Reused/Recycled Animation

[NinjaGoku]

After watching MrWalnut4's favorite scenes from Kai he 'sparked' my interest....

https://youtu.be/Otc-N-Yt8Qg

Not sure if this recycled scene from episode 178 was re-animated out of laziness, or a clear tribute to the intro. (is the correct term 'recycled'?)

That was the most obvious instance but one thing is for sure and that is production did get lazy, has anyone else spotted any recycled scenes?

[JulieYBM]

After watching MrWalnut4's favorite scenes from Kai he 'sparked' my interest....

https://youtu.be/Otc-N-Yt8Qg

Not sure if this recycled scene from episode 178 was re-animated out of laziness, or a clear tribute to the intro. (is the correct term 'recycled'?)

That was the most obvious instance but one thing is for sure and that is production did get lazy, has anyone else spotted any recycled scenes?

It's a tribute to the Opening animation. It was drawn from scratch, using the precious little money afforded to each episode. 'Lazy' it was not.

[Metalwario64]

Yeah, I compared them frame by frame a while back, and surprisingly, the Last House clip in the episode had even more frames of animation than the intro shot.

[NinjaGoku]

It's a tribute to the Opening animation. It was drawn from scratch, using the precious little money afforded to each episode. 'Lazy' it was not.

Did you watch the clip? 'Drawn from scratch'. You just contradicted yourself. Sure it has more frames than the original opening, but each frame doesn't contain much attention to detail. If it wasn't lazy they wouldn't have rotoscoped it the first place. It's easier to re-draw something that has been drawn before so yes Last House was being lazy instead of creating original animation.

[LuckyCat]

It's a tribute to the Opening animation. It was drawn from scratch, using the precious little money afforded to each episode. 'Lazy' it was not.

Did you watch the clip? 'Drawn from scratch'. You just contradicted yourself. Sure it has more frames than the original opening, but each frame doesn't contain much attention to detail. If it wasn't lazy they wouldn't have rotoscoped it the first place. It's easier to re-draw something that has been drawn before so yes Last House was being lazy instead of creating original animation.

Even in the Cell games, it was more of a Shout Out to that scene. Anyone who was watching the Japanese broadcast immediately recognized the iconic shot, but in context it looked pretty cool when paired with the animation used for Goku's power up. Don't get me wrong, Toei uses recycled shots in some terrible ways, but I don't think this is the best example.

[JulieYBM]

Yeah, I compared them frame by frame a while back, and surprisingly, the Last House clip in the episode had even more frames of animation than the intro shot.

The key animator of the opening might have relied more on timing than excess drawings.

It's a tribute to the Opening animation. It was drawn from scratch, using the precious little money afforded to each episode. 'Lazy' it was not.

Did you watch the clip? 'Drawn from scratch'. You just contradicted yourself. Sure it has more frames than the original opening, but each frame doesn't contain much attention to detail. If it wasn't lazy they wouldn't have rotoscoped it the first place. It's easier to re-draw something that has been drawn before so yes Last House was being lazy instead of creating original animation.

Yes, the animation was not recycled, it was drawn from scratch. New key animation and in-between drawings were made and the framing and timing is completely different. It's not lazy because detailed drawings are not a prerequisite of good animation. either. It's not roto-scoped, either, nor did Uchiyama or Obara draw the original shot from the opening. Neither storyboarded Episode #178, either, Episode Director Ueda Yoshihro did, as a clear callback to the opening.

You're throwing around the term 'lazy' like the production staff are putting the show together on an infinite amount of time and simply being negligent. Such a thing does not exist in the Japanese animation industry. Everyone is paid by the quantity of their work, not how much time they spent on it, which means most are constantly working to get to the next project. Uchiyama and Obara were putting together the most episodes of any other team at the time, typically all by themselves. Episode #178 had four other key animators work on it, meaning the production schedule was even shorter than usual given Uchiyama and Obara had been doing all of the key animation themselves for episodes sub-contracted to Last House since Episode #145.

