Peanuts! Feature film by Blue Sky

[Elodie]

A first teaser for the feature film "Peanuts" is available here : http://geektyrant.com/news/happy-teaser ... or-peanuts" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;



2D animation (especially for the FX) are made with... TVPaint

[ZigOtto]

geezzz ... they dared to 3D him,
... poor Snoopy ...!
... but why such a punition ?

and don't tell me : "... because the market is here."
or : "he needed that today for a bankable survival "
grrrr

[Elodie]

In a way, I like the rendering they chosen : even if it's 3D, they kept the original core of Charlie Brown's animations
I mean, the animation is a little "rough" and "twitchy".

(But yes, of course, I would have prefer to have a full 2D animation feature film, but that's better than nothing )

[slowtiger]

No, this is worse than nothing.

[D.T. Nethery]

No, this is worse than nothing.

Agreed.

The group think conventional wisdom in mainstream Hollywood that all stories and characters based on drawn images (comic strips , graphic novels, hand drawn animation) must now be revisioned as 3D CGI is crazy.

Schultz's "Peanuts" characters are graphic, 2D designs. They could be animated fully using all the graphic cheats that are natural to hand-drawn animation. I will admit I'm not a fan of most of the animated films of "Peanuts" made by the Bill Melendez studio (yes, "A Charlie Brown Christmas" is a classic, but more for it's story than the quality of the animation ). I never much cared for the limited animation approach that Melendez took to the characters. Simple, graphic characters CAN be animated in full animation , with a lively inked line and full use of all the principles of animation such as anticipation, squash & stretch , and overlapping action, etc. The choice didn't have to be a big-screen version of the Melendez-style limited animation OR CGI . Elegant , stylized hand-drawn animation retaining the graphic look of Schultz's comic strip could have been wonderful.

.

[Paul Fierlinger]

Simple, graphic characters CAN be animated in full animation , with a lively inked line and full use of all the principles of animation such as anticipation, squash & stretch , and overlapping action, etc.

Sure they can be all that and they can be 3D, but both cases are destructive to the spirit of the Peanuts strips and books. Simple, graphic characters can be vandalized by the overdone, stupid squash & stretch gimmickry at every move. Simple graphics are often best when left to simple, dead pan animation, which was the appropriate approach the Melendez studio took at the time they took it.

[Elodie]

Well, you are all a little bitter. I totally understand your point of view (I share it actually : animating Peanuts in 3D is a little like inventing an over complex machine to hammer in a nail.), but I'm not completely opposed to this new version in 3D.

As you said, animating this in 2D would have been very easy. In a way, it's an exploit to render Peanuts in 3D ^^

(Be patient, the TVPaint invasion is slow but sure. Now Blue Sky, tomorrow : the world ! )

More seriously, in Europe many "famous" comics characters are turn in 3D films or TV series, and with these versions, I think we completely lose the original "core" of those characters.

An example with "Le petit Nicolas" :

Original drawings :




Excerpts from the TV show :
http://kartoonz.net/video/IzYk2T12879/L ... -58-Bonbon" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I grew up with Snoopy and Charlie Brown, as I did with "Le petit Nicolas". Honestly, and I'm less shocked with "Peanuts"

[slowtiger]

I'm with Paul here: I feel the approach of Bill Melendez was completely appropriate with these characters. But I'm used to it, I had my share of eastern european animation and lots of experimental stuff, so for me limited or even jumpy animation is completely normal. Someone grown up with only a diet of Disney might react differently.

(Fun fact: There's a scene in one of the first films where all characters dance in a school auditory. Each character has a distinct style, each is just a small loop. But these loops are still spread over the net today (as GIFs), each of them as illustration for a personality type.)

Elodie: Ugh, I never saw these - something completely different from the original! (One of the boys wears a yellow sweater with a Charly Brown Zigzag line!) That short handdrawn bit at the title card looks really nice - but my guess is that they couldn't find enough animators to handle this style well enough, and/or didn't have a suitable software to do this. And of course "handdrawn" is more expensive than digital puppetry.

But I expect this to change because of Ernest and Celestine, which uses a similar "broken" line approach still on a budget (with Flash!), and the next movie of that kind will be in TVP.

[Elodie]

But I expect this to change because of Ernest and Celestine, which uses a similar "broken" line approach still on a budget (with Flash!), and the next movie of that kind will be in TVP.

Yep, Flash... and many little hands hidden in the shadow to close lines, re-do colors several times to have an interesting rendering.

But yes, I wish E&C will contribute to encourage producers to realize 2D is NOT dead.

[Paul Fierlinger]

I don't believe that stuff about 2D being dead. There just aren't enough 2D animators being born anymore.

but my guess is that they couldn't find enough animators to handle this style well enough,

and to be more succinct, enough hard working animators with real drawing skills.

[Elodie]

but my guess is that they couldn't find enough animators to handle this style well enough,

and to be more succinct, enough hard working animators with real drawing skills.

It has nothing to do with that : I met many talented animators, young and old ones, who are stuck in cut-out and 3D productions.

The problem is just money + the fact that many producers are just ignorant and think 2D is "old school" and now, everything must be done in 3D with stereoscopic glasses
2D afraid them because it's paper : paper is old and expensive. "You can do it on a software ? My gosh, money to spend again... "



Fortunately, there are still many great producers who know the real potential of 2D animation

[slowtiger]

I think the main problem is to think about animation production only in terms of money. From personal experience I'd say that 3/4 of all producers don't give a shit about quality. No sense of style or artistry, no sense for choosing the right combination of medium, technique, style, and so on, for any given subject.

[Elodie]

That's it.

[Fabrice]

But I expect this to change because of Ernest and Celestine, which uses a similar "broken" line approach still on a budget (with Flash!), and the next movie of that kind will be in TVPaint.

Not only with Flash. Many companies involved in the film (like Digital Graphics in Belgium) have some TVPaint licenses to "save their life on tricky retouch situations", as they told me.

[slowtiger]

That makes TVP the secret swiss army knife for tricky animation! Maybe we shouldn't advertise in public anymore, better to pass on the knowledge down to animators in need ... "Yeah, been there, but I know of a tool which could save your ass as well ..."