I’m really tired of people trying to “fix” anime scenes by making the 60FPS. If you think making the frame rate higher is improving the animation, you don’t know how to improve animation to begin with.
Again, it's a matter of application. MANY anime scenes purposefully break the rules of animation to give an extra OOMF to a scene. AI 60 fps interpolations do help in production and can be selectively not used during scenes for purposeful artistic punch.
As well as the game Guilty Gear, where they also dropped interpolation and mixed the framerates to get an anime feel in a 3d game. And in the opposite side of things, there is an appropriate use of using ai inbetweens to make something smoother, when it is within the artist's intention. For example, there are slowmo shots in some emotional parts of episodes in Demon Slayer, where they actually used artificially created inbetweens to sell the effect more than it already was. the shots would have looked fine without it, but the extra smoothness gives off a much more lifelike feel to those shots then they could have looked without them or with jittery inbetweens.
@@tutumazibuko2510 Stop-motion isn't "action" or "fast-paced". It was done to save money, nothing more. That's why we have a horrendous 23.97 FPS standard for television programs instead of 59.97 as well. To save money.
It is quite annoying for people to spout frames as being the end all be all for quality animation, especially in regards to anime where the films use a mixture of rates to achieve their look. Spriggan rivals Akira in its number of shooting on 1s, funnily from most of the same staff as Akira. But Akira offers good use of timing and spacing in most areas. Saying "some" sounds like selling it short. The areas in which it does "fall short" (IE the few shots, not scenes, where keys are not many and movement is limited) are the exceptional areas and generally symptomatic of Japanese animation techniques common in even the highest grossing anime films of today, rather than any sort of incompetence from the star studded animation crew. They never particularly stood out to me as they at least felt appropriate for the instances which they happened. With the sheer number of cuts the film has, they get lost in the whole. Similar nitpicks regarding sheer technicality can be made for other greats like Thief and The Cobbler, despite the fact it outclasses its contemporaries and still represents a pinnacle of the medium. Yet, I can't think of many anime films that equal Akira in terms of its movement, it really set a new standard for anime films that many don't even _try_ to reach for. Perhaps Redline, Steamboy, Memories, Spriggan, or a handful of Ghibli films. But even those frequently push movement to the backseat in favor of dialogue done via still lip flaps (in some already dialogue heavy films). You will only find some Western films where movement is beyond Akira, though still the content being animated is generally restricted to character acting and the occasional effects work. I think what makes Akira a pillar of animation, especially now, is the abundance of quality aesthetics, animation, and scale that required a good amount of innovation and experimentation to get right for the final picture. The ambition is insane and I say especially now because I see fewer attempts at reaching this pillar compared to the greats of three decades ago. CGI especially being used as a supplement nowadays for what Akira was doing with minimal computer implementation. Most can reach Akira's level of quality, but on a rather small and mundane scale by comparison, like a drama. Good video regardless, clearing up the difference between animation in the West vs the East for the layman.
You're right, and we should really remenber that such movies are a giant team production, everyone cannot be at the top of his game, and there are junior animator and even interns often on those production. It's really a mix of differents artists at different levels of technicity. That's also why some shots stands out as being a little bit weirder in their timing or just drawings. But it blends it quite well and that's what directors always should try to achieve.
Metropolis anime does have lots of movement and fluidity. People love to say anime sucks compared to American is bc of mouth flaps and lack of movement and saying anime is lazy. They don’t understand that unlike USA where they can draw like 1 million frames for disney animated movies or like for one episode of Rick and Morty is bc Japan studio is not as rich as American one also Japan headline is too tight and they don’t have lots of time to draw many frames unlike Americans.
Also Americans are very fortunate and spoiled bc they media already dominate around the world entertainment from 50’s. Also unlike Japan USA has bigger market and bigger audiences and they tend to earn 100 times more than Japan market
Thank you for making this! Yes, Akira was animated on Ones, but not ONLY on Ones. It uses a tasteful mix of frame rates as needed by the action on screen.
I don’t know how I got here but I’m begging you to make more videos on animation. Animation discussion on UA-cam is pretty niche and isn’t as in-depth as I would like, but you seem to have an extremely good grasp on the subject. This video was excellent and you definitely earned a new sub.
The whole problem with social media these days. Repeating things they hear and repeating it without even being sceptic, questioning if it's a fact or not. Just copy paste. And thinking they are journalists too. Well even journalists nowadays are falling for this easy method. All for money and personal fame. Likes likes likes.
@@mfartsmonkeys2982 No, not at all about this uploader, but all the other 'popular' (tech)reviewers/UA-camrs with their "10 facts about..." styled videos. They are just trying to create a constant flow of videos without real research.
@@wodan74 oh, them too I guess. This uploaded basically did the same thing, I’ve already seen other videos that already debunked this myth with the same reason. However, I do like how he wrote this piece.
Fantastic video of explaining how animation works. As a former computer animator, who also had to studied 2 D animation and how it works, it was amazing to see how Akira was animated at different key frame rates during certain scenes. In addition, if you look at Akira credits. You will see that several different studios worked on it, even American animation studios worked on it too. It was something special that took place at that time.
Thank you. I’ve always thought Akira mostly looked like 2’s. I’m glad I’m not going mad. It’s striking that people who’ll talk up the benefits of the higher frame rate can’t tell the difference
I watched another video on the Akira anime recently which went more in depth to the technical side of things. I still really enjoyed this short video, very well presented.
No way, my jaw actually dropped at 1:03 when you mentioned The Thief and the Cobbler, its one of my favorite movies. I watched it all the time as a kid on VHS, but i never new it was directed by richard williams RIP the goat :(
I'm a filmmaker, not an animator but the 60p fetish in tech and on the internet kills stylistic choice. Most films for example should be shot at 24 it helps create the tone we subconsciously associate with cinema. I know I can tell when someone is shooting at a different frame rate because I spend my whole day in an editing program or on a set outside of youtube. 60 looks great for slowed-down action hell up until about 240p looks great for action(Not sure why you'd need that much but I guess if you do sports yeah). It helps smooth a shot, I use it all the time but I don't use it in my youtube videos because it makes everything look like a soap opera. In tech 60 has become a weird point to put on a box. For example, I'd love to shoot a film on a cellphone. I use a pixel but the pixel line, up till now has dropped 24p in favor of 60p and a weird adaptive frame rate which is fine for the quick social posts but is awful for the creatives they target every year. A technical lead I forget who said "who needs 24p anyway" or something similar like an absolute idiot as if higher frame rate equals better. At least with video games, the 60p makes sense and people claiming otherwise for that medium are excusing flaws. The mediums are each different is what I am saying but the dinguses turning animation 60p with deep learning AI aren't making it smoother nor are they making it "better". there are huge issues with mixing frame rates in NLEs and I doubt an AI can make extra full functioning frames for 60p edits. The tech of it is cool and applications exist, If I can smooth out a clip by using that tech it could save me from a botched shot but animation allows for a great variety of expression and people got to realize that a frame rate says something whether you realize it or not.
Most people like 60 fps just for video games. It's just something that you get used to, most people are used to watching videos in 24 or 30 fps but if you get used to games at 60 fps playing one that limits to 30 can be a jolt. So I don't know about the internets "fetish" for 60 fps but the only times I see it seriously are around game discussions.
@@no_nameyouknow Odd. I play videogames all the time and still find animations put through 60fps to be incredibly jarring still. Though my experience is anecdotal, I find the mechanical movements APLattanzi mentions if present in the 60fps releases. As for FPS DIESEL, I think a benefit to glean from recording 60fps is being able to hand pick specific frames. Albeit it's a backwards process to record and then go back to hand pick everything after, making the work double. But it could offer new avenues.
