#animation industry rant

[aniketsanimationblog]

The SUMMARY Of This Whole Current Debacles Of Animation Industry

Netflix Canceled Majority of their Original Animated Kids Content after the Realignment of their Animation Department and their Stocks Plummeted at NASDAQ e.g. City Of Ghosts!!

HBO Max (Now called Max, By Warner Bros. Discovery) Canceled and erased majority of Cartoon Network Content and their Kids Animated Original Content, e.g. Over The Garden Wall, Infinity Train, Final Space etc. To Cut Costs!!

The Walt Disney Company is just replacing Human Jobs with AI, for Art Creating and Script Writing Purposes, however there's no Animated Content in this year's massive Purged Content list of Disney+ had been announced, but who knows what will happen next!!

Nickelodeon and Paramount Pictures are going to rely on Popular IP based Movies (SpongeBob, PAW Patrol, Avatar, Transformers) to be released in Theatres over the Original Ideas based Movies!!

Speaking of Nickelodeon and Paramount, their Streaming Service, Paramount+ removed several Animated Content from their Platform, after the Cancelation and Removal of Star Trek: Prodigy, e.g. Pig Goat Banana Cricket, Becca's Bunch, Digby Dragon, Monsters vs. Aliens and Most Notably, My Favourite Nick Jr. Show after Oswald ended, Peter Rabbit!! Also, Star Trek: Prodigy has been removed everywhere on Nickelodeon, including, Nickelodeon's Website, nick.com!!

As of August 2023, Cartoon Network Studios at Burbank, California, got officially Shut Down, as the Studio Operations merged with Warner Bros. Television Animation, just like Hanna-Barbera Studios!!

And Finally, when WGA and SAG-AFTRA Strikes are ongoing, The Unemployment Rate in The Animation Industry has gone at an Insane High!!

The Animation Fandom have gone way more Toxic than ever before!!

Disney Channel, Nickelodeon and Cartoon Network are not interested to Greenlit any project for the better or worse!!

Ain't this Depressing, as an Ardent Animation Fan?? When Last Year, The Owl House got canceled, the fans protested on Twitter/X by using #SaveTheOwlHouse, and when this year, Star Trek: Prodigy got canceled and removed from existence, we are protesting by using #SaveStarTrekProdigy, I will ask you this question!!

"Will you Accept these Debacles in Animation World as The Future of Animation??"

Because, right now, it is true fact, that the Animation Fandom is not quiet ready to see the destruction of Animation in their bare eyes!!

But what shall we do?? The Fandom of This Miraculous Ladybug/PAW Patrol Duopoly and the Bootlickers of Egoistic Showrunners like Thomas Astruc, will still support the Duopoly, no matter how much we make them the noises that respect and give other shows a chance, don't sleep on them!! We will listen, we will see, we won't take any action, and we still be in Silence after all the Debacles, and the Freedom of Speech will be taken away from us!!

And in Next Year, when The Animation Guild (TAG) goes on Strike, we see more and more animated series gets the Cancelation and Purge from Streaming Services, like suppose at this rate of condition, if Next Year, Disney Channel's Series, Marvel's Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur, cancels at Disney TVA, and the fans will again protest on Social media by Using #SaveMGADD, I will come back and ask the Question again!! And this cycle will go on and on and on!! Unless, we have to take action against the unfairness, this Corporate Studios and Money-hungry Showrunners have created!!

So, let me ask you this question one last time, Animation Fans all over the world!!

"Will You Accept these Debacles of this Animation World as The Future of Animation??"

We have to Take Action Right Now, Before it's too Late!!

But,

Is this one Tumblr Post enough, to Reach Out to Others, and Talk about this Issue???

#animation #animation fandom #animation fans #animated kids show #television #nickelodeon #cartoon network #disney channel #netflix #wga strike #sag aftra #save the animation industry #save animation #you cannot stop us from spilling the truth #animation industry #animation industry rant #animation is for everyone

[bixels]

I think 90% of my gripes with how modern anime looks comes down to flat color design/palettes.

Non-cohesive, washed-out color palettes can destroy lineart quality. I see this all the time when comparing an anime's lineart/layout to its colored/post-processed final product and it's heartbreaking. Compare this pre-color vs. final frame from Dungeon Meshi's OP.

So much sharpness and detail and weight gets washed out and flattened by 'meh' color design. I LOVE the flow and thickness and shadows in the fabrics on the left. The white against pastel really brings it out. Check out all the detail in their hair, the highlights in Rin's, the different hues to denote hair color, the blue tint in the clothes' shadows, and how all of that just gets... lost. It works, but it's not particularly good and does a disservice to the line-artist.

I'm using Dungeon Meshi as an example not because it's bad, I'm just especially disappointed because this is Studio Trigger we're talking about. The character animation is fantastic, but the color design is usually much more exciting. We're not seeing Trigger at their full potential, so I'm focusing on them.

Here's a very quick and messy color correct. Not meant to be taken seriously, just to provide comparison to see why colors can feel "washed out." Top is edit, bottom is original.

You can really see how desaturated and "white fluorescent lighting" the original color palettes are.

[Remember: the easiest way to make your colors more lively is to choose a warm or cool tint. From there, you can play around with bringing out complementary colors for a cohesive palette (I warmed Marcille's skintone and hair but made sure to bring out her deep blue clothes). Avoid using too many blend mode layers; hand-picking colors will really help you build your innate color sense and find a color style. Try using saturated colors in unexpected places! If you're coloring a night scene, try using deep blues or greens or magentas. You see these deep colors used all the time in older anime because they couldn't rely on a lightness scale to make colors darker, they had to use darker paints with specific hues. Don't overthink it, simpler is better!]

