I really want to buy CT animator pipeline but after reading other forums, is its worth buying?

Or should I get Anime Pro? (which seems to be a better buy)

If you can draw then go for Anime Pro and enjoy its Bone and Point Animation. The particle system is also powerful.

CTA2 on other hand gives you access to 3D character and motions.

For me the key advantage CrazyTalk Animator 2 Pipeline has over Anime Pro is the ability to import 3D motions for your character. Having the entire iClone motion library available to you is a massive time saver. Just drop in a motion and your 2D CTA2 character will be performing realistic 3D animations in just seconds rather than the hours it would take normally.

                                                                

Peter
Forum Administrator

www.reallusion.com

it's been a couple of years since I've played with anime pro. But I remember that when I did try working with it, it was so incredibly difficult to draw even the simplest things.

You had to basically use an external software like flash or drawplus, which is no different than what you have to do with crazy talk. if I wanted to draw a curved line, I couldn't just take a pencil and draw it. I had to use a belzier curve tool to plot out each point. But it wasn't enought to have created that curve you also had to manually go in and use a different panel to adjust properties such as thickness, color, and whatever oh yeah, visibility. (cause it's not enough that you actually want to draw your artwork you also have to tell it that you want it to be visible)

Then for the character riggs you really have to rig up one angle at a time. So instead of having one full character like in crazy talk, you literally have to come up with an individual rig for every angle that you need. On top of that all the sprite replacement that takes place during animation is done manually and rigging any of that stuff ahead of time is insanely complicated and time consuming. You really have to be more technical minded as opposed to artistic.

It's been a while since I've played with it. But I have seen some very impressive results. I doubt any of them were easy to create though. I do love their 3d evironment and 3d camera system. Thats something CTA can't do, its still stuck on simulated "multiplane" (like toon boom). Its an adequate filming technique almost 100 years old.

But anime studio has had real 3D within a vector environment for about 10 year or so, so its not like its not possible. Anyhee what's the point if having some great features if you can even get past some of the basic stuff in order to use it.




Ibis Fernandez   |   (available for hire)
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Professional Animator, Filmmaker | Creator of the highest quality (modular) G2 rigs for cartoon animator and developer of Toon Titan and Puppet Producer 
Author of Flash Animation and Cartooning: A Creative Guide
>>> be sure to check out http://toontitan.com for professional grade assets, templates, and custom tools for Cartoon Animator and more.

I prefer Anime Studio Pro. It's a much more creative endeavor than CTA. As Peter said, the import of 3D motions is a great benefit of CTA Pipeline, but only if you want to use them. Personally, I find the whole 3D to 2D aspect gimmicky, and often not worth the hassle it takes to clean up the layering on these motions after applying to a G2 character. Not to mention that most of these 3D motions leave characters in an undesirable position, and adding new animations to it can create some really wonky transitions.

Creating new characters for CTA is a very tedious and often painstaking task, whereas I can draw and rig a character in ASP in a fraction of the time. With Smart bones, you can do some great 3D like effects, such as head turning, that is much, much smoother than the sprite layer swapping that CTA uses.

Also, ASP allows for you to do your own rigging. This may put off some users, not wanting to rig their own characters, and only use the pre-rigged characters from CTA, but by rigging your own, you're not limited to bipedal characters. You can build and rig any type of character. You could also apply bones to anything... Trees, snakes, letters, etc... Anything.

The only real reason to get CTA over ASP is if you're not familiar with how to do 2D animations, and want to just use a stock character and pre-built motions. That is where CTA would excel, over ASP. If you don't want to, nor are able to draw and/or create your own characters, then you'll have trouble with ASP. However, to create anything good or unique with CTA, you should still understand the underlying fundamentals of animation.

[EDIT]
Also, I just wanted to add that CTA is great for animating characters, but Anime Studio Pro is great at animating anything. Built in physics engine, built in text, built in drawing system, smart bones, etc... If you haven't seen it, here is a good video of the feratures in Anime Studio Pro: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YO1mca71ZWY

I am really surprised. I thought guys like you with some drawing ability would excel in Anime pro and come up with great work.

