I want to be excited about Princess and the Frog. I’d love to see 2-D animation make a come back in a big way, especially if it means Disney returning to Lion King form. But I’m having a really tough time buying in to The Princess and the Frog. Something about the animation style just isn’t working for me, for some reason it looks a little too direct-to-dvd.

Enter Rapunzel, Disney Animation’s next animation project, set for release at the end of 2010. They’ve just put out beautiful new concept art for the film, and it’s everything I’ve been looking for in Princess and the Frog and haven’t found. Take a look these:











Looks great right? There’s a catch. The movie isn’t hand-drawn. It’s being done with CGI. So for me the question is how close is this concept art to what we’ll actually see? Are they using CGI to create a 2D look? And if that’s not what they’re doing… why aren’t they? This is stunning. No further changes necessary. Snatch it up and bring it to the screen as-is.