Animation vs Procedural generation

[The Wooster]

Considering writing something a little longer and more profesional than my usual shit on this subject so I'm going to make a topic so I can steal your ideas.

One of the things you may not know about me (and no I don't mean all the dead hookers)is that I am a major animation buff. Nothing is more frustrating to me than the slew of talking animal bullshit cgi movies when we could be doing a whole lot more. Also. Wall-E is the best film pixar has ever produced.

But I digress. As technology continues it's inevitable march forwards a lot of the old techniques and skills that made an animator what he is are being forgotten. Western style 2d animation has been largely forgotten with Disney handing the 2d reigns to Japanese companies such as Studio Ghibli. Now even games are starting to move away from classic animation in favour of procedural animation. It started simply enough when ragdoll physics allowed monsters to sail through the air like marionettes stuffed with helium instead of just falling to the ground with the same animation each time. GTA4, for all it's failings, really wowed me with the euphoria animation system. The way ingame characters would try and exert force and pressure realistically depending on their situation was a truly beautiful thing to watch but I can't help think that this could be the death knell for classic game animation which is already losing ground to easier and quicker animating methods like Mocap.

DOn't get me wrong I think all these leaps are great things but I think that animation, particularly by hand animation, adds a lot more personality than mocap or procedural animation. Sure it might not be as 'spot on' and it may take longer but in the end I think it adds, oddly, a much more human touch to a character.

 

[meatloaf231]

Have you ever played The Darkness? I think you would like it. The physics were iffy, but there were so many different animations for things that it didn't even matter.

It was also an awesome game.

 

[Erana]

I, personally thought ratatouille was wonderful, but that's because it was both a gifted story, and a child-friendly version of the life-changing book, The Alchemist.

As for the topic, what is it that you want to discuss? You make good points, but I'm not quite sure what to respond to.

 

[Anarchemitis]

Well, the comparison I don't think is a very fair one, because it's comparing the modern machine (Procedural generation, a program written by people) and man.

 

[OverlordSteve]

I swear, if I see another 3-D animated animal movie, I'm going to blow a gasket.

 

[The Wooster]

I, personally thought ratatouille was wonderful, but that's because it was both a gifted story, and a child-friendly version of the life-changing book, The Alchemist.

As for the topic, what is it that you want to discuss? You make good points, but I'm not quite sure what to respond to.

Yeah sorry. I ended a little prematurely. I was basically asking people whether they preferred by hand animation or more technical approaches.

Also yes I've played the darkness. The animation was nice, especially Jackie's little monologues.

 

[Treblaine]

well, it's interesting to see many Japanese animators (Naruto, Ghost in the shell) heavily use computer graphics yet with cell shading to make it appear as if they were hand drawn rather than making very distinctly CGI type animations like seen with The Incredibles.

I think Procedural animations will be just another tool for animators to use to make their jobs easier to achieve the same results though probably to a higher degree. But in gaming it will probably be far more relevant as games strive on interactivity and fluidity where a procedure can fit beautifully into a game rather than some clipping animation.

http://www.gametrailers.com/player/38002.html

If you caught John Carmack's Comic-con interview he states that it would not be hard at all to have an interactive game with 99% equivalent graphics to Wall-E (though some minor gameplay sacrifices). He also states that it really couldn't be beyond 99% with current technology as the last 1% is the cleaning up of the last bit of aliasing or clipping that requires a human to scrutinise frame by frame.

maybe this is a sign of the development of games or their fundamental graphical limitations compared to pre-rendered animations where although textures and movements are finely mapped, they can't get it all to come together seamlessly.

 

[Erana]

Well, I'd like someone to show me a 2-D cartoon that has improved because there was a switch from being hand-drawn to computer-edited.

 

[mark_n_b]

Well, I'd like someone to show me a 2-D cartoon that has improved because there was a switch from being hand-drawn to computer-edited.

True that.

Procedural animation has a lot of things going for it, you can integrate players into the cinematic action with it more absolutely, and it saves a lot of money on the whole pre-rendered 3D cinematics.

The 3D realm is very popular, and it is arguably easier to develop 3D motion pictures over traditional cell drawing. But, solely for stylistic reasons, 2D will never die until such time as a render engine can produce a quality "cell shader" to emulate the style.

