How TVPaint Could Capture The Entire 2D Animation Market
Posted: 28 Sep 2006, 15:46
Having been involved in computers and animation since the late 1980's, I've had a chance to be witness to nearly every innovation regarding computer animation including those developed for the AtariST, the Amiga, the Mac and, of course, those Windows things. I'm sure you'll be able to follow where I'm going with the next bit.
Two-Dee was ruling the early marketplace and growing by leaps and bounds in the early 90's. Innovation was found primarily on the Amiga platform. Then, a strange obsession took the entire graphics community by storm - photo-realism. Realism in every possible form, including animation. I believe it is this obsession that has driven nearly all graphic product development through the 90's all the way till now.
But people have begun to realize they have eaten enough of this pie. Their stomachs are stuffed and their heads are reeling. "No more photo-realism, pleeeese!" This is why we are witnessing a resurgence of 2D art and animation, even among professional animators who make their living doing 3D.
So lets look at today's market and the objections that still remain to using a product like TVPaint. How many dedicated 2D animation packages exist, really, in the marketplace, today? I mean the one's that are trying to cater to new users as well as hardened, old school traditionalists. Products that are both affordable and functional. I can really only find 3, two of which are vector-based. The others I find are either greatly over-priced or not truly dedicated to the sole purpose of 2D animation. A fourth product is just an antiquated version of TVPaint, so I won't mention that one.
Now I wholeheartedly agree with the developers and ardent users of TVPaint - that pixels really are the thing to push, given their great flexibility and ability to mimic natural media and beyond. They are much more natural entities to deal with in nearly every way. They allow the real artist in each of us to come forth and present himself or herself. Far above and beyond anything else in the pixel-based marketplace, TVPaint has soared and continues to soar.
But, given all of this glory, people still have some ligitimate objections to transferring all of their available animation hours over to pixels and frame by frame animation, (at least in the area of character animation). The main objection, which stems from lack of experience and training, is the time it takes to produce production quality animation drawing every frame by hand. Only very experienced animators can do this fast enough to compete with the other 3D or vector-based animators; even some of the more inexperienced 3D and vector animators can put out more feet of film, per week, than seasoned, traditional pros can.
And, among those very productive 2D animators, nearly all of them are using one of two vector-based products.
How can TVPaint and its dedicated team of developers cause their product to overcome this, the most critical objection? I know this would not be easy, nor would it be fast. But, time is wasting and budgets are running low. The big guys can always outlast the little ones, where money is concerned. Yet, I do think there is a chance for TVPaint to show itself superior in every single aspect of 2D production. All the product lacks, at this juncture in history, is an independent, tweened, vector-based linework layer. That's it. Add this and the product will blow everything else away, period.
Greg Smith
Two-Dee was ruling the early marketplace and growing by leaps and bounds in the early 90's. Innovation was found primarily on the Amiga platform. Then, a strange obsession took the entire graphics community by storm - photo-realism. Realism in every possible form, including animation. I believe it is this obsession that has driven nearly all graphic product development through the 90's all the way till now.
But people have begun to realize they have eaten enough of this pie. Their stomachs are stuffed and their heads are reeling. "No more photo-realism, pleeeese!" This is why we are witnessing a resurgence of 2D art and animation, even among professional animators who make their living doing 3D.
So lets look at today's market and the objections that still remain to using a product like TVPaint. How many dedicated 2D animation packages exist, really, in the marketplace, today? I mean the one's that are trying to cater to new users as well as hardened, old school traditionalists. Products that are both affordable and functional. I can really only find 3, two of which are vector-based. The others I find are either greatly over-priced or not truly dedicated to the sole purpose of 2D animation. A fourth product is just an antiquated version of TVPaint, so I won't mention that one.
Now I wholeheartedly agree with the developers and ardent users of TVPaint - that pixels really are the thing to push, given their great flexibility and ability to mimic natural media and beyond. They are much more natural entities to deal with in nearly every way. They allow the real artist in each of us to come forth and present himself or herself. Far above and beyond anything else in the pixel-based marketplace, TVPaint has soared and continues to soar.
But, given all of this glory, people still have some ligitimate objections to transferring all of their available animation hours over to pixels and frame by frame animation, (at least in the area of character animation). The main objection, which stems from lack of experience and training, is the time it takes to produce production quality animation drawing every frame by hand. Only very experienced animators can do this fast enough to compete with the other 3D or vector-based animators; even some of the more inexperienced 3D and vector animators can put out more feet of film, per week, than seasoned, traditional pros can.
And, among those very productive 2D animators, nearly all of them are using one of two vector-based products.
How can TVPaint and its dedicated team of developers cause their product to overcome this, the most critical objection? I know this would not be easy, nor would it be fast. But, time is wasting and budgets are running low. The big guys can always outlast the little ones, where money is concerned. Yet, I do think there is a chance for TVPaint to show itself superior in every single aspect of 2D production. All the product lacks, at this juncture in history, is an independent, tweened, vector-based linework layer. That's it. Add this and the product will blow everything else away, period.
Greg Smith