I can’t not wonder how the Japanese anime industry is going to change in the years to come. I look at the Animator Expo videos, and half of them are basically full CGI. Sometimes it takes minutes to finally get a giveaway hint that it’s not hand-drawn animation. High-polygon models, refined cell-shading, and good direction can disguise CGI really well.
Needless to say, CGI allows much smoother animation much cheaper, since you don’t need people to draw each and every tween, nor worry about the number of tween frames (tweeners are paid by frames drawn usually). People argue that hand-drawn animation still looks better, but how long is that going to hold true?
