Why Japanese animation is very smooth, but domestic animation is very stuck?

In fact, it can be easily concluded that the picture quality is not enough.

Not only the original painting level in the mid-term was not enough, but the director's performance level in the early stage and the processing level in the later period were also insufficient.

Let’s look at it from the perspective of Full-time. Full-time is considered to be a relatively comprehensive film that embodies the level of visual beauty. It has obvious advantages and disadvantages. Excluding animated movies, it should be regarded as the first-class level of domestic 2D animation. But the lingering "domestic" feeling can still be seen in the full-time picture.

(Borrowing the white box animation flow chart translated by zecy.)

From top to bottom, I will not mention the screenwriter, but let’s look at the screen part.

In terms of early setting, many people actually do not clearly feel the gap between China and Japan.

The difference in character design. In fact, the character design is very restricted in China. If you are not careful, you will be accused of plagiarizing Japan and not being Chinese enough. Although I don’t care about these at all, but aside from the difference in style, the image is The design level can still be seen. Take the full-timers as an example. Many people dare not say that the character design of the full-timers is not good. Just looking at the line drawings is okay, but after coloring, they feel that they are really not good. That armor, don’t say anything else, is it simple and beautiful? I think it’s a web game style. Many domestic styles are rushing towards the so-called beautiful character design, but the finished product is really not flattering. The original painting is too heavy, and the audience does not think it is very good.

The gap in art settings mainly refers to all aspects of animation details. If possible, you can find a Japanese animation setting book. In the early stage, various details of scene props are set. There is a lot of effort put into drawing this aspect of Japanese animation nowadays, and the more realistic the subject matter, the more so. Looking at Shirobako’s studio settings, it can be said that the details are down to what trinkets will be placed on each original painting table. The lack of early settings in China affects the look and feel of the picture to a certain extent. When indoor shots appear in full-time, I pay special attention to this. Many domestic shots are empty as soon as they arrive indoors. When combined with the high-end post-production, it feels inconsistent. serious.

The problem of color design, together with the light and shadow of the original painting and post-processing, constitutes a big problem for domestic characters to jump out of the picture. What should the colors of characters with different brightness look like, and what direction should the background art that matches the characters be in. If we coordinate well, we can create a good look and feel without adding crazy light sources in post-production. In China, sometimes the coordination is not good, and After such a stir in the later stage, the impression immediately dropped.

When it comes to storyboarding, the director has little acting experience and his level is still poor. Still full-time, the camera switching is stiff, the character performances are Q version without looking at the atmosphere, and the fight storyboards are weak. You can't see it in the PV. That's because the storyboarding and painting of the PV are concentrated on the resources of a few big artists. The big masters of original painting are very good at the painting field they are good at, but when it is extended to the length of TV, the director's overall ability The constraints are reflected.

The shortcoming in the painting stage is that the domestic ones do not have good cooperation experience. Liang Boya on Weibo criticized them for not drawing layout. Layout is an important part of Japanese animation. The storyboard information is expanded, and the relationship between the characters and the background is indicated to facilitate the subsequent work on the original painting and background. Some people in the industry complained at S1. In fact, they also draw layouts, but many times the functions of storyboarding and layout are blurred. There are still no good standards for the animation process in China. The Japanese animation process is not like Japan, nor is it like the United States. The process of each studio is different. This is also a trace left by the barbaric growth of domestic animation.

Problems at this stage directly affect post-production synthesis. The background and characters do not match up, and the conflict between 3D and 2D is serious. These are all problems. Even in Japan, they are rushing to work or lack of experience. This happens sometimes, and last season's handshaker is a good example.

The problem of the original painting level can be said to be the most intuitive and the most fatal. There is an answer above who thinks that there is no gap in painting at present. What is just a lack of money and insufficient frame rate is actually a complete amateur. The movement of the characters feels stuck and unnatural, which is entirely due to the low level of the original painting. What is the number of frames? The animation is only 24 frames per second. Where does the number of frames come from? How to allocate the number of animations per second is a reflection of the level of the original painting. For high-level original paintings, such as Mitsuo Iso, eight frames per second can form a smooth battle scene. In general Japanese animation, twelve frames per second at 2K are very smooth. Many original paintings also use 2K to create intense fighting scenes. For the sense of speed, the 24 frames per second of 1K are rarely used. For ordinary walking, eight frames are enough. For extreme close-ups of talking, four or five frames are enough, and the mouth is still moving. In some shots of Full Time, it feels strange to walk, and the expressions when speaking are extremely stiff. This is entirely a problem of the original artist's level. Even if it was made up into 24 shots, it would be just as unnatural. There are a few masters in China who can draw very well, no worse than the first-class ones in Japan, but the overall low level highlights the unnatural feeling, and the gap between different pictures is too big, which is also a problem of low average level.

I won’t say anything about the coloring. The unnatural feeling is all due to the color specification + the light and shadow of the original painting. There are also many problems with post-production synthesis. This area is also the hardest hit area where the self-perception and the actual situation are different. Everyone uses ae, how can the template be so different? Even the development of some exclusive special effects will not cause much difference in materials.

However, the reality is that the experience level of post-production photography in China is still not good enough. If you are someone who has done related work, you will understand that even if you apply a dozen templates, it may not look as good as a veteran. Japan has a set of experiences that have been developed since the early days when celluloid was scarce. Now that China is directly using the same tools, the gap in experience will be clearly reflected. There is an example like this in Full-Time. It is obvious that I want to change the depth of field, but I use too much pure four-corner blur. I want to make the weapon more cool. Adding too much reflection will cause light pollution, and it is not as good as the light pollution of a flying saucer. .

Most of the problems with domestic Japanese animation are here. Even if there are breakthroughs in certain directions, other shortcomings will still cause a barrel effect. Just like this time, the fineness of the picture in the full-time animation is better than that in Japan. The third-rate light modification is much better, and it costs a lot more money, but some weaknesses can still be seen at a glance, and the "domestic flavor" comes out immediately.

Some domestic animations do not have this problem, such as those films that are not in Japanese animation style, such as short films and short animations from some studios. If it's not Japanese style, then there's nothing to say. For short films, it usually means that the entire studio has been well-tuned for a long time, the level is consistent, the ability is average, or it is completely handled by a really big hand, but no matter which one, extremely low output cannot be enough for domestic production. What big changes have the environment made? Domestically, production is the top priority and speed is the priority. Gao Piao also said that we can compress painting to one-third and one-fourth of that in Japan. The current painting period in Japan has made many original paintings miserable. Our time is compressed like this. Any seriousness about the original painting is nonsense.

In addition, the domestic Party A has developed the habit of randomly changing things, intervening in mid-term production, which has caused very negative effects when cooperating with Japan and South Korea. Big fish outsourcing It is said that hundreds of cards have been scrapped. Director Jian Lingshan himself said in interviews that he would leave it to the Japanese side, and if it doesn’t work, they would have to start over with it. If Japan can’t keep up, they will have to make changes on their own. It seems like what he said is that it’s up to him. It's quite hard, but if you do it well in the early stage and supervise it well in the mid-term, there will be no problem of making changes later.

In short, there are many problems in China, not to mention the various gaps outside the picture. No one is good at things. The main problem is that no one is at a high level. If you want to make good things, you have to improve your skills step by step. The average level has gone up, and if the picture does not violate the harmony, there will be no problem at all.