of 7,000 drawings a year?

The bleak future of animation - part 4

This could be a long post as I'm going to try to wrap up my current thought process in this one - I need to spend more time figuring out how life is going to work with this new addition!

So what happens when the current generation of traditional animators retire or die? When we lose those people who drew every single day for longer than they did pretty much anything else in their lives? Those people who lived 'practice makes perfect'?

Well, Andy said - the death of animation happens.

In so many ways, yes, yes, yes. Decay sets in, those skills and training die over time and there is a massive decline in animation ability. It's that simple and seems blindingly obvious. You can only learn so much in college - most animators will tell you they learned more in three months (or even three weeks) in a studio than they did in three years in college. Theory only gets you to the starting point. Practice does make perfect. Influence and teachings from people who have put in years of that practice guides that practice. Take that away, and a generation later you'll see that decay set in.

Aaron over at Cold Hard Flash did make some good points however when Brad Bird made those comments. Firstly, Flash has brought animation production back to the US, UK, Ireland, Canada and other countries that otherwise wouldn't have any. This is very true, though I would be skeptical about how long that will last. Aaron also mentions the amount of independent animation that is now being produced, some of which is excellent. He goes so far as to call it a new "golden age". And you know what? He's right. He's absolutely right. Flash has opened up possibilities like nothing else before it. Have an idea? You can make a film in Flash about it.

But is that a golden age for animation as in the actual animation itself? Or a golden age of animated realisations of ideas?

The latter is important and its impact and the opportunities it opens up should definitely be recognised and even celebrated. But, even though Flash and 3D offer their own sets of skills, it is not a golden age for the craft.

If you have any doubts as to the importance that drawing plays in either of those, ask yourself why the best people sketch what they want before they actually make it move in Flash or 3D. Consider what can be explored in a good, finished drawing. And what can be learned by creating one.


And what you lose if you're not doing 7,000 a year for every day you work.

But Aaron from CHF also put me up to it, as does Humphrey in the comments - what do I suggest?

A damn good question.

What do I suggest? I have no idea. Every way I look at it, it seems to me that with the way things have gone, things right now, with many of us getting work in Flash or 3D, it's actually as good as it can be in the current climate. I can think of no way to rescue the craft. I don't come with a solution. I come empty-handed.

And that is why the future is so bleak.

This decay will happen. And this is as good as it gets.



Of course, there's always nostalgia and people will come and try to mimic what was done in the past. But, having lost those traditional animators, not having put in that intense practice, those studies that come from simply doing your job in even cheap traditional animation, people will start from scratch not by trying to relearn the process, but by just looking at what they grew up with as a child and trying to mimic what they see on the surface.


That already happens now. Imagine what that will be like in 30 years time. 40 years. 50.


If my zombie corpse rose up to see Disney's Tai-Chi Platypus, I'd be weeping. But with joy? No. Of course not. I'd weep a single dramatic tear and then shuffle off to eat somebody's brains.


And, compared with animation, I think that's a pretty bright future to look forward to.

The bleak future of animation - part 3

I meant to get to this post yesterday but ended up having to attend the birth of my child. Live blogging would have been seen as bad form. So where was I?

7,000 drawings a year. Possibly a little less. Possibly much more. That's how much a traditional animator or would-be animator could rack up in just the normal course of their day. That doesn't include personal studies or sketches or little thumbnails that they would do along with those drawings. That's 7,000 finished approved drawings.

You don't get this from Flash animation.

Nope, really. You just don't.

Seriously.

In Flash, with most working methods, it is about manipulation of libraries, often totally flat and completely predefined. Drawing within Flash is for two things - to rough out a piece on the timeline so you have an idea of what you're doing (and some animators skip this, at their peril), or to make a missing symbol or hide a join, and some studios discourage or completely disallow this for fear of loss of control. The good Flash animators will likely (hopefully) have doodles of poses and expressions around their desk from the scenes they are working on. But that's not the same or even close to what is expected from a traditional inbetween, clean-up or animation drawing. And certainly doesn't approach the same numbers in volume.

But Flash animation isn't the same thing, is it? So does it matter?