We may be getting close but it is a long long way off. The talk about great game cell shading always strikes me as settling, because nothing even comes close to the actual shading style of animation cells.

Western styled animation may be the result of work done in Japan and Korea, but the western style will not be lost because of standards set by Disney (or whoever) that must be adhered to.

 

[phlewidthoughts]

Hi uni lecturer for character animation and games here. btw sorry, im a rambler.

the following is only my opinion, and the reason im posting is because im interested in other peoples point of view.

sometimes we need to question the definitions of words we are talking about, "procedural" to one person may mean something different to someone else.

To me procedural means "solved + driven by code"
systems in above mentioned "gtaVI/force unleashed "euphoria" Is an amazing step for procedural animation and i think im in love, i do not know what it will mean for the future employment of animators, but i think there would have been many animators consulted by the programmers of euphoria.

The procedural animation/skeleton solving in Spore (demo character creator) nearly destroyed my brain, as my job is to try to teach initial theory of 3d skeleton, rigging for animation to game students, i think i can safely say that spore is running some psychotically awesome animation code. I really like it because it frees up people to not have to spend all their time understanding the complexities of trying to make a character in 3d, instead the creation tools are so powerful and simple to use that people can spend more time just being creative and exploring design ideas, i recommend/yell at and force, my character design students to play with the spore demo.

mocap... (in my book dosnt really fall into the category of procedural as the motion is not generated by code, it is captured from another source, but what ever, who cares)

I think that mocap does have a place in animation, althogh i dont realy think its that good,
the data capture and the live performance is fantastic but the very medium of use, game/screen 3D has this strange abuility to smooth/soften everything out. anytime i have ever witnesed a 3D scan or mocap animation, no matter how accurate, (down to the millimeter, whatever), the 3D some how makes it bland and boring. modle looks to smooth or bland, animation is to bland. (my opinion only)

because of this i advise my students that their work is primarily for and audience and that it must convey/communicate a story. to do this in the medium of 3d which softens everything i suggest they over exaggerate everything a little, over exaggerate the modle's silhouette and proportions, contrast the colours more in the texture, over exaggerate the movement in animation.

ok here is an example.
on one side: hypothetical, supper accurate, 3D scanned, mocaped npc game character.
on the other traditional stage Theater.
what is the purpous? one reason is to communicate to the audience.
why do theater actors have insanely bright clown like make up and leap about, flailing their arms even if they are trying to say "how dismal the weather is"? one reason is because of the poor buggers at the back of the theater who cant afford a closer seat ticket. they need to see/understand as well right? the actors over exaggerate their colour and movement so that it "reads" better to an audience over different distances/scales

now 3dscaned mocaped acurate everything Npc looks ok close up, great! but what about when you are "virtual" 50 meters away and looking at an npc that is 1-3 cm of screen space and trying to figure out if he is a threat or an ally? if it takes to long you may endup dead. if the story/information is not communicated clearly to the audience then the audience may get bored / frustrated and decide to go play in the sunshine instead of watching mr amazingly accurate mocap guy.

the other reason i dont think mocap or procedural will ever destroy traditional animation is because animation can be an "ART form" yes there is an "Artist" behind that movement, it is the very way that character moves, dosnt move, over exaggerates, hides movement, time drags out, quickens, breaks bones, stretches, squashes; that delivers a performance to an audience. and it is the artists skill, knowledge, talent, passion, ability; to recognize when and where these are appropriate in the delivery.

also, its animation, we can make our characters do anything, a 50 meter ogre with a feather boa? no problem. jump of a 10 storey building, nah lets make 30. a character that can squeeze through a key hole of a door lock.....

honestly if you want realism, buy a video camera and be done with it. (nervous tick, yes i have issues)

""animation, particularly by hand animation, adds a lot more personality than mocap or procedural animation. Sure it might not be as 'spot on' and it may take longer but in the end I think it adds, oddly, a much more human touch to a character."" quoted from initial post.

I have to agree whole heartedly with this statement.

anyhow, sorry for the ramble,


btw if anyone is interested in these sorta chats,
look me up, Melbourne, Australia,
phlewidthoughts@hotmail.com