Cartoon Animator

Pros

It's really intuitive once you understand how it works. I'm new to this type of program and don't know of any other like it. I find that it is like building the early "South Park" like format but with less work.

Cons

I didn't have time to work with it like I needed to and it's to pricy for me right now but I do expect to get it once there's more money available.

Summary

Again I'm impressed and I'm to lazy to build the animations from scratch.

Pros

The body puppeteering is so easy and fun to use, the kids love it! There are also advanced features for more serious animators, you can do most of what the other advanced 2D animation programs out there do, and it's incredibly user-friendly.

Cons

Would like to see more embedded or 3rd-party content available for download or sale. Also morphing transitions for facial sprites on vector characters would provide more detail.

Summary

Overall this is an impressive product for version 1.0, and the unique approach from other traditional 2D animation software is really interesting. I also own CrazyTalk 6 which is an awesome program for facial animation, and this version is really a step up with great support for vector characters & flash format, not to mention you can now do the body animations.

The embedded characters are all customizable, however it would be nice to have a larger library of default content (limited clothing & facial options currently available).

You can make simple and fun animations really quickly... the main thing I was impressed by is how my kids were wildly entertained by the body & facial puppeteering. Putting my son's head on an embedded body and making him do the chicken dance with an angry face in minutes was a blast. I can see how this program could really appeal to kids, but it also surprisingly has all the tools needed to make great quality animation for fun or business. Highly recommended!