There’s a style of ‘animation’ that has become widely used on YouTube where they take a still image of a character then make them sway back and forth repetitively. I guess it’s cheap to make but I find it distracting and weird, even a bit patronising, as if they think we need moving pictures to keep us interested. I think it started with Veritassium and spread to other edutainment YouTube channels and now I just flat out avoid channels which use it.
Anyone else find it annoying?
Very fair. If you watch the start of this video you can kind of get an idea of the style I mean. In particular the unnecessary head swaying when it could just be a static picture.
Not throwing shade at the channel or its content, it’s just the animation style really grates on me.
I can only imagine you could’ve found a better example because I don’t see anything annoying about that at all. It’s simply an inexpensive animation style where more elaborate animation isn’t necessary.
But that’s the point - why animate a scene that should be completely static? Do we really need the character to lol their head around like a bobble head for no reason? To be clear I’m being hyperbolic here - I realise in the grand scheme of annoying things this falls somewhere between ‘that speck of dust under your phone screen protector’ and ‘the noise grandma makes when she chews’.
Why do you think it “should” be static? Someone wanted to convey something with that movement or they wouldn’t have put the effort in. I mean, why animate anything at all?
Ideally it would be an animation of the character that actually moves intentionally. Failing that, just keep it still! I’m happy to stare at a still photograph or cartoon of someone for 30 seconds, I don’t need to watch them sway back and forth like a slow flailing tube man to keep me engaged!
People don’t stand perfectly still. It’s exaggerated in the animation, but it’s done to make them seem alive.
Yea pretty much, it’s the same as old video games that had the sprite loop through an animation when you were standing still, instead of having the character freeze in place
If everything was still, I might as well be flipping through a PowerPoint
I mentioned it in another comment but I feel like there’s an intentionality and craftsmanship to those animations. The speed and fluidity of the repetition adds character detail. The stuff that annoys me almost feels procedurally animated, like they take the body parts and then just sway them all back and forth with no real thought.
True! You and our other commenter friends all have very valid opinions! I think I may be in a minority who it annoys for whatever reason, a bit like how some people can’t stand chewing noises.
i had never seen this before but i totally get what you mean. the other comments are latching on to motion vs no motion, and i think in most cases motion would be better, but these just look like inflatable arm wavers stuck in molasses. just panning over a static image slowly would achieve a much better effect for less effort than this
In the first minute of that video, it depicts someone walking up the stairs, writing with a pen, and closing a cupboard. All of these scenes and movements were really well animated, actually. I didn’t see any awkward standing or wobbling that seemed out of place.
Random diagnostic question; are you an anime fan? I ask because anime often has scenes where people kind of just stand there completely stock-still and talk, with the camera moving around. The art style is a bit reminiscent of anime, so I’m wondering if the movement is coming across as uncanny-valley due to the similarity.
Interesting comparison. I don’t mind a sparse animation style, I think what bothers me is the animation used in these YouTube channels feels much more ‘procedurally generated’ and repetitive.
I could definitely have picked a better example, I just found the first one that popped up. It’s most jarring when it’s just a static shot of a cartoon toso swaying back and forth for like 10 seconds for no reason.
Can you find any other examples? This seems completely innocuous to me.