#not art #dungeon meshi #rant #i'm someone who can get obsessive over colors in my own art #will stare at the screen adjusting hues/saturation for hours #luckily i've gotten faster at color picking #but yeah modern anime's color design is saddening to me. the general trend leans towards white/grey desaturated palettes #simply because they're easier to pick digitally #this is not the colorists fault mind you. the anime industry's problems are also labor problems. artists are severely underpaid #and overworked. colorists literally aren't paid enough to do their best #there isn't a “creative drought” in the anime industry. this trend is widespread across studios purely BECAUSE it's not up to individuals #until work conditions improve anime will unfortunately continue to miss its fullest potential visually #don't even GET ME STARTED ON THE USE OF POST-PROCESSING FILTERS AND LIGHTING IN ANIME THOUGH #SOMEONE HOLD ME BACK. I HATE LENS FLARES I HATE GRADIENT SHADING I HATE CHROMATIC ABBERATION AND BLUR

[piplupcola]

Some shameless POS literally used AI to steal my friend's animated film

I usually don't post stuff like this but this shit's insane and downright insulting. I graduated from Ringling College of Art and Design in 2022, a pretty well known animation school in the US, and every animation student on their final year of college has to make an animated film for our final thesis. If you have any idea of the animation making process, you would know that making an entire film by yourself in one year is batshit insane and extremely exhausting, to the point where I'm still feeling the effects of the process on my physical and mental wellbeing 2 years after I graduated. Once more, my friends and I did it during the covid period, which was another level of hell. I was literally watching my grandfather's funeral while working in the labs at 2am because I couldn't fly home to attend it because we had to make this film. This film was our lifeblood, the culmination of 4 years of hell at school which was suppose to be our gateway into the industry. Tldr, it's fucking difficult to do, especially on your own.

So imagine 2 years later and I wake up to a bunch of messages on our alumni chat where a dear friend of mine posted a link to a tiktok video of someone literally stealing her entire film and superimpose it shot by shot and claim it as their own ad for their AI game. As animators, we aren't unaware of people stealing our films and reposting them elsewhere. Heck my own film "The End" was stolen from our school vimeo and posted on tiktok BEFORE IT WAS EVEN OFFICIALLY RELEASED, and that tiktok got hundreds of thousands of views while a year after my own real release my film is still struggling in the thousands.

But this

This is a fucking new low.

Can you imagine? A fresh graduate going through literal blood sweat and tears to make a film on their own that is so important to their future in the industry, to get them a job, with a film that represents a part of themselves to the world, just used as fodder for some stupid tech assholes? It's infuriating. It's insulting. It's literally a big fuck you to the hundreds of students who spent their lives toiling to make these films from the heart who are just desperate to get into the industry.

The animation industry right now is in complete shambles. People are graduating from animation schools with thousands of dollars in dept only to be met with a wasteland of minimum wage and lack of funding and competing for jobs with people who have already been in the industry for years affected by the massive layoffs not only in the movie but also the gaming industries. These films we make for our thesis aren't just films made for fun, they represent our lifeblood, our only opportunity to get a job as a graduate in this sea of hell. If you didn't make a good film, chances are you're never even stepping foot in the industry ever. It's our golden ticket that we would put thousands of hours through, sleepless nights and pushing through no matter the circumstances of sickness and pain it caused us.

And now some dumb fucking AI using dickbags see that and decide it's worth nothing.

Here's a link to my friend's real film. Please go watch it and support her work. I'm not even gonna link the other piece of shit tiktok because I don't want that video to even get a single extra view but here's a recording my friend made so you can see this malarkey side by side.

It's heartbreaking to see my friend's film barely getting any views while the stolen garbage is already in the thousands. I hope the person who stole my friend's work and made that shit dies in a fiery car crash and go straight to hell.

I cannot emphasise how we must not let this shit continue to happen. We're living in a fucking dystopia and unless we do something about it and support those affected by it it's only going to get worse. They're already expanded from stealing people's still art to stealing people's entire films, if we don't stop this nothing we create would ever be safe.

My friend's film:

The shameless fuckheads who stole her film:

#fuck ai art #fuck ai everything #fuck ai bros #animator #animation #ringling college #ringling college of art and design #rcad #animated films #animation industry #3d art #3d animation #support artists #artists #artists on tumblr #artist on tumblr #summer blood #vampire #animated film #animated short #ai rant #Youtube

[vcendent]

art vs industry

Sometimes I'm having a good day, but then sometimes I think about how industry is actively killing creative fields and that goes away. People no longer go to woodworkers for tables and chairs and cabinets, but instead pick from one of hundreds of mass-produced designs made out of cheap particle board instead of paying a carpenter for furniture that is both made to last generations and leaves room for customization. With the growth of population and international trade, the convenience and low production costs are beneficial in some aspects, but how many local craftsmen across the world were put out of business? How many people witnessed their craft die before their eyes? There is no heart or identity put into mass produced items; be it furniture, ceramics, metalwork, or home decor; and at the end of the day everybody ends up with the same, carbon copy stuff in their homes.

I'm a big fan of animated movies, and I see this same thing happening too. When was the last time western audiences saw a new 2D animated movie hit theatres? I can't speak for other countries, but, at least in America, I believe The Princess and the Frog was the last major 2D movie released and that was back in 2009. Major studios nowadays are unwilling to spend the time and money that it would take to pay traditional animators who have spent years honing their craft to go frame by frame, and to pay painters to create scene backgrounds. We talk a lot about machines replacing jobs, but when the machines come, artistry professions are some of the first to be axed (in part because industry does not see artistry as "valuable" professions). Art, music, and writing are no longer seen as "real" jobs because they belong to the creative field and there's this inane idea that anyone who goes into those fields will be unsuccessful and starving. I'm not saying that 3D animation is bad, it has its own merits and required skills and can be just as impressive as anything 2D, but it has smothered 2D animation and reduced it largely to studios that cannot afford the tech to animate 3D.

And now we have this whole AI thing to deal with, stealing existing artists' work to "train" it to take over those few professions that, until now, required actual people to do them. Internet artists have already been dealing with people complaining about the price of art for years and now have to face their work being stolen to train AI. With AI technology, anyone who undervalues the work of the artist can now get something generated at little or no cost to them, all at the expense of the artists themselves. Why would studios pay script writers when they could just get an algorithm to do it without pay? Why pay actors to bring characters to life or pay models to pose for ads when CGI has progressed enough we could digitally render humans and cut out having to pay people entirely? Why use practical effects or film on location when green screens and adding in-post is faster and so much cheaper? It's no wonder we had the SAG-AFTRA strike. AI has already been trained to write children's books and produce music, continuing down this road will replace authors and musicians too at the convenience of cost. How much longer until the actual, real-life people behind all forms of artistry become completely obsolete?

