Current Events > Why do modern cartoons look so bad?

(+) Yeah! (+)

Now, you will probably immediately recognize that I suck with words and explaining this, but I think this is a somewhat valid concern.

I feel like so many cartoons (western, at least) just look the same nowadays. They all seem to have the same uninspired, lazy art style.

I guess it's because most of them are made on the computer? Not saying good art can't be made on a computer, but perhaps it provides too many shortcuts or whatever to just slap something together?

I feel like animation should be a way to make visually unique ways of telling a story since the possibilities are endless, but instead the majority of cartoons just use the same lazy, copy/paste art style as everyone else and it makes me irrationally upset.

Can someone who isn't a dum dum like me shed some light on this topic, please? Thank you!
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I remember there being a gif related to this, maybe it's to cut costs or help make animation more fluid
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No more hand-drawn animation, just computer made

and a lot of it, especially in the last decade or so, looks like it was made in Flash
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Agreed. A lot of cartoons cut costs in animation. But there are a few exceptions like Gumball and Miraculous, though those two could be argued as cheating since they make heavy use of 3D CG. Nevertheless, they look great.
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mlp:fim is gorgeous. and the shatner episode was fucking nuts.
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I was flipping through the channels on cable in one of the rare times that I was at a TV with cable. None of the cartoons I saw had a style thay stood out or seemed visually interesting. The art styles just look so lame. I miss stuff like this:




The animation seems a lot faster too than in previous decades, like the pacing is different.
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Gumball does have a unique art style that sets it apart from most cartoons. Never heard of Miraculous.

Never watched My Little Pony. It does seem kinda like an old new grounds flash cartoon style, but the pony designs are unique. Again, never actually watched though.
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Adventure Time, Steven Universe, Gravity Falls...
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Vol2tex posted...

I was flipping through the channels on cable in one of the rare times that I was at a TV with cable. None of the cartoons I saw had a style thay stood out or seemed visually interesting. The art styles just look so lame. I miss stuff like this:




The animation seems a lot faster too than in previous decades, like the pacing is different.

Yes exactly.
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They don't.
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nikko004 posted...

Agreed. A lot of cartoons cut costs in animation. But there are a few exceptions like Gumball and Miraculous, though those two could be argued as cheating since they make heavy use of 3D CG. Nevertheless, they look great.

Two of my fav cartoons <3
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Cutting costs and abuse of CGI. Traditional animation just looks better, but it's expensive and labor intensive.

Pretty much everything these days suck in comparison to a few decades ago, be it animation, music, even videogames.
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SageHarpuia posted...

Pretty much everything these days suck in comparison to a few decades ago, be it animation, music, even videogames.

I'd personally disagree. I think that is just nostalgia kicking in. Video games tend to be a lot less obtuse and indie gaming has created a bevy of new genres and ideas that have been really well received. I will agree with animation, though, at least for the west, because of the emphasis on cheap, CGI over traditional animation. I don't really know about any other places animation, though.

I also feel like a lot of them just look super flat? Hard to explain considering I'm talking about 2D art lol
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It's not just Western.

Dragonball Z is 20 years old, and most episodes have excellent animation qualities, and some have shitty animation qualities. Back then it all depended on the artist, as there were 3 artists in rotation, one being really good, another being fairly good, and the third being just god-awful.

I bring up DBZ, because currently Dragonball Super is new, and still in production as it airs. DBSuper has really good animation and literally some of the worst the franchise has ever seen. But unlike Z where it varied every couple of episodes (one animator would do sometimes 2-3 in a row), Super can change one minute at a time. It's insane really.

After seeing the newest movies (Battle of the Gods, and Ressurection of Frieza) and how excellent the animation was in those movies, I thought we'd be in for a huge treat, but god damn was I wrong.

As far as western shit goes though, I think you're right. Styles are fairly similar, especially when it's computer generated art (cgi), but I don't know the reasoning behind it.

I know the reason for DBZ and DBSuper being the way they are has to do with Akira himself not actually drawing the characters. There are new artists that try to imitate his style, and create their own stuff using his influence as a direction to go in.

Look up Supers bad animation comparisons. You guys would literally shit your pants. It's funny, but sad at the same time. Such potential is bein wasted with the series. Especially the beginning couple of sagas. It's gotten better, but still has terribad moments.
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N3xtG3nGam3r posted...

It's not just Western.

Dragonball Z is 20 years old, and most episodes have excellent animation qualities, and some have shitty animation qualities. Back then it all depended on the artist, as there were 3 artists in rotation, one being really good, another being fairly good, and the third being just god-awful.

I bring up DBZ, because currently Dragonball Super is new, and still in production as it airs. DBSuper has really good animation and literally some of the worst the franchise has ever seen. But unlike Z where it varied every couple of episodes (one animator would do sometimes 2-3 in a row), Super can change one minute at a time. It's insane really.

After seeing the newest movies (Battle of the Gods, and Ressurection of Frieza) and how excellent the animation was in those movies, I thought we'd be in for a huge treat, but god damn was I wrong.

As far as western shit goes though, I think you're right. Styles are fairly similar, especially when it's computer generated art (cgi), but I don't know the reasoning behind it.

I know the reason for DBZ and DBSuper being the way they are has to do with Akira himself not actually drawing the characters. There are new artists that try to imitate his style, and create their own stuff using his influence as a direction to go in.

Look up Supers bad animation comparisons. You guys would literally shit your pants. It's funny, but sad at the same time. Such potential is bein wasted with the series. Especially the beginning couple of sagas. It's gotten better, but still has terribad moments.

tbh, super has the lowest lows (RoF, eps 5,45,62,76,33), and the highest highs (57, 39, 44, 47, 11,13,1,2,66,75, many eps in the current arc), but yeah, it is very inconsistent
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Mine Fujiko is the best modern animation of the past decade I can recall, so good it made me stop watching modern anime since it grossly sucks in comparison
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SageHarpuia posted...

Pretty much everything these days suck in comparison to a few decades ago, be it animation, music, even videogames.

It's because of vector graphics.

That "flash game" look is because flash games were early adopters of vector graphics for real-time purposes like animation and games. This is also why nobile games look like flash games.

Vector graphics have the advantage of being scalable. It's essentially necessary in today's world where viewers will be using resolutions anywhere from SD to 4k. As such, you'll notice that outlines and detail lines also get thicker as the image zooms. What you perceive as a lack of detail is a result of scaling and also a limitation of the format's design concept that doesn't allow pixel-level detail. Some vector graphics look amazingly detailed, but this is accomplished through lines instead of pixels.
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bump
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