
It's Better To Animate a Film Alone, Even If It Takes Years - curtis
https://creators.vice.com/en_uk/article/animator-hand-draws-film-in-4-years-nova-seed
======
Red_Tarsius
Nick DiLiberto's work is incredibly inspiring and shows you the power of
discipline and long-term planning. Years ago my university featured a talk
with _solo traditional animators_. It's a grueling life. You wake up, start to
draw, eat, go back to drawing, sleep. Repeat for x months/years. Indie hand-
drawn shorts are a popular niche in France and, to a lesser degree, in Italy.

 _Via Curiel, 8_ (10min short) required 2 years of work and more than 4000
hand-made acrylic drawings.
[https://vimeo.com/141520314](https://vimeo.com/141520314) Animation is not my
field, but it's interesting nonetheless.

 _" An hour of my animation is made up of about twenty small films, twenty
years of work and thirtyfive-thousand drawings"_ – Simone Massi
[http://www.simonemassi.it/index.php?menuid=3](http://www.simonemassi.it/index.php?menuid=3)

~~~
Keyframe
_It 's a grueling life. You wake up, start to draw, eat, go back to drawing,
sleep. Repeat for x months/years._

That's exactly what it is. Animation is kind of my field. My friend and
colleague is just now finishing his ~12 minute short (hand-drawn with cats
(quadrupeds animation ffs)) which I've helped him with on some of the shots
and co-directed it. It's now in editing and scoring. It took him around three
years. Day in and day out the cycle you've described. It's a tough life,
mostly battling yourself.

On a semi-related note, most of the animation was drawn in Harmony on a
Cintiq... yet, in final stages of animation he decided to give Krita a spin
(Harmony had some issues). Looks like Krita is good enough (for him) to be
used in place of Harmony for next projects. He says it's better even in most
cases.

~~~
wapz
I always thought that after photoshop/illustrator a lot of work is done with
computers (layers and separating parts for movement etc). For example, if
someone is running through a field I presumed the grass/trees would be 10-20
frames repeated, the clouds would just be "shifted", and the sun's change in
colors would be "automated" with a computer.

Do artists still have to redraw large parts of every image still?

~~~
dagw
Almost all 'traditional' animation you see is put together almost entirely
using computers. Even pre-computers people would paint a background once and
then paint each part that moved on transparent plastic or glass and layer it
all on top of each other (sometimes each body part of each charter would be on
its own layer so that you could keep the body still while just moving one arm
for example).

There is however a movement that rejects all that for entirely artistic
reasons, and insist on painting each frame from scratch by hand. Doing so
gives the animation a really unique (and in my opinion cool) look that is hard
to mimic using computers. However it is extremely labor intensive and is
basically only used for short animations done entirely as labors of love.

~~~
dagw
If you want to see an amazing example of what hand painted frame-by-frame
animation can really do take a look at The Old Man and the Sea from 1999 by
Aleksandr Petrov [1]

Almost 30,000 frames, painted by hand on glass, producing probably some of the
most visually striking animation you are likely to see.

[1]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vnZD6RBt9S0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vnZD6RBt9S0)

~~~
Keyframe
First thing that came to my mind. I remember, when it won an Oscar, seeing it
and thinking 'no f way'.

------
cwyers
That's one hell of an accomplishment, to be sure. But I take great issue with
the headline. What's _better_ about it? The guy was wearing basically a hand-
cast to let him draw through the injury he was inflicting to himself with that
workload. The animation itself doesn't seem to be that good -- I mean, your
mileage may vary and different people have different sensitivities, but it
looks like one of the ways you animate a film by yourself is drawing fewer
frames per second than a traditional studio animation, and for me that looks
below the threshold where it's comfortable to watch, and I couldn't imagine
sitting through 80 minutes of it. It gives me a headache. In terms of art...
man, I'd really rather sit through a Studio Ghibli movie, I well and truly
would.

~~~
alphonsegaston
From a growth-oriented perspective, it's a giant investment in cultivating his
talent. I'm sure after 4 years of working this hard, he can draw circles
around most of his peers. He's also probably developed techniques for boosting
his creativity and motivation that others might lack.

~~~
Filligree
> I'm sure after 4 years of working this hard, he can draw circles around most
> of his peers.

Assuming he's still capable of drawing at all. It looks like he's ruined his
wrist.

------
archagon
Incredibly inspiring, to be sure, but I can't help but wonder: how do you
iterate and learn over the course of such a long-haul project? For me, the
creative process involves exploring a lot of dead ends until I find the right
path or develop my skills sufficiently. If you're doing one scene a day for
four years straight, how do you end up with a consistent product at the end?
How do you apply what you've learned to the mountain of drawings you've
already put behind you?

Also, tangentially, how do you make money when you're working 15-hour days on
your passion project for 4 years straight?

Anyway, I'm really looking forward to watching this! Any Bay Area screenings
in the near future?