While I absolutely agree lower and variable frame-rates are fine and a very important style, I think some random videos of amateurs trying to use new AI tech to retroactively turn 24p animations into 60p animations are giving people an unfair prejudice against high frame rates. We are after all comparing a team of professionals with a budget to some guy's hobby twitter post, which closes off our mind to how a team of ambitious professionals could make a 60 fps animation to be absolutely stunning unseen style. Frames are not the only measure of good animation, but to deny the potential having over double the frames could offer is a sort of foolishness. 2D animation and film alike are absolutely being held back by an air of traditionalism and snobbery. The nostalgic ridden obsession to replicate old tones and styles for everything instead of trying something new is in my opinion very counter-productive to art in it's entirety. 60 fps animation gives more freedom for more expression, I understand that you probably won't believe it until you see it, but unfortunately currently no one's brave enough to make it because of the cost and effort, and right now the only thing AI knows how to do is evenly interpolate frames. The subconscious association with cinema is important if that's your style, but the video game industry is in this state of extreme innovation and progression, and it's frankly lapping the stagnant art forms of film and animation. So more and more the future generations will have a strong preference for higher frame rates, being slow to adapt to this culture shift will definitely be a mistake. The videogame industry is already bigger than film. I don't predict or wish for film and animation to be pushed aside, I love both and I think both forms still have a huge place in future cultures, but I just don't see the ambitious innovation that used to be there, there's no more Walt Disney characters trying to push animation to mind-blowing levels of quality, the energy isn't there.
p is short for pixels. FPS is short for frames per second. More frames = higher temporal resolution. It's a more immersive and lifelike experience. Have you ever seen real life footage at 120 fps or more? It makes it seem so real, rather than the distant manufactured feeling of low framerates below that certain smoothness threshold. Great interpolation can also give you a peek into what it can look like, but it's just an approximation. Look at how REAL it makes the actors look: rather than being some pixels on the screen, you can see them as the human being actors they are. It feels like a play right in front of you. I think interpolation is merely a band-aid: they should be filmed natively at least 60, if not 120 FPS.
Great video, thank you for it. As an animator, i hope more people will understand. I noticed how some people have entire YT channels about animation but now nothing about productions and animation techniques, yet they will commentate and say ignorant things. One doesn't need to have worked on cartoons to commentate about animated movies, but when someone doesn't know some realities and wonders about them, it is better to either do some research first, or simply ask your audience about it. Like when YTbers say things such as "How could they not notice this detail?!" (answer is often: THEY DID. At least one person in the production did, but that retake probably never got scheduled, because of either bad leadership/production pipeline, or lack of time) Nice poke at the 60fps bullsh*t at the end. I hate it so much. Even live action movies should not go 48 or 60fps. It looks awful. The reason we stayed on 24/25fps is the same as why animated features are animated a lot on 2s (12fps) (outside for production cost/time) : because IT WORKS. IT LOOKS WELL. No one thinks "something is lacking" while watching it. And since i'm a CG animator, i still feel surprised to see some shots shown in this video that are animated on 3s: it works so well! Not even looking like a TV anime.
“Don’t get me wrong Akiras animation is impressive” oh! Well thank you random UA-camr, glad this marvel of animation has your seal of approval! For if it hadn’t, we’d surely all have never known. You’re not an expert, you’re not anything. Don’t speak with authority, unless you yourself are an animator.
"Only far off in monastic isolation does Richard Williams, the Icaresque Rembrandt of animation, whittle away at the best work being done in the field." This line is so great. As a huge fan of his work- Roger Rabbit having shaped my early love of animation, his book teaching me so much, and the convoluted history of the Thief and the Cobbler providing endless inspiration, fascination, and sorrow - I feel like your one line sums up so much of his work so well.
@@incription No it wont, the problem is that naturally, a lot of information is lost by motion blur and how we focus with our eyes, and thats fine. The 60 and higher fps camp wants to force that info back as a series of pictures taken with a fast shutter camera and it just look bad. To get better then it would need to fake the blur and/or have lots and lots more of frames, and well, we have a cheap nice looking way of doing that.
@@SageX85 The tech they are using for this video tries to smoothly interpolate the video frames, not ideal for animation. Soon a paper will come out that tweaks the model so that it can make animation look smoother without increating the framerate much
@@incription Yeah, something that is called smear frames but is better how it is done today since its done for production, not post-production, butchering the work
This is a great video. Really puts Akira into perspective with other animated features instead of placing it on a pedestal like every other video regarding the film.
90% of what he said In this is factually inaccurate for the record. He’a a fat youtuber, not an animator. Much of what goes into the animating process in japanese film is a tightly guarded secret. To actually know what went into them requires on the job experience and up close observation. Not FPS stats you read on Wikipedia.
This was actually very educational. I always wondered why some scenes looked smoother and now I understand the mechanical need and the aesthetic direction behind these choices. Well done.
I totally rolled my eyes when nerdwriter1 brought out his napkin math of animating on ones. Before that, i was wondering how he can speak on so many topics. From then on, i knew he was speaking out of his behind and i don't think i ever watched anything of his since.
through this lecture you probably presented the best demonstration of variable frame rate in animation that I've seen outside instruction. thank you sir
Honoring Richard Williams! The animation and drawings for "The Prologue" are the major expression of animation as an art made of the highest craft and experience. His passing leaves all of his legacy for the future. Thanks for this expose'!
I feel like this video is perpetuating some of the very confusions you set out to dispel. True, Akira is not shot all on 1s. But conversely it is untrue that a film needs two’s to avoid “taking on a mechanical nature” as you say. Lively animation can happen on a film that’s shot solely on 1s or 2s or 3s. The slower frame rates only require more smear frames to connect larger increments. See LAIKA’s stop motion work for something on 1s that avoids these pitfalls. The conversation shouldn’t be about frame rate at all, only about good key frames and accurate inbetweens, as you mention. Kudos for getting more in depth though!
Exactly. It wasn't explained clearly in the video that there's a difference between the timing of keyframes + inbetweens, and how many individual drawings are actually used. The gold standard of animation being "on ones" means that each frame is a unique drawing, but that only means the movement is very fluid. The video mentions 'looking mechanical', and the rubber hose animation used in the early days of animation, which are both a result of keyframe/inbetween timing -- which is usually the responsibility of the lead animator, and has nothing at all to do with the frame rate or whether it is on ones, twos, or threes. For example, if you evenly space your inbetweens, you can do rubber hose animation at any framerate you want, but it will be smoother on ones.
@@mkocel Akira was never about the story, it was a tech demo, pushing limitations of animation at the time, use of new technologies etc in other words it was a very long 80s OVA as they all did the same, tried to push limitations more and more and more
very much agreed. the essayist seems pretty confident that they know about the craft of animation but steps into a lot of the same traps as the channels it accuses of getting things wrong, speaking in absolutes and making broad statements about animation as a whole for example, every single piece of animation cited as "bad" is, in fact, crafted with care even if the production staff know it's not exactly high brow entertainment. angry birds is about as formulaic and uninteresting as you can imagine but great care and craft went into making those characters move. if you're in a place where you can't see those merits then you're not in a position to make sweeping statements about the animation industry
I don't know, extremely fluid animation can look funny if not used well. Example: He Man. Maybe it's because I used to watch a lot of anime at the time He Man came out, but I always found his extremely fluid run animation kind of unnatural (and a bit silly).
The number of cells in a movie also depends on how many cell layers make up each scene, and indeed each frame. If you just have a single background layer and a character layer then it's going to be a order of magnitude less work than some of Disney's best feature-length 2D animations that pioneered the use of the multi-depth parallax camera shots that could often have like 3, 4, 5, 6 and maybe even more layers. Anyway, regardless of the numbers of frames per second or the cells, Akira is just utterly stunning. I mean, seriously, even to this day I still think it is all round one of the most visually accomplished and consistently beautiful in both look and motion 2D feature-length animations ever created--and it has an underlying idea and plot that lives up to the quality of the animation too.
The main thing this doesnt address is the reason 60fps is that golden number is it is about where the human eye stops being able to see the differences between frames. Its why monitors for a very long time were 60hz.
Thanks for this video. I saw the thumbnail before my most recent viewing, and I recalled it a little later into the movie. Akira definitely has its moments where simple 3s suffice, particularly for moments of less intense dialogue, and while I probably wouldn’t have noticed otherwise, these moments certainly don’t have the same fluidity of the ride scenes.
FINALLY someone lays this to rest. I remember when I first read that 24 fps 'factoid' and being highly confused. You sir are doing excellent work and I urge you to keep it up.
