6 ms·

Anime Photography in the Cel Era (2020)

184 points by zdw 5y ago

vmception 5y ago
I figured out what was charming about that, and it was the camera shake. Digital animation sequencing lost the entropy from the shaking of the cel frames. It can be added back in via simulation, during production. I think I would love that.
- rasz 5y ago
  Like you would enjoy added needle noise in your music? or pixelation in your games?
  - fsloth 5y ago
    Noise can be perceived as an additive component in a work of art - if done right. Just like any other component of a composition, it depends on how it's used. For example the surface detailing on the Star Wars ships can be viewed as a type of noise as they are not really representing anything of actual engineering, but rather are aesthetic addendums selected from a preset set of visual components. The mathematical space for animation frames is of course different from that of a surface of a static 3d shape, or music, but the philosophical concepts are analogous, I think. Perceptually - how human brain interprets them - there are of course larger differences. But all in all, visual arts, music, regardless of the mathematical domain (space, time, volume) artistically used noise is not just a pathology.
  - npteljes 5y ago
    You say that but many games and music pieces do specifically that. And movies emulate VHS effects, manipulated images re-add noise and texture, and so on.
  - royjacobs 5y ago
    Most modern music production is predicated on replicating analogue distortion and assorted non-linearities by digital means.
  - boondaburrah 5y ago
    Film grain is (used to be? It's been a while since I've seen one) added to hollywood movies despite the entire pipeline being digital, and noise can be instrumental in masking hard edges and artifacts while tying together an audio mix. Painters will drag a brush with only medium and no pigment across a canvas just to "glue" the elements together. So yes, People do enjoy this.
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
    - JohnBooty 5y ago
      "People enjoy some things like this" != "People enjoy all things like this" I'm no luddite when it comes to modern animation; there is an absolute deluge of modern animation that I love. Most if not all of it would have been impossible with traditional animation techniques. But as for the charm of traditional animation, the "charm" of those visual imperfections wasn't the aesthetic value of the imperfections themselves; it was the slight breaking of the "fourth wall" and how it reminded me that human beings physically arranged and photographed every single frame of animation. Digitally faking those imperfections would be silly to me. As for something like artificial film grain noise in Hollywood, I suppose that perhaps some people love the fact that it reminds them of the physical filmmaking process. For most others I suspect it's a purely visual aesthetic charm, that is indeed ripe for digital replication. Art is subjective (always a dangerous thing on HN) and I won't say anybody is wrong if they feel otherwise about this. However, it would be objectively true to point out that the appeal of "analog imperfections" goes far beyond their face-value aesthetic appeal for many.
      - boondaburrah 5y ago
        Yup. People != Everyone. I will argue a bit for the value of noise (visual or auditory) of causing you to stop processing each individual element and accept them as one whole though. I don't think that argument applies to pin registration shake on film animation, but if every element of a mix were perfectly dry it would sound unrealistic (even live, arguably the highest fidelity of music for this argument, has room characteristics). Regarding hollywood it was originally a way to make the CG elements and live-action elements actually blend. Once they went all-digital it didn't make as much sense.