~~~
zanny
Passion projects are rarely profitable. You make them _for_ you - because you
are compelled to. By definition of the production, nobody else wants it as
much as you do, so you are not going to find anyone who would value it more
than your own times worth, which is usually what it takes to get salaried or
hourly employment.

You can definitely kickstart something like this, though. Once you have
something great out there, making a trailer and pitching it to the Internet
and hoping to get enough money to live off while making it is a possibility.

It is just never a certainty. Any artistic passion project must be done for
the final product, not for any hopeful long term fiscal reimbursement for it,
because its success is bound to how much the people that come into contact
with it agree with your valuation of your own work.

The real question is, how in the 21st century are more people not able to
pursue their passions like this.

------
ryanmarsh
Is it fair to draw parallels to software development here? Is it better to
toil in obscurity until your masterpiece is complete or is it better to
involve others early? We can see examples of both. Curious what HN thinks.

~~~
digikata
With respect to software and art - it makes me think of the author(s) of Dwarf
Fortress where what is accomplished probably would have been severely diluted
without the singularity of vision of a single primary programmer.

Regarding more production oriented software environments - it reminds me of
chapters in the Mythical Man Month discussing the considerations to team
size/composition and it's tension with consistency of design and
communications cost.

~~~
ralfd
The Dwarf Fortress authors are lucky though, that people care enough for their
niche to donate money to them. They are not under pressure to produce
something finished or follow some traditional release cycle.

------
brink
Just a heads up for those at work - The embedded video does have some animated
footage of a topless woman. (Mildly NSFW)

~~~
eridius
A topless snake demon.

~~~
khedoros1
If you're somewhere that you're likely to get in trouble for looking at
animated breasts, I'm not sure that the distinction matters so much.

And anyhow, snake demons are people too. Don't be speciesist.

~~~
eridius
It changes the context from titillating to, well, watching an animated movie
that involves a snake demon. Sure, workplaces may still frown on it, but it's
still probably much more acceptable than looking at a topless human woman.

------
magic_beans
I may have missed it in the article, but what was Nick DiLiberto's source of
income during the 4 years he worked on his film??

~~~
6stringmerc
This is relevant to my interests as well, as art in the US isn't produced in a
vacuum and economic conditions what they are...it's not to take away from the
achievement, but rather understand the context upon which something was
produced. If two people both make an identical origami swan, but one had the
luxury of leisure and tutoring while the other was created between shifts
working in a coal mine using self-directed creativity, well, I mean that's
part of the story.

------
rl3
This is a discipline where machine learning could vastly accelerate
productivity. Imagine having automated interpolation between frames. Hand-draw
every 5 frames, render out to 60 fps.

Not to mention automated style coherence between artists.

Future artists will likely indirectly manipulate their art, influencing
various forms of machine learning that will do most of the leg work. In a way,
matte painting artists already work in similar fashion. Their art usually
begins as pre-existing images that are manually blended into a coherent image,
with original work added later.

~~~
olavk
Almost all animation is fully computer animated these days. Even Disney have
given up on hand drawn animation. So when a film is hand-drawn like this it is
a very deliberate choice to eschew computer animation.

~~~
rl3
What I was suggesting is that machine learning could make the hand-drawn style
viable again from a productivity standpoint.

Modern digital techniques aren't without their drawbacks, hence why hand-drawn
is often viewed as superior. A machine learning workflow augmenting hand-drawn
might be the best of both worlds.

~~~
TFortunato
To play devil's advocate, I think what was suggested is that for the artists
who do this kind of work, the eschewing of using a computer IS what makes
this, if not superior, at least their preferred method of working. For at
least some artists doing this work, the whole point is that everything you see
is drawn by hand because they want to do that work, not for lack of a better
tweening algorithm, machine learned or otherwise.

~~~
rl3
Fair enough, but some day interpolated renders may be completely
indistinguishable. The only benefit to completely hand-drawn work by then
could very well be satisfying the artist's own preference.

------
curtis
The Nova Seed trailer can be found here:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ADm0BSHMeA&feature=youtu.be](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ADm0BSHMeA&feature=youtu.be)

------
savanaly
It's incredible he was able to accomplish an eighty minute movie himeslf. The
art in the trailer for Nova Seed (not necessarily the fight scene embedded in
the OP article) reminds me of Sally Cruikshank animated shorts. [1]

[1] e.g.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N0Z6SOlWbds](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N0Z6SOlWbds)

------
everyone
I feel that way about making games. Imo the most efficient team size is 1. It
will take longer, but it will take less man-hours and the product will be
superior.

~~~
failrate
I disagree. The amount of time it takes me to produce art at the level of
polish required to suit the games I develop is far longer than it takes my
artist friends to create better work. Same with music and just about
everything else other than the design and (arguably) the programming. If I had
the budget to hire one person for each major discipline, I would.

~~~
Arizhel
This sounds right. Many things require different talents, and the tasks can be
divided so that people with different talents can focus on what they do best.
If I were involved in a video game, I could be productive in programming, but
definitely not in the artwork. Lots of tasks are like this.

