Awesome-2D-Animation

A collection of tools, datasets and papers about inbetweening and 2D animation.

Feel free to create a PR or an issue. (Pull Request is preferred)

(The left two examples are from JoSTC and the right one is from ToonCrafter)

Outline

• 0. Survey
• 1. Software
• 2. Dataset
• 3. Raster-based Animation
• 4. Vector-based Animation
• 5. Differentiable Rendering + Optimization-based Animation
• 6. LLM/LMM-based Animation
• 7. Interactive Animation Tools

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0. Survey

Paper	Source	Code/Project Link
Generative AI for Cel-Animation: A Survey	arxiv 25.01	[code]

1. Software

software	software	software	software
Blender	OpenToonz	Harmony	TVPaint
Adobe Animate	Live2D	Cartoon Animator	CACANi

2. Dataset

Name	Paper	Source	Code/Project Link
CreativeFlow+	Creative Flow+ Dataset	CVPR 2019	[code]
ATD-12K	Deep animation video interpolation in the wild	CVPR 2021	[code]
AnimeRun	AnimeRun: 2D Animation Correspondence from Open Source 3D Movies	NeurIPS 2022	[code]
AnimeCeleb	AnimeCeleb: Large-Scale Animation CelebHeads Dataset for Head Reenactment	ECCV 2022	[code]
Sakuga-42M	Sakuga-42M Dataset: Scaling Up Cartoon Research	arxiv 24.05	[project]
Anita	Anita Dataset - An Industrial Animation Dataset	online 2024	[code]

3. Raster-based Animation

• Based on template deformation (e.g., ARAP)

Paper	Source	Code/Project Link
As-Rigid-As-Possible Shape Interpolation	SIGGRAPH 2000
As-Rigid-As-Possible Shape Manipulation	TOG 2005
As-Rigid-As-Possible Image Registration for Hand-drawn Cartoon Animations	NPAR 2009	[project]
Live Sketch: Video-driven Dynamic Deformation of Static Drawings	CHI 2018	[video]
ToonSynth: Example-Based Synthesis of Hand-Colored Cartoon Animations	SIGGRAPH 2018	[webpage]
A Method for Animating Children’s Drawings of the Human Figure	TOG 2023	[code] [project] [demo]
Skeleton-Driven Inbetweening of Bitmap Character Drawings	SIGGRAPH Asia 2024	[code] [webpage]
SketchAnim: Real-time sketch animation transfer from videos	CGF 2024	[code] [webpage]

• 3D Animation

Paper	Source	Code/Project Link
From Rigging to Waving: 3D-Guided Diffusion for Natural Animation of Hand-Drawn Characters	SIGGRAPH Asia 2025	[project] [code]
DrawingSpinUp: 3D Animation from Single Character Drawings	SIGGRAPH Asia 2024	[project] [code]
Occlusion-robust Stylization for Drawing-based 3D Animation	ICCV 2025	[project] [code]
SPECSIA: Stylization Dataset for Novel-View Enhancement in Drawing-based 3D Animation	ECCV 2026	[project]

• Based on frame prediction with network

Type	Paper	Source	Code/Project Link
Line art	Optical Flow Based Line Drawing Frame Interpolation Using Distance Transform to Support Inbetweenings	ICIP 2019
Line art	Bridging the Gap: Sketch-Aware Interpolation Network for High-Quality Animation Sketch Inbetweening	ACM MM 2024	[code]
Colorized	Deep Sketch-Guided Cartoon Video Inbetweening	TVCG 2021	[code]
Colorized	Deep Animation Video Interpolation in the Wild	CVPR 2021	[code]
Colorized	Improving the Perceptual Quality of 2D Animation Interpolation	ECCV 2022	[code]
Colorized	CharacterGAN: Few-Shot Keypoint Character Animation and Reposing	WACV 2022	[code]
Colorized	ToonCrafter: Generative Cartoon Interpolation	SIGGRAPH Asia 2024	[code] [webpage]
Sketch	FlipSketch: Flipping Static Drawings to Text-Guided Sketch Animations	CVPR 2025	[code]
Colorized	PhysAnimator: Physics-Guided Generative Cartoon Animation	CVPR 2025	[webpage]
Colorized	AniSora: Exploring the Frontiers of Animation Video Generation in the Sora Era	IJCAI 2025	[code]
Colorized	LayerAnimate: Layer-level Control for Animation	ICCV 2025	[webpage] [code]
Colorized	ToonComposer: Streamlining Cartoon Production with Generative Post-Keyframing	arxiv 25.08	[webpage] [code]
Colorized	FairyGen: Storied Cartoon Video from a Single Child-Drawn Character	SIGGRAPH Asia 2025	[webpage] [code]
Colorized	Trajectory-guided Anime Video Synthesis via Effective Motion Learning	PG 2025	[webpage]

