What is the definition of hand drawn animation in the Pencil2D Community?

When I originally asked what is the definition if hand drawn animation, in this Discord group I think I was not specific enough.

The reason I asked the question, is that I didn’t want to upset other members.

Some people are upset, when others have a different perspective.

Some feel under attack when others don’t use simular techniques.

I didn’t want to offend anyone, please tell me were the boundaries are, in this discussion.

I can then do my best not to offend!

The only way that progress can occur is by experimentation, I.e the process of trial and error, to see what works.

What ever we do, someone somewhere will be upset, that’s life.

Greetings @AnimatorElisa

I’m sorry if you’ve felt unheard, offended or underappreciated in this community.

Since you seem to have a very personal understanding on what animation is based on your experiments and experience, I dare say that perhaps addressing the Pencil2D community as a whole for any topic related to animation will not be useful to you in the long run.

This community has a very heterogeneous user base and not everyone is an expert that could provide you with detailed knowledge any different than what using a search engines could short term.

In that sense, I feel the Pencil2D community might not be qualified to answer any of your expectations in regards to animation theory or practice.

As such I’d personally suggest you consider visiting different communities with a higher ratio of experts to potentially provide you with a more reasonable discussion framework and, perhaps, a satisfactory answer to whatever it is you’re looking for in your animation journey.

As a moderate example, there are veritable places like Animation World Network which gather a lot of animation experts, and could become a first stop to satisfy your curiosity in theoretical topics.

Have a good evening,

My sister has looked at the communications, and she’s of the opinion that certain members of the Discord group dislike me because I use the vector drawing tools.

I’ve seen some of them openly discussing their removal, to stop problems. I’ll continue to use version 0.6.6 of Pencil2D, so removing them won’t stop me, so doing.

It’s a crying shame because the vector tools are excellent. They don’t do everything I would wish, but that happens in life!

I understand that most Pencil2D users don’t use vectors, but with a few workarounds they do everything I require.

If I leave the Discord group as a result of the actions of others, it will be a sad day. I think I have much to contribute, so if that happens it will be the Discord groups loss.

Have a good day

Show this to your sister about what I write to you in the previous discussion:

Your sister has the same problem as you about not reading what others wrote.

let me address the cartoon of you by myself and not by your laughable strawman.

Why can’t traditional animation be drawn with vectors.

I had answered this in the previous topic and the answer is: Yes! Hand-Drawn Animation can be done with vectors. Vectors, raster, doesn’t matter, just as long a you draw each frame of animation by hand.

My process is sketch, ink in and then colour, just like yours?

(Each cell is an individual drawing) So are my cell drawing!

We are not talking about creating a single picture/image but creating an animation. That is, how you create your sequence of frames of animation. Hand-Drawn Animation is where you create each frame of animation by drawing each by hand. If you are cut & paste the previous drawing and move the pieces around to create the frames of your animation, you didn’t draw each frame by hand, and by definition, you didn’t have hand-drawn animation.

Are you saying you Draw each cell From scratch?

You never cut & paste and trace?

If you want pure hand-drawn animation, then cut & paste is out.

Tracing is actually a big part of hand-drawn animation. When we create a new frame, we referenced or trace parts of the previous drawings, i.e. the onion-skin feature. Creating animation cels require you to trace drawings from paper. One technique called Rotoscoping actually is tracing over live action footage.

Why is hand-drawn animation like this?

Just go back to the history of term. Before we use computers (hence the other name Traditional Animation), we animate using paper. To create a new frame of animation, we take a new sheet of paper and draw. We don’t take the previous drawings and cut them up to make the new the frames, that would just destroy the previous drawing and the product would literally be useless further down the animation process.

Here is a video of such process demonstrated by a veteran:

To make a hand-drawn animation in your computer, you essentially replicate this process in it.


That is the definitions of the term. That is what it means. If you don’t take my word, then how about Wikipedia:

Traditional animation (or classical animation, cel animation, hand-drawn animation, or 2D animation) is an animation technique in which each frame is drawn by hand.

No one told you not to animate your way (or your style as you say), but your way is just not hand-drawn/traditional animation. it is not just my opinion, it is the fact of the matter.

If you can’t accept my answer because I’m a lazy newbie with no experience whatsoever and therefore not qualified to tell you anything, or you won’t take Wikipedia’s either because for whatever reason; JoseMoreno points you to where you can find experts who are more qualified to answer your inquiries. Go there, show your work, and ask them. With qualified people, hopefully, your search for answers would finally come to an end.

Do what you believe is best. I’m sure there are other forum/Discord groups out there who would take you in (maybe to the Animation World Network that JoseMoreno pointed you to). And then, you can present your questions to the people there.

@AnimatorElisa Hi. I think it’s important to identify that currently you’re writing on a public forum. Not a discord server. It’s a different platform.

On the other hand not all platforms are moderated by the same individuals. Some moderators are shared but owners are different. It’s a a decentralized community.

In that sense the discord server is a different community hub / platform unrelated to this forum.