One thing I am trying to get to the bottom of is the aesthetic difference between the Anime of the late 80's and 90's and that of current anime. Some things are obvious, modern anime has a tendency to rely on cheats a little more now as the pressure of more and more content is weighed down on animators, we also have more juvenile character designs today. Also, and most obviously, is the introduction of digital art which seems to make everything bolder, crisper and punchier. But I'm struggling to get to the heart of the difference. 90's anime, like Ghost in the Shell has an animation that feels more...I actually can't put my finger on it. It just has more maturity. Has anyone else felt this? Has anyone been able to explain it?
It could be that in there were styles, like GITS and other Mamoru Oshii films, that emphasized realistic proportions as well as movements and camerawork. But yeah, it's hard to pin down exactly. The cel era was practically a whole other world.
the handrawn cells, have more character to me, it's not just smooth uniform lines on character rigs. The trend nowdays is to go 3d, making it look like 2d .. and boy, does it suck, just compare the new GITS series to the first one, it kinda lost all it's style..also the trend to higher fps makes everything look cheap (soap opera effect)
Digital animation allows for those bolder and punchier colors while animation cells were typically scanned/photographed and no matter how well or refined this process was, it produced those washed out "mature" colors of the old days. There were also some unique tricks such as using light tables and letting the light bleed through to create the illusion of a light source, which is basically impossible to create in digital. But don't worry, there's still beautiful modern animation out there, I highly recommend Avatar and Korra.
Great video. Before I watched this, I tried to watch an Akira in 60FPS video and had to turn it off pretty quickly because I found it unpleasant to watch. Now I know why!
Akira having more cuts shot on 1's isn't necessarily due to budget but the talent the studio sought out to work on it. This is true for all anime. Budget ≠ animation quality
Yes thank you! I'm getting so sick of people underplaying the hard work and talent that goes into animation (mainly anime) by acting like money is all that's needed for good animation.
when i was a kid, the only Japanese animation i liked to watch was Astro Boy. the others, like Gigantor and Speed Racer,all looked cheap to me. as all Japanese cartoons at the time, Astro Boy was very limited animation -done mostly in "3's". when i was an animation student in college, i saw an Astro Boy episode, and realized the difference - even though the animation was exactly the same, AB had much finer, and way more dynamic drawings. the motion was already in the individual drawings, and read much cleaner in "3's". also, the character design was vastly superior...but that's another story.
As an 2d animation student I love seeing videos taking a look into technical stuff like this, and agree with first hand experience that a lot of the time, timing just works better on 2s or heck even 3s. 1s aren't the end all be all golden concept-some actions need their frames to hold for longer to create a more natural flow. In a recent cut I did of someone preparing to jump, I broke them down generally as thus. Down on 2s, hold a few drawings at the lowest point for 3s, initial liftoff on 1s, then 2s as they lost momentum. Slow in, slow out. Timing, spacing, and well placed and chosen keys and inbetweens are what define a motion, not it being exactly on 1s.
Yes, it's all in the timing and spacing! Japanese Sakuga - anime best animation - has lots of detail and poses, but sometimes because of the rapid timing the movement *can* look too fast and slightly choppy. Akira, as an exception, flows more than average anime series. If one would slow down anime frames adding more in-betweens then it would flow more naturally, in my opinion. Another difference is in anime there are few squashes and stretches in characters if any, which also make the animation flow.
IMO people miss the point by talking about framerate when what matters is the quality of the in-betweening. Computer-aided tweens are going to suck because they are linear, so you are approximating what often should be a curved motion by a series of straight lines. Lower framerate isn't better automatically but it gives the viewer's brain more freedom to fill in a curved motion in these cases.
from what I've heard from live-action people there is a modern drive for 48fps there similarly. however actual film makes tend to use 24fps out of choice but the public complains about it as if it is a cost-saving measure.
Thank you for making this video, it makes perfect sense you can't do everything on one's it would be boring. Some movement is better when it's "choppy". Also thanks for the high quality Akira clips
THanks so much for this video. People are eager to jump on statistics like you said when animation is a medium made ofr expression which is not so focused on number of drawnings. Very well explained!
Very awesome video. I remember taking animation in college. It was of course traditional hand drawn work and being blown away on the concept of timing. Having a ton of frames is mundane if you don’t have the timing to give it life.
Just rewatched Akira and that old “160,000 cels!!!1” meme really annoyed me. I would watch a 40+ min version of this essay about all the details of animating on 1s, 2s, 3s, smear techniques, everything that feels so lost in the latest age of rotoscoping, CGI, and motion capture/tracking. It’s why the ice skating in Yuri On Ice bothers me so much while the cartoony faceplants from the first season of Ranma 1/2 feel so superior. Off the top of my head, Spider-Verse and Dragon Ball Super Broly have a variety of styles that feel as close to the current standard of expertise as one can get, but the artistry showcased in Akira and older hand-drawn and hand-assembled films is all but a dead language. Really appreciate the effort here to correct this ahistorical, wikifact level non-appreciation for what actually makes great animation great.
Thank you! I really do feel like animation is fulfilling much less of its potential these days. But in my own personal work I aim to help rectify that someday.
@@voltgaming2213 Cell was just the technique of applying colour LOL It has a very unique texture very difficult to replicate digitally which gives it a very unique look and nostalgic feel at least for me. The animation techniques developed in the golden age of anime can still be found in very many anime studios today, they are just not very widely used as most studios are more focused on producing cheapest possible anime that can get the most views.
Dynamic data is almost always the best solution. Take variable bit rate MP3 vs constant bit rate or Dolby vision vs. HDR10. So, although I did not know (until now) that this is also used in animation, I'm not surprised. But, ya.... I just keep being amazed at how creative and clever these anime artists are!!!
Thank you SO much for that last part calling attention to all the idiots making 60fps versions of sakuga in anime. I hope someday some one makes a dedicated video telling them to STOP!
There really is a huge difference in 'feel' from a well frame paced live action 24fps movie to a 60fps one. In live action productions like the recent Gemini Man and Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk, it really didnt 'feel' like i was watching a film. Granted yes, more detail per frame was present, but the result was everything felt much slower paced to me. More like a '60fps game' or a live tv show. Its fascinating that in animation a mix of 1s and 2s is what gives the best 'feel'. Great video!
i was recc'd this immediately after watching a 60 fps edit of various bits of animation. totally agree with all your points, consistent fluidity kills style.
Bravo! This is one of the most well stated commentaries on animation I have ever heard. You do the genre justice! I've done stop motion animation with a Super-8 camera as a teen, before I truly understood animation timing. I've mostly done CG animation, but even there, I know how to use more or less betweens to control the flow of a scene. One of my most eye opening experiences was just a few years after the original Star Wars was in theatres. Some toy company made a film viewer and you could buy several cartridges that had very brief clips from Star Wars. One of them was an X-wing firing at a T.I.E. fighter. I was amazed, clicking through that clip one frame at a time, to discover the animated laser blasts were only 3 frames each. It solved the problem I was having (in my stop motion animation film) of laser blasts moving too slow. So once again, I applaud your commentary!
"Its not like this is something people have said in one or two videos" oddly enough, thats almost exactly how a lot of misconceptions in online discussion start. Someone says one in a video they make on the subject, probably just misinformation that they saw on a forum or something that they didn't actually look into but put into their vid anyway, states it as a fact and then that video gets used in the research on the same topic for another video then it just continues down the pipeline of people regurgitating the "factoid" with no real idea of where it came from and if it's even a real fact or not.
I'm not a weeb at all. I grew up on the typical TV animes but never really went beyond that except for a very few exceptions. But i could watch Akira breakdowns for hours and hours. what a piece of art
I don't want to be fucked up, but that initial bit about CGI being a "well oiled machine that's grinding itself into the ground" needs some unpacking. Saying that in terms of what it does for execs and shareholders is where I agree with the statement. Just remember the machine runs on 3d artists, too. They're making heartfelt content, it just isn't delivered or processed the same way. They put their effort and heart into that stuff. Also just wanna be clear; I'm no fan of the live action/CGI moneygrab. I hate that shit.
This is why I cant understand why people think they can replicate the anime feel with live action, or smooth subtle movement. Most anime is made to be efficient, focusing on poses instead of the tiny details.
This kinda fails to educate more than to bash the people obsessed with higher framerates IN OLD MEDIA. This fails to excuse lower framerates in animations as a subproduct of labor, not real a artistry on the selection of the framerate. And really fails at explaining how true 60fps can only work for pieces built from the ground up and are not only possible but the rules of 1 2 3 can be preserved. Real world 48fps is doable to interpolate less than half of the frames to reach seamless 60.