Yes, you need to use connected bezier to draw the shapes. It's almost like TRACING over an image. But that in any case people do while developing their characters, don't they ?

The SWITCH feature is so powerful for switching any body part at any point of time.....need not talk about the Bone features...

Well I must not write more...but you can take a casual look again.

I personally can't draw. Though I have some basic ability, I never honed it. That's why I prefer 3D characters for my story telling. Otherwise ANIME PRO would have been just perfect. Check again what you could do with the Bone and Point animation.

The thing is that for people who can draw its actually easier and a million times faster to just draw the character in the pose you want him rather than fiddle around with bones and all sort of clicky-dicky stuff.

In terms of Anime studio thats not at all how an artistic person would asproach drawing. Yes belziers are good for tracing with accuracy, but for drawing, we just want to draw, we dont want to go through a thousand technical steps just to make the simplest things. Yes I definitely need to check it out again.


Ibis Fernandez   |   (available for hire)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Professional Animator, Filmmaker | Creator of the highest quality (modular) G2 rigs for cartoon animator and developer of Toon Titan and Puppet Producer 
Author of Flash Animation and Cartooning: A Creative Guide
>>> be sure to check out http://toontitan.com for professional grade assets, templates, and custom tools for Cartoon Animator and more.

It's funny, but I prefer drawing with beziers and splines... It's probably because I'm not very graphically talented, meaning I can't draw very well at all. But I can illustrate. Illustration applications such as Illustrator, Canvas, and even Anime Studio Pro suit me much more than drawing/painting programs. There are many people who paint in Anime Studio Pro, using the freehand tools. And now with the point reduction tools, it's even more efficient to do so nowadays.

But when it comes to the end of the day, I choose the application that best suits what it is I'm trying to do. CTA is good for animation, but it's not my go to app for creating characters. We all don't have the kind of patience you must have when trying to get a custom character into CTA. I can draw and rig a full character in Anime Studio Pro faster than I can draw it in some other program, break it up into all it's itty bitty parts and either import one by one into CTA (resize, rotate, and reposition after each and every single piece) or try to fight with the template to get a character imported all in one shebang...

Plus drawing props and or sets is completely impossible inside CTA, so you have to draw (illustrate) it elsewhere, then import into CTA. If you need to change it for any reason, start over by drawing it elsewhere and re-importing. Why go through all that when I can just draw it directly into Anime Studio Pro, and begin animating it immediately. And if I need something extra special, I can work with it right there in ASP. Add some bones, give it some physical attributes and use the physics engine, etc...

Yeah... I have to admit that I like them both. Depending on the job I have had to switch between the two. The ability to draw and animate directly in ASP can be a huge advantage. ASP has come a long way over the years. I think we have a tendency to do the best work in the programs that we have spent the most time with. I am better with After Effects than I am with CTA only because I have used it far more often, but the beauty comes when you can incorporate many programs to achieve the goal. Many of the animations I create in CTA or ASP usually end up in After Effects for the final composition anyway. These are all tools... so like my tool shed at home, I have more than one screwdriver and more than one socket wrench to help me get er done!



Rick Owens

I am just an interested hobbyist who cannot draw characters of my own.
I need presets and finished characters to buy.

Last year I needed an animation software to produce short videoclips for children.
So I surfed the internet which software would be the right one for me.
I tried the free trial of Anime Studio and others (and in addition I owned an older version of CTA1, so I was familiar with this kind of animation software).

After comparing the different softwares my decision was clear:
for my purposes CTA2 would be the right program to fit all my needs.

Meanwhile I have purchased nearly all of the offered content from Reallusion and RL-Marketplace and I am happy with all of my stuff.

So I would advise you:
if you are a newcomer or a hobbyist to animation software and you are not willing to spend your time to create and produce your own characters, CTA2 could be the right software for you.

If you are an advanced creative, you should have a look into the free trial of Anime Studio.

By the way: I think that the real professional users prefer to use both possibilities to produce their animation videos.