Industry is just driving the cost of people-made crafts up and up with every mass produced product and every streamlined shortcut to reduce costs, which only makes it harder and harder for artists of all kinds to make a living, as very few people want to pay for the time and skill of artists when they could just pick something off a shelf or feed AI a prompt and get something satisfactory enough, yet not what they actually wanted, for so much cheaper.

#this isnt my usual type of post but this genuinely upsets me #my rants #industry is killing creative fields #art #writing #acting #screenwriting #animation #2d animation #3d animation #crafts #ai #ai generation #sag aftra #sag afra strike #pay your writers #pay your artists #pay your craftsmen #support all forms of artistry

[selfloathingextraordinaire]

I think MAPPA has ruined an entire generation of anime watchers.

Yeah.

People should NOT be expecting their level of animation when you have brutal scheduling and low budget. No, I'd say watching the TV series of Neon Genesis Evangelian should be mandatory, not for the story, but what to expect when a show is running out of money and time.

Yes, you should be expecting a "slide show", aka a bunch of stills when you give staff a month or less to complete an entire episode. There should be shots of still characters with their heads turned away from the camera so mouths aren't even animated when you give an animator a day to a week to get a shot done. There is a REASON limited animation is used. But now people expect more and more without there being a change to anime scheduling or pay. Like every episode needs to be full of sakuga every second or else.

People are getting burnt out and the whole damn industry is collapsing, y'all.

#rant #anime #anime industry #mappa #hell animation industry in general #sometimes i get so mad yall #i see first hand how it affects ppl and it constantly makes me want to scream #i haven't even ranted about line milage yet either #that's a whole nother anime rant #also part of this is me getting annoyed at seeing ppl complaining about dungeon meshi #trigger is doing fine #like go watch some older anime #it is 3 in the morning and my brain woke me up with FEELINGS #probably delete this later

[leresq]

If you support, indorse, or are even neutral towards the fur industry at all please get off my blog. This is one of the things that makes me the angriest when I see it. I don't know how anyone can see foxes and minks locked in cages so they can't even touch the ground, bred to grow as much skin as possible so they look like bags of fur, put out in the hot sun, and think that it's fine. It's disgusting and unethical, and it's also really weird at least to me. I don't know why you would think you look good with a dead animal draped around you like that. Wool is fine. It doesn't hurt the sheep, and it's actually good for them. (ignore the fact that we selectively bred them to be able to grow so much wool that if we don't shear them they'll suffocate from the heat) Fur is not environmentally friendly. (fake fur isn't either it's full of microplastics) It's environmentally friendly in the same way that the modern livestock industry is environmentally friendly. If you want to be good to the environment there's a lot better clothes you can buy.

#anti fur industry #vegan #vegetarian #side note: peta is gross please don't think just because I ranted about animal rights I'm a supporter of those pet murderers #animal rights #wool

[death-limes]

negativity incoming, re: hazbin hotel (i tried to add a cut but its not working fsr, maybe cuz im on mobile)

————

watching the fuckin…. trailer they recently posted. the happy day in hell one. i keep wanting to stay as level-headed and neutral as possible, there ARE elements of HH that i like, i’m against bad faith criticism so i try to balance good with bad, but….

oh my god this looks so bad. and i do mean LOOKS. im talking entirely about the visuals here. the animation is stiff and awkward, the camerawork is erratic, charlie goes off-model so often i can barely even tell what she’s supposed to look like… some shots have really heavy gradient lighting and others are basically flat color, though thats admittedly a more minor thing…. the pilot looked less “polished” but it had a charm to it, and the animation looked like people were putting effort into it….

ugh i feel awful being so critical of indie animation but considering everything else about this production, i’m stuck between feeling upset and being thoroughly unsurprised. i had hopes, yknow.

and i haven’t even listened to it with audio yet. i can’t bring myself to.

#hazbin hotel critical #lime rants #and if youre reading this thinking i have no authority on the matter… youre new here #ignoring the silliness of ‘authority’ in the arts… i do have a bfa in animation #hhhhHHHHHHURGH the animation industry is such a popularity contest #i mean. so is entertainment in general #i get that. thats how things are #doesnt mean i have to be happy about it

[kukuandkookie]

Gnashing my teeth a bit because I found another reaction to donghua (it was for the Lord of the Mysteries trailer) and I was pretty excited because—despite bad experiences—I always try to be tentatively excited about any international attention paid to donghua…

But then the man says halfway through, “Somehow China’s not sucking, which is like…shocking.”

Yikes, much? 😬

And you know what sucks even more??

He later mentions it looks great, but he also says, “I don’t know how much of it could be AI-generated though, but yeah…”

Is it that insane that some Chinese animators can actually make something really nice?? Jesus fucking Christ.

#I’ll be honest the more I think about it the more irritated I am #but also I’m so fucking tired #I’m too tired to even be passionately outraged by this because anime fans keep doing it #they’re always looking down on donghua and if they’re not making semi-racist jokes they’re pulling this shit 🙄 #kuku rants #kuku vents #donghua #anime #lord of the mysteries #like oh sorry China’s animation industry isn’t quite as robust or well-known as your precious Japan’s #maybe you’d find more good donghua though if you asshats actually gave Chinese animation a chance #because I don’t think any of us *want* more animators dying from overwork so we?? #like at the very least I wish they’d stop talking about donghua like they know anything about it or at least show some fucking respect 🙄

[hezuart]

Why did you switch from animation to reviews? Also, do you still plan on doing CGI like you mentioned multiple times?

oH BOY..... you may need to sit down for this one

So it all started back in 2012. I was around 14 years old and just saw Rise of the Guardians and Wreck it Ralph. The stories, the characters, the world-building, the animation... now I never really went to movie theaters as a kid, but as a teen I started going and I instantly fell in love.

I went to community college for a few years and made some amazing friends. Loved some of my teachers and we participated in fun events like the 24-hour challenge and Campus Movie Fest. I had gotten in the top picks for Campus Movie Fest at some point and was supposed to go to the Cannes Film Festival in France to showcase my short film, but then the pandemic hit and it got canceled indefinitely.

