In answer to Robot Monkey's question upthread:
IncendiaryLemon said:
It's probably because most of the time it looks like terrible and doesn't mesh with the 2D at all.
Exactly this. When there's an awkard fit between the CG elements and hand drawn stuff, it's immediately noticeable. CG features like the Appleseed movies work really well visually, say what you will about their stories. But something like Appleseed XIII just looks godawful by comparison.
Where the Berserk Golden Age movies are concerned, the aesthetic mostly works. But the first film has some jarringly fake shots and frame rate issues (I draw attention to this in my Youtube Review of The Egg of the King - worth a look if you want to see EXACTLY what I mean.)
I find it really irritiating when shows or movies do this. Sometimes it comes off as unbelievably lazy. I think the all time groaner for me, which actually made me fall off my seat laughing, was the use of CG to render - I kid you not - a SLOWLY CLOSING DOOR in Ghost In The Shell: Innocence. That kind of thing, to me, is the complete antithesis of what first drew me to anime as an art form. I love those older shows where CG simply isn't present as a crutch for the animators to fall back on. The attention to detail that went into them... it's simply not something you see in much anime at all now, short of bigger budget theatrical releases.
To quote our very own resident flaming citrus once again:
IncendiaryLemon said:
When it's done right, it can be a great tool. My go to example for CGI done right in Anime is Ghost in the Shell SAC. The Tachikomas in that do not look out of place at all and fit right in with everything else.
This is also very true. And a great example in favour of decent CGI (I was pleased that GITS Arise managed to further that tradition for tasteful use of CG as well.) There's a certain way of using it that definitely works and doesn't detract from the shows or movies it's featured in.
I will say, after seeing Knights Of Sidonia a month or so back, I was pretty impressed with its visuals. No, truthfully, it's not the sort of show that makes me think 'holy poopsticks! All anime should be CG from now on!' because it's still not as fluid as it needs to be if it's going to be fully convincing. But the animation style is certainly more expressive than similar stuff I've seen, and the final episodes even manage to push things in a direction I simply don't think would be possible with hand drawn animation - the fast camera moves during the final mecha battles, the guard pilots bobbing about in their cockpits, etc.
BUT... and this is the important thing: however good Japanese studios get at CG animation, it's never going to be the same as good quality hand drawn animation.
Nobody has a problem with work that's executed well. But when it's done sloppily, it's immediately obvious.