You also don't get this from 3D. In 3D animation you are manipulating marionettes effectively. It's about posing them. It's an art in itself of course so not really all that directly comparible to traditional. But, like Flash, good animators will often have poses roughed out in pencil first. Again, not close to what is expected from a traditional finished drawing.

3D animation is a whole different form though, more like stop-motion. So does it matter?

Some of the best Flash animators learned traditionally and then were trained in Flash. Some of the best 3D animators learned traditionally and then were trained in 3D. In both methods, traditional animators have a massive advantage, are often the people directors seek out first and can have a great positive influence in studios.

Those are the 7,000-a-year drawing people.

Could it happen the other way around? Could someone spend five years animating on a Flash show and then produce a great piece of 2D animation? Or even 3D?

Not the way the 7,000-a-year people could.

Yes, I'd say it matters.

The most-excellent Cold Hard Flash reported on something Brad Bird said about a Marky Maypo spot. He said "I sometimes worry that people whose knowledge is limited to Flash tricks will never be able to reach the level of skill demonstrated in these little demonstrations of genius." Personally, I think he's right. How could he be wrong? We're comparing with the 7,000-a-year people.

But what happens when those animators retire or die? What happens when their influence is gone? What happens when you take away the people who were practicing to the tune of 7,000 drawings a year?

The bleak future of animation - part 2

So what's the difference between the way an animator used to work their way through their craft and the way it happens now? A difference that could matter so much?


Well, what you guys said in the comments is all relevant (and some of it I'll come back to) but Limbclock got where I was going. It's the drawing. He says "when the person learning animation the pen and paper way, he is able to learn all the important fundamentals, such as timing and spacing between frames, and how to actually create simple stuff like walks and so on". I believe this to be very true.


But people who end up in Flash animation likely did loads of drawing in college, or their own personal sketches and same with many people in 3D. The difference is the drawing but that's just the start of my thought process. Just take a look at how it works -

With the way it used to work, no matter which end you came in on, you would be drawing constantly every single day. Drawing after drawing. For 8-10 or more hours. How many drawings you would get done in a day depends on where you come in and what type of production you are on but let's say as an example that you're doing 4 drawings an hour. On an 8-hour day, that's 32 drawings a day. On a 5-day week, that's 160 drawings a week. 640 drawings a month. 7,680 drawings a year. That's rough of course. It could be less, it could be more, especially as I was conservative on my studio hours (we've all worked much longer hours than that).

But that's around 7,000 drawings a year during work hours. Finished approved drawings. All having to conform to certain structures, so they can't just be self-indugent. All having to be approved by animation directors, animation checkers, directors and producers. All having to work within the animation of other people. And that doesn't begin to count your own personal drawings.

They say practice makes perfect. How is 7,000 drawings for practice? Five years in the business? 35,000 drawings worth of practice. 70,ooo in ten years. Each drawing in just about any traditional animation studio (yes, even the crap ones) teaches structure, adherence to rules, flow, posing, acting, expression, control and even time management - principals and techniques that can be applied to all styles and methods of animation.

So what's the difference between the way it used to work and the way it works now?

About 7,000 drawings a year.

The bleak future of animation - part 1

As many of you know, I started in this business animating traditionally and have since moved into Flash because that is the way the idustry would have me go. I blogged about why I thought Flash both rocked and sucked before, here, and here and here. Oh and here too. And here and here. That series of posts seemed to strike a chord with people who had been working with Flash far longer than I have so I reckon my initial feelings were on the right track.

That's probably not a good thing because some of my feelings on where it could lead the industry were pretty bleak - especially regarding the devaluing of the craft and outsourcing of even cheaper Flash animation. But that's not what this post is about (or series of posts actually, because I'm realising this will be too long for one post).

It is, however, about the demise of animation. But not from a financial/production end. From an artistic end.

I was discussing animation recently with an animator who has some really good traditional skills in terms of movement and timing and is now working in 3D. We were just talking references and stuff and then something hit me. Hit me hard. I realised that this animator was now at a disadvantage. And then, the next day, I was looking around the studio and I saw it - the beginning of the end. The decay of animation. Not just old fashioned bitter 'animation ain't what it used to be when I were a lad' stuff.