I was quite annoied by how often I heard this misconception too. Happy to see someone pointed it out. As an animator, you can actually tell just by looking when a film is using 1s or 2s (or fewer), there's a very subtle shift in fluidity. Every time someone said "for the first time" or "never again" talking about this issue on akira, especially when comparing it then to other movies or studios, it felt like they were doing poor research (and kind of insulting, like if no one else is working as hard): just ask someone who knows about this stuff instead of looking on wikipedia.
I was with you until the 60fps comment. It seems like a dig thrown in at the last moment of the video without any time to expand on what you mean. 60fps absolutely makes panning shots look better for example, and you don't even necessarily have to interpolate to 60. You can do 48fps, or simply double whatever is given by the video, turning 2s into 1s, 1s into 0.5s, etc. It still maintains that modulated framerate that you say is so important.
It's just pure fan marketing. You have a few shots animated in 1s, so you say this movie was animated in 1s and people will think the entire thing was done that way.
Only 284 views? What the hell internet! And yes Akira is impressive, but please learn about Disney's legacy. By comparison Disney is still the reigning champion especially when you look at the production of each frame and animation
I got into animation because of Japan and looking back to The Lion king and a lot of western animation I think that`s amazing, though idk much about it
magnusm4 no they are not cooler in animation than akira or better,they are simple lacks complexity but they move beautifully and why this guy and you fell so triggered and think Disney is being bashed so insecure,Disney is the face of animation and everyone knows about them and loves them but at times I love watching foreign media getting attention
@@voltgaming2213 The motion is the only part that counts when talking about animation. What you are saying "lacks complexity" is not Disney's animation, but their visual aesthetic. I would agree with that, but that is not the animation component.
I wasn't sure why I disliked the 60fps conversions, I just knew something was wrong with it, but couldn't put my finger on it. I have known about sakuga and that it wasn't just more detailed but it could increase the frame rate at times. After knowing that, I did notice bursts of higher frame rate on anime on much less important scenes, but this video really told me why that might be done, and now I understand why it looks so wrong to have it stuck at 60fps the entire time.
Animated films vary their frame rate depending on what is going on, some scenes can be 24fps, or more, or less, and a scene could even involve the different planes of cells having different fps.
Very glad you mentioned Prologue, it's a goddamn masterpiece that is so overlooked. Richard Williams was one of the greatest IMO. Check out Frédéric Back's 'The Man Who Planted Trees' and 'The Mighty River' if you wanna see some other masterpiece works, they're also amazingly beautiful in their stories alone.
WTF is this so pervasive!? this is the *third* time I've seen this in a single month: You do realize that "cannot be understated" means that it would be impossible for praise to be _too lackluster,_ implying at best indifference, and at worst contempt for the person you're trying to celebrate. To say what you want to say, we say "Cannot be *overstated."* because that implies that no matter how much praise you heap onto the thing, the praise is deserved, because the quality survives under the weight of the added scrutiny that comes along with it. You probably heard someone say that something "should not be" or "cannot go understated." Which may seem like a subtle distinction, but those two statements suggest _intolerability_ of understatement, not implied preference to it.
I haven't come across this fallacy before, but good work on exposing it. Sometimes I get so used to my own "animator's eye" that I forget that most people can't really tell the difference between ones and lower frame counts just from looking at it. I think another aspect that is often ignored (although maybe I'm stating the obvious) is that shots in films like Akira will often use MULTIPLE drawings per frame... usually when there is more than one character or vehicle on screen, they will be animated on different layers (it depends of course, crowds are often crunched down to two or three layers). I always wonder if these "drawing counts" account for that...
The first part of this video are great & then only become rather just another "typical bashing" video with that 60 fps animation rants. There are a differences between animation fundamentals & progressions of the techs itself. interpolation techs is function in helping animation techs & production, especially for 2D drawing & stop motion. It's a very young age technology & dismissing it totally while taking the extreme side is not helping at all when we actually do have problems with how low frame rates ruined animation, especially 2.5 & 3D animation that very much have a different approaches in pacing fundamentals.
clinging on 24 or less fps because "its art" or something is a very cultist viewpoint DAINs can smooth animation to 60 fps making them very fluid and creating nice detailed motion. obviously not every animation benefits from that, but then again the technology is in its very infancy
Upscaling both temporal and spacial resolution is adding stuff that isn't there, an AI making artistic choices about what to add is still "artistic" and can still violate the original intent or artistic vision of the movie.
@@woobilicious. yes, but actually no ... the AI fills in positions between keyframes which the artist designed. the artist already set the motion speed and form. filling the inbetweens is not altering it.
![Smoother animation ≠ Better animation [read description]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/_KRb_qV9P4g/mqdefault.jpg)
R.I.P. Richard Williams
APLattanzi 😢
O h .
You sound like a butthurt Disney fanboy HAHAHAH
a real loss to the world of animation ;-;
A True Legend
I’m really tired of people trying to “fix” anime scenes by making the 60FPS. If you think making the frame rate higher is improving the animation, you don’t know how to improve animation to begin with.
it's cool to see the difference tho
@@parrotplays7 and not even that, its good for us editors :-)
@@SenselessIdea stuff like dragon ball Z, this would work with it very well,
Again, it's a matter of application. MANY anime scenes purposefully break the rules of animation to give an extra OOMF to a scene. AI 60 fps interpolations do help in production and can be selectively not used during scenes for purposeful artistic punch.
I know, it just looks unnatural
When FPS is a stylistic choice. Look at Spiderman into the spiderverse for a modern example. Mixing the frame rates for emphasis.
As well as the game Guilty Gear, where they also dropped interpolation and mixed the framerates to get an anime feel in a 3d game.
And in the opposite side of things, there is an appropriate use of using ai inbetweens to make something smoother, when it is within the artist's intention. For example, there are slowmo shots in some emotional parts of episodes in Demon Slayer, where they actually used artificially created inbetweens to sell the effect more than it already was. the shots would have looked fine without it, but the extra smoothness gives off a much more lifelike feel to those shots then they could have looked without them or with jittery inbetweens.
@@deddrz2549 When i first saw the spiderverse trailer i immediately thought of Xrd, should get around to it lol
That's not a stylistic choice, it just looks stupid and bad.
@@acumenium8157 thanks for not explaining how dumbfuck. You're immediately wrong
@@tutumazibuko2510 Stop-motion isn't "action" or "fast-paced". It was done to save money, nothing more. That's why we have a horrendous 23.97 FPS standard for television programs instead of 59.97 as well. To save money.
I feel like i learned more about animation in less than 10 mins than those 25 mins work on a certain film, you sure as hell earned my sub
"Unfortunately for some people Frame rate is everything"
PC Gamers: Yes.
Other than professional competitive gamers, I often wonder why anyone cares that a graphics card can run a game over 100 FPS.
@@robertm3951 Its a PC gamer thing
@@robertm3951 should try Linus explanation for why gamers need more fps
@@itsmilan4069 Input lag, also most pc gamers have 144hz monitors
@@robertm3951 because we can and high frame rate is good also for VR
It is quite annoying for people to spout frames as being the end all be all for quality animation, especially in regards to anime where the films use a mixture of rates to achieve their look. Spriggan rivals Akira in its number of shooting on 1s, funnily from most of the same staff as Akira.
But Akira offers good use of timing and spacing in most areas. Saying "some" sounds like selling it short. The areas in which it does "fall short" (IE the few shots, not scenes, where keys are not many and movement is limited) are the exceptional areas and generally symptomatic of Japanese animation techniques common in even the highest grossing anime films of today, rather than any sort of incompetence from the star studded animation crew. They never particularly stood out to me as they at least felt appropriate for the instances which they happened. With the sheer number of cuts the film has, they get lost in the whole. Similar nitpicks regarding sheer technicality can be made for other greats like Thief and The Cobbler, despite the fact it outclasses its contemporaries and still represents a pinnacle of the medium.
