i like s3′s designs 10x better than s1+2 for the same reason i like the new pokemon sun and moon art style, and it doesn’t have to do with the aesthetic. it has to do with the animation.
it’s more difficult to draw inbetween frames for two highly-detailed keyframes that don’t have every detail consistent, so the animation looks weird or stiff. the colored and detailed linearts take up time that could be used for other things.
(on the topic of inbetweens, every show has shitty inbetweens no matter what style it is, so i’m not going to touch on that)
in animation you have to budget your time rigorously, otherwise you either don’t finish or you get a few decent scenes and a lot of trashy, half-assed ones (or even worse, things get scrapped). rounder art styles also lend themselves to more fluid animation, which can make an action scene; this coupled with the style’s current popularity is the reason many mainstream shows (especially shows with lots of action) use this style.
an argument of ‘they have lots of time between seasons, they could invest that into making the old art style look better instead of redesigning everything!!” has some issues, too. we don’t have the studio’s perspective. a scenario i could see happening is that a decision gets stuck somewhere in the pipeline, and the whole project can’t move forward until it gets resolved, and so the animation winds up rushed and the show looks like garbage. however, what i think happened more with crystal is that the budget is limited, so the animation teams have to choose which scenes look good and which ones are sacrificed.
(^ originally posted by @sailormoonfever)
something like these are scenes the animators decided were very important and needed the best the studio had to offer. they look good. they’re slow and beautiful and there’s lots of attention to detail. each stand of hair moves with different timing. the fabric folds are beautifully animated. sure, the watch tweens away and isn’t animated and queen serenity’s bodice is kind of funky, but it doesn’t subtract from the gorgeous, delicious detail.
however, things they would have to sacrifice to give these scene this kind of quality on their budget and time restraints are scenes like the infamous one:
this glorious thing. it’s the example everyone points to when they say crystal s1+2 had bad animation. and they’re right; the quality of a show’s animation is the cumulation of all its parts, not just the best ones. and, well, if the bad parts overshadow or even rival the amount of good ones, the show can be considered poor animation.
(i actually think yuri on ice has the same issue, but that’s for another time.)
s1+2′s art style lends itself to this trap. to make the good scenes look great, they have to animate every individual strand in usagi’s hair, every wrinkle in the fabric (especially those s-shaped pleats - animating those looks like a nightmare). it does look gorgeous, but that kind of detailed animation takes time and money.
which is why we wind up with scenes like the moon stick scene. aside from the obvious shitty stick spinning, look at her hair. somehow it manages to both look like it isn’t moving and like it’s moving, but in the wrong way. hair doesn’t just stay in the same position all the time, the stands should move independently of each other, like it does in the watch scene. but even if we keep them in the same position to save time and budget, they should be consistent in placement - they move around really weirdly and it doesn’t much like these were drawn very carefully.
(^ originally posted by @sailorcinnamonroll)
these kinds of scenes are what s3 is good at, action shots with lots of movement. the flying scene has the same hair issue that the moon stick scene does, but because she’s moving dynamically, it’s not nearly as prominent.
the attack scene has very simple hair design, only one strand per pigtail, but it works much better than attempting to slap in a second one - it makes the motion much clearer, and allows for more animation in their bodies and the attack itself. the skirts and faces are the same way - because they’re simpler, the team can afford to be less detailed and have it still look good.
of course, there’s still shortcuts here and there
(^ originally posted by @sailorcinnamonroll)
but, again, this one doesn’t bother me as much as the moon stick scene. particularly because it’s a very fast spinning scene that lasts about a half second, unlike the 1.5 second still staff spin, and it transitions into a slower, more detailed spin. the hair issue isn’t a problem here because most of it is drawn as one clump, as per the style. it would look glaringly bad in the old style.
(it probably speaks volumes that it took me almost 10 minutes to find a gif of s3 that looked poor, but aboue 20 seconds for s1+2??)
now, i’m not saying i hate s1+2′s art style. there are things about it that bug me, sure, but i really like the detailed hair and other such things. but, with the budget toei had for this show, the s3 style works better. it lends itself to low budget animation better, and (whether you’re a fan of moe trends or not), it’s likely to appeal to a very large audience. many diehard sailor moon fans will still watch it, even if they don’t like the style, and that’s what toei’s banking on.
(sorry, this was much longer than intended. for those who read through the whole thing, i salute you.)
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