No. I'm talking proper end is nigh stuff.

The first thing you have to consider to know where I'm going to go with this is that Flash (or Flash-equivalents) and 3D are dominating the markets. Flash is cheap, can be produced with small crews in high volume and it makes perfect sense for television production. 3D is shiny, works for games (which employs a huge number of animator and shouldn't be discounted), and right now dominates the larger budget productions. Flash and 3D dominate.

Traditionally-made frame at a time 2D is slow and is reserved for very rare features (which industry-wide don't employ a significant percentage of animators) and still some television production (which is shipped to Korea etc. and will likely be replaced by Flash in the very near future).

The next thing to consider is - what leads to a good animator actually getting good?

Here's the way it used to work - a person with decent drawing skills would study animation in college, then they'd get employed inbetweening or cleaning-up or, if they had a serious amount of raw talent and were going into a tv studio, they may even get to start directly as an animator. And off they'd go, moving up the ladder and getting better.

Here's the way it seems to work now - a person with decent drawing skills would study animation in college, then they'd get employed as a junior or trainee animator in a Flash studio or games company or whatever. And off they'd go, moving up the ladder and getting better.

So what's the difference?

Well, the difference, as it turns out, is pretty damn huge. Feel free to let me know what you think it is. I'll let you know my take on it in the next post.

Working within your means

I started this Flash rambling talking about killing scenes. And, as far as what is going on right now is concerned, I'm blaming the Flash system. In reality, that means budget, though Flash facilitates the drop in budget and the higher expectations of quantity so it's all rolled into one and Flash itself becomes a nice easy target.

I'm seeing some animation gurus, people I hugely respect, take on Flash mostly because they have to. Now, it would be hard for me to criticise any of those people, and probably disrespectful too - they've earned their positions. And me, well, I've earned jack shit.

But I'm worried.

You see, I've seen a lot of flack get thrown on to flat, model-sheet-rigid cartoons (can you throw flack?), and I've seen a lot of people bemoan the loss of so many aspects of animation and cartooning (and I'm one of them). And the antic/settle abuse or similar systems bug me in creating a sameness and mind-numbing pointless bounce to everything so I'm giving them flack too.

But...

I believe that if you take designs, aspirations and techniques that come from systems that nurtured talent, had the budgets to allow for experimentation and perfecting, had the schedules to allow for finding that one unique expression for the scene - take all that and try to sandwich it into a cheap-as-shit, got-to-be-finished-last-Friday Flash system, it just won't work. The cracks will appear. It will look far more like cheap Flash animation than a really flat very controlled rigid show that was designed from the ground up to work within all the limitations of those Flash systems. Even that example I gave yesterday from my own images wouldn't really work all that well because the drawings (while certainly being rubbish enough) aren't flat enough. They'd need to be crushed down to far more Cartoon Network-like designs.

It's like when Disney make a television show based on one of their expensive movies. The designs just weren't meant to work on a tv budget and the animation comes across as piss poor. The cracks appear. Whereas a show like 2 Stupid Dogs, completely flat and all basic curves and angles, looks far better even though it takes a hell of a lot less to make. It worked within its means.

That's why I think El Tigre (as an example) works. There's an example here.

It has vibrant designs with sometimes ambitious colouring that is easy in Flash and wouldn't have been easy back in the old cel days. It relies on strong action posing that requires very little between them to work - just a bit of the antic/settle abuse system. It has a bank of well-designed yet easy-to-use expressions, with some nazi control over the animators.

It knows the limits of the system and works well within them.

Some use the antic/settle abuse and don't look as well. Skunk Fu (click this to see a sample in what appears to be Klingon) doesn't hide the symbol changes as well and the more you see the symbol changes, the scrappier and cheaper the animation looks.

Hiding those symbol changes really is the one true goal of Flash animation.

Oh and just in case someone is going to pull me up on that, I know it's not Klingon.

The show I'm on at the moment is kind of on the edge. It doesn't even have a fraction of the budget of a US show - not even close. It's trying to reach towards those and some scenes are just being killed. There's not quite enough control actually - if anything, I reckon a show like this needs tighter model sheets, less freedom for the animators. Because that's the only way the show could meet its deadlines without risk of a bunch of scenes coming about absolutely awful.

And then the scenes that work, well, they use that system - the antic/settle abuse system. And those scenes bore me.

Bored, bored, bored.

They work though.

But they're boring.

So I'm left wondering if there is any room for decent animation at all with cheap-ass Flash production? Animation that is aiming to get across character or emotion (like those poncy method actors) rather than just trying to hide the production methods. Reach beyond your means and have it look half-assed or severly comprimised. Or work well within them and have it look samey, repetitive, just a system rather than actually bringing something to life, which is what animation was supposed to be.

Is it no-win?

Animate in Flash in 5 easy steps!

It was an emotional night last night. My double Ally fix included the episodes where Billy died. Very sad. I don't think I've quite recovered from the death of my dog. Anyway, on to Flash -

There are many ways to animate in Flash. Usually, you just shift a symbol and tween it if you can get away with it, barely matching switches in symbols. But telling you that wouldn't do you any good because the results are crap.

No, I'm going to tell you how to do great animation in Flash.

You see, you have one goal when animating in Flash for broadcast. To tell the story? No, that's what the writer is for. To convey emotion? What are you, some kind of poncy method actor?! No, the one true goal of broadcast Flash animation is to hide the symbol changes. That's it. That's what differentiates quality Flash from the cack in the minds of a whole bunch of people.

And I've seen the system to achieve this from many respected Flash animators - people who've worked on big shows. Shows you know, not the kind of crap I work on. This is the top way to animate in Flash.

I call it the 'antic/settle' abuse system. Here's how it goes -

a) Antic. Take Pose 1. Stretch or squash slightly for anticipation (just move away from Pose 2 like it has the plague).

b) Sweep. Create sweep image that is somewhere roughly between Pose 1 and Pose 2. It doesn't matter if pieces are all over the place, you're only going to show this for one frame and nobody will ever see it.

c) Overshoot. Squash or stretch Pose 2 to overshoot the animation (just move your animation away from Pose 1 this time).

d) Hit Pose 2. Bounce up into Pose 2 proper. This is the settle.

e) Wobble. Move random piece. Hair perhaps. Doesn't really matter - just move something and let's say it's secondary action.

Use this system no matter what the mood is, action is, expression is.

I'll show you an example. Let's say I'm watching Ally McBeal and Billy is talking about how much he loves Ally. Then he dies! Holy crap, that was a shock! So I pull my two expressions from the library.

I've got everything I need right here. And I just work through the steps. I've skipped step d in the images because it ends up the same as the end anyway.
Two poses pulled from library (easy). Symbol switch hidden. And the arbitrary wobble makes it look expensive - secondary action doesn't come cheap. If you really want to get fancy, you can ease in your tweening for your antic and ease it out for your settle.

Use it for everything. Character jumps? Antic/settle abuse. Character shugs? Antic/settle abuse. Character raises eyebrow slightly? Antic/settle abuse.

And that is how to animate in Flash. Man, I should charge for such animation secrets. Or write a book. Because that's not just how to animate in Flash in our studio. No, I've seen this technique used in Flash animation from all over the world.

Thing is, some people look at this bounce, bounce, bounce animation and actually think it's bloody fantastic. Like that is what animation is supposed to look like.

But... it's not really animation, is it? It's just following a system to achieve one goal - hide one of the main issues with a Flash-for-broadcast (ie. cheap) system.

I'm seeing people being trained in this system. Like it's the only way to animate and if your scene bounce, bounce, bounces, then that's a good scene.

Is it the animator's fault? They are at the mercy of this Flash system. If they were to actually animate the scenes well and treat each scene as its own piece, they'd never hit their targets and remove the point of doing it all in Flash in the first place. And, while I may be mocking this method, I assure you it works. You'll have your scenes approved in no time. But that constant bouncing probably does untold brain damage to the viewers.

I love Flash as a personal tool. One animator, or two, with an idea, illustrating and realising that idea on their own. That's great. That's artistic expression. But when it was brought into the studios, it started killing scenes, pushing up numbers, pushing down costs - devaluing the craft.