So get this, for community college, I got a certification in 3D Animation and Video Game development. It's basically an AA degree but without general ed. (Why do you need general ed to get a degree in something? Math and PE have nothing to do with Animation. College is ridiculous. People have to pay you more simply because you were forced to spend more money in college. Wild.) Out of the 20 classes I had taken to get this certification, only 3 of those courses were hands-on 3D animation. And only one of those courses was hands-on video game development and I dropped out of that class because it was PC only and I only had a Mac at the time. I applied to the class without realizing it was accommodating only to PCs. So even my certification is barely reaching the basics for the title of it, but I did take another online course or two for 3D animation which I have a different certification for.

Now even with my 3D animation, I was never taught the physics engine. I was never taught hair or cloth simulation, but I do have modeling, rigging, animating, and texturing experience. For gaming, I have very little experience. I've only modeled things and found my way around Unity, but otherwise, I suck at coding. I hate coding with a passion. Making a video game without coding isn't really possible.

Now, when the pandemic hit, a lot of things were shutting down. I had no idea where I wanted to go next. People kept asking me where I was going for my higher education, but I kept getting warned not to waste money on college if you're trying to become an artist, especially at University. It's a money pit, and competition is so high, you're not guaranteed a job, you're just gonna be in debt. Even colleges like Cal Arts, who charge over $1K per class, I've been told are a "Pay to get in" kind of place. Where the money is used to nab professionals from their work to teach students or talk about their company or programs, and through that, you get a bigger chance to get your foot in the door because you know someone. I've unfortunately been told that's the more realistic way to get into animation: networking. If you're a shy introvert who doesn't know any famous people, you need to be extremely talented and unique to stand out to get the chance of being noticed. I don't really want to suck up to people nor do I want to waste thousands of dollars and 5 more years on college that I may not even need (let alone be able to afford) especially if there are online classes that may be even more valuable.

Now after I got out of college and started applying a few places, I discovered a LOT of unfortunate information.

Most animation these days is done overseas. South Korea, India, Japan, and Canada are the big ones.

Invader Zim, Steven Universe, Miraculous Ladybug, The Simpsons, OK KO, Star vs the Forces of Evil, Kipo and the Age of the Wonder Beasts, Adventure Time, Twelve Forever, and the Powerpuff Girls Reboot were animated in South Korea. The Ghost and Molly Mcgee is animated in Canada.

(The first four seasons of the Simpsons were animated in America until it switched to South Korea and India.)

2D traditional animation is no longer viable. Puppetry is the industry standard because it's the cheapest. Luckily, Toon Boom Harmony has allowed us to push the boundaries of 2D puppetry. Puppetry these days, if done well, can look really great, like Tangled the Series, but if you don't have Toon Boom Harmony, you're probably not gonna be hired.

Not even all 3D is made in the USA. If it's Disney, Dreamworks, or Pixar, then it's usually USA. But streaming service movies, like Sea Beast, Kid Cosmic, The Willoughbys, and Klaus, while they claim to be a "Netflix Original" that "Netflix Animation" animated, that's a lie. Klaus was animated by Yowza! Animation in Canada. The Willoughbys: Bron Animation, Canada. Kid Cosmic: Mercury Filmworks, Canada. Sea Beast: Sony Pictures Image Works, Canada. (X)

Go Go Cory Carson is written and storyboarded in America, but the animation is shipped out to be done in France. Sonic Boom is also French Animated.

Even Sony Pictures? Open Season, Surf's Up, Spiderman: Into the Spiderverse, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, SMurfs, Hotel Transylvania, Over the Moon, The Angry Birds Movie, Sea Beast? Sony Pictures Imageworks is based in Canada. They're doing all the animation for them. It's not animated in America, it's merely funded by them.

I should also clarify: I only want to participate in stylized animated media. I don't want to do CGI for hyper-realistic films, which eliminates most of the animation jobs out there these days. It's just not my thing. The insane amount of details and uncanny valley are just so unappealing, I can't do it.

The closest animation studios are still far away. Most companies are located in LA. I'm over 7+ hours away from there. LA also has a high poverty rate, terrible air quality, is overcrowded, and is just generally not a good place to live, especially if you're low middle class. You're not gonna survive there.

Pixar is located in Emeryville, a few minutes north of San Fransisco city. Emeryville is the most crime-ridden city in that area. They tell you not to walk home alone at night. You're more likely to get robbed there than anywhere else according to the population ratio there. There are a lot of gangs that hide up there, and there's a lot of poverty there, even outside of San Fransisco. It's basically a trash pit. Not an ideal place to live, and commuting through 3-hour SF city traffic is also not gonna work. (X)

I have also been informed some people who work at Pixar are petty that the interns use their facility. Pixar has a heated pool, soccer field, gymnasium, and a few other nice things on their property. I was informed there was a person or two who got mad that an intern was using their basketball court.... when the intern was on break. As though they weren't part of Pixar, as though they had no right to touch the property. Apparently, they also used to make the interns push around little tea carts to serve refreshments as a way to "talk to the fellow animators" to probably get them interacting, but hearing that the interns were basically chored with butler duty to bother the animators hard at work seems like such a forced thing. That makes me uncomfortable. Of course, the person who told me these stories has been working with Pixar for over a decade or two now, so things could be very different as the years went on. Pixar itself on the inside of the animator building is gorgeous. They all decorate their office spaces in crazy ways, it looks like a movie set. But they have a bar and "whiskey club". They're apparently allowed to drink at work and have often had parties that got a little out of hand. There's also an old chain smoker room where the founders used to play poker and spy on people outside of their room with hidden cameras; I've even been inside. I don't think they use it anymore, though I'm not totally sure. Some of this info was fascinating, but the drinking made me uncomfortable. I kinda want to work with sober people here.

The sex ratio in the animation industry is also interesting and unfavorable. 70% of the animation and art school ratio is women, but only 34% of the actual animation workforce is women. 34% female to 66% male. More women study animation than men, but more men get hired and hold positions than women. Animation, ironically, has always been a male-dominated workplace. This unfortunately contributes to the "you have to know someone" or "be rich" to get-in situation. Men know a lot more men and not as many women. So the 30 to 40-year-old guys hire the other guys they know rather than a young poor girl with a passion. This makes it even more difficult for me to get in. (X)

20th Century, Netflix Animation, Nickelodeon, Cartoon Network, Bento Box, Vanguard Animation, Universal Studios, Titmouse, 6 Point Harness, ShadowMachine- all LA / South California.

