Research Blog Study Task 2 - Hybrid Animation

Hybrid animation has actually been integrated into the pretty much entirely already. Just not in a massively obvious way. Something could be animated in photoshop, animate, toon boom, maya and then taken into after effects to be altered, have effects and motion graphics put on top and finally it gets taken into premier to be assembled together. This is the low key hybrid animation happening all the time in the industry but their are even more blatant examples. Live action with Visual effects. The interaction with that which isn't there and green screen. This is where the mainstream animation industry is at with hybrid animation, but there are a few very interesting developments that are being worked on.

One of the first instances of 3D being implemented into 2D animations was in the black cauldron where a glowing orb was animated in 3D. Nowadays some key animations that have used 2D and 3D Hybrid have been The triplets of Bellville, The iron giant and the most recent example is the disney short paper man. These films all make use of 2D, 3D integration in different forms.
Triplets of belleville used 3D limbs attached to 2D bodies so that the bicycle kept a consistent shape while the body had a squash and stretch to it. The iron giant made good use of the 3D model to keep a consistent shape to the model because has a machine his body did not shift and warp like a squishy human. And the most recent example, Disneys Paperman, was all about John Kahrs desire to bring the hand drawn, illustrations, character designs and line tests back to the animation as they had been lost with 3D. Each one used 2D and 3D to its own end but Triplets of Belleville and Iron Giant had them as very separate entities while Paperman fully integrated the two mediums together. The lines were brought into the 3D and made part of it. The limitations right now is that this software is still in its production stages and it suffers from a lot of issues with colour bleed so it can't be applied to big budget movies just yet. However hybrid animation really doesn't have any limitations except time. any form of art can be created it just a matter of having the time to make, assemble and program. The encroaching deadline would have to be worked towards in the fastest fashion possible using the most suitable medium but with the combining of mediums a lot of time is lost.