Devaluing the craft.

If it even is a craft any more.

My studio got rid of its drawing desks. There is one animation desk in the whole building now. Everyone is on computers. The line tester is disconnected.

It's not good. It's just not good.


Poor old Billy.

Killing scenes is tougher on the younger guys

There are many ways to kill a scene. So many ways.

There always have been. Even in the frame-by-frame drawn 2D days, it was a fight to keep the life from the storyboard panel to the layout drawing, to key poses, to clean-up. By the time the finished image made it to screen, if each artist along the chain wasn't exceptionally talented and on top form that day, the result could often be so watered down it had no life left in it.

That's one recurring theme over at John K's blog, seen recently in this post. Those storyboard panels look like the drawings of just one particular storyboard artist. They are full of personal idiosyncrasies that I would imagine would have a very hard time translating to the final image. And Mr.K is more encouraging than most about individual 'handwriting' making it to the screen. On most productions, that wouldn't be tolerated at all. You'd have to drag those rough sketches kicking and screaming to model.

Cartoonbrew had a post last week on some storyboard to CG comparison images from Bolt. Whether 3D has anything to do with it or not, it's hard to deny the decay from that initial image.

So it can happen anywhere and always could.

But, right now, I'm seeing this happen every day in such a scale and with such a drop in life that it's frightening. I'm seeing great board panels, great sketches by the animators themselves, in my own scenes (okay, not so great sketches by me) and others, turn to completely dead, lifeless pieces of, well, nothing.

And Flash, or the Flash system, is to blame.

Now you can argue that Flash can be made to do wonderful things and it's something I won't deny. I've seen some really great and surprising Flash shorts. And I love that it can give the means to express artistically when, before, making cartoons was expensive and required a huge team. But, when it comes to broadcast television, Flash is not being used as a tool because it can lead to artistic shorts, or because it can improve the quality of animation (it can't) or for any artistic reason. It's being used because it is quick, plain and simple. It makes animation production much quicker, requires far fewer people, works in finished colours, can utilise banks of animation from previous scenes and so on. It's cheap.

I've said it before but I'll say it again - Flash is a tool for producers.

So what's happening here in the studio? Well, all the characters were built in Flash during preproduction from design drawings done by a rather talented character designer. They were constructed in their main angles - front, side, three-quarter and back. They were given libraries of eye shapes, mouth shapes, arm shapes and so on. This is all to speed up production, and it works. Making a character move is incredibly quick. And we're expected to do it quickly, of course - otherwise, there would be no point in using Flash, would there?

But this system is killing the scenes. When an animator wants to get across an expression or a pose, here is what is happening -

a) Animator sketches quick doodle of pose or expression (many animators skip this step).

b) Animator browses library for similar poses, usually can't find one and pull default pieces.

c) Animator shifts these around, replacing some symbols, moving an eyebrow here and there, like a photofit image until -

d) They end up with a really poor variation on a dead default pose that was probably meant for little more than size reference at one point.

Rarely does 'd' resemble 'a' and those that skipped 'a' end up with even more crap results. Dead.

And if by some miracle they find a similar pose in step b, it had been made with this a-d process so is already dead.

And then they go to animate them. This isn't about getting good movement. No, this is Flash animation - this is about finishing the scene. But it usually doesn't matter at this stage because the scene has already been killed. This photofit method of animation is based on tweaking, not creating or bringing to life. Thing is, I find myself part of the problem and not the solution and it's the same for so many animators, even directors - if you don't get with it and just get on with it, the shows wouldn't be made. The budgets are just too low and, if they went higher, the financing wouldn't happen.

It's a shame really.

But even if the poses and expressions were good, you'd likely find one of the default Flash animating methods applied to them. Actually, that's one for another post - how to animate in Flash: the only method you'll ever need.

Princess and the Frog

Andy sent me the link to Disney's 'Princess and the Frog' trailer (see it here!). It doesn't show much but, well, I like it. I really like the design of the frog - it's very traditional and more than a little old fashioned. I like that.

Not that they can succeed just living in the past but I think it will take one good movie that treads old ground to put that 2D style back on the map, even though it was retreading that old and very battered ground that probably took it off the map to begin with. I'm confusing myself with map/ground metaphors.

I'd love to see a return to quality 2D (you can debate the merits of the Disney style and whether it's 'classical' until you're blue in the face but it always was the poster boy for quality animation, deserved or not). I'm bored with 3D for the very same reason I was bored with 2D many years ago - everyone is just trying to make the same sort of film. Actually, Wall-E looks different but I haven't actually seen that yet.

But as for me burning my computer and Flash along with it, I would love to do that but the last time I set fire to the computers, they took it out of my pay and I need the money right now to feed a Walnut Whip addiction. And I don't even like walnuts.

Also, whether this film does well or not, it's not going to really impact on us poor saps working on television animation. Flash is just too cheap. We have priced ourselves too low and reset all budgets to a figure that will barely pay our rent (or for our Walnut Whips). For my feelings on Flash and what it has done for us, click the Flash tab below and hopefully it will bring up my posts on why Flash rocks, and why it sucks.

Though the film being a success may prompt others to try similar things and start a whole new boom of traditional 2D animation. I began my career on a traditionally animated tv feature. Then a proper feature feature. Those methods brought their own crap but the work was usually of a higher quality than we accept as the norm now. It was easier to take pride in it.

I'd like that.

Thanks for sending me the link, Andy. You never know, you may get to work on a traditionally animated feature yet!

We all know Flash is unstable

Yes, Flash has always crashed. It's just the kind of programme it is and everyone who works with it knows it. But I haven't heard of it wiping whole files.


So I can't help but be suspicious is this situation. It just doesn't feel right. A little too convenient. And, if you've worked for Flash for years, you'd be saving multiple versions, wouldn't you?

The graveyard

Since learning Flash, I have been enthusiastic about the ability to make a little short all by myself. Even if it's crap. Just an expression of an idea.

But, in reality, what I have ended up with is a big folder full of unfinished Flash files. Barely started actually. Usually I draw a face. And then I'm bored.

Unfinished.

Must... finish... something.

See this is why I like single drawings. That one above? Yeah okay, it might be rubbish but it's finished. That counts for something. Doesn't it?

I know I said I was done...

I mentioned this in a comment to Ron and thought I should share it.

In the studio I'm in right now, the producer is always talking to people, companies, whoever, about new projects. So, on a regular basis, he comes to us with some visual reference (usually painted children's books, or beautiful illustrations) and shows them to us to find out what we think.

Without fail, the words that come out of his mouth are, "I was thinking maybe...", and somewhere in there he adds a pause to show he really is thinking about it, "thinking the look would be perfect for Flash."

The look. Perfect for Flash.

No matter what the hell he's showing us. It could be anything. An ink illustration - perfect for Flash. A children's book - perfect for Flash. A video of two donkeys having sex - perfect for Flash.

Every single thing on this planet is perfect for Flash. Oh, but not because it's cheaper and that's where he can make bigger margins. No, it's because the look would work best in Flash.


Okay, I'm definitely done with Flash for the moment. Honest.

Ooh! I'm on the web!

Was browsing Cold Hard Flash this morning when I saw a familiar image. It was me! Seems someone took note of my Flash ramblings. Well that's just lovely of them.

Insightful, eh?

See? http://coldhardflash.com/

See?

Thanks, Cold Hard Flash guys! I appreciate the mention.

Flash - for the moment

So I think, ultimately, Flash and its equivalents will be harmful to animation and harmful to those employed by the animation industry. I don't like what it is, what it does and what it's doing to animation. But, right now, it's keeping people employed. Right now, it's helping shows get off the ground. Right now, it comes with a lot of positives.

And it's not going to go away.

I've learned to use Flash and I think anyone in animation today should because we are not living in an age where one can specialise any more. Animators need to be jacks (or jills) of all trades to be employable. And Flash does offer quick means of expression as a bonus.

I know if I get a show going in the next few years, it will have to be produced in Flash. That's just the reality of budgets over here. And accepting that means the design can be tailored right from the start to work with those methods rather than against them.

And there is good Flash out there. If you're curious, keep an eye out at the Cold Hard Flash blog - they have showcased some great work. Sure, it's not traditional, but it's not all atrocious by any means. And a lot of cartoons are just really entertaining regardless of technique or animation ability.

Sometimes the animation is just an expression of ideas and that's okay.

There was way too much rambling about Flash over the last week so I'll let that positive note be the end of it for the time being. I guess we'll see where the industry takes us or, hopefully, where we take the industry.

Flash as its own form

There is also the argument that Flash is simply another form of animation, like stop-motion or cut-out or whatever and should be taken on its own with its own positives and negatives.

This is a view I would be inclined to support. After all, you can't get the same things in cut-out animation that you can get from traditional hand-drawn animation but that doesn't mean cut-out animation doesn't have merit or isn't valid. Cut-out animation brings its own character and can be really entertaining - just look at Terry Gilliam's Monty Python work.

Similarly, Flash has its own limits and should be taken on its own... right?

Well, the problem here is that Flash is being used as a direct replacement for 2D. It's faux 2D. If anything, a huge amount of studios using Flash are trying to fool you into thinking it's not Flash because Flash was a dirty word for a while in the industry - not so much now. If Flash is being used as faux 2D, then it should stand up to direct comparisons.


But it doesn't.

Why Flash stinks some more

Mitch commented on my first Flash post expressing a fear that Flash animation will be detrimental to the craft itself. People use it who don't have a clear understanding of classic principals and it could happen that, over the years, those skills are lost completely.

Others would argue that Flash is just a tool and that it's down to the animator to get the best out of it.

Flash is a tool, yes. But it's a tool for producers - to get volume of product for less money. It's really not a tool for animators because it in no way helps you create better animations. It's all about cutting corners. That helps producers, not animators.

Unless:

A) You're a lazy-ass animator.

B) Or someone who just learned computer skills and call yourself an animator because you can move stuff around.

Or, more positively...

C) A creative person who wants to get an idea out there quickly and easily or a writer who is just happy seeing their script 'illustrated'.

'C' offers a perfectly valid reason to be excited about Flash and similar programmes. But that makes it great for writers and creators and, especially, producers. Not animators.

So to continue with the 'tool' theme because people who argue the merits of Flash often come back to that, Flash isn't a tool in the way that a hammer will help you drive nails into a plank of wood to stick it to another plank of wood. Because a hammer can help you do a far better job at hammering in that nail than you can without it. Flash is more of an instant glue spray - okay, so it won't hold as well as hammering four nails will but it's way quicker. A shortcut. With serious comprimises.

This, ultimately, is bad for animation.

I have worked with Flash animation. I have worked in Flash animation studios. I have seen animation directors have to fight every day against the corner-cutting Flash provides. I've seen animators who were hired on the strength of their traditional animation work for a year on a Flash project and lose the ability to create a strong pose from scratch because they became so used to working in the cut-out Flash method. And, though it may seem ridiculous to some, I've seen people like that guy above hired because sometimes it's quicker just to get someone who already knows the programme.

I've also seen directors love that they can keep their crew close to them and keep the creative process alive all the way through.

But the sacrifices are great and, even then, I don't think that will last all that long.

Why Flash absolutely stinks

So, because budgets have reduced with Flash, stuff can be produced at home. Good, eh? Yes, but the huge problem is that, in each of these steps, budgets have been reduced. And reduced. And reduced.

And reduced some more.

When limited animation was used to cut budgets, it must have been quite a similar scenario. Okay, so the quality wasn't the same as full animation but you can still get really entertaining animation from limited techniques if the right people are doing it. Just like Flash now.

But what happened to limited animation?

Before long, it was shipped to the Far East. The craft of animation was soon seen as almost a production nuisance. More than that, budgets fell and the craft was severely devalued. Animators who had spent years honing their skills found it tough to get work and, when they did, they were being paid less for it. Many people had to leave the animation industry for good.


And now, people are celebrating the fact that Flash can allow people to produce stuff at home. But, in the process, it has once again devalued the craft. And how long do you think it's going to be before all Flash animation is shipped to the Far East for even less? Honestly? It's already happening and once more facilities are all up and running, there isn't a producer on this planet who won't take advantage of the cheaper production. Animation will vanish once more and the craft will have lost so much value that, if you could find work, you'd be lucky to make minimum wage.

