My Top 10 Favorite Animators

This post is basically to expand upon my ask.fm answer to @tamerlane's question about who my top 10 animators were. So this is basically an explanation as to why these 10 individuals are my favourite animators of all time. I, like many "Sakuga Otaku" follow the works of a lot of animators and know their styles mostly by sight but when it gets down to it, i in particular have a very specific taste in terms of the kinds of animators whose work really excites me. This list is entirely subjective so the order isn't based on objective skill but rather how much i enjoy their work. 

10. Masahiro Sato

Masahiro Sato is by far one of my favourite effects animators because of the extremely detailed and unique way that he animates natural elements like fire and water and the way that he conveys movement. Of all the animators on this list he Is the most recent that I became aware of and that was late last year when I was putting out my Korra Book 2 blog posts. I became aware of him after I was informed he animated segments of Pierrot's book 2 work by Jojo's character designer Masahiko Komino who worked as Animation director on Episode 4 of Book 2. His work is easily the best in Pierrot's half and after I saw his other work when putting together the above video I was Immediately enthralled. His work is consistently great and his effects always impress with their detail and smooth motion. Whats not to like.

9. In Seung Choi

My enjoyment of the work of In Seung Choi is largely where my love for the first book of The Legend Of Korra comes from. The vast majority of the best scenes in that first season were his work and it is really quite staggering. The way he animates fire is particularly unique because it largely remains formless and dissipates into a lot of separate parts. His effects in general largely are very expressive and mostly unique. I think his style is a happy medium between a realistic style and a more limited style. He's able to create somewhat realistic motions without high frame counts but in a fundamentally different way when compared to guys like Toshiyuki Inoue and Iso. It is largely inspired by the styles of prominent Japanese animators of the past decade (Like Yutaka Nakamura and others of his ilk) rather than the more usually constricted style most Korean productions continue to operate under. This is true for both Studio's Mir and Moi Animation these days as some prominent Korra staff (primarily Ki Hyun Ryu and Joaquin Dos Santos) have also been involved in Moi's DCAU output as of late. Choi is basically to me the poster child for the current crop of young Korean animation talent that are being allowed to be more creative thanks to productions like Korra and the DCAU movies and that's why i like him so much.

8. Bruce W. Smith

Now my love for Bruce's work isn't because he and i are of the same race (just putting that out there) but rather that I looooove his character design aesthetic and his work as supervising animator for the character of Dr. Facilier in The Princess and the Frog. The character is simply the most dynamic in that entire movie and it baffles me that he didn't win the Annie Award that year for his work. Looking back no one really remembers the movie for the gater. When i think of the movie this scene is what immediately comes to mind and the way that the character expresses himself in the scene and many others in the movie just inspires me so much. Seeing a character that's both that imposing and flamboyant is pretty hard to pull off but it was executed very well in the movie with this song being the best sequence in the movie. In terms of his character designs, I'm mostly referring to his work on The Proud Family and Da Boom Crew.

His style can be very varied while still looking recognisably his. As a Disney animator he is able to design characters that are very expressive primarily which is a skill unto itself but i just enjoy the simple yet unique style of design he employs. Now that's not to say I'm the biggest fan of the content of the 2 shows but i do genuinely like his sense of design in terms of a focus on expressiveness of characters and that's why i like his work so much. 

7. Hironori Tanaka

Hironori Tanaka is probably the most obligatory placement on this list. He was the first animator whose style i was able to figure out simply by  looking at it but then again it is a pretty unique style. The effects animation being my absolute favourite thing about his animation. The point at which I fell in love with his animation was when he was the animation director for I think episode 131 of Naruto Shippuden. His scenes in that episode are an epic showcase of his abilities with beautifully detailed stills, great effects animation and uniquely timed character movements. This he also showed off in every scene he worked on in my favourite show of all time Birdy the Mighty: Decode. His is a style that's incredibly easy to fall in love with and its just that simple.