Yet, I can't think of many anime films that equal Akira in terms of its movement, it really set a new standard for anime films that many don't even _try_ to reach for. Perhaps Redline, Steamboy, Memories, Spriggan, or a handful of Ghibli films. But even those frequently push movement to the backseat in favor of dialogue done via still lip flaps (in some already dialogue heavy films). You will only find some Western films where movement is beyond Akira, though still the content being animated is generally restricted to character acting and the occasional effects work.
I think what makes Akira a pillar of animation, especially now, is the abundance of quality aesthetics, animation, and scale that required a good amount of innovation and experimentation to get right for the final picture. The ambition is insane and I say especially now because I see fewer attempts at reaching this pillar compared to the greats of three decades ago. CGI especially being used as a supplement nowadays for what Akira was doing with minimal computer implementation. Most can reach Akira's level of quality, but on a rather small and mundane scale by comparison, like a drama.
Good video regardless, clearing up the difference between animation in the West vs the East for the layman.
Redline is more fluid and the best action animated film there is out there
You're right, and we should really remenber that such movies are a giant team production, everyone cannot be at the top of his game, and there are junior animator and even interns often on those production. It's really a mix of differents artists at different levels of technicity. That's also why some shots stands out as being a little bit weirder in their timing or just drawings.
But it blends it quite well and that's what directors always should try to achieve.
Metropolis anime does have lots of movement and fluidity. People love to say anime sucks compared to American is bc of mouth flaps and lack of movement and saying anime is lazy. They don’t understand that unlike USA where they can draw like 1 million frames for disney animated movies or like for one episode of Rick and Morty is bc Japan studio is not as rich as American one also Japan headline is too tight and they don’t have lots of time to draw many frames unlike Americans.
Also Americans are very fortunate and spoiled bc they media already dominate around the world entertainment from 50’s. Also unlike Japan USA has bigger market and bigger audiences and they tend to earn 100 times more than Japan market
Thank you for making this! Yes, Akira was animated on Ones, but not ONLY on Ones. It uses a tasteful mix of frame rates as needed by the action on screen.
Akira is still better than any western shitty animation
@@EnriqueVivancoH no, but akira is definitely better than any shitty japanese animation
@@EnriqueVivancoHyoure just a hater
I don’t know how I got here but I’m begging you to make more videos on animation. Animation discussion on UA-cam is pretty niche and isn’t as in-depth as I would like, but you seem to have an extremely good grasp on the subject. This video was excellent and you definitely earned a new sub.
Thank you! Will do!
Seconded
The whole problem with social media these days. Repeating things they hear and repeating it without even being sceptic, questioning if it's a fact or not. Just copy paste. And thinking they are journalists too. Well even journalists nowadays are falling for this easy method. All for money and personal fame. Likes likes likes.
You’re taking about the UA-camr who uploaded this video right? If so, I understand lmao.
@@mfartsmonkeys2982 No, not at all about this uploader, but all the other 'popular' (tech)reviewers/UA-camrs with their "10 facts about..." styled videos. They are just trying to create a constant flow of videos without real research.
@@wodan74 oh, them too I guess. This uploaded basically did the same thing, I’ve already seen other videos that already debunked this myth with the same reason. However, I do like how he wrote this piece.
Fantastic video of explaining how animation works. As a former computer animator, who also had to studied 2 D animation and how it works, it was amazing to see how Akira was animated at different key frame rates during certain scenes. In addition, if you look at Akira credits. You will see that several different studios worked on it, even American animation studios worked on it too. It was something special that took place at that time.
Richard On twitter once brought this is up that more frames isn't better it's all about capturing a specific pacing and feeling
Thank you. I’ve always thought Akira mostly looked like 2’s. I’m glad I’m not going mad. It’s striking that people who’ll talk up the benefits of the higher frame rate can’t tell the difference
6:10 artist is literally on fire. impressive.
I watched another video on the Akira anime recently which went more in depth to the technical side of things. I still really enjoyed this short video, very well presented.
No way, my jaw actually dropped at 1:03 when you mentioned The Thief and the Cobbler, its one of my favorite movies. I watched it all the time as a kid on VHS, but i never new it was directed by richard williams
RIP the goat :(
I'm a filmmaker, not an animator but the 60p fetish in tech and on the internet kills stylistic choice. Most films for example should be shot at 24 it helps create the tone we subconsciously associate with cinema. I know I can tell when someone is shooting at a different frame rate because I spend my whole day in an editing program or on a set outside of youtube. 60 looks great for slowed-down action hell up until about 240p looks great for action(Not sure why you'd need that much but I guess if you do sports yeah). It helps smooth a shot, I use it all the time but I don't use it in my youtube videos because it makes everything look like a soap opera. In tech 60 has become a weird point to put on a box. For example, I'd love to shoot a film on a cellphone. I use a pixel but the pixel line, up till now has dropped 24p in favor of 60p and a weird adaptive frame rate which is fine for the quick social posts but is awful for the creatives they target every year. A technical lead I forget who said "who needs 24p anyway" or something similar like an absolute idiot as if higher frame rate equals better. At least with video games, the 60p makes sense and people claiming otherwise for that medium are excusing flaws. The mediums are each different is what I am saying but the dinguses turning animation 60p with deep learning AI aren't making it smoother nor are they making it "better". there are huge issues with mixing frame rates in NLEs and I doubt an AI can make extra full functioning frames for 60p edits. The tech of it is cool and applications exist, If I can smooth out a clip by using that tech it could save me from a botched shot but animation allows for a great variety of expression and people got to realize that a frame rate says something whether you realize it or not.
Most people like 60 fps just for video games. It's just something that you get used to, most people are used to watching videos in 24 or 30 fps but if you get used to games at 60 fps playing one that limits to 30 can be a jolt.
So I don't know about the internets "fetish" for 60 fps but the only times I see it seriously are around game discussions.
@@no_nameyouknow Odd. I play videogames all the time and still find animations put through 60fps to be incredibly jarring still. Though my experience is anecdotal, I find the mechanical movements APLattanzi mentions if present in the 60fps releases.
As for FPS DIESEL, I think a benefit to glean from recording 60fps is being able to hand pick specific frames. Albeit it's a backwards process to record and then go back to hand pick everything after, making the work double. But it could offer new avenues.
While I absolutely agree lower and variable frame-rates are fine and a very important style, I think some random videos of amateurs trying to use new AI tech to retroactively turn 24p animations into 60p animations are giving people an unfair prejudice against high frame rates. We are after all comparing a team of professionals with a budget to some guy's hobby twitter post, which closes off our mind to how a team of ambitious professionals could make a 60 fps animation to be absolutely stunning unseen style. Frames are not the only measure of good animation, but to deny the potential having over double the frames could offer is a sort of foolishness.
2D animation and film alike are absolutely being held back by an air of traditionalism and snobbery. The nostalgic ridden obsession to replicate old tones and styles for everything instead of trying something new is in my opinion very counter-productive to art in it's entirety. 60 fps animation gives more freedom for more expression, I understand that you probably won't believe it until you see it, but unfortunately currently no one's brave enough to make it because of the cost and effort, and right now the only thing AI knows how to do is evenly interpolate frames.
The subconscious association with cinema is important if that's your style, but the video game industry is in this state of extreme innovation and progression, and it's frankly lapping the stagnant art forms of film and animation. So more and more the future generations will have a strong preference for higher frame rates, being slow to adapt to this culture shift will definitely be a mistake. The videogame industry is already bigger than film. I don't predict or wish for film and animation to be pushed aside, I love both and I think both forms still have a huge place in future cultures, but I just don't see the ambitious innovation that used to be there, there's no more Walt Disney characters trying to push animation to mind-blowing levels of quality, the energy isn't there.
p is short for pixels. FPS is short for frames per second.
More frames = higher temporal resolution. It's a more immersive and lifelike experience. Have you ever seen real life footage at 120 fps or more? It makes it seem so real, rather than the distant manufactured feeling of low framerates below that certain smoothness threshold. Great interpolation can also give you a peek into what it can look like, but it's just an approximation. Look at how REAL it makes the actors look: rather than being some pixels on the screen, you can see them as the human being actors they are. It feels like a play right in front of you. I think interpolation is merely a band-aid: they should be filmed natively at least 60, if not 120 FPS.
@@no_nameyouknow Funny is that most animations in a game are still animated at 12 or 24 fps.
Great video, thank you for it. As an animator, i hope more people will understand.
I noticed how some people have entire YT channels about animation but now nothing about productions and animation techniques, yet they will commentate and say ignorant things.
One doesn't need to have worked on cartoons to commentate about animated movies, but when someone doesn't know some realities and wonders about them, it is better to either do some research first, or simply ask your audience about it.
Like when YTbers say things such as "How could they not notice this detail?!" (answer is often: THEY DID. At least one person in the production did, but that retake probably never got scheduled, because of either bad leadership/production pipeline, or lack of time)
Nice poke at the 60fps bullsh*t at the end. I hate it so much. Even live action movies should not go 48 or 60fps. It looks awful. The reason we stayed on 24/25fps is the same as why animated features are animated a lot on 2s (12fps) (outside for production cost/time) : because IT WORKS. IT LOOKS WELL. No one thinks "something is lacking" while watching it.
And since i'm a CG animator, i still feel surprised to see some shots shown in this video that are animated on 3s: it works so well! Not even looking like a TV anime.
Tv anime has less budget than anime movies in general
“Don’t get me wrong Akiras animation is impressive” oh! Well thank you random UA-camr, glad this marvel of animation has your seal of approval! For if it hadn’t, we’d surely all have never known.
You’re not an expert, you’re not anything. Don’t speak with authority, unless you yourself are an animator.
And then there's Red Line who took 7 years of hand drawing to produce.
Redline, otherwise known as
Gas,
Gas,
Gas,
The anime.
@@theenglishmajor1198 wasn't that Initial D already?
@@philippecontreras3650 yes. But initial d didn't have flying cars the size of houses with hyper drive and guns.
@@theenglishmajor1198 yes, but gas gas gas is still synonymous with Initial D not redline.
Thief And The Cobbler took 31 years.
THANK YOU. Next you Aguilar make a video about Redline and the myth that it’s traditionally inked and painted.
"Only far off in monastic isolation does Richard Williams, the Icaresque Rembrandt of animation, whittle away at the best work being done in the field." This line is so great. As a huge fan of his work- Roger Rabbit having shaped my early love of animation, his book teaching me so much, and the convoluted history of the Thief and the Cobbler providing endless inspiration, fascination, and sorrow - I feel like your one line sums up so much of his work so well.
I can't stand 60fps edits. Makes everything look like bad cg
It will get better with time, just wait
@@incription No it wont, the problem is that naturally, a lot of information is lost by motion blur and how we focus with our eyes, and thats fine. The 60 and higher fps camp wants to force that info back as a series of pictures taken with a fast shutter camera and it just look bad. To get better then it would need to fake the blur and/or have lots and lots more of frames, and well, we have a cheap nice looking way of doing that.
@@SageX85 The tech they are using for this video tries to smoothly interpolate the video frames, not ideal for animation. Soon a paper will come out that tweaks the model so that it can make animation look smoother without increating the framerate much
@@incription Yeah, something that is called smear frames but is better how it is done today since its done for production, not post-production, butchering the work
@@SageX85 not talking about smear frames, about an AI that can reanimate things better
This is a great video. Really puts Akira into perspective with other animated features instead of placing it on a pedestal like every other video regarding the film.
Local man tears down Akira to teach you to actually appreciate Akira.
90% of what he said In this is factually inaccurate for the record.
He’a a fat youtuber, not an animator. Much of what goes into the animating process in japanese film is a tightly guarded secret. To actually know what went into them requires on the job experience and up close observation. Not FPS stats you read on Wikipedia.
@@gibsonflyingv2820 the last third of the video is stating that animation is more than just fps stats.
This was actually very educational. I always wondered why some scenes looked smoother and now I understand the mechanical need and the aesthetic direction behind these choices. Well done.
I totally rolled my eyes when nerdwriter1 brought out his napkin math of animating on ones. Before that, i was wondering how he can speak on so many topics. From then on, i knew he was speaking out of his behind and i don't think i ever watched anything of his since.
Siana Gearz he did say 1 and 2s
through this lecture you probably presented the best demonstration of variable frame rate in animation that I've seen outside instruction. thank you sir
Honoring Richard Williams! The animation and drawings for "The Prologue" are the major expression of animation as an art made of the highest craft and experience. His passing leaves all of his legacy for the future. Thanks for this expose'!
Thank you for mentioning the destruction of 60 frames being applied to works that were originally not, especially Akira!
I feel like this video is perpetuating some of the very confusions you set out to dispel. True, Akira is not shot all on 1s. But conversely it is untrue that a film needs two’s to avoid “taking on a mechanical nature” as you say. Lively animation can happen on a film that’s shot solely on 1s or 2s or 3s. The slower frame rates only require more smear frames to connect larger increments.
See LAIKA’s stop motion work for something on 1s that avoids these pitfalls.
The conversation shouldn’t be about frame rate at all, only about good key frames and accurate inbetweens, as you mention.
Kudos for getting more in depth though!
Exactly. It wasn't explained clearly in the video that there's a difference between the timing of keyframes + inbetweens, and how many individual drawings are actually used. The gold standard of animation being "on ones" means that each frame is a unique drawing, but that only means the movement is very fluid. The video mentions 'looking mechanical', and the rubber hose animation used in the early days of animation, which are both a result of keyframe/inbetween timing -- which is usually the responsibility of the lead animator, and has nothing at all to do with the frame rate or whether it is on ones, twos, or threes. For example, if you evenly space your inbetweens, you can do rubber hose animation at any framerate you want, but it will be smoother on ones.
All the frames in the world cant stop SHITTY, LAZY WRITING. FUCK AKIRA.
@@mkocel
Akira was never about the story, it was a tech demo, pushing limitations of animation at the time, use of new technologies etc in other words it was a very long 80s OVA as they all did the same, tried to push limitations more and more and more
very much agreed. the essayist seems pretty confident that they know about the craft of animation but steps into a lot of the same traps as the channels it accuses of getting things wrong, speaking in absolutes and making broad statements about animation as a whole
for example, every single piece of animation cited as "bad" is, in fact, crafted with care even if the production staff know it's not exactly high brow entertainment. angry birds is about as formulaic and uninteresting as you can imagine but great care and craft went into making those characters move. if you're in a place where you can't see those merits then you're not in a position to make sweeping statements about the animation industry
I don't know, extremely fluid animation can look funny if not used well. Example: He Man.
Maybe it's because I used to watch a lot of anime at the time He Man came out, but I always found his extremely fluid run animation kind of unnatural (and a bit silly).
Anime at 24p on a plasma is sublime.
The number of cells in a movie also depends on how many cell layers make up each scene, and indeed each frame. If you just have a single background layer and a character layer then it's going to be a order of magnitude less work than some of Disney's best feature-length 2D animations that pioneered the use of the multi-depth parallax camera shots that could often have like 3, 4, 5, 6 and maybe even more layers.
Anyway, regardless of the numbers of frames per second or the cells, Akira is just utterly stunning. I mean, seriously, even to this day I still think it is all round one of the most visually accomplished and consistently beautiful in both look and motion 2D feature-length animations ever created--and it has an underlying idea and plot that lives up to the quality of the animation too.
The main thing this doesnt address is the reason 60fps is that golden number is it is about where the human eye stops being able to see the differences between frames. Its why monitors for a very long time were 60hz.
This is so professional ! I'm shocked by the number of views !
Thanks for this video. I saw the thumbnail before my most recent viewing, and I recalled it a little later into the movie. Akira definitely has its moments where simple 3s suffice, particularly for moments of less intense dialogue, and while I probably wouldn’t have noticed otherwise, these moments certainly don’t have the same fluidity of the ride scenes.
FINALLY someone lays this to rest. I remember when I first read that 24 fps 'factoid' and being highly confused. You sir are doing excellent work and I urge you to keep it up.
Interesting that Otomo made Steamboy 10x more impressive in matter of animation, but nobody talk about it.
One thing I am trying to get to the bottom of is the aesthetic difference between the Anime of the late 80's and 90's and that of current anime. Some things are obvious, modern anime has a tendency to rely on cheats a little more now as the pressure of more and more content is weighed down on animators, we also have more juvenile character designs today. Also, and most obviously, is the introduction of digital art which seems to make everything bolder, crisper and punchier. But I'm struggling to get to the heart of the difference. 90's anime, like Ghost in the Shell has an animation that feels more...I actually can't put my finger on it. It just has more maturity. Has anyone else felt this? Has anyone been able to explain it?
