There is something uniquely charming about animation cels.
They are literally the physical objects that's filmed for the production of animated shows/movies.
The live action production's equivalent to owning an animation cel would be owning the entire set, actors included lol.
Owning a single key frame from my favorite Anime movie has always been a dream of mine, that's why I was ecstatic to get my hands on this last year: https://i.imgur.com/WcWF7x8.jpg
There's nothing really logical about the desire to own NFTs or physical animation cels, so I'm not going to claim one is better than the other in some objective way.
But, to put it extremely mildly, those two things scratch entirely different itches.
I guess if you don't care about either of them, then they might seem superficially similar. However I don't think anybody interested in one of those things would consider the other one to be remotely similar.
NFTs are about proving you own something. "This is 'mine', and nobody else can 'own' it, until I sell it."
Owning a physical animation cel is about touching a piece of history; a physical artifact of a near-magical process. It's like holding one of Michaelangelo's paintbrushes, versus looking at a picture of one of Michaelangelo's paintbrushes. Again, nothing logical about one or the other, but we are not robots.
There is no particular reason why an NFT must be associated with a JPG file, as opposed to a physical object. It's just a certificate, after all. Instead of (or in addition to) the usual IPFS URL you would have a detailed description of the physical artwork, including any identifying marks, and of course some evidence that the NFT issuer was in fact the original owner of the piece.
It gets a bit dicey if someone later decides to sell the physical art without passing along the NFT, or vice-versa, but then again the same thing could happen with a traditional (physical) certificate of authenticity. Presumably the artwork would still have some value even without the certificate, as there are other ways to establish its authenticity; the reverse may or may not be true.
I know that it can't be 100% same but some part of the appeal also bound to the ownership. The feeling that one owns the partial of the anime they love is really important. In that sense, I thought NFT also could appeal especially for those digital animes because there is no other way to get the same feeling.
> The feeling that one owns the partial of the anime they love is really important.
If made by the company behind the anime, then maybe. If made by some third party in a copyright infringing manner, then that most certainly isn't applicable, which i've seen be a problem with the NFT space insofar.
> In that sense, I thought NFT also could appeal especially for those digital animes because there is no other way to get the same feeling.
How about physical collectibles? Plushies, keychains, figurines, posters, cosplay outfits, that sorts of stuff. Seems like many video games, cartoons and anime out there all have that in some capacity, unless it's very niche and merch is never made.
Actually, it seems like a pretty interesting space, for example, the Potekoro Astolfo bean plushies from the Fate anime series seem to go for about 300-400$ nowadays.
I agree that a lot of it is sentimental value, but i'm not sure that non fungible things will capture people's attention quite as much, or will feel the same as something physical that you can put on a shelf or whatever people do.
How do you explain the millions spent on in game purchases of digital goods then? Seems like you are projecting your own issues with NFT and the person asking is just imagining ownership paradigms.
Just because people are buying something doesn’t make it a smart decision. I understand the technology but I’ve never come across an new idea for using NFTs that didn’t feel like I was just going to be scamming the person buying them. The fact others don’t have the same ethical compunctions I do does not in any way make me feel more like disregarding my own personal ethics.
> How do you explain the millions spent on in game purchases of digital goods then?
With different forms of interaction.
The game IS the product and those items directly affect how you interact with it, for example, with different items or skins for those items or other types of customization. There, those things aren't necessarily all that different from a DLC that adds more content, though microtransactions are a slippery slope in an unregulated industry and sometimes ethically dubious.
Anime isn't necessarily like that, since getting a new item (NFT or otherwise) won't change how you interact with it directly. Your figurines, mouse pads, mugs, pillows etc. will probably spruce up your place a bit, maybe even a background image might... but that's largely orthogonal to it being on a blockchain.
Of course, NFTs are the new hotness, so i don't doubt that some will try to speculate, others will want to get on the trend and so on. Human perception of value is a curious mess.
it really isn't about ownership. it's about the artifact, and the feelings associated with knowing an artifact you behold was physically part of an event or process. for collectors, the appeal may be in responsibility for preservation, and interpersonal details of access to an artifact. for usable artifacts, there may be joy in recreating the original conditions of use or adapting the artifact to newer uses.
ownership is just the legal framework and social norm we use to manage those activities, it is not those activities. NFT ownership provides none of the fun bits.
that first clip from Pinocchio is exactly the camera-cel shaking that I like about layered animation with cels that I would love to see simulated in modern digital processes, that I referred to here https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30403219#30403899
Just add some camera shaking to each layer in after effects!
I built a multi-plane camera setup in high school for an animation project in, without knowing it was a thing used in the industry.
My version was very simple. Instead of stacking the planes, I hung them from yardsticks spanned between two tables, so I could slide the planes forward toward the camera at different rates of speed.
Here is a short doc from Disney (1957) about the invention of the first multi plane camera:
My wife casually mentioned seeing that camera when she worked at Disney.
She wasn't being coy; it just wasn't a big deal for her.