That's the future of animation. Once again.

So, yes, it's allowing some projects to get going that otherwise wouldn't have been greenlit. But the lowering of budgets also means that many projects that would have been funded before will now not get funded. A cheap-shit Flash show will get off the ground way easier than a high-quality production. The animation will vanish, the work of animators devalued.

That stinks.

Flash positive for the industry too?

There were some good comments on the last post - that Flash isn't right for those wanting to get the absolute most from their animation and that it could even cause whole generations of animators to lose the craft. Some good points there and I plan to go into them in my next posts.


But first I just want to expand on what I was saying yesterday because it has larger implications. Beyond just the individual, Flash makes it much more realistic to put a full project together and actually get it off the ground.

Back in the day, an animated series or film required a huge number of people - storyboard artists, layout and background artsists, animators, assistants, clean-up artists, a whole ink and paint department and many more. And a whole bunch of production people to just keep track of all that. Financing something like that is a seriously daunting task. Convincing someone else to spend that amount of money on your project? Almost impossible.

Limited animation was required to make projects a bit more realisitic on television budgets and then the dreaded outsourcing happened. Studios in the Far East and elsewhere can pay people a hell of a lot less to get your job done. Unless you were an animator in the Far East, that sucked shit.

The positive, however, was that budgets reduced to an even more realistic level. You might be wondering how this could be considered a positive but what it means is that the risk involved in launching an animated show is not what it once was. So you could say there is more room for creativity.

Whether that happened or not is open to debate.

Then along came Flash. Just as one person can make a little cartoon in an afternoon with Flash, one studio can make a whole show in less than a year with just a handful of animators. So, not only can more shows get off the ground because the financing is easier and less risky, but studios can keep the work in-house. No outsourcing! That's great for those Flash animators as they can actually find work. It's also great for directors who are open to Flash because they can keep that creative process close rather than having to ship it off after storyboard stage.

There are a bunch of shows being produced in the US and in Europe that, ten years ago, either would never have been produced or would have been shipped to the Far East. And, in the Far East scenario, the project could have ended up divided among so many co-producers each with ownership and creative input that the porject could have ended up a mess.


Flash has allowed people to keep that work close, easier to fund, easier to make and easier to retain creative control. That's got to be positive for the industry, right?

Why Flash rocks

Okay so, in reality, we booted out those cel painters quite some time ago but the point still stands - Flash (and its equivalents) allow us to make cartoons without having to have a massive team of people.

Much has been said all over about Flash animation and its effect on the animation industry in general. Probably too much has been said. Nevertheless, I'm going to say my own piece (or pieces) here.

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I'm quite a traditionalist when it comes to animation. Mostly this is because I see programs like Flash as more than just tools for animators - they are tools for producers to provide cheats to animators (or people who can just move stuff around) to get high volumes of product at a cheaper cost.

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But, having said this, I discovered Flash years ago, back when they had just launched Flash 4. The tutorials were bizarrely good and, after about a week of messing about with it, I sat down on a Sunday afternoon and made a cartoon. A very basic little short animation in Flash. I sent it on to a few people who thought it was pretty funny and it made it on to the websites showcasing Flash animation at the time. It gathered momentum and seemed to spread all around, popping up on other websites. I even got an offer to animate on some Italian show from someone who saw it and I still get the odd bit of mail about that cartoon to this day. None of that would be particularly spectacular if it wasn't for this - I made that on my own on one Sunday afternoon.

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I had the idea then and there and just went ahead and made it. I didn't have to get a team together. I didn't have to call in a ridiculous amount of favours. I didn't need 347 cel painters.

How cool is it that, in this day and age, a creative person can just go ahead and realise an idea in an afternoon? Or a week if you really want to work at it?

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To me, that's pretty damn amazing and breaks open the world of animation. It means anyone with a shred of creativity has the tools to get their ideas out into the world and show people what they can do.

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That's pretty amazing.

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On an unrelated topic - does anyone know how to stop blogger joining up all my paragraphs? It's really pissing me off.