It could be that in there were styles, like GITS and other Mamoru Oshii films, that emphasized realistic proportions as well as movements and camerawork. But yeah, it's hard to pin down exactly. The cel era was practically a whole other world.
@Deltacon777 1 well it's not like you watched all 80-90's movies there is, you can watch them now you know :)
the handrawn cells, have more character to me, it's not just smooth uniform lines on character rigs. The trend nowdays is to go 3d, making it look like 2d .. and boy, does it suck, just compare the new GITS series to the first one, it kinda lost all it's style..also the trend to higher fps makes everything look cheap (soap opera effect)
Digital animation allows for those bolder and punchier colors while animation cells were typically scanned/photographed and no matter how well or refined this process was, it produced those washed out "mature" colors of the old days. There were also some unique tricks such as using light tables and letting the light bleed through to create the illusion of a light source, which is basically impossible to create in digital. But don't worry, there's still beautiful modern animation out there, I highly recommend Avatar and Korra.
Anime now looks kind of same-y to me. There isnt much veriaty art wise. Dont get me rong its still good, its just i miss the visual verity.
Great video. Before I watched this, I tried to watch an Akira in 60FPS video and had to turn it off pretty quickly because I found it unpleasant to watch. Now I know why!
Akira having more cuts shot on 1's isn't necessarily due to budget but the talent the studio sought out to work on it. This is true for all anime. Budget ≠ animation quality
Yes thank you! I'm getting so sick of people underplaying the hard work and talent that goes into animation (mainly anime) by acting like money is all that's needed for good animation.
There's also the matter that Akira's animators weren't exactly paid well. The budget on that movie is a fraction of that for the Little Mermaid.
1's=more animating, more animating=
more time, more time=bigger budget
I get your point, but the BUDGET does matter in terms of animation, after all animators are payed on animated frames, for most productions in Japan.
Thank you for making and helping me explore more into animation
when i was a kid, the only Japanese animation i liked to watch was Astro Boy. the others, like Gigantor and Speed Racer,all looked cheap to me. as all Japanese cartoons at the time, Astro Boy was very limited animation -done mostly in "3's". when i was an animation student in college, i saw an Astro Boy episode, and realized the difference - even though the animation was exactly the same, AB had much finer, and way more dynamic drawings. the motion was already in the individual drawings, and read much cleaner in "3's". also, the character design was vastly superior...but that's another story.
As an 2d animation student I love seeing videos taking a look into technical stuff like this, and agree with first hand experience that a lot of the time, timing just works better on 2s or heck even 3s. 1s aren't the end all be all golden concept-some actions need their frames to hold for longer to create a more natural flow. In a recent cut I did of someone preparing to jump, I broke them down generally as thus. Down on 2s, hold a few drawings at the lowest point for 3s, initial liftoff on 1s, then 2s as they lost momentum. Slow in, slow out. Timing, spacing, and well placed and chosen keys and inbetweens are what define a motion, not it being exactly on 1s.
Yes, it's all in the timing and spacing! Japanese Sakuga - anime best animation - has lots of detail and poses, but sometimes because of the rapid timing the movement *can* look too fast and slightly choppy. Akira, as an exception, flows more than average anime series. If one would slow down anime frames adding more in-betweens then it would flow more naturally, in my opinion. Another difference is in anime there are few squashes and stretches in characters if any, which also make the animation flow.
IMO people miss the point by talking about framerate when what matters is the quality of the in-betweening. Computer-aided tweens are going to suck because they are linear, so you are approximating what often should be a curved motion by a series of straight lines. Lower framerate isn't better automatically but it gives the viewer's brain more freedom to fill in a curved motion in these cases.
amazing and well informed essay, kept me hooked from start to finish
from what I've heard from live-action people there is a modern drive for 48fps there similarly. however actual film makes tend to use 24fps out of choice but the public complains about it as if it is a cost-saving measure.
StandardDifferent aka. samsausage what’s the point of 48fps lol
The hobbit was one of the first films to use 48fps i think, and it looks like a cheap tv production.
Thank you I am making an animation right now I needed this to remind me how why I am making an animation and not just completing my college task
Thank you for making this video, it makes perfect sense you can't do everything on one's it would be boring. Some movement is better when it's "choppy". Also thanks for the high quality Akira clips
THanks so much for this video. People are eager to jump on statistics like you said when animation is a medium made ofr expression which is not so focused on number of drawnings. Very well explained!
one of the best youtube video about animation. Woooow
I'm so glad this video exits. Thanks for shining a light on this topic.
Can't believe they made AKIRA at 48 fps! And they cut it down to 24 because no one would believe them
5:10 those "choppy animation" is art, it's all about the pacing of motion tween made manually by the artist.
Variable frame rate is the way
Very awesome video. I remember taking animation in college. It was of course traditional hand drawn work and being blown away on the concept of timing. Having a ton of frames is mundane if you don’t have the timing to give it life.
Just rewatched Akira and that old “160,000 cels!!!1” meme really annoyed me. I would watch a 40+ min version of this essay about all the details of animating on 1s, 2s, 3s, smear techniques, everything that feels so lost in the latest age of rotoscoping, CGI, and motion capture/tracking. It’s why the ice skating in Yuri On Ice bothers me so much while the cartoony faceplants from the first season of Ranma 1/2 feel so superior. Off the top of my head, Spider-Verse and Dragon Ball Super Broly have a variety of styles that feel as close to the current standard of expertise as one can get, but the artistry showcased in Akira and older hand-drawn and hand-assembled films is all but a dead language. Really appreciate the effort here to correct this ahistorical, wikifact level non-appreciation for what actually makes great animation great.
Thank you! I really do feel like animation is fulfilling much less of its potential these days. But in my own personal work I aim to help rectify that someday.
Cori Johnson you mean cell animation is dead
@@voltgaming2213
Cell was just the technique of applying colour LOL
It has a very unique texture very difficult to replicate digitally which gives it a very unique look and nostalgic feel at least for me. The animation techniques developed in the golden age of anime can still be found in very many anime studios today, they are just not very widely used as most studios are more focused on producing cheapest possible anime that can get the most views.
Dynamic data is almost always the best solution. Take variable bit rate MP3 vs constant bit rate or Dolby vision vs. HDR10. So, although I did not know (until now) that this is also used in animation, I'm not surprised. But, ya.... I just keep being amazed at how creative and clever these anime artists are!!!
This vid needs more views coz it tell about Akira 24-frames per second animation...gud job bro on making this vid 👍
He said what were all thinking 🤯
Views coming in:)
Omg. Thank you for saying the name of that cartoon dance of fantasia. I forgot the name of it and I have been searching for years.
thank you, animation community needs to hear this -_-
but hentai only works with 20000fps
@@chrisakaschulbus4903fix yourself
Amazing review and animation history! Thanks a lot for sharing!
Thank you SO much for that last part calling attention to all the idiots making 60fps versions of sakuga in anime. I hope someday some one makes a dedicated video telling them to STOP!
There really is a huge difference in 'feel' from a well frame paced live action 24fps movie to a 60fps one. In live action productions like the recent Gemini Man and Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk, it really didnt 'feel' like i was watching a film. Granted yes, more detail per frame was present, but the result was everything felt much slower paced to me. More like a '60fps game' or a live tv show. Its fascinating that in animation a mix of 1s and 2s is what gives the best 'feel'. Great video!
Try watching the higher FPS for like a week or two and you'll question your past self on its stance on 24FPS.
Hope this gets signal boosted at some point! A great short essay on animation quality!!
We need more people like you who take a moment to research, enjoy, and appreciate.
i was recc'd this immediately after watching a 60 fps edit of various bits of animation. totally agree with all your points, consistent fluidity kills style.
I definitely need to buy the BluRay...I didn't even realize how amazing it looks!
that was a... yes quite a SMOOTH video my guy.