[NinjaGoku]

Yes, the animation was not recycled, it was drawn from scratch. New key animation and in-between drawings were made and the framing and timing is completely different. It's not lazy because detailed drawings are not a prerequisite of good animation. either. It's not roto-scoped, either, nor did Uchiyama or Obara draw the original shot from the opening. Neither storyboarded Episode #178, either, Episode Director Ueda Yoshihro did, as a clear callback to the opening.

You're throwing around the term 'lazy' like the production staff are putting the show together on an infinite amount of time and simply being negligent. Such a thing does not exist in the Japanese animation industry. Everyone is paid by the quantity of their work, not how much time they spent on it, which means most are constantly working to get to the next project. Uchiyama and Obara were putting together the most episodes of any other team at the time, typically all by themselves. Episode #178 had four other key animators work on it, meaning the production schedule was even shorter than usual given Uchiyama and Obara had been doing all of the key animation themselves for episodes sub-contracted to Last House since Episode #145.

The way you imply 'drawn from scratch' it is as if the animators just drew that shot straight from their head without using the original shot as reference. I get that they had to draw each frame, but I wouldn't count a shot such as that as being 'from scratch' because it was directly used from the first opening. I'm mainly speaking using the only information available on the subject from the Dragon Ball Wiki (not that reliable, I know). It says 'When Goku is powering up at the start of the episode, he clenches his fist and raises his arms up to make a great explosion of power. This shot is recycled from the first opening of the Japanese version "Cha-La Head-Cha-La", except that Goku is a Super Saiyan instead of his base form and the blast is colored red instead of blue.'

Yes 'lazy' is just an easy way for me to say that the animators were trying to put the show together under pressure, like 'cutting corners', pretty much what you explained. I didn't mean to come across as being disrespectful to the animators. Sometimes you have to cut corners with terminology in order to make a point. I thought the comparison video was clear enough. So maybe it wasn't rotoscoped (if you want to get specific) but it certainly was clean cut copy reference. Every frame doesn't need to match up in order for a shot to be recycled.

Maybe it was a stylistic 'tribute', maybe it was a decision made when staff were under pressure for original shots, but the shot was recycled.

[VegettoEX]

I think we're all getting a bit pedantic here, but I think it's also important to be so if the discussion's even going to happen.

Where you need to step back and think here is: so does that mean every single "homage" is then "recycled"...? Is that the best word to use there?

There are lots of homages throughout the entire series. In the anime, you've got Gohan vs. Buu where they take the same stance as Goku vs. Vegeta's first fight. Does that mean it's "recycled"...? I personally wouldn't call that "recycled" (or "lazy" for that matter). I'm sure someone else can litter the discussion with tons of these types of examples, and I'm not sure that "recycled" would be the right word to describe any of them.

[LuckyCat]

Here's a good recycle example:

https://youtu.be/cZIvtkVkzKg?t=20s

Omega Shenron charges towards both Goku and Vegeta in exactly the same way, basically ignoring background objects and even actual attacks.

[NinjaGoku]

I think we're all getting a bit pedantic here, but I think it's also important to be so if the discussion's even going to happen.

Where you need to step back and think here is: so does that mean every single "homage" is then "recycled"...? Is that the best word to use there?

There are lots of homages throughout the entire series. In the anime, you've got Gohan vs. Buu where they take the same stance as Goku vs. Vegeta's first fight. Does that mean it's "recycled"...? I personally wouldn't call that "recycled" (or "lazy" for that matter). I'm sure someone else can litter the discussion with tons of these types of examples, and I'm not sure that "recycled" would be the right word to describe any of them.

You're right, it's all a little vague and pedantic. I think that the shot mentioned was iconic of the opening sequence and can therefore be considering a 'homage', however it still incredibly similar that it can also be considered 'recycled', it's what I first thought when I watched it and it was on the wiki. 'Homage' is a nice term, and I had no idea about scene reflected from Gohan vs. Buu which was anime-only. It's decisions like that which make me appreciate the anime staff even more.

I'm curious about other homages which only featured in the anime, but I'm also curious to see if there were any other not-so iconic shots they heavily used as reference to make production easier.