  - Aeolun 5y ago
    There is definitely a ton of games that add it back for stylistic effect.
  - vmception 5y ago
    Yes, to needle noise I didn’t grow up with those things so it is neither nostalgia or being “retro”, I like things that makes the consumer’s eyes and ears search
  - krinchan 5y ago
    > added needle noise in your music The entire “Lo-Fi Beats” niche-genre and it’s popularity would indicate that people do in fact enjoy that.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- JohnBooty 5y ago
  Art is subjective, so if that's what makes it magic for you... cool. Not remotely what made it charming for me. Doesn't mean I'm right, though!
_ZeD_ 5y ago
"Kyoko is cute." Yes, she is :)
Cookingboy 5y ago
There is something uniquely charming about animation cels. They are literally the physical objects that's filmed for the production of animated shows/movies. The live action production's equivalent to owning an animation cel would be owning the entire set, actors included lol. Owning a single key frame from my favorite Anime movie has always been a dream of mine, that's why I was ecstatic to get my hands on this last year: https://i.imgur.com/WcWF7x8.jpg https://i.imgur.com/WcWF7x8.jpg
- 0F 5y ago
  Woah, how do you go about buying that without getting ripped off? That is really cool.
  - Cookingboy 5y ago
    I did it through a very reputable auction house in the U.S.
    - JohnBooty 5y ago
      Could you share the name of the auction house? I don't think that would be against HN rules.
      - Cookingboy 5y ago
        Heritage Auction, they have another lot coming up soon: https://comics.ha.com/c/auction-home.zx?saleNo=7265&ic=breadcrumb-comics-121913-interior https://comics.ha.com/c/auction-home.zx?saleNo=7265&ic=bread...
- dialogbox 5y ago
  Oh that's really cool but how about making every frames as NFT and sell? I think that can be a thing in digital animation as well.
  - fsloth 5y ago
thaumasiotes 5y ago
> Kouji Nanke didn’t only draw Kyoko’s (the character) eyes obviously This is an interesting example of a parenthetical supplement being attached to a word which also has a grammatical particle attached to it. The particle has not been applied to the supplement, which messes up the way the sentence reads when the parenthetical is included. On the other hand, if the parenthetical is conceptually excluded, it's perfect. There are some other options: - ...didn't only draw Kyoko's (the character's) eyes... [double marking] - ...didn't only draw Kyoko (the character)'s eyes... [marking on the full phrase "Kyoko (the character)"] - ...didn't only draw Kyoko's eyes (Kyoko is the character)... [circumlocution] I'm curious what people think.
- bckr 5y ago
  I like the 2nd of your options the best. It has the property that if you delete the parenthetical, it's perfect, while avoiding all of the other issues you mentioned, and still explaining who Kyoko is. Perhaps more importantly, when said aloud it feels natural. This is a good rule of thumb for improving ambiguously good writing. edit: another option: ... didn't only draw the eyes of Kyoko (the character)...
  - astrobe_ 5y ago
    Perhaps the relative importance of these elements is actually swapped: the subject is the character's eyes, the fact that this character is named Kyoko is secondary. So: ...didn't only draw the character's eyes (Kyoko).... This parenthesis is only "necessary" because later they say Kyoko is cute. That said, leaving out the name of the character at first would have worked better, I believe. The parenthesis is a distraction from the topic of that paragraph, which is all about technique, and then later on the light note. It's absolutely not a big deal here, but for most types of user documentations, it's important to go straight to the point and avoid distractions. Schools tend to train for the opposite (fill at least 2 pages etc.).
