The Growth of 3D Anime

Outside of Japan, 2D animation has become a near extinct medium. Nowadays, it’s all 3D and CGI here in the West. It’s a large reason why anime has become so successful since the advent of streaming.

But the thing about animation is that it ain’t easy. It’s expensive, time-consuming, and requires a ton of skill, practice, and coordination in order to make something truly good. Japan has it especially rough, since anime production deadlines are nothing short of inhumane. In an environment like that, corners will inevitably be cut.

For a long time, CGI was used purely as a way to cut production time and costs. Can’t draw that big thing? Slap a model together, put it in there, and presto! You’ve got your episode. Unfortunately, this rushed work was as clear as day to anyone watching, because holy shit, CG animation in anime used to look awful. Often times, it still is.

You can see it in most shows if you look anywhere you’re not supposed to. Scene set in a crowded part of town? Put a few copy-pasted CG characters doing a generic walk cycle into the shot, and presto! You’re done. Just keep your eyes on the focal point of the scene and pray it doesn’t cut to a wide or bird’s-eye-view shot. Or, god forbid, put the army of goblins right in the center of, like, six shots.

Sorry, ‘Overlord.’ I had to.

However, to say that a show is entirely awful looking purely because of CGI is a stupid claim. Especially since 3D animation has developed quite a bit in the last few years. The number of misses these days are vastly overshadowed by the number of successes.

The main problem is how jarring 3D looks when its slapped on top of 2D. If you’re not careful, then the two visual styles are gonna clash harder than the Romans and the Punics. The worse the model, the more disjointing the visual.

Surprisingly, the solution to this was fairly simple. Instead of slapping CGI on top of a drawing, put drawings on top of the CGI. This closes the gap between the two styles, and if done well, it can look great. Hell, there are whole shows animated using this style, leaning more heavily on 3D than 2D.

Studio Orange is especially good at this. Look no further than ‘Beastars’ or their take on ‘Trigun.’ All the characters are in 3D, but they have the same frenetic movement and energy as 2D. Sometimes even more so.

Dragon Ball even took a stab at it with the Super Hero movie. After years of video games trying to adapt Toriyama’s signature style into 3D, Toei Animation themselves adopted the same techniques those games have started using and applied it to a full film. Say what you will about it, but that movie looked pretty damn good.

It’s honestly crazy how far we’ve come. I still remember when 3D anime looked like RWBY. To be fair, I think that series helped push the envelope on the style more than I sometimes give it credit for. I wonder what kinda crazy magic the late Mounty Oum would’ve been able to work if these techniques existed back then…

One of the stranger evolutions of 3D anime comes in the form of V-Tubers. The amount of work it takes to rig and animate those models is nothing short of impressive. Even if the working conditions surrounding them have been… questionable. But that’s a topic for another day.

Video games have improved a ton in this regard as well. Arc System Works games like ‘Guilty Gear’ basically are their own anime at this point; they just have a fighting game attached to them. The new ‘Sand Land’ game basically lets you play the ‘Super Hero’ style, and I’m sure Dragon Quest 12 will blow our socks off as well. Not to mention the good arena fighters, like the old Naruto Ninja Storm games and the upcoming ‘Dragon Ball Sparking: Zero.’

But not that Jujutsu Kaisen game. I don’t even feel comfortable calling that a game.

A lot of people still complain when CGI pops up in anime, and I just don’t get it. If that’s your preference, that’s fine. But to say something is bad just because it employs a certain visual style seems a bit silly. It’s not like Japan is going to do what Hollywood did and get rid of 2D animation entirely.

Animation is constantly evolving. Even more so because the technology used to make it is doing just the same. With time, 3D anime will only become better and better looking. And I, for one, cannot wait to see where it goes next.

Just so long as it isn’t AI art… Which is another rant for another day.