As far as I recall we have not seen you discussing on the discord server in several months at least not with this username, I don’t think :thinking:

I think it’s important to clarify some misunderstandings:

  1. All Pencil2D communities are hosted in platforms considered as public. And those who enagage with them accept the terms and regulations of each community & platform separately.
    In that sense you can talk with other people and they can talk to you in any way the platform allows.

  2. The Pencil2D project has minimum guidelines to moderate potentially harmful behavior. But we are not here to moderate discussions on topics of individual opinion. Your opinions are your own.

  3. Pencil2D vector capabilities have NOT been removed. They DO need to be improved. Those are separate issues.

    I explained this already in a different thread. Pencil2D had document templates added, and the default template was made simpler.

    You can create your own template with ONLY vector layers in upcoming versions.
    We will probably have two base templates available as well, one for bitmap and one for vector.

    But since any changes made to Pencil2D until the new version are under discussion

  4. Any change made to Pencil2D is not a change aimed to disgruntle you, nor is aimed towards any specific user. We have thousands of users every day giving feedback or complaining about different things. One of those complaints is that they didn’t understand which layer to use so we thought it would be better if they chose which template they wanted to use. That’s all.

  5. Remember that the license for this software states that is provided free of charge “AS IS” everyone using becomes aware that it is a product under development. So it’s important to understand that changes will be made to further improvements asked by the community over time.

  6. You are not required to leave this forum, nor the discord server, but you do need to understand that we cannot control everyone’s action in a public forum. We are simply providing a web space for people to interact, and unless there’s a complete violation of the code of conduct we won’t make other users leave this space.

  7. You are welcome here to post your artwork, but I’ve told you already that we are probably not an adequate community to answer all of your animation questions. This is first and foremost a technical support forum, more than an art community, There are better communities for answering your theoretical requirements.

  8. We can’t control what individual users do, and individual users do not represent the entirety of the Pencil2D community.

  9. If you feel you have to leave this community however, we apologize for not being able to help you in the long run to have a satisfactory experience and wish you well.


Notes for mods

  • Edit1: Clarification of various points to make it easier to read
  • Edit2: Improvement of language used to avoid misunderstandings of tone or intent

I am a member of a group, which I shall call Neuro divergent. This means that my brain wiring is very slightly different to that of Neuro typicals.

I struggle to read between the lines. Please don’t assume that a misunderstanding is deliberate, they aren’t.

I love Pencil2D, I was experimenting over the weekend, and I’ve discovered new facets of the vector mode, which are mind-blowing and have much potential.

I’ve developed a work flow which allows me to work around the slight bug and turn them into features.

There are some people who demand a perfect program, with no bugs, unfortunately that’s not possible because they’re written by human beings. But I’ve always found ways around to perform the sane task. Perhaps that’s my the result of my traditional art training.

I wish the Pencil2D Team well, with a few minor problems, your doing an excellent job, keep it up. But you should be a little more accommodating of different ways of working.

Have a nice day.

@AnimatorElisa Thank you for taking the time to share your personal experience with us.

Taking your comment into consideration, we will review better ways to allow users that work with Pencil2D as a tool for alternative pipelines to feel more welcome.

Currently there’s a plethora of possible creative products that are already possible with Pencil2D, and some of them have been pioneered by veteran users beyond the original intent of the software.

We acknowledge that there are very talented and dedicated individuals in this community creating artwork with Pencil2D in surprising and challenging ways, and we sincerely want all of you to succeed in what you do.

After all Pencil2D is only a tool, and how the artist uses a tool depends on them entirely.

We certainly don’t hold any definitive truth in how the software should be used, however we do feel obligated to inform our users how the software was meant to be used, at least as a guideline.

It is expected that every user of this software has the freedom to tackle new challenges in unexpected ways and does not need to honor our recommendations if they don’t want to.

That said I’m afraid we can only provide limited support when the software is used in alternative ways, but we will consider discussing how to achieve more efficient solutions that can improve our communication with the community, so the experience of using Pencil2D as a creative tool beyond it’s original purpose can be accomplished more pleasantly in the future.

I wish you the very best, and you too have a great day!

Hi Jose

I’ve always realised that when I go off piest artistically, that I’m on my own. I accept that and enjoy the challenges of doing new things.

I’ve asked the occasional questions, but these were general enquiries, not directly related to what I was doing. I hope the answers I’ve ilicited are illuminating to others as they have been to me.

I’ve noticed that some people moan if specific features are not provided in Pencil2D, rather than working out how they can do it, using the existing features.

The animation below was made by my sister, in responce to a user of Pencil2D who complained there was no circle tool.

https://m.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLaPr720VeVOi5wD6pa-6c5f4Thzn5zeeG#menu

Have a nice day.

Hi Jose

Disregard the third entry on the playlist!

Some people think that because they can take a horse to water, that they can teach it to scuba dive!

@AnimatorElisa I’ve been very busy with my work so I apologize for not answering sooner.

Thank you for sharing your Sister’s work.

We hope to continue improving the software so it cab be used in the way that every user prefers best.

Disregard the third entry on the playlist!

Noted. Thank you for informing me.

Have a good day :wave: