OpenToonz: The Emperor’s New Clothes of Open Source Software

When I was growing up, I always found Hans Christian Anderson’s The Emperor’s New Clothes to be among my favorite stories. It was about how two con artists convinced a king to “wear” this outfit that was supposedly made from “invisible thread.” The king paraded in his new “outfit” while his subjects pretended to go “oooh” and “aaaah” over what he wore. It was a young boy who really told it like it was when he said “The king is naked!” All the adults snapped out of their denial and realized that, yes, the king is really parading around in public totally naked.

A few months ago much of the Internet was buzzing about how this new high-end animation software known as OpenToonz was going to be made available in both Mac and Windows formats as open source software. In other words, this high-end animation software was going to be made available for free. What’s more, OpenToonz was based on this software that was used by Studio Ghibli when it made its hit feature-length anime films like Spirited Away and Ponyo. Sounds fantastic, right?

Wrong! After spending several weeks trying to use the latest Mac version of OpenToonz (version 1.0.3), I have to admit that OpenToonz is little more than the open source software movement’s equivalent of The Emperor’s New Clothes. It is not only buggy (such as having the screen suddenly turn from white to grey and the zoom tool being completely nonfunctional) but anyone who uses the Mac version will soon find out that OpenToonz cannot export any animations as a standalone video file. Instead the end user will have to export the animation as a series of separate graphic files then import them into another graphic program, assemble those files together, then export everything as a standalone video file.

What’s more, OpenToonz has the “Quit” command completely grayed out so the user can’t easily quit that application. (And the usual “Command” + “Q” keyboard shortcut doesn’t work either.) In my nearly 30 years of using Mac software, this is the first time I’ve ever encountered anything like this. (Basically Mac users have to choose to either hold down the “Control” key then click on OpenToonz’s alias in the Dock to get the pop-up menu that offers the “Quit” command or do a “Force Quit.”)

Yet I see so many videos and articles touting OpenToonz when, in reality, it has to be among the worst software I’ve ever tried and I’m miffed of the time wasted trying to master it that I’ll never get back.

So, yes, I’m basically like the boy who said “The king is naked!” when I say that anyone with animation ambitions should avoid OpenToonz. I even shot a short video where you can see for yourself how awful OpenToonz really is (complete with the grayed-out “Quit” command, the non-functioning zoom tool, and the inability for Mac users to export their animations as standalone video files).

It’s like the rap group Public Enemy once said, “Don’t believe the hype!”

(An earlier version of this article was posted on my blog Sagittarius Dolly.)