Animation and effects: Are we losing the human touch?

Given the way things are at present, being a claymation figure in a stop-motion universe seems quite appealing. If things turn out bad, you can roll yourself into a ball and start afresh. 

Forget the Marvel universe; it’s the animators who have real superpowers.

And while the smooth squad of new tech across CGI, VFX and AI-prompted image-making is rolling out its carpet and setting up stall across the industry as the business of the future, today’s animators are grounded in old-school techniques, while putting the new tech to uses it probably wasn’t designed for.

What they’re able to do in three days is unlike anything we used to be able to do in a week.

Mixed media production studio Hornet in New York is home to hot young animating talents such as Thai duo Jay & Jin, boldly mixing live action and animation across a range of brand spots and short films, that break out of the frame to encompass a borderless imaginative world enveloping fantasy, cultural lore, transient moments and striking visual metaphors. They’re steeped in the latest tools but with those tools firmly in human hands. 

Then there is Laser Days, comprising animator Jack Wedge and game designer Will Freudenheim and their innovative world-building studio powered by real-time game engines and animation.

Above: Directing duo Laser Days created a projection for WhatsApp and Mercedes that illuminated NYC’s Empire State Building.

Hornet’s co-founder Michael Feder has been in the industry for 25 years, cutting his teeth on the likes of 2002’s Ice Age movie, and he is in awe of the latest wave of talents coming through Hornet. – particularly Jay & Jin and Laser Days. Their amalgam of talents fuses AI and animation, film, performance, conceptual and installation art, and the sheer chutzpah of projecting some animation on the Empire State Building for WhatsApp.

Overnight, these guys can pump out 20 seconds of original animation using their tools and the ways that they think. They’re very inspiring.

“They’re both part of this community of like-minded artists in the same space,” says Feder, “and they’re very much operating as a collective; they support each other, help each other on jobs and pitches. If I’m pitching a job with Jack and Will at Laser Days, they’ll have an instant list of 30 artists that we’ll narrow down until we get the right ones, and what they’re able to do in three days is unlike anything we used to be able to do in a week. 

"Overnight, these guys can pump out 20 seconds of original animation using their tools and the ways that they think. They’re very inspiring. I’ve been doing this for 25 years and it’s an exciting shift for me, to be exposed to artists who have this wide-open perspective on what they create.”

Above and main image: Hornet directers Jay & Jin expressed the transformative experience of chewing 5Gum in this spot for Mars Wrigley.

It’s a bracing indication of how hi-tech tools can open up the new and unexpected, as long as they remain in human hands. “In any given week Jack could be curating a show with six like-minded artists doing mixed media work – launching it, marketing it, designing the whole thing – while at the same time pitching on new jobs through us. Will might be in Korea presenting technology that he’s just written, about AI and generative art, or they might be doing some wonderful visuals for an exhibition in Japan for an artist like Anicka Yi. They’ve taken away the boundaries,” he adds. “There truly are no boundaries there.”

It’s too early to tell what the extent of it will be, but it’s mind-blowing, how [AI is] evolving.

Their room-sized projection piece with Anicka Yi, Each Branch of Coral Holds Up the Light of the Moon, is a deeply awesome artefact that evolved out of Laser Days’ custom-built systems combining real-time game engines with generative AI to explore and extrapolate on Yi’s art and practice.

“When they’re pitching work, it’s almost an inspirational speech, and that shines through their work. They’re wonderful to watch and to work with. They inspire me and they inspire the whole studio. And when it comes to what’s new in animation, it’s people like them, borne out of what the next generation of artists are. They’re using game engines, they’re writing their own code to create AI tools that help them make things faster. To get to the vision they believe in faster, which leads to a better finished film.”

This next generation of directors is very polyamorous when it comes to their filmmaking.

Feder goes on: “That’s our take on AI. You cannot replace the human touch. AI does not have emotions or feelings, and so much of what makes our work really special is the team and culture and the community behind the film. We want to make sure our work still feels human, because it will still be from a human.”

Above: For the sumptuous visuals for artist Anicka Yi’s exhibition Each Branch of Coral Holds Up the Light of the Moon, Laser Days used AI and real-time game engines.

AI, of course, is the new main player in animation and VFX. For Bart Yates, founder of BlinkInk in London, it’s a facilitator for innovations and evolutions that we’re only beginning to glimpse on the road ahead. “It’s too early to tell what the extent of it will be, but it’s mind-blowing, how it’s evolving,” he says. “It’s very good at doing weird, funny, uncanny stuff. Whether you’ll get to proper comedy or emotion, I don’t know. The software is amazing, the way you can integrate different things and how different artists can collaborate on stuff. People are doing good stuff with [open-source 3D computer graphics software] Blender.”

With digital animation techniques, because it’s generated by a computer, it’s not very relatable… Interesting, but a bit cold, a bit machine-like and dead.

What this new-generation software lacks, however, is the surgical precision of previous models. “It’s not totally controllable, in the way it needs to be if you’re working on a film or commercial. If you need to tweak the colour of Chris Hemsworth’s toenail, you need to be able to do that, and quickly, But AI, Blender and the emerging software is more spontaneous, so you get what you get. It’s harder to revise that imagery.”

Jettisoning the strict silos of the past, where 2D, 3D, stop-motion and live action generally lived separate lives, the AI-native new creatives are mixing it up like never before. “Integrating different styles of animation is happening a lot now,” says Yates. “This next generation of directors is very polyamorous when it comes to their filmmaking. That’s fun and it feels like a very interesting time.”

Above: The BBC loved human the touch that Nicos Livesey put into his dazzling stop-motion film for this year’s UEFA Women’s Euros.

Even interesting times come with downsides. “You see anything done in AI and you know instantly, it has that feeling. So if 80 per cent of ads are made on AI, the other 20 per cent will have to work even harder to stand out.” 

And however spontaneous the new software, its imagery still struggles to escape the uncanny valley of the not-quite human. “With digital animation techniques, because it’s generated by a computer, it’s not very relatable,” says Yates. “Interesting, but a bit cold, a bit machine-like and dead. Too much sheen. Whereas hand-crafted styles like 2D and stop-motion are like sketches. It’s immediately one human being engaging an emotional response from another.”

Companies that work on high-end videogame cinematics occupy a really interesting creative and technical space.

Among the trends Yates is following is new animators working in traditional crafts while employing the speed and dexterity of modern tools. Nicos Livesey’s superb stop-motion claymation work for the BBC’s UEFA Women’s Euros is a case in point. “Nicos had done the embroidered World Cup tapestry a few years ago, conceiving the animation process utilising these big embroideries to create frames of animation, and we did a similar thing on the Women’s Euros spot. The BBC loved it, that hands-in-the-clay feel, that human touch. And we came in and helped them evolve the script and story around that technique. Because your choices of technique, of craft, is interwoven with the concept itself. That’s when it’s really sweet.”

Above: A clip from Baloonerism, the CG odyssey directed by Hornet’s Samuel Jerome Mason, that follows a group of children as they face their fears of adulthood.

Animating legends Aardman are globally loved for their claymation characters, and while their craft remains much the same, with the launch of the Aardman Academy in 2023, they have opened their doors to rising filmmakers. “It’s essentially a playground, a bit like a school where we bring in people from outside the company to develop their films and make them the way they want to make them,” says Aardman director and stop-motion lead at the Academy, Will Becher. 

“We’re not trying to create Aardman shorts, we’re trying to create alternative filmmakers, but along the way we’re showing them how we approach things, too. That’s a new area and it brings with it new techniques. Wherever we can we’re evolving the processes we use [here], so that we’re up to date with the latest techniques and materials.”

Today’s generative AI tools can quickly generate options, and if you don’t like them, it generates more, but what they can’t easily do is take one of those options and refine it.

The cutting-edge pyrotechnic world of VFX is one closely tied to animation, and the meeting point is in the melting pot of game cinematics. For Joseph Bell, a VFX veteran of Industrial Light & Magic, Lucasfilm and The Mill, “companies that work on high-end videogame cinematics occupy a really interesting creative and technical space”. Among the trending range of styles is hyperreal animation that’s close to photorealism. “These projects require layout and art direction as extensive as an animated feature,” says Bell. “They also use the latest in performance capture technology, particularly facial capture.”

Above: Platige Image created a cinematic trailer announcing the return of the videogame The Witcher 4.

He picks out Polish studio Platige Image, which has put out two examples of hyperreal animation in the past few months. “First, the cinematic reveal trailer for The Witcher IV video game, which was rendered in a game engine supplied by video game development studio CD PROJEKT RED. Second, the episode Crossfire in Amazon’s anthology series Secret Level. Two very different projects, both beautifully executed using a hybrid of high-end 3D animation and VFX techniques.”

A convergence of VFX and real-time 3D technology is a holy grail, but one that’s still over the horizon. “There are steps in the workflow leading up to that which can be made much more interactive and intuitive for filmmakers and VFX artists using real-time 3D technology,” says Bell. Where he sees a sticking point is in the relationship between VFX, animation and AI.

The innovative use of visual effects comes not from the software but from the way the writing and direction uses visual effects.

“High-end commercial content and Hollywood movies are expensive because filmmakers and executives demand almost complete control over the final image,” he says, echoing Bart Yates at BlinkInk. “Today’s generative AI tools don’t give you that control. They can quickly generate options, and if you don’t like them, it generates more, but what they can’t easily do is take one of those options and refine it. Their output can’t be directed.”

And while clients could save a lot of money by settling for less control, that’s the last thing they will do, while still expecting to reap the much-vaunted savings that come with using AI. One wonders if it is a sort of creative pot noodle passed off as premiere dim sum.

My personal impression of visual effects and animation these days is chaos, panic, despair. I feel it's an industry that has completely lost its way.

Andy MacDonald is another well-seasoned VFX veteran, co-founder of that next-generation incubator of talents, The Rookies, whose credits include Transformers, Happy Feet and Harry Potter. “The things that can be created today are mind-boggling if you look at what we had just 10 years ago,” he says, “and when any new script is read, it’s tackled mainly with CG animation as the prime source of image creation.” 

But the human touch is still central. “The innovative use of visual effects comes not from the software but from the way the writing and direction uses visual effects. The clever stuff is the way that it’s used to tell the story. That's when it becomes more magical.”