Bravo! This is one of the most well stated commentaries on animation I have ever heard. You do the genre justice! I've done stop motion animation with a Super-8 camera as a teen, before I truly understood animation timing. I've mostly done CG animation, but even there, I know how to use more or less betweens to control the flow of a scene. One of my most eye opening experiences was just a few years after the original Star Wars was in theatres. Some toy company made a film viewer and you could buy several cartridges that had very brief clips from Star Wars. One of them was an X-wing firing at a T.I.E. fighter. I was amazed, clicking through that clip one frame at a time, to discover the animated laser blasts were only 3 frames each. It solved the problem I was having (in my stop motion animation film) of laser blasts moving too slow.
So once again, I applaud your commentary!
Why every video about Akira I watch is knocking it down. Does it matter? It was a great film, sure there are flaws but nothing is perfect.
24 fps animation is underrated. It’s so beautiful.
"Its not like this is something people have said in one or two videos" oddly enough, thats almost exactly how a lot of misconceptions in online discussion start. Someone says one in a video they make on the subject, probably just misinformation that they saw on a forum or something that they didn't actually look into but put into their vid anyway, states it as a fact and then that video gets used in the research on the same topic for another video then it just continues down the pipeline of people regurgitating the "factoid" with no real idea of where it came from and if it's even a real fact or not.
I'm not a weeb at all. I grew up on the typical TV animes but never really went beyond that except for a very few exceptions. But i could watch Akira breakdowns for hours and hours. what a piece of art
WELL PUT! Thank you for making the statement into the most effective and well shaped words. Thank you.
Impressive presentation, as an animator.
I’ve noticed this mistake many times.
Good job highlighting it. :)
I don't want to be fucked up, but that initial bit about CGI being a "well oiled machine that's grinding itself into the ground" needs some unpacking. Saying that in terms of what it does for execs and shareholders is where I agree with the statement. Just remember the machine runs on 3d artists, too. They're making heartfelt content, it just isn't delivered or processed the same way. They put their effort and heart into that stuff.
Also just wanna be clear; I'm no fan of the live action/CGI moneygrab. I hate that shit.
Gantz:0 is some mighty fine cg
Yeah, this whole thing smacks of "Why do they make things I don't like?! Waaaahhhh"
Very well said.
This video is short and to the point, and is something I would recommend to watch for any aspiring animators.
This is why I cant understand why people think they can replicate the anime feel with live action, or smooth subtle movement. Most anime is made to be efficient, focusing on poses instead of the tiny details.
It's really refreshing to have a grounded and informed perspective out there. Keep it up. 🤙🏽
This kinda fails to educate more than to bash the people obsessed with higher framerates IN OLD MEDIA.
This fails to excuse lower framerates in animations as a subproduct of labor, not real a artistry on the selection of the framerate.
And really fails at explaining how true 60fps can only work for pieces built from the ground up and are not only possible but the rules of 1 2 3 can be preserved.
Real world 48fps is doable to interpolate less than half of the frames to reach seamless 60.
"This kinda fails to educate"
and then you proceed to fail in educating
why
I was quite annoied by how often I heard this misconception too. Happy to see someone pointed it out. As an animator, you can actually tell just by looking when a film is using 1s or 2s (or fewer), there's a very subtle shift in fluidity.
Every time someone said "for the first time" or "never again" talking about this issue on akira, especially when comparing it then to other movies or studios, it felt like they were doing poor research (and kind of insulting, like if no one else is working as hard): just ask someone who knows about this stuff instead of looking on wikipedia.
I have been enlightened, and I shall now go forth and utter "um, Actually..."
Excellent points and super important info.
I was with you until the 60fps comment. It seems like a dig thrown in at the last moment of the video without any time to expand on what you mean. 60fps absolutely makes panning shots look better for example, and you don't even necessarily have to interpolate to 60. You can do 48fps, or simply double whatever is given by the video, turning 2s into 1s, 1s into 0.5s, etc. It still maintains that modulated framerate that you say is so important.
It's just pure fan marketing. You have a few shots animated in 1s, so you say this movie was animated in 1s and people will think the entire thing was done that way.
Only 284 views? What the hell internet!
And yes Akira is impressive, but please learn about Disney's legacy. By comparison Disney is still the reigning champion especially when you look at the production of each frame and animation
I got into animation because of Japan and looking back to The Lion king and a lot of western animation I think that`s amazing, though idk much about it
and the use of multiplane cameras
magnusm4 no they are not cooler in animation than akira or better,they are simple lacks complexity but they move beautifully and why this guy and you fell so triggered and think Disney is being bashed so insecure,Disney is the face of animation and everyone knows about them and loves them but at times I love watching foreign media getting attention
@@voltgaming2213 The motion is the only part that counts when talking about animation. What you are saying "lacks complexity" is not Disney's animation, but their visual aesthetic. I would agree with that, but that is not the animation component.
@@vomErsten yea I said that Disney is beautiful cuz of movement and pacing alone
thank you, As an animator i can apreciate the criticism to those who only see numbers and not the art.
I wasn't sure why I disliked the 60fps conversions, I just knew something was wrong with it, but couldn't put my finger on it. I have known about sakuga and that it wasn't just more detailed but it could increase the frame rate at times. After knowing that, I did notice bursts of higher frame rate on anime on much less important scenes, but this video really told me why that might be done, and now I understand why it looks so wrong to have it stuck at 60fps the entire time.
Thank you sir for clarifying this whole topic 👌
Animated films vary their frame rate depending on what is going on, some scenes can be 24fps, or more, or less, and a scene could even involve the different planes of cells having different fps.
Very glad you mentioned Prologue, it's a goddamn masterpiece that is so overlooked. Richard Williams was one of the greatest IMO.
Check out Frédéric Back's 'The Man Who Planted Trees' and 'The Mighty River' if you wanna see some other masterpiece works, they're also amazingly beautiful in their stories alone.
WTF is this so pervasive!? this is the *third* time I've seen this in a single month: You do realize that "cannot be understated" means that it would be impossible for praise to be _too lackluster,_ implying at best indifference, and at worst contempt for the person you're trying to celebrate.
To say what you want to say, we say "Cannot be *overstated."* because that implies that no matter how much praise you heap onto the thing, the praise is deserved, because the quality survives under the weight of the added scrutiny that comes along with it. You probably heard someone say that something "should not be" or "cannot go understated." Which may seem like a subtle distinction, but those two statements suggest _intolerability_ of understatement, not implied preference to it.
What a coincidence that the day I hung up my Akira poster, I saw this. Very informative video!
I sware to god if I see one more of those "60 fps interpolated with an AI" videos I will probably gouge my eyes out.
I haven't come across this fallacy before, but good work on exposing it. Sometimes I get so used to my own "animator's eye" that I forget that most people can't really tell the difference between ones and lower frame counts just from looking at it. I think another aspect that is often ignored (although maybe I'm stating the obvious) is that shots in films like Akira will often use MULTIPLE drawings per frame... usually when there is more than one character or vehicle on screen, they will be animated on different layers (it depends of course, crowds are often crunched down to two or three layers). I always wonder if these "drawing counts" account for that...
The first part of this video are great & then only become rather just another "typical bashing" video with that 60 fps animation rants. There are a differences between animation fundamentals & progressions of the techs itself. interpolation techs is function in helping animation techs & production, especially for 2D drawing & stop motion. It's a very young age technology & dismissing it totally while taking the extreme side is not helping at all when we actually do have problems with how low frame rates ruined animation, especially 2.5 & 3D animation that very much have a different approaches in pacing fundamentals.
just here to check out more Akira clips.... thanks
Unpopular opinion: Great animation, freaking ugly characters.
YH fr none of them are hot but that is kind of refreshing tbh
clinging on 24 or less fps because "its art" or something is a very cultist viewpoint
DAINs can smooth animation to 60 fps making them very fluid and creating nice detailed motion.
obviously not every animation benefits from that, but then again the technology is in its very infancy
Upscaling both temporal and spacial resolution is adding stuff that isn't there, an AI making artistic choices about what to add is still "artistic" and can still violate the original intent or artistic vision of the movie.
@@woobilicious. that's why you don't use it if it violates it... duh, I would suggest you brush up your reading comprehension
@@woobilicious. yes, but actually no ...
the AI fills in positions between keyframes which the artist designed. the artist already set the motion speed and form. filling the inbetweens is not altering it.
I'm watching AKIRA at the cinema in 4k tomorrow the 7th October 2020. I can't wait! Very informative video. Thanks