[JulieYBM]

There are lots of homages throughout the entire series. In the anime, you've got Gohan vs. Buu where they take the same stance as Goku vs. Vegeta's first fight. Does that mean it's "recycled"...? I personally wouldn't call that "recycled" (or "lazy" for that matter). I'm sure someone else can litter the discussion with tons of these types of examples, and I'm not sure that "recycled" would be the right word to describe any of them.

Those cuts you are referring to are from Dragon Ball Z Episode #265, storyboarded by Ueda Yoshihiro for Episode Director Kadota Hidehiko. Ueda had just been episode director and storyboard artist for Episode #263, so I assume he didn't have time to see the storyboard he drew through to the end so Kadota did so for him. Episode #265 is the only episode of Dragon Ball Z that Kadota acts as episode director (enshutsu) for. Kadota is usually an assistant episode director, so it seems likely he was only given the keys to the ship for Episode #265 because Ueda was too busy approving Episode #263 and then storyboarding and directing Episode #267. In other words, these homages are all most likely the ideas of Ueda Yoshihiro, not Uchiyama and friends.

[VegettoEX]

While that's great information, I don't actually see its relevance here. I'm not asking who did what; I'm asking for additional examples of cuts that are clear homages to previous work in the series (unless, of course, the exact same person happened to storyboard and/or directly animate an homage to their own, earlier work).

[JulieYBM]

While that's great information, I don't actually see its relevance here. I'm not asking who did what; I'm asking for additional examples of cuts that are clear homages to previous work in the series (unless, of course, the exact same person happened to storyboard and/or directly animate an homage to their own, earlier work).

I spent all that time researching the first half of my post the second part slipped my mind. I can't think of any others off-hand, but these two examples in episodes storyboarded by Ueda do lend a starting point for anyone who wants to sit through all of Ueda's episodes as enshutsu or storyboard artist:

DB: 7-8, 12, 18, 21, 25-26, 32, 34, 40, 43, 48, 52, 55, 61, 63, 68, 70, 73, 75, 78, 80, 87, 90, 94, 98, 103, 105, 108, 114, 118, 121, 123, 126-127, 129, 133, 137, 145, 150

DBZ: 4, 8, 11, 18, 23, 26, 29, 32, 38, 43, 47, 51, 56, 60, 65, 70, 74, 78, 81, 83, 86, 89-90, 94, 98, 103, 108, 113, 119, 125, 129, 133, 138, 140, 144, 148, 152, 157, 171, 178, 185, 205, 209, 214, 218, 220, 223, 227, 249, 254, 260, 263, 267, 270, 273, 277, 281, 285, 290; SP2

DBGT: 4, 8, 13, 18, 23, 27, 31, 37, 44, 49, 54-55, 59, 62; SP (Storyboard: 64)

Movies: 9, 10
Plan to Eradicate the Super Saiyans

I imagine 'no', of course.

Going back to what you said earlier, 'recycled' animation implies prior animation was reused, which clearly did not happen. The key animation and in-between animation drawings are done from scratch. One could say an idea was 'recycled', but that has such a dirty connotation and is really a careless approach to the subject. So far we've established two homages--by one storyboard artist--to prior, somewhat memorable shots in Dragon Ball Z. That's not really calls for even declarations of 'cutting corners', let alone another less savory.

[Kakacarrottop]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IwnCTKM252E

FUNimation added a lot of random stock footage from the Saiyan Saga for their first Tree of Might dub.

I've heard they also did the same for their original Curse of the Blood Rubies dub.

[Azelf89]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IwnCTKM252E

FUNimation added a lot of random stock footage from the Saiyan Saga for their first Tree of Might dub.

I've heard they also did the same for their original Curse of the Blood Rubies dub.

They did actually. Between the scene where Bulma wets herself while stuck on a branch and the scene where her and Goku are driving through the forrest, they inserted part of the beginning of the second episode of the TV series.
Makes it really god damn jarring when watching the original dub not only because you know WHERE that part comes from, but it also just sticks out like a sore thumb (seeing how they literally took something directly from the TV series and put it into the first movie).