There are a few places I could apply to, but what they do, I just don't care for. Niantic(Pokemon Go), Lucasfilm(Effects), Whiteboard Animation(Marketing), Sharpeyeanimation (Marketing), EA games (Mass Effect, Battlefield, Dragon Age 2, all those hyper-realistic war, sports, or fantasy games.)

So whether it's outside of the USA or within the USA, I need to move. I don't have the money for that yet.

Just find a company that does remote work, right? It should be easy, especially in pandemic times! Wrong. Most animation companies don't permit remote work. It's probably a security issue. But I've done research on this. The only big animation company I've found (so far) that allows remote work (or is HIRING for remote work) is Mainframe Studios in Canada. They have a 3D animation job list, and I guess they focus on animating Barbie movies(???). (X) But that's about it. And even if you're a remote worker, there's a high likely hood you still need a Visa to be allowed to work for a company belonging to another country. So that's a whole other legal process to deal with.

Disney is becoming a huge corporate monopoly over American animation. They bought Blue Sky only to kill them off. (Disney also just recently laid off 7,000 people due to their stock price drop and failed movies they released the past year with deliberately bad marketing for political reasons. (X) Disney also bought Pixar and is pushing for sequels because weird or bad, sequels and terrible live actions make them a LOT of money. Did you know Disney's terrible Lion King CGI remake is amongst the top 10 highest-grossing movies ever made? It's criminal. (X)

Because Disney is such a big name in the USA, there's a huge association of animation = children's media, which is not true. Animation at the Oscars also has its own category, when it's not a genre, is a medium. Disney often wins at the Oscars too because no one sees the other animations. Granted, Disney has an insane marketing budget in comparison, but it's clear no one cares to seek out animation outside of heavy CGI live-action these days. No small-time studios, no limited releases, no anime. The fact that Disney also now OWNS the Oscars is SUS as hell. (The fact that Disney-owned ABC threatened the Oscars, forcing them to cut 8 categories or else there wouldn't be a show that year is wild. There isn't even an oscar for stuntmen. What the fuck, Hollywood?) (X)

Dreamworks nearly went bankrupt and sold itself to Comcast back in 2013. Comcast also owns Illumination. Dreamworks has been focusing on making bad tv show adaptions of their IPs. So yes people, Jack would sooner meet the Minions than meet Elsa. Disney is the biggest corporate monopoly, but it's definitely not the only one. The animation industry in America is snuffing out its competition by buying it out for itself. It's insane the kind of power they have.

Competition is HIGH. Because of this, the only ways to get in? If you're rich or you know someone. Pixar gets over 3,000 intern applications every summer. Less than 100 are seen by actual hiring managers. The most interns Pixar has ever taken in a single year were 12. The least they ever took in a single year was two. A 12 to 3,000 ratio is not favorable. That's a 3% chance to get into a big-shot animation company.

And again, because remote work isn't permissible to new hires, you need to live in the area to commute to the campuses. This is one of the reasons why LA is so crowded.

If you get into an animation company purely remote and maybe even for a different country? You are the luckiest person alive.

Programs are expensive. The animation industry is very strict on what programs they use. The industry standard for 2D puppetry is Toon Boom Harmony; the industry standard for 3D animation is Maya, and the industry standard for video game development isn't as clear but Unity is one of them.

Some of these programs are free, as long as you are a student. If you are attending college or a certain online program, you can use your school-issued email through them to apply to get the program for free for about a year. Otherwise, if you're using it to make your own animations solo?

Autodesk Maya: $225 a month or $1,785 a year (X)

and guess what? Maya removed its free render service. Arnold is now built in by default, however, if you want to BATCH render (Meaning render a full scene or several slides) it will slap it's ugly watermark over it.

Fun fact, this very rendered watermark can be seen accidentally in a single frame for the Kingdom Hearts Frozen cutscene

Well, you need to batch render if you're trying to animate so let's see what Arnold costs- $50 monthly to $380 annually.... are you kidding me?! The rendering PLUG-IN BUNDLED TO MAYA COSTS MORE TO USE THAN THE OWN PROGRAM?! (X)

Now, there are other rendering plug-ins you can probably use with Maya. But they all have their ups and downs and their own costs as well. (X) Pixar's Renderman is $595 per license. I can't seem to get info on Octane. V-ray solo is $39 monthly while premium is around $60 monthly.

Now there IS Blender, an alternative to Maya. It is free and I have it. That is ideal to work in for people like me. I tried it a while back, but I hated the interface windows. It was hard to work on it when you can't close them properly. It's possible they've fixed this in an update, but I haven't touched the program in over three years so I wouldn't know. It's different from Maya a little, so it has ups and downs in comparison too. But Blender is a savior to 3D artists everywhere.

Toon Boom Harmony isn't as bad but still high: Lowest price is $27 monthly / $220 annual and the highest is $124 monthly / $1,100 annual (X)

Unity has a basic version that is free, but Unity Plus is $399 yearly while Unity Pro is $2,040 (X)

So some programs are clearly more viable than others. But imagine you're trying to model, texture, rig, animate, simulate, and render a short film all by yourself in Maya. That's gonna take you over a year or two, and you'll have several thousand dollars out of your pocket by the time your free trial ends. And might I say, for an industry-standard program, Maya sucks. It's almost unusable without those plug-ins for not only rendering but also for the models to even be able to SELECT their BONE rigs.

Do you want to practice on your own when school is out of session? Fuck you! Fuck subscription services! Welcome to capitalist hell, baby!

Again, using Blender is more viable, but you're still going to be basically doing everything yourself. That's gonna take years. Do you have the patience for that? Do I?

Because of the pandemic, movies aren't even hitting theaters anymore. They're going straight to streaming services. Streaming services of which, gain sole rights to and can take media off their platforms at any time without warning. Thanks, Discovery+ ! Does everyone remember the HBO Max Animation & DC purge? It could happen to other streaming services too. Piracy will save the future of animation at this point. (X)

And again, Streaming services like Netflix will purchase films and claim they made them by slapping their logo over it; but no, they either bought the distribution rights or produced them through funding and maybe storyboarding. Often times from a Canadian film studio. (Link again X)

Even stop motion companies like LAIKA are losing money and may have to shut down or be bought out in the future, especially considering how much work and money they put into their films vs. how much money they actually make. (X)

All of this? Naturally made me fall into a depression. My god, the layers of hopelessness. My animation and modeling is pretty average too. I'm decent. I can maybe make a good shot. But I can't blow people away like James Baxter can. I mean, I shouldn't compare myself to people. If I worked really hard, maybe I could get into a good company. But again, I have to move! A part of me gave up. I don't really do 3D animation anymore, though part of me misses it.