6. Glen Keane

Glen Keane has proved to be one of the more influential animators on this list. His style of character design is what people generally think of when they think modern Disney. His animation is very expressive in the same way that I find Bruce Smith's animation interesting with a slightly less exaggerated style but interesting nevertheless. His recent short "Duet" reminded me why I love his work with my favourite project he worked on being Tarzan. That movie had some of the most dynamic action scenes in the Disney movies of that era and Tarzan's uniquely exaggerated style of traversing spaces being really interesting to watch. Its always nice when animators go out of their way to design a specific style of movement rather than just regular walking and they found a lot of interesting ways to best show off that style of movement and I commend them for their effort because it really adds to the movie in a big way. 

5. Yoshinobu Michihata

Michihata is one of the most talented individuals to ever work on a WB Animation project. His work animating Clayface in "A Feat of Clay II" is simply some of the best character and effects animation I've ever seen. He hasn't been doing anything truly this impressive nowadays as far as I am aware but I know he worked on a hell of s lot of Aikatsu episodes. He's the only animator on this list whose style I have yet to fully grasp but when I do you know I'll make a video showcase of the mans work. It just takes such skill to combine character and effects animation so seamlessly that you can never quite forget the clayface scene no matter how long it's been since you saw it.

4. Vladimir "Bill" Tytla

I have Vladimir on here so high because his work in Fantasia was the first time i was actually scared by a piece of animation as a kid. I enjoy his work animating Chernabog (in the Night on Bald Mountain portion of Fantasia) a lot because as an animator working back then they were largely winging it and laid the groundwork for many to follow. He had the task of animating such an incredibly imposing figure and figuring out how to convey the demeanour of a demon through various motions and he accomplished that rather well. He did this without dialogue to help him out like he had in Snow White or some his other work back then. His character animation was exceptional in a time where arguably animation was harder to produce and he and his compatriots are to be admired for that.

3. Yutaka Nakamura

Yutaka Nakamura is someone whose work I've admired since i first watched that first episode of soul eater in 2008. I've followed his work since then and he has never ever disappointed. He is the most consistently excellent animator currently working in anime and its easy to see why. His unique style has been emulated by many with a more recent Nakamura-inspired animator being Naoki Kobayashi. 

My favourite work of his to this day is all his Soul Eater work cause its some of his most stylish fights and most disturbing morphing sequences with the Kishins transformation being perhaps my favourite sequence from him followed closely by Ed Vs Greed in the first FMA series. Those 2 sequences are the ones of his that are the most memorable to me. 

2. Richard Williams

Richard Williams isn't the top of this list because while i enjoy his work immensely and love his animation and his book, I'm not the biggest fan of his art. That doesn't stop me from loving his work immensely. He's just a big inspiration to me and many others like me in terms of our approach to animation thanks to him sharing everything he's learnt in The Animators Survival Kit which is one of the most comprehensive guides to understanding the medium in a technical and fundamental sense.

1. Yoshihiko Umakoshi

And finally #1. Now my love for Yoshihiko Umakoshi borders on the irrational. Just looking at his character designs moving about feels like my eyes are making love to the screen. Then when he actually animates them himself i feel like fainting. His older work while good only goes so far for me. It really started with Casshern Sins which is one of my Top 10 favourite shows. It had such a well executed atmosphere with Umakoshi's designs only adding to the beauty of that show. Then there's Heartcatch Precure and Saint Seiya Omega (only the first 51 episodes cause I dropped dat shit as soon as Umakoshi left cause the new guys pseudo-Umakoshi design attempts just looked like ass), I was purely into these shows for superficial reasons and am not ashamed in the least. Dat shit was pretty. Even whoever the guy is behind the Penguindrum designs is obviously Umakoshi inspired which is why the real Umakoshi was just able to slide in there and animate the characters better than anyone else working on that show. Man I just can't get enough of Umakoshi's sense of style.  That's why he's my number 1.

Thats it for now. Next time I'll be reviewing Korra Book 3 before Book 4 starts up and may have a video to accompany that post so stay tuned and good bye for now.