For me, that was like "casually" mentioning she'd had lunch with Jesus or Einstein or something. I've always been really fascinated with that aspect of animation, so Disney's big multiplane rig is something of a holy relic to me.
I often reference this short doc from Disney for two reasons: the first is the subject itself, the multi-plane camera; the second is how well the subject is explained. It’s a good example of excellent and clear visual communication even if it might appear a bit slow in pace for today’s audience.
> Kouji Nanke didn’t only draw Kyoko’s (the character) eyes obviously
This is an interesting example of a parenthetical supplement being attached to a word which also has a grammatical particle attached to it. The particle has not been applied to the supplement, which messes up the way the sentence reads when the parenthetical is included.
On the other hand, if the parenthetical is conceptually excluded, it's perfect.
There are some other options:
- ...didn't only draw Kyoko's (the character's) eyes... [double marking]
- ...didn't only draw Kyoko (the character)'s eyes... [marking on the full phrase "Kyoko (the character)"]
- ...didn't only draw Kyoko's eyes (Kyoko is the character)... [circumlocution]
I like the 2nd of your options the best. It has the property that if you delete the parenthetical, it's perfect, while avoiding all of the other issues you mentioned, and still explaining who Kyoko is.
Perhaps more importantly, when said aloud it feels natural. This is a good rule of thumb for improving ambiguously good writing.
edit: another option:
... didn't only draw the eyes of Kyoko (the character)...
Perhaps the relative importance of these elements is actually swapped: the subject is the character's eyes, the fact that this character is named Kyoko is secondary. So: ...didn't only draw the character's eyes (Kyoko).... This parenthesis is only "necessary" because later they say Kyoko is cute.
That said, leaving out the name of the character at first would have worked better, I believe. The parenthesis is a distraction from the topic of that paragraph, which is all about technique, and then later on the light note.
It's absolutely not a big deal here, but for most types of user documentations, it's important to go straight to the point and avoid distractions. Schools tend to train for the opposite (fill at least 2 pages etc.).
Noise can be perceived as an additive component in a work of art - if done right. Just like any other component of a composition, it depends on how it's used.
For example the surface detailing on the Star Wars ships can be viewed as a type of noise as they are not really representing anything of actual engineering, but rather are aesthetic addendums selected from a preset set of visual components.
The mathematical space for animation frames is of course different from that of a surface of a static 3d shape, or music, but the philosophical concepts are analogous, I think.
Perceptually - how human brain interprets them - there are of course larger differences.
But all in all, visual arts, music, regardless of the mathematical domain (space, time, volume) artistically used noise is not just a pathology.
You say that but many games and music pieces do specifically that. And movies emulate VHS effects, manipulated images re-add noise and texture, and so on.
Film grain is (used to be? It's been a while since I've seen one) added to hollywood movies despite the entire pipeline being digital, and noise can be instrumental in masking hard edges and artifacts while tying together an audio mix. Painters will drag a brush with only medium and no pigment across a canvas just to "glue" the elements together. So yes, People do enjoy this.
"People enjoy some things like this" != "People enjoy all things like this"
I'm no luddite when it comes to modern animation; there is an absolute deluge of modern animation that I love. Most if not all of it would have been impossible with traditional animation techniques.
But as for the charm of traditional animation, the "charm" of those visual imperfections wasn't the aesthetic value of the imperfections themselves; it was the slight breaking of the "fourth wall" and how it reminded me that human beings physically arranged and photographed every single frame of animation. Digitally faking those imperfections would be silly to me.
As for something like artificial film grain noise in Hollywood, I suppose that perhaps some people love the fact that it reminds them of the physical filmmaking process. For most others I suspect it's a purely visual aesthetic charm, that is indeed ripe for digital replication.
Art is subjective (always a dangerous thing on HN) and I won't say anybody is wrong if they feel otherwise about this. However, it would be objectively true to point out that the appeal of "analog imperfections" goes far beyond their face-value aesthetic appeal for many.
I will argue a bit for the value of noise (visual or auditory) of causing you to stop processing each individual element and accept them as one whole though. I don't think that argument applies to pin registration shake on film animation, but if every element of a mix were perfectly dry it would sound unrealistic (even live, arguably the highest fidelity of music for this argument, has room characteristics).
Regarding hollywood it was originally a way to make the CG elements and live-action elements actually blend. Once they went all-digital it didn't make as much sense.
Akira has everything described in the article practiced to an absurd degree. I don't think there is a single light in the movie that isn't an actual real light.
Yeah I'm not sure what the parent poster meant by that.
They may have been referring to the glow/bloom effect created by backlighting the cel, which actually is "real light" and is used very liberally in Akira.
They are literally the physical objects that's filmed for the production of animated shows/movies.
The live action production's equivalent to owning an animation cel would be owning the entire set, actors included lol.
Owning a single key frame from my favorite Anime movie has always been a dream of mine, that's why I was ecstatic to get my hands on this last year: https://i.imgur.com/WcWF7x8.jpg