saagarjha 5y ago
Kind of amusing that the entire page layout seems to be RTL, down to the scroll bar being on the left side of the screen.
sireat 5y ago
The anime in question - Maison Ikkoku is a superb romantic comedy - with great OP and ED songs as well. MI along with Kimagure Orange Road (also fantastic songs) were the standard setters in 1980s.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
Fricken 5y ago
I built a multi-plane camera setup in high school for an animation project in, without knowing it was a thing used in the industry. My version was very simple. Instead of stacking the planes, I hung them from yardsticks spanned between two tables, so I could slide the planes forward toward the camera at different rates of speed. Here is a short doc from Disney (1957) about the invention of the first multi plane camera: https://youtu.be/YdHTlUGN1zw https://youtu.be/YdHTlUGN1zw
- agys 5y ago
  I often reference this short doc from Disney for two reasons: the first is the subject itself, the multi-plane camera; the second is how well the subject is explained. It’s a good example of excellent and clear visual communication even if it might appear a bit slow in pace for today’s audience.
- JohnBooty 5y ago
  My wife casually mentioned seeing that camera when she worked at Disney. She wasn't being coy; it just wasn't a big deal for her. For me, that was like "casually" mentioning she'd had lunch with Jesus or Einstein or something. I've always been really fascinated with that aspect of animation, so Disney's big multiplane rig is something of a holy relic to me.
  - rwmj 5y ago
    There's a simple one (two or three layers IIRC) in the Ghibli Museum which you can play with. I didn't know until now the name of this system.
JohnBooty 5y ago
It's so beautiful and sad to learn about "lost arts" like physical animation cel photography. Or perhaps "dead arts" would be a better term, as in "dead languages" like Latin. It's not lost; it's just not a living, breathing thing any longer.
skhr0680 5y ago
Akira has everything described in the article practiced to an absurd degree. I don't think there is a single light in the movie that isn't an actual real light.
- JohnBooty 5y ago
  Have I got a video for you: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xf0WjeE6eyM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xf0WjeE6eyM "AKIRA: How To Animate Light"
  - ghostly_s 5y ago
    ...and as highlighted here, basically none of the lighting effects are "real light".
    - JohnBooty 5y ago
      Yeah I'm not sure what the parent poster meant by that. They may have been referring to the glow/bloom effect created by backlighting the cel, which actually is "real light" and is used very liberally in Akira. Regardless, very cool video!!
goto11 5y ago
If you want to see what the Disney multi-plane camera could achieve in 1940, watch this tracking shot from the beginning of Pinocchio: https://kottke.org/19/12/cool-multiplane-animation-in-this-pinocchio-clip-from-1940 https://kottke.org/19/12/cool-multiplane-animation-in-this-p... It is technically amazing, and the scene reportedly cost as much to produce as a regular Disney short. I'm sure Orson Wells was inspired by this scene when he made Touch of Evil.
- vmception 5y ago
  that first clip from Pinocchio is exactly the camera-cel shaking that I like about layered animation with cels that I would love to see simulated in modern digital processes, that I referred to here https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30403219#30403899 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30403219#30403899 Just add some camera shaking to each layer in after effects!

