jack-o-fficial:

Okay so… this shit?

I absolutely love Houseki no Kuni, and I haven’t watched TDP so maybe it’s hot garbage and I just don’t know it, but still, I’m getting reeeal tired of people comparing HNK to The Dragon Prince and/or RWBY as a “Houseki no Kuni is how you SHOULD do 3D animation” thing.

Just… no, no no no. 

This is an apples to oranges comparison. Why? Because yes, HNK does use 3D models. However, the animation style is something called 2.5D, the use of 3D models to imitate 2D animation. The Guilty Gear Xrd games, for example, use this animation practice;

And this is what Houseki no Kuni uses as well:

Now, if you want an example of BAD 2.5D animation, it certainly exists. Here’s examples from Berserk 2016:

Now THIS, this here you can put side-by-side with Houseki no Kuni, and say HNK’s animation should be the standard. However, you can’t do that with RWBY and TDP and it be a fair comparison. Why?

Because RWBY and TDP are 3D animation. Simple as that. They may be cell-shaded, but they aren’t trying to imitate 2D animation.

A key difference between 3D animation and 2.5D animation is that the latter is hand-animated frame-by-frame, just like a drawing would be, again with the intent of imitating 2D animation, whereas the former still relies on model physics and a sort of “pose-by-pose” kind of animation. As you can see in the above .gif, the skirts, coats, cloaks, and hair are all moving with the wind due to model physics, rather than the hair, skirts, cloaks, and coats being animated frame-by-frame to look like they’re moving in the wind.

And same can be said of TDP, wherein you can see how the beard and wings move like that due to model physics, rather than being animated frame-by-frame to move.

Stop holding 2.5D animation up as the standard for 3D animation when, while both use 3D models yes, they’re still two entirely different styles of animation.

Furthermore, stop glorifying Japanese animation over Western animation in such a way when Japanese animators are treated like actual literal fucking SLAVES to produce animation of that quality.