However, there definitely is a real truth to the saying "too many chefs in the
kitchen". You don't want to waste the chef's time with table service or
janitorial duties, but you can't have 20 chefs all arguing about the menu or
how to prepare food. The problem with too many companies, though, is they want
the product done sooner, and think that adding more people will get it done
faster, just like having 9 women will cause you to bring a baby to term in 1
month....

~~~
failrate
Yes, and I have experience working on very large development teams where it is
clear diminishing returns. There's probably a critical pivot around 7 people
(Dunbar's Number, right?) where you begin to have significant drag caused by
the overhead of managing people and their resources in addition to creating a
piece of software.

~~~
Arizhel
Of course, but it depends on the project and all the skills it entails. If
it's a big, complex software project like a AAA game, you're going to need
more than 7 people just for the programming work alone, and you can't expect
them to also do the artwork, music, etc.; they'll probably do a lousy job of
it. You can ask me to do artwork for a game, and you're going to wind up with
something like stick figures; it simply isn't a strength I have. So more
people may mean more difficulty with management, but if you don't do it, you
just don't have a product.

But it does seem like some places are overstaffed and do that as a way to mask
terrible management.

------
rosser
I have an acquaintance working on a similar project, a CG film titled "White
Tiger Legend". He's been a VFX artist on many films you've seen (LOTR and the
Hobbit movies, Avatar, the Matrix trilogy, &c), and has been plugging away at
this the entire time I've known him.

It's very much a passion project for him, much like "Nova Seed" seems to be
for DiLiberto. He isn't working _entirely_ alone (he's got actors — though as
a Kung Fu black belt, he's doing most of the motion capture for the fight
scenes himself — voice talent, a composer for the score, &c), but it's very
much his vision, and his baby.

This kind of thing takes discipline and dedication of a sort most of us can't
even _imagine_ , let alone execute.

~~~
thenomad
Speaking as someone who did something similar a few years ago (entire
significant-length CGI animated film solo-ish) - thanks. That (your last line)
is really nice to read.

(And if you haven't, please do tell him what you wrote there - he's probably
struggling more than he lets on to finish his work, and a bit of encouragement
and praise goes a long way, particularly when you're working solo.)

------
diogenescynic
Venture Brothers is a good example of this. Venture Brothers is created by a
very small team over a painstaking few years and that process consistently
produces higher-quality content and a better story than their peers.

------
_Codemonkeyism
Voices of a Distant Star comes to mind.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voices_of_a_Distant_Star](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voices_of_a_Distant_Star)

------
ficklepickle
For those in Vancouver, it is playing at the Rio Theatre tomorrow as part of a
double-feature.

See you there!!

~~~
Jack000
I'll be there! Throw up the "Y" hand sign if you're from HN, we can have a
little hn meetup.

------
sebringj
I feel his pain in the brain from coding an entire startup from scratch with
ios/android apps, website, kiosks and backend using 4 different technologies
because i generally dislike coding with others because they have this nasty
thing called an opinion. Obviously this is a personality flaw in any case.

------
Animats
The look seems to come from Heavy Metal, the 1981 movie.

------
ourmandave
I would worry that you get a lot better as you go so that by the 3rd year,
your starting work looks shoddy by comparison and you have to go back and re-
do a lot.

Like code I wrote 6 months ago looks like schlock, but that's not something
anybody sees.

------
phonon
Reminds me of the Star Fox fan movie...also a stunning solo effort.

The author live-streams his animation work.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uieM18rZdHY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uieM18rZdHY)

------
zczc
Made me think about Yuri Norshteyn's project started in 1981, animated by
husband and wife team, and still not finished (36 years so far).

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Overcoat_(animated_film)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Overcoat_\(animated_film\))

------
Apocryphon
It's quite ironic that he began his career at BioWare, given the current
kerfuffle over Mass Effect: Andromeda animating horridly.

------
linkregister
Did anyone else experience bizarre scrolling behavior on the desktop site?

------
xiphias
It looks like it had 0 success, maybe even less than 4 years work's worth of
revenue (I couldn't find any data on it), so the conclusion should be the
opposite: even if people slow other people down by getting on agreement, the
final quality is usually better.

~~~
sosuke
It isn't even available for sale yet is it? I didn't get any impression about
0 success.

Amazon is saying 2017 (unavailable)

~~~
xiphias
Actually you're right. Still, I don't see any data proving the headline in the
title by any metric. The whole article is just an advertisement.

~~~
zck
I wouldn't be surprised if anyone who takes four years to animate a film alone
doesn't measure success solely in financial terms.

~~~
xiphias
Probably not, it was just my expectation to see some beautiful animation that
a team wouldn't be able to do after the headline. I still remember when I
watched Lion King in the theatre when I was about 10 years old, and I was very
sad when Disney shut down the hand-made animation studio. I would love to see
something similar, but in my eyes this comes nothing close to those movies.