184 points by zdw 5y ago

I figured out what was charming about that, and it was the camera shake. Digital animation sequencing lost the entropy from the shaking of the cel frames. It can be added back in via simulation, during production. I think I would love that.

rasz 5y ago
Like you would enjoy added needle noise in your music? or pixelation in your games?
- fsloth 5y ago
  Noise can be perceived as an additive component in a work of art - if done right. Just like any other component of a composition, it depends on how it's used. For example the surface detailing on the Star Wars ships can be viewed as a type of noise as they are not really representing anything of actual engineering, but rather are aesthetic addendums selected from a preset set of visual components. The mathematical space for animation frames is of course different from that of a surface of a static 3d shape, or music, but the philosophical concepts are analogous, I think. Perceptually - how human brain interprets them - there are of course larger differences. But all in all, visual arts, music, regardless of the mathematical domain (space, time, volume) artistically used noise is not just a pathology.
- npteljes 5y ago
  You say that but many games and music pieces do specifically that. And movies emulate VHS effects, manipulated images re-add noise and texture, and so on.
- royjacobs 5y ago
  Most modern music production is predicated on replicating analogue distortion and assorted non-linearities by digital means.
- boondaburrah 5y ago
  Film grain is (used to be? It's been a while since I've seen one) added to hollywood movies despite the entire pipeline being digital, and noise can be instrumental in masking hard edges and artifacts while tying together an audio mix. Painters will drag a brush with only medium and no pigment across a canvas just to "glue" the elements together. So yes, People do enjoy this.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - JohnBooty 5y ago
    "People enjoy some things like this" != "People enjoy all things like this" I'm no luddite when it comes to modern animation; there is an absolute deluge of modern animation that I love. Most if not all of it would have been impossible with traditional animation techniques. But as for the charm of traditional animation, the "charm" of those visual imperfections wasn't the aesthetic value of the imperfections themselves; it was the slight breaking of the "fourth wall" and how it reminded me that human beings physically arranged and photographed every single frame of animation. Digitally faking those imperfections would be silly to me. As for something like artificial film grain noise in Hollywood, I suppose that perhaps some people love the fact that it reminds them of the physical filmmaking process. For most others I suspect it's a purely visual aesthetic charm, that is indeed ripe for digital replication. Art is subjective (always a dangerous thing on HN) and I won't say anybody is wrong if they feel otherwise about this. However, it would be objectively true to point out that the appeal of "analog imperfections" goes far beyond their face-value aesthetic appeal for many.
    - boondaburrah 5y ago
      Yup. People != Everyone. I will argue a bit for the value of noise (visual or auditory) of causing you to stop processing each individual element and accept them as one whole though. I don't think that argument applies to pin registration shake on film animation, but if every element of a mix were perfectly dry it would sound unrealistic (even live, arguably the highest fidelity of music for this argument, has room characteristics). Regarding hollywood it was originally a way to make the CG elements and live-action elements actually blend. Once they went all-digital it didn't make as much sense.
- Aeolun 5y ago
  There is definitely a ton of games that add it back for stylistic effect.
- vmception 5y ago
  Yes, to needle noise I didn’t grow up with those things so it is neither nostalgia or being “retro”, I like things that makes the consumer’s eyes and ears search
- krinchan 5y ago
  > added needle noise in your music The entire “Lo-Fi Beats” niche-genre and it’s popularity would indicate that people do in fact enjoy that.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
JohnBooty 5y ago
Art is subjective, so if that's what makes it magic for you... cool. Not remotely what made it charming for me. Doesn't mean I'm right, though!

_ZeD_ 5y ago

"Kyoko is cute." Yes, she is :)

Cookingboy 5y ago

There is something uniquely charming about animation cels. They are literally the physical objects that's filmed for the production of animated shows/movies. The live action production's equivalent to owning an animation cel would be owning the entire set, actors included lol. Owning a single key frame from my favorite Anime movie has always been a dream of mine, that's why I was ecstatic to get my hands on this last year: https://i.imgur.com/WcWF7x8.jpg https://i.imgur.com/WcWF7x8.jpg

0F 5y ago
Woah, how do you go about buying that without getting ripped off? That is really cool.
- Cookingboy 5y ago
  I did it through a very reputable auction house in the U.S.
  - JohnBooty 5y ago
    Could you share the name of the auction house? I don't think that would be against HN rules.
    - Cookingboy 5y ago
      Heritage Auction, they have another lot coming up soon: https://comics.ha.com/c/auction-home.zx?saleNo=7265&ic=breadcrumb-comics-121913-interior https://comics.ha.com/c/auction-home.zx?saleNo=7265&ic=bread...
dialogbox 5y ago
Oh that's really cool but how about making every frames as NFT and sell? I think that can be a thing in digital animation as well.
- fsloth 5y ago

thaumasiotes 5y ago

> Kouji Nanke didn’t only draw Kyoko’s (the character) eyes obviously This is an interesting example of a parenthetical supplement being attached to a word which also has a grammatical particle attached to it. The particle has not been applied to the supplement, which messes up the way the sentence reads when the parenthetical is included. On the other hand, if the parenthetical is conceptually excluded, it's perfect. There are some other options: - ...didn't only draw Kyoko's (the character's) eyes... [double marking] - ...didn't only draw Kyoko (the character)'s eyes... [marking on the full phrase "Kyoko (the character)"] - ...didn't only draw Kyoko's eyes (Kyoko is the character)... [circumlocution] I'm curious what people think.