I still 2D animate. I'm trying to make a short film and though my college friends who were working on it with me have given up, I have done my best to keep going. Even if it has been produced at a snail's pace for the past three years, I still intend to finish this animation. It's gonna be beautiful when it comes out, and it will be a wonderful portfolio piece regardless.

So with nothing else to do and no other kind of job experience really under my belt(plus my family is prone to covid so getting a job in the pandemic was just kind of out of the question) I decided to go to youtube. I heard some people can make a little money on there, but the truth is I had actually wanted to become a youtuber for a few years prior. I've always looked up to animators and reviewers on youtube, I've loved the stories they tell and their incredibly detailed analysis essays on movies, tv series, books, etc. I wanted to be one of them. I wasn't sure exactly what I'd do, so I just followed the Youtube Partnership program set up which took a few months, and then jumped in! I found I only had the time to upload once every month or two. I had a ton of audio issues and I'm not outputting at the proper 1920 x 1080 quality that I should be doing either. It's a huge learning process that I still haven't perfected, but I'm taking notes to try and get better.

Even though Youtube is fun, I only make $300 a month, and that isn't even consistent. With patreon, I make maybe another $80 or $100 on top of that, so overall $400 a month average. That's really nice and pretty cool! But it's not enough to survive.

Now I work part-time at a coffee shop. My mental health is a lot better and I love my coworkers. I make roughly $400 a week in comparison to the $400 a month. It's still not enough to live off of (the cheapest rent around is over $1,000 a month, not ) and it's still a temporary job in the long run. I intend to work here for maybe another two years to save up money.

But what do I do now?

Am I welcome in animation spaces anymore?

As a critic of popular media, it could be likely that they could fire me or deny my application because of my critique of their past films or tv series. They could see my youtube persona and assume I'm a raging untrustworthy nitpick instead of a passionate, kind person.

Vivziepop's Spindlehorse company? What Viv was doing was a dream. I was so inspired by her. She made her own company, made a super successful pilot, and was even creating more jobs for traditional, high-quality animation. However, for Hazbin Hotel, she required more funding, which is why she sold it off to A24, who now has corporate say in the show. A24 is known for letting creators be more lenient, but otherwise, Viv won't have full control over it anymore unless she managed to get them to sign something over to her; but with the rumors of her being kicked off season 1? I don't know anymore.

Her own company Spindlehorse; they rely on youtube revenue and/or merch sales to fund Helluva Boss. That's a tricky business practice, but it's kept them afloat so far.

However, Spindlehorse is hiring a lot of people as of late. This could be a bad sign; that people might be leaving the company due to potential mistreatment or unhappiness. With the way the show is going, I don't really want to be part of that company regardless, but maybe before season 2 of Helluva Boss, I would have considered applying. Had I made any critique videos prior, there's no way they'd accept me. "Aren't you that one YouTuber that said my writing is bad for season 2 episode 2?" And you expect me to hire you?" Like yeah, that application process would go down well. Not. By critiquing artists' work, some of them are very sensitive. I'd be kicked out for a lot of things, when really, we artists should be critiquing each other all the time, trying to improve. That's how the writer's room always is, ahaha... hours of fighting goes down in those meetings. It's intense, but fun.

But yeah, it's such a shame. Even small companies need to sell out to corporate to survive. Either that or be HEAVILY crowd-funded, which again, can be a slippery slope.

I see a ton of small projects on Twitter looking to hire people, or looking to become a big studio to release a pilot or game. I've joined a few of them, but most are unpaid because of COURSE they are, and then these projects?? Just don't go anywhere. Because it's unpaid. Because we can't afford to work on a project for free. IRL comes first. Some of these projects seem so great but they don't go anywhere, and it's hard to have faith in start-up studios anymore. (Game creators might have a chance, but tv series or films? Good luck, folks.)

At that point, should I just make my own company? I don't have the money or knowledge for such a thing! It's insanely expensive to start a business and get licensing. So much paperwork, so much everything! And the USA Government is so behind in understanding technology. If you want to create a remote business and/or copyright something, you're still required to put an advertisement in a local newspaper about it, even if your business isn't selling to locals. 💀 The number of fees and ridiculous legal hoops you need to jump through... it's a ridiculous waste of time and money. But you need to do it. The question is, am I willing to do it? Am I willing to tackle such an insane thing by myself?

I want to keep my internet persona and IRL persona separate, but can I? I value having a private, quieter life away from the screen. I worry about getting doxxed one day because of the nature of the internet. I worry about people finding my IRL resumes or profiles for work I want to do outside of youtube for security's sake. My art style is unique and very recognizable. I don't have a lot of private art that is worthy of being in a portfolio. But for absolute safety, I'd need to password-protect my websites or portfolios so the public doesn't have free access to them; only companies I'm applying to. But at that point, does password-protecting my resume and portfolio make it less likely I'd be hired due to the inconvenience? Due to the private, hard-to-find nature of my work? Being a YouTuber with great story skills and art skills with a fanbase could be a big plus to getting hired somewhere, but it could also be a horrible disadvantage that would get me fired. It's a double-edged sword that I cannot work around and I don't know what to do.

I've considered the video game industry, but even that isn't ideal. A lot of the indie ones I adore aren't made in the USA. Gris and Monster Camp were made in Spain. Ori and the Blind Forest: Austria. Hollow Knight: Australia. Little Nightmares and Raft: Sweden. LIMBO & INSIDE: Denmark. Outlast, Don't Starve, Spirit Farer, Bendy and the Ink Machine: Canada.

SuperGiant Games did Hades, Transistor and Bastion and is located in SF, but they're not hiring. Janimation, a multi-media company located in Texas isn't hiring. Frederator in New York isn't hiring.

I don't want to work for a studio that does nothing but first-person shooters or sports games. If I want to get into the gaming industry, I probably need to crowdfund and make a company to make a game myself.

