Sony Pictures Animation has had a pretty checkered past, with critical reception to their films ranging from wild lows to the mid-tier to impressive heights. Recently, however, the studio seems to be hitting a pretty stable stride regarding animation variety. It’s something other Western animation studios could learn from.

Sony Pictures Animation feels like a place willing to let creative minds celebrate art for art’s sake, to have more room for fun and freedom. Audiences have certainly received endless entertainment from their recent projects. Many animators and artists out there would love their own shot at making something memorable, fresh, and fun for us to fall in love with. Sony has shown us what happens when that freedom is given – we wind up with unique, visually spectacular, and emotionally heartfelt roller coaster rides. It’s time for more Western studios to follow this direction and let their artists go a little wild.

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Sony’s Varied Art Styles

     Sony

While attention may be turned to their more recent releases, Sony Animation has always dabbled in different art styles. Not all of their projects could be deemed successful – take, for instance, The Smurfs or any of the Open Season films. Still, it remains admirable how much they’ve experimented over the years. This experimentation begins at the conceptual phase. If we take the 2021 film The Mitchells vs. the Machines as an example, looking through concept art detailing its creation shows how much the 2D designs contributed to the film’s stylization.

Cartoonish drawings of Katie Mitchell and her family weren’t left to the drawing board. They were translated into a 3D space. Meanwhile, those 2D drawings make appearances through Katie’s colorful film editing. This is what gave The Mitchells vs. the Machines such a distinctive and fun feeling.

A similar case can be made for 2018’s popular Into the Spider-Verse, and even going as far back as 2006’s Open Season, Sony Animation’s debut feature film. Each Sony Animation film mentioned so far has a unique style that sets them apart from one another, adding variety to Sony’s library, even if the movies aren’t necessarily “good.”

Disney’s Uniform Art Styles

     Disney

On the flip side of variety, we have art style uniformity, where films may tackle different concepts and plot lines but have a similar look. The most prolific adherent to this in the Western animation scene would be Walt Disney Studios, whose art style we’d probably be able to point out from a group: the gigantic eyes, the rounded facial features, soft lighting, and fluid movements. This is as much a marketing tool as it is an identifying mark: see the art style, and you know who created it without needing the Disney name.

Sure, there are enough visual differences from Disney film to Disney film to provide some measure of unique flair. The Colombian mountain village Mirabel calls home in Encanto has a different energy from the lands of Arendelle in Frozen. However, on a basic visual level, it’s clear that Disney films have some art style rules they must follow before releasing to the public. And while a uniform art style to advertise yourself isn’t innately a bad thing, it’s how we end up with arguments that Sisu from Raya and the Last Dragon looks like Elsa got turned into a dragon or how people wonder why most Disney princesses have little variety to their facial features. It’s a safe move from Disney but not a particularly interesting or creative one.

DreamWorks Might be Taking Inspiration

We’ve seen the influence of experimentation on another big-name Western animation studio, DreamWorks. Similar to Disney, audiences could most likely point out the more realistic style of earlier DreamWorks movies, such as Shrek, Megamind, Over the Hedge, or The Bee Movie. Over the years, that art style has shifted into something that could be considered more “palatable” for younger children, though now we might be seeing the beginnings of more unique stylization.

For their recent film The Bad Guys, inspiration is reported to have been taken directly from Into the Spider-Verse in terms of a more illustrative animation style. In fact, the film’s art direction was one of its elements to receive the most praise. DreamWorks’s upcoming film Puss in Boots: The Final Wish is also turning out to look very stylized. Based on the trailer, it will blend 3D with 2D effects and a vibrant color scheme.

We’re hoping to see that this will be the start of DreamWorks allowing animators to experiment more. Perhaps the studio could make the next animated film that catches eyes the same way Into the Spider-Verse did. It would be a welcome development for a studio that many believe has fallen from grace in recent memory.