I've been watching Shingeki no Kyojin lately. It's amazing for a number of different reasons. I'd like to bring up more specifically it's use of CG. These days, most all animation is done on a computer as well, so I figured I'd start by clarifying CG. I refer to the use of 3D rendered environments and elements that are incorporated alongside the animation. What makes it interesting is how well it's done, or at least how well it seemlessly incorporates it. Consider for example this clip.

While there are better examples, especially in episode 5, you can see how far we've come in that we no longer have this monstrosity from gogo 13. Some of you probably know about this without even clicking on it. Even in the past few years, we've seen CG that seems okay but ultimately looks out of place. For instance, the cars in Eden of the East are obviously CG.

I feel that CG has a lot of potential in anime, especially for quick moving scenes like in the example above. When the detail isn't as important as the quantity of a certain item, it's benefit really shows. However, it can lead to unoriginal and bland designs. If you pause the clip at 1:04, you can see that the same buildings are repeated throughout the town. The effects are simultaneously positive and negative.

Question is: how do you all feel about CG in animation? What are some of your favorite examples, or most laughable catastrophes from the early bleeding edge. Is CG merely a crutch for lazy/time lacking studios? What would you like to see more or less done with CG?

Oh boy, haven't done one of these in awhile. Ranking these will be hard.

1. Gunbuster
2. Psycho pass
3. Toradora
4. Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann
5. Revolutionary Girl Utena

The rest are unordered, can't pick on over the other

• Perfect Blue
• Time of Eve
• Tiger and Bunny
• Cowboy Bebop
• Jojo's Bizarre Adventure (new series)

That's a good suggestion @KyomouACID. We have some resources tucked away on the site, but it would be nice to have a more visual primer for new members and perhaps some kind of weekly events brief. As a long time member who comes and goes, I too get confused by the inner happenings around here, even if I foresee them coming half of the time.

As @Trev said, @Decae hit exactly what I intended to say. To expand ever so slightly, let's look at the current frontpage (as I write this). We have threads about:

Cheesy songs, yuri anime, missing people, book purchases, comic repost, manga, japanese movies, valentines day, a new game, steampunk, celebrity court case, american movie, pokemon mmo, game group formation, tablet drawing, travel, an upcoming convention, this thread, and a picture request.

Only one of those threads were about anime, the next closest being Japanese movies or Manga. Of this list of 19 threads, we have 4 things directly related to anime or Japanese culture. Say we throw in games (and DC makes good, thoughtful threads so it's cool). We get bumped up to 6. While you can justify somethings as relevant to the site, such as various art threads or other entertaining media. However, at this point we can't really advertise ourselves as an anime fan site because we don't talk about it that much. We talk about whatever comes to mind.

Another big problem is chat. Chat hasn't changed much from when I first joined, but our members I feel have. When the site hit that big population jump, for awhile I saw a clear flow to chat and actual topics. It was quite fun. I know we have the capacity for it, but it hasn't been around much. Lately, I feel like chat has devolved into idle chit chat and pestering, with some bad chat RP here and there. I only get on late these days, but still. I've yet to log on and be happy with chat.

This vaguely leads into my next point. You can't expect people to be in recruitment mode all the time. I think we should have some kind of recruitment drive that occurs once every 2 months or so. A period of time that we clean up our forums, stop being dicks, and recruit people. Post to other sites, talk to friends, etc. Our university has an anime club of 30 or so people, half of which love discussion and sites like this. However, the site has such an entry barrier I don't feel like I can tell them about it without it reflecting poorly on me.

Having a good, not-stagnating community will take some time and effort. I certainly don't expect people to change their behavior on a dime, but maybe we can be more inviting for a week every so often.

Now that I have a job and I'm (somewhat) an adult, I find myself paying for A LOT more. However, I do often take pencils and pirate my anime. I've only bought 3 anime titles, and all of them were simply out of love for that series/movie. (Toradora box sets, Summer wars, Paprika)

I feel that a lot of the dislike for dubstep is based on the stereotypical representation of wub wub noises and as @acostoss put it, drop-fetishization. To some people, it's just a jumble of sounds, some less pleasant than others. You can also look at genre by how easy it is to compose in that genre and get a passing grade, most notably rap and country. In most cases though, it's just a person generalizing their preference into the quality of a genre of music. I'm quite found of liquid dubstep myself. I'm not fond of country though. While I may say it sucks, I really mean it sucks to my ears. I don't like it, but I don't deny that it has artistic value or that it isn't entertaining.

TL;DR - People think their opinion is infallible and make claims about quality as though they are made by some kind of established standard.

"This must be very strange for you all," Kiche said with a slight sigh. His gaze focused on the window behind the boys, boarded up with slightly damaged wood. Yuuta and his friends had difficulty understanding Kiche, for time had drastically changed the areas language. However, not enough to make it impossible to understand.

The entire area was hit by a massive snowstorm, bigger than anything recorded in human history. That winter was terrible for the entire planet, but caused the continent of Japan to be completely encased. All the inhabitants were presumed dead. In the chaos of this new ice age, a mad scientist took control of the earth, subjugating the entire population. However, not even he could prevent the planet from turning a barren tundra. 10,000 years passed before people began to melt and wake again.

PS: Why is it that whenever a thread like this is made, somebody tries to dick it up and throw everything out the window? Ripped up all the cards, kill the cast, skip ahead 10,000 years? Really? Eat a dick dude.

Looking for a new Minecraft server to scratch itches associated with the recent patches? Tired of the long overdone mindless pvp server? Want something more meaningful when you play? Well what if I told you I had the solution to all three of those problems and then some, here in this very thread! That's right folks, I'm here to advertise a Minecraft server!

Baneshroud is a PVP/Towny server that seeks to balance economy, PVP, and creativity. Our server does rely on a fair number of plugins to function, but most are for permissions and economy. And cannons; We love our cannons. By using Towny instead of Factions, we've been able to create a more stable atmosphere of play. Rather than focusing on hunting down victims, players can create grand houses or design shops. Towns require money to function, rather than player kills.

I could go on and on about how great our server is, but it's really something you need try for yourself. Log on, take a look around. My favorite thing is the player base. We have a mature group of players that can be trusted not to hack, mod, or cheat. I wouldn't be posting here at The Colorless if I didn't think you all were a good, (mostly) mature group. So please, give the server a try.

IP: 23.24.246.162:25609 Recruitment site: http://www.planetminecraft.com/server/baneshroud---enhanced-pvp/ Our subreddit: reddit.com/r/baneshroud

Eh, close enough

I've been on this road, @Chestnut_Rice. I found many ways in my mind that a deity could exist. A being that exists outside our plane of existence, outside our universe. Something that transcends everything in existence. I considered that said god would have created the universe then gave it the properties that allow it to sustain itself. My divine faith and love for science/skeptical exploration could coexist.

But then I started to question my purpose. Why do I need there to be a god? If the universe is self sustaining, what role does god have? I eventually settled with an agnostic view, with occasional nihilism if I tried to think too much about it. One can reason the idea of god to it's logic end, but always realize it's too immense and far beyond our understanding/existence. Really, most of my religious views were taken to that point until I just said "Screw it all, this is pointless."

So when someone asks me if I believe in god, I tell them I don't care enough to decide in one way. I follow some of the advice/wisdom of religious texts, but I don't actively practice a religion.

As for the whole life building blocks thing, that argument has one large flaw. In such a large universe, it certainly is not strange that the planet that can maintain life is the one with sentient life. With something so large as the universe, there are probably planets of all types. Most of the vital elements of a earth life are small elements, easy enough to find throughout the universe. It's not strange that OUR planet has this capability. We (well lifeforms at least) would be on any other planet that had life sustaining capability. You can't play Yahtzee and claim the dice that landed on 6 is special. It's like the other dice, it just got lucky.

Yeaaaa, you know why this is here.