If I make my own game, which I've wanted to do for a long time now and still want to... I can't code. I guess I could try to hire someone that could? But a game to the extent I want... I'd need to start small. I'd need to practice. It's several years of work. Will it even be worth it? I don't think I can do it alone. I'd need crowdfunding and workers; which again, here comes the "make my own studio" issue...

Do I even want to animate anymore? I prefer traditional animation in comparison to puppetry. I prefer 2D animation to 3D animation simply because it is more accessible. But even then, I'm finding myself drawn more and more to writing, storyboarding, and character design. If I were a 3D animator, this is mostly what I'd be working with all day: Naked models in an empty room. I'd do none of the physics simulation or texturing or lighting.

Animating naked & bald people all day... I don't know... 3D Animation kind of lost its appeal. You only work on such a small portion of a film, you almost never have the bigger picture. You won't see the final result until the film is done. As an animator, you're almost kept in the dark. Maybe that's how they want it anyway, since leaks are a huge issue they keep quiet under strict NDA.

But yeah, anyway... I'm an artistic digital generalist. I can do almost anything. 3D animation, storyboarding, writing, photo editing, illustration, rendering, modeling and so much more. It's hard to choose what you really want to be in this industry. I feel like Barry Benson dfklgjdflkjg

I don't know what I'm gonna do anymore. There's gotta be a solution to this but I just can't figure it out. I don't want to give up my youtube channel so I can be an animator. I don't want to give up a safer, quiet countryside house to be able to survive financially. Am I even willing or able to move countries? Is my career more important than friends and family?

I think I'm thinking too much about everything. I should start small. Move less than an hour away first and move in with roommates to get a feel for independence instead of jumping into it immediately. Get a job at a small time company, maybe not for what I want at first, but it'll get me some experience and maybe I'll learn some things along the way to understand where I can go next. Take it slow and don't panic too much over trying to be a young big shot. Take things one day at a time? That's my current goal, I suppose.

So you know... to answer your question... why did I switch to youtube for a current career? Because of a classic existential & career crisis in my 20s. Will I ever go back to 3D animation? Maybe. Maybe one day.

#ask #personal #3D animation #career #youtube #long post #i should also say because im a fan artist #i dont have a lot of original work to add to a portfolio which is a HUGE issue #Pixar doesnt even want to look at a portfolio if it has copyrighted material #they want to avoid lawsuits if they see material owned by a different company #you need to be so careful what you put in a portfolio #i mean especially if i use my 2D stuff or illustrations #my illustrations especially #animation #the animation industry #CGI #rant

[punkymaysnark]

I don't think there's a greater showcase of how far artists have fallen from the societal ladder than watching everyone embrace AI generated nonsense the moment it gets pushed forward, even in places where posting your art is, I don’t know, the entire point.

#i have an entire rant about how bad i wanted to be an animator growing up #only to watch helplessly as the industry became more and more unfriendly to creatives #how i eventually lost the dream altogether thanks to people inc who are in themselves another rant #now i have no motivation to draw at all #and in comes ai being the new success just to pound the final nail in my coffin #fuck ai #anti ai #fuck you tumblr #hope you crab day idiots are still happy with what you paid for #anti ai art #artists used to be celebrated what the fuck happened

[aniketsanimationblog]

Here is The List of the Money Mafias, Who are trying Much Hard to Destroy Animation Industry as an Artistic Media Industry, as Follows:

1. David Zaslav (CEO, WBD)

2. Bob Iger (CEO, Disney)

3. Brian Robbins (CEO, Nick/Paramount)

4. Thomas Astruc (Creator, Miraculous Ladybug)

All of them are just trying to Destroy the Animation Industry and Making Animation Fan Community even more Toxic!! They are gravitated towards Money over Animation Fandom, who made them to have their positions alongside trusting and respecting them in the first place!!

Just know the fact, if they don't stop what they are doing, then More and More Fan-loved Shows like Star Trek: Prodigy and The Owl House etc. will get Canceled and erased from existence in the near future!! So, Stop giving them the funding, Stop supporting This Miraculous Ladybug/PAW Patrol Duopoly, which is nothing but to biasing you towards them to take your Hard Earned Money in exchange of those Merch and Toys, and Start Supporting Great Deserving Animated Shows, before it's too late!! Because these Money Mafias aren't Your Friends!! They don't give a Damn About You!! And just Stop trusting them for God's sake, if you have some sense and if you truly love Animation as an Artistic Medium and great storytelling through Great Animation!!

At last I will say,

TRUST is Infinity Times Bigger and Greater than Money!!

Keep Supporting and Trusting These Money Mafias, Keep Destroying The Animation as an Artistic Media!! As Simple as That!!

Animation industry won't change until you stop supporting these Corporate CEOs and Money-Hungry and Egoistic Showrunners!! Boycott them immediately!! They are not Good Person at all, they don't care about you, they aren't your Best Friends/Pals/Buddies!!

Support Great Artists, Support Great Creators, Support High Quality and Well-Told Stories and Animation!!

Until then, It's Me, Aniket Dhar!!

Peace Out!!

#AnimationIsForEveryone #LiveLongAnimation

#star trek prodigy #star trek #animation #nickelodeon #animation fans #animation fandom #animated kids show #television #save star trek prodigy #animation media #animation industry #animated series #animation industry is in ruins #animation industry rant #stop supporting these Money Mafias #animation is for everyone #live long animation

[ask-artsy-oncie]

I've said it before and I'll say it again - Disney TVA isn't a good avenue for story-based shows because it doesn't care about good storytelling. Telling a quality story isn't the network's goal, so they clash with this genre of show way more often than not.

Like, there's a reason why episodic, slice-of-life shows tend to last so long on their channels and also usually exist with much less controversy - when you're working with the smallest snippets of story that executives can demand you drop if they're not "safe" or "consistent with the brand", all without really impacting an over-arching plot, you gain a lot more staying power than a show where leaking a single episode, or "accidentally" airing episodes out of order, or rushing the ending due to sudden cancelation can actually ruin the viewing experience.

When you get a company that offers you a "choice" between a season 3 or a movie, a company that carelessly leaks information, a company that cancels you when you need more screen time to wrap up certain plot points properly, you suffocate your showrunner and your crew when they're just trying to make it all work. Gravity Falls, Ducktales, Amphibia, and The Owl House were ALL victims of this network's shitty practices (Star VS was its own can of worms, that I don't feel escaped these practices but also had other problems that affected it more, especially since it very miraculously got more screen time than any of the other shows mentioned) and their stories suffered for it at various points of the shows' airing.

I have said this - SO MANY TIMES to the Ducktales fandom specifically lol - but when you decide to engage with a story-based DTVA series, you're very, VERY likely going to have to meter your expectations just solely due to it being produced by Disney. Because Disney has now a long history of mistreating and mishandling its story-based shows. Now that The Owl House has ended and people are talking about this again, I want to spread that reminder around, again:

It's okay to criticize these shows and their ability to tell a story properly, but PLEASE try to understand the context and working conditions the crew was under when they were making it, when you're drafting your criticism. A lot, and I mean a LOT, of the problems people complain about the most (and often blame the crew for) are issues that none of them had control over, or were simply doing their best to work around whenever Disney steps in to fuck things up. If you're going to engage with public criticism, or, more worryingly, engage with the crew on social media, I cannot emphasize enough how important it is to understand how the behind-the-scenes of the show operated.

It just genuinely boggles my mind sometimes - we live in an era where people working in the Television Animation Industry have more of a voice than they EVER had, to detail the issues and constraints networks have dealt to them. Social media has allowed so much mistreatment and mishandling of crews and shows to come to light. And yet!!! So many people are given this avenue of understanding!! And they don't!!!!! Listen!!!!!!! And instead they use it to yell at showrunners and crewmembers.

I'm begging y'alls to at least develop some pattern recognition with this godforsaken network. Please do that at least.

#Long post #Rant #Vent #I'm not even sure if I should tag this as any show lol #Disney #There I'll do that lol #It's so frustrating when a story-based animated show gets popular #And then the story or general quality suffers because of REALLY TEXTBOOK NETWORK MISTREATMENT #But like because no one bothers to learn about the industry they just blame the crew #I'm so tired of it #SU was also 100% a victim of this. Just not in the same way. #Since CN has its own fucken issues and history of practices. #It's a mess. It's a mess. Why was I cursed with a brain hard-wired for animation. #I could have had a brain hard-wired for a better industry.

[professorcalculusstanaccount]

I just found your blog and I love everything you do! Could you please draw something with Szut? I love this character so much ❤

Thank you so much! Honestly I've been really enjoying returning to tumblr, the best part of posting here is hearing all the incredible feedback. I got pretty excited seeing your message and I wasn't quite sure what to do for Szut, I hope this super quick animation will do!

his design is so cool but also kinda tricky to get right

#asks #fanart #animation #2d animation #tintin #adventures of tintin #gif #piotr skut #captain skut #i love messages and feedback! this blog honestly keeps me energised to continue animating #i graduated in 2020 and only got two animation jobs since lol #there's no proper studio work anymore #the animation industry is looking a lot more like gig work which really sucks #anyway i gotta stop ranting in the tags

[anti-ao3]

saying this makes me look like i hate fun, but oh boy am i tired of seeing everyone on instagram making up "pixar versions" of themselves with AI... it's just uncanny and annoying.

#lotus.txt #ranting #like obviously i don't say anything #but i'm tired of the way ppl use ai in general #it feels disrespectful to the artists they're mimicking #especially when you consider that hollywood wants to use ai and fire writers; actors and ESPECIALLY animators #artists are the biggest victims of the ai industry(?)

[i-bring-crack]

Alright yeah fuck it. If you dont have characters that will be beloved by the people who read it then the stories dont last long in a fandom or sometimes even have an impact on people. Fuck the premise fuck the storyline fuck your worldbuilding becuase Ive seen so many, MANY, stories that are great have no one else to talk about simply because the characters were either too little screentime or none at all to be explored.

And now more than ever more people will define their liking of a story to whenever or not the characters are solid on their own instead of everything else. Its why much of the retellings or the same genre tropes are played out over and over again instead of new things compromising around the same idea.

And its not bad, but its also dumb for someone to go ahead and call another work of art, of whatever kind but im mostly talking about stories here, as a 'lesser work' simply because theres no characters that fit into neat molds or are hot and you can quickly get attached to, completely ignoring everything else about what it is and just deciding everyone who likes it has horrible tastes.

#rant #another personal rant oh boi #but honestly ive been looking at this obbession with fandoms lately. and even im the culprit of it. #where now a story is less defined by its content and instead defined by tropes #and its most consistent on characters as if you have to fit all of them into molds and let your characters be the best versions ever becaus #it will attract more people to come over and ship your works or have enough attraction to these characters that will make the readers buy #more of their content. merch. whatever #yeah specially in anime #and so specifically in isekai to the point where the character only needs to be physiscally attractive--- #but im getting out of the point #the thing is that so much art in general has been constantly linked to having this parasocial relationships with the ones who interact with #it that to some extent its fine but to the worst its litterally chaining people to spend away their lives and profits for something thats #just art. #i really dont know how to explain this to you without going over the basics of blah blah capitalism and the entretainment industry and #people linking their traumas and using parasocial relationships as coping mechanisms for their miserable lives and thats why so many #character driven stories sell so well nowadays. #without so so fucking much needed to be told but I just think it needs to be talked about at some point. #and to be clear again im also one of the people who IS stuck with those parasocial relationships #but ive seen worse and im genuenlly scare of what that could possibly meant for the future

[bobokitty]

wait till ya see the next few gundam shows coming out. It is clear bandai isn't a fan of G Witch and its success. And no, us Gundam veterans are not looking forward to the next 3 shows.

Honestly, all the love and respect for the G Witch team. I hope the sales are good because the animation industry is a tough one. There's a lot of behind the scenes bullshit that happens, ESPECIALLY for any show that tries to break the norm (such as having openly queer characters). It's a constant uphill battle that is fueled by people's passion to push through.

#answer #gundam #g witch #I've only been in the industry for less than two years #and I've seen so much behind the scenes bullshit #what you often see is the end result of teams being dealt crappy hands and doing the best they can #each country also has it's own layers of crap as well #i can easily go on a rant about it all #because animation is such a passion job #it's not something you go into for money or fame aha