Full 2D animation

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IWannaGoHome

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I recently saw that Family Guy episode where Stewie and Brian enter a Disney inspired universe, and i was just drooling over the animation in the sequence. In fact, i was almost to distracted by the animation to even notice the jokes, at least upon first viewing.

However, that sequence made me ponder a bit over how rare full (2D) animation is these days. Of course i, like everyone else here, already knew more than well that it's rare, but i think it was only then that i realized just how utterly unbelievably rare it is. I tried to think of all the times when full animation has been produced in America (im not all that familiar with modern-day animation in other countries, to be honest) since Disney's Cow Gang came out in 2004, and the only instances i could think of were in movies and TV shows that needed to use full animation only because it was referencing older Disney. Namely these instances:

1 Disney's direct to video/DVD sequels to their classic films, which of course needs to be drawn in the same style as the movies they are based on

2 The animated sequences in Enchanted, which were intended to parody classic Disney

3 And of course, the aforementioned Family Guy sequence, which used it for the same reason as Enchanted

Can you guys think of any other works that have used full animation in the last five years or so? Or is it really that nobody these days uses full animation for any other reason that to make a connection to old-school Disney, that nobody uses it simply for... well, for the sake of using it? For the sake of it being a beautiful art form?

Of course, Disney themselves are going to give the technique a new try in The Princess and the Frog. But even then, the stated purpose of using it is to try to make the film similar to Disney's older classics. And while it is of course fantastic that they are doing that, i think that unless other companies are eventually going to return to the technique as well, full animation is probably going to remain more or less a lost art form.
 
I've always been a teeny bit fuzzy on exactly where the distinction between full and limited animation is - Snow White is full animation and The Flinstones is limited I get that, but how about - say - the Ghibli films? They have a noticably lower framerate than Disney films, but in every other respect they're full animation.

If Ghibli films use full animation, then I'd point to Avatar as an example of full 2D American animation. Er, except for the outsourcing...
 
Yeah, 2-D animation seems mostly dead. It's too bad, because it can still make some great looking animation. I actually prefer a traditionally animated show to a CGI one.

Maybe The Princess and the Frog will bring 2-D back to the mainstream. We can only hope.
 
The only fully-animated TV show airing right now that I can think of Superjail (which while animated in Flash, is drawn individually, frame-by-frame). The rest are just small segments, short films, and commercials. The reason why full animation isn't used as much anymore is because no one can afford to. Making full animation takes a lot of time and money (for example, that 2-minute FG sequence took as much time and money to produce as a regualr 22-minute FG episode, according to one of the people who worked on the segment), something that small studios don't have. Another factor is that back then, full animation was the only alternative. They didn't have outsourcing or computer programs like Flash back in the 1930s.
 
To be honest, im not exactly sure either were the distinction goes between full and limited animation. Maybe there is no absolute definition of either?

However, i do know that anime works almost per definition is included in the limited animation category (due to the low frame rate, which is practically a defining trait of anime). So with that in mind, Avatar would be placed in the same category, since that show more or less is anime, only produced in America.
 
Eh, I don't care really.

To me Tiana just looks like she belongs in Lilo and Stitch and the frog reminds me of Sebastian. If Disney truly wants to start a new 2D era, they need to put everything they've got in it and not make some half-butt attempt. I mean, the movie looks very good but can't we see something aside from gagging crocks?
 
Have you actually seen Miyazaki's films? Those aren't anywhere close to "limited" in terms of movement.

Full animation has always been rare on television, simply because it's not practical with a TV budget. Superjail manages to do it because it's got very loose artwork that doesn't really have to stay in-line with the character models.
 
I did notice that a lot of cereal commercials did have fluid animation, and I thought that was kind of weird how the only things carrying on the tradition were ads.

@rattis1
I believe full animation is where the entire character's body moves pretty much all the time, so when they speak they constantly change poses when standing still. Limited is where characters often only move one or two parts of their body at a time. Anime may have more fluid action sequences, but the way the characters mouths are animated makes dialogue generally look pretty limited. (these aren't dictionary definitions though)

I would say that on television Samurai Jack and Tartakovsky's vastly superior original Clone Wars series had some fairly fluid action sequences, however, plenty of those scenes were simply limited animation that was so well done that it pushed the boundaries of what it looked like so that it seemed like full animation to anyone watching it. There were a few rare instances though where the swordfights were completely fluid.
 
All I am able to find on the web are the flashy shots I was talking about. Most of the time, it is limited. Action scenes like I have stated are not so limited.
 
When it comes to animation in Japan, you should always compare television animation with what's used in movies. The animation is less limited in comparison.
So far, Katsuhiro Otomo's animation is the most "full" 2D animation I've ever seen come from Japan.



Yep, that's pretty much it.
 
Which is why I pointed to Ghibli as a grey area in the first place. Framerate-wise it's a little lower than Disney's work, but it's still higher than some other cartoons I could name. If we were to put these things onto a slider chart, then Spirited Away would be closer to The Little Mermaid than to (say) Astro Boy.

And can you please stop inflicting that video on us?
 
You really should check out theses scenes then. They're subtle scenes but there is always some movement in each (Especially the tree growing scene).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KWMEBbkxsq8

In terms of shows with "full" animation that have come out other than Avatar or Superjail! in the past 5 years, I can only think of a couple: Chowder, Mighty B, and the new Batman Series (Brave And The Bold). I'm not sure exactly what you mean by "full", so I picked some shows with some fluid animations given off by the characters.

I can recall some full length movies too, but I'm not sure if you're asking for films produced in North America or if asking if there were any at all.
 
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