bckr 5y ago
I like the 2nd of your options the best. It has the property that if you delete the parenthetical, it's perfect, while avoiding all of the other issues you mentioned, and still explaining who Kyoko is. Perhaps more importantly, when said aloud it feels natural. This is a good rule of thumb for improving ambiguously good writing. edit: another option: ... didn't only draw the eyes of Kyoko (the character)...
- astrobe_ 5y ago
  Perhaps the relative importance of these elements is actually swapped: the subject is the character's eyes, the fact that this character is named Kyoko is secondary. So: ...didn't only draw the character's eyes (Kyoko).... This parenthesis is only "necessary" because later they say Kyoko is cute. That said, leaving out the name of the character at first would have worked better, I believe. The parenthesis is a distraction from the topic of that paragraph, which is all about technique, and then later on the light note. It's absolutely not a big deal here, but for most types of user documentations, it's important to go straight to the point and avoid distractions. Schools tend to train for the opposite (fill at least 2 pages etc.).

saagarjha 5y ago

Kind of amusing that the entire page layout seems to be RTL, down to the scroll bar being on the left side of the screen.

sireat 5y ago

The anime in question - Maison Ikkoku is a superb romantic comedy - with great OP and ED songs as well. MI along with Kimagure Orange Road (also fantastic songs) were the standard setters in 1980s.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

Fricken 5y ago

I built a multi-plane camera setup in high school for an animation project in, without knowing it was a thing used in the industry. My version was very simple. Instead of stacking the planes, I hung them from yardsticks spanned between two tables, so I could slide the planes forward toward the camera at different rates of speed. Here is a short doc from Disney (1957) about the invention of the first multi plane camera: https://youtu.be/YdHTlUGN1zw https://youtu.be/YdHTlUGN1zw

agys 5y ago
I often reference this short doc from Disney for two reasons: the first is the subject itself, the multi-plane camera; the second is how well the subject is explained. It’s a good example of excellent and clear visual communication even if it might appear a bit slow in pace for today’s audience.
JohnBooty 5y ago
My wife casually mentioned seeing that camera when she worked at Disney. She wasn't being coy; it just wasn't a big deal for her. For me, that was like "casually" mentioning she'd had lunch with Jesus or Einstein or something. I've always been really fascinated with that aspect of animation, so Disney's big multiplane rig is something of a holy relic to me.
- rwmj 5y ago
  There's a simple one (two or three layers IIRC) in the Ghibli Museum which you can play with. I didn't know until now the name of this system.

JohnBooty 5y ago

It's so beautiful and sad to learn about "lost arts" like physical animation cel photography. Or perhaps "dead arts" would be a better term, as in "dead languages" like Latin. It's not lost; it's just not a living, breathing thing any longer.

skhr0680 5y ago

Akira has everything described in the article practiced to an absurd degree. I don't think there is a single light in the movie that isn't an actual real light.

JohnBooty 5y ago
Have I got a video for you: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xf0WjeE6eyM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xf0WjeE6eyM "AKIRA: How To Animate Light"
- ghostly_s 5y ago
  ...and as highlighted here, basically none of the lighting effects are "real light".
  - JohnBooty 5y ago
    Yeah I'm not sure what the parent poster meant by that. They may have been referring to the glow/bloom effect created by backlighting the cel, which actually is "real light" and is used very liberally in Akira. Regardless, very cool video!!

goto11 5y ago

If you want to see what the Disney multi-plane camera could achieve in 1940, watch this tracking shot from the beginning of Pinocchio: https://kottke.org/19/12/cool-multiplane-animation-in-this-pinocchio-clip-from-1940 https://kottke.org/19/12/cool-multiplane-animation-in-this-p... It is technically amazing, and the scene reportedly cost as much to produce as a regular Disney short. I'm sure Orson Wells was inspired by this scene when he made Touch of Evil.

vmception 5y ago
that first clip from Pinocchio is exactly the camera-cel shaking that I like about layered animation with cels that I would love to see simulated in modern digital processes, that I referred to here https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30403219#30403899 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30403219#30403899 Just add some camera shaking to each layer in after effects!