4. Vector-based Animation

• Based on vertex or stroke correspondence

Paper	Source	Representation	Code/Project Link
Computer Aided Inbetweening	NPAR 2002	stroke
BetweenIT: An Interactive Tool for Tight Inbetweening	CGF 2010	stroke
DiLight: Digital light table – Inbetweening for 2D animations using guidelines	C&G 2017	stroke
Context-Aware Computer Aided Inbetweening	TVCG 2017	stroke
FTP-SC: Fuzzy Topology Preserving Stroke Correspondence	SCA 2018	stroke	[webpage] [video]
Stroke-Based Drawing and Inbetweening with Boundary Strokes	CGF 2021	stroke
Deep Geometrized Cartoon Line Inbetweening	ICCV 2023	vertex/point	[code]
Joint Stroke Tracing and Correspondence for 2D Animation	TOG 2024	stroke	[code] [webpage]
Thin-Plate Spline-based Interpolation for Animation Line Inbetweening	AAAI 2025	pixel point	[code]
LayerInbetween: Occlusion-Aware Stroke Correspondence and Inbetweening with Automatic Layering	SIGGRAPH 2026	stroke	[code] [webpage]

• Based on template matching

Paper	Source	Code/Project Link
Non-linear Rough 2D Animation using Transient Embeddings	CGF 2023
Efficient Interpolation of Rough Line Drawings	PG 2023
Inbetweening with occlusions for non-linear rough 2D animation	C&G 2025

5. Differentiable Rendering + Optimization-based Animation

• Sketch / Line art

Paper	Source	Representation	Code/Project Link
Sketch Video Synthesis	EG 2024	stroke	[code] [project]
Breathing Life Into Sketches Using Text-to-Video Priors	CVPR 2024	stroke	[code] [project]
Dynamic Typography: Bringing Text to Life via Video Diffusion Prior	ICCV 2025	curve	[project] [code]
Multi-Object Sketch Animation by Scene Decomposition and Motion Planning	ICCV 2025	stroke	[webpage] [code]
Multi-Object Sketch Animation with Grouping and Motion Trajectory Priors	MM 2025	stroke	[webpage] [code]

• Color image

Paper	Source	Representation	Code/Project Link
AniClipart: Clipart Animation with Text-to-Video Priors	IJCV 2024	image/mesh	[project] [code]
FlexiClip: Locality-Preserving Free-Form Character Animation	ICML 2025	image/mesh	[project]
Generative Cutout Animation	EG 2026	image	[project]
LiveSVG: Zero-Shot SVG Animation via Video Generation	arxiv 26.05	SVG	[project]

6. LLM/LMM-based Animation

• LMM

Paper	Source	Code/Project Link
Anim-Director: A Large Multimodal Model Powered Agent for Controllable Animation Video Generation	SIGGRAPH Asia 2024	[code]
AniMaker: Multi-Agent Animated Storytelling with MCTS-Driven Clip Generation	SIGGRAPH Asia 2025	[code] [webpage]

• LLM

Paper	Source	Representation	Code/Project Link
Keyframer: Empowering Animation Design using Large Language Models	arxiv 24.02	SVG	[webpage]
LogoMotion: Visually-Grounded Code Synthesis for Creating and Editing Animation	CHI 2025	SVG	[webpage]
MoVer: Motion Verification for Motion Graphics Animations	SIGGRAPH 2025	SVG	[webpage]
VAnim: Rendering-Aware Sparse State Modeling for Structure-Preserving Vector Animation	ICML 2026	SVG	[webpage]
LottieGPT: Tokenizing Vector Animation for Autoregressive Generation	CVPR 2026	SVG	[webpage] [code]

7. Interactive Animation Tools

Paper	Source	Code/Project Link
Draco: bringing life to illustrations with kinetic textures	CHI 2014	[webpage]
Kitty: sketching dynamic and interactive illustrations	UIST 2014	[webpage]
Autocomplete Hand-drawn Animations	SIGGRAPH Asia 2015	[webpage] [video]
Motion Amplifiers: Sketching Dynamic Illustrations Using the Principles of 2D Animation	CHI 2016	[webpage]
Energy-Brushes: Interactive Tools for Illustrating Stylized Elemental Dynamics	UIST 2016	[webpage]
DrawTalking: Building Interactive Worlds by Sketching and Speaking	UIST 2024	[webpage]
Notational Animating: An Interactive Approach to Creating and Editing Animation Keyframes	CHI 2026	[webpage]
SketchDynamics: Exploring Free-Form Sketches for Dynamic Intent Expression in Animation Generation	CHI 2026