Season 1: traditional cel animation

BatteryMill said:
Wasn't Season 5 of Arthur in 2000 and Season 6 in 2001? Either way, around that time.

Yeah, I guess so. Cel animation does give an eerie feeling as well.
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Cel animation animation does give an eerie feeling, especially when watching cel animation Halloween specials on tv. An example would be SpongeBob's cel animated snail transformation, it would be less scary if it used digital ink and paint or Hand-Drawn tablet animation.

AngryKoopa2002 said:
I realized Arthur and South Park were in the same seasons around the same time. But anyways, I could've sworn it changed in Season 4 when watching some episodes.
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I saw a Christmas Special from Season 4, 6 years ago and it was noticeably cel animation.
Other than that I don't really know any other post-1999 shows that use cel animation besides
Drawn Together.
 
The last show to use real cel painting was Ed Edd n' Eddy in 2004. The overseas studios stopped offering it in that year. Digital coloring has been around since the 80's but it didn't become mainstream until the late 90's.

For some reason some people think SpongeBob uses "Flash" or "3D" animation these days but that's not true. It's just digital-ink-and-paint in HD. That's not to say they haven't used 3D animation for certain "3D" things since season 2 but it's not how they do the main animation.
 
Here's a complete list of Ren and Stimpy episodes that used digital ink and paint:

S1, E9a - Out West (1992)
S1, E10 - Sven Hoek (1992)
S1, E13 - Son of Stimpy (1993)
S1, E18 - The Royal Canadian Kilted Yaksman (1993)
S2, E4 - Stimpy's Cartoon Show (1994)
S2, E9 - Hard Times for Haggis (1994)
S2, E13a - Blazing Entrails (1994)
S2, E14a - Prehistoric Stimpy (1994)
S2, E26b - City Hicks (1995)
S2, E33 - A Scooter for Yaksmas (1995)
S2, E34b - The Last Temptation of Ren (1996)

And most of the bumpers also used electronic animation. So not including the bumpers, 11 episodes used the technique.
 
I have no emotional attachment with the 90's, so to be something I think season 1's art style (along with most other 90's animation) to be ugly. I find the dark colors, the off model and wonky animation gives me some kind of uneasy feel. I mean, while anime continue to rise in animation quality around the 90's, I feel it wasn't until early-mid 2000's cartoons can reach back to pre-World War 2 quality in animation.
 
Even though I started watching during Season 4, Season 1's animation still has a special place in my heart, as do the other properties of that era (the more relaxed voice-acting, the less overtly comedic plots, the less exaggerated personalities of the characters, etc.). It just felt more simple and peaceful.
 
I rewatch a few episodes and I take back the mean things I said about the cel animation of season 1. It's so unique that the smears randomly pops out. I even consider it an Animation Bump along with seasons 4 and 9 and the movies. If you watch Pizza Delivery, the animation in every minutes of it flows so well.

*Note: Animation Bump is this trope. I wrote a few notes of SpongeBob's animation bumps (Western Animation category): http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/AnimationBump
 
Switch list:
Ren and stimpy (11 episodes, 1992 to 1996)
Hey arnold (season 4, 1999)
Arthur (season 4, 1999)
Spongebob (season 2, 2000)
Powerpuff girls (tested in a second season episode in 2001. Permanently switched in season 3 in 2002)
Dexters lab (season 5, 2001)
The simpsons (tested in season 7 in 1995 and season 12 in 2001, switched for good in season 14 in 2002)
Ed edd n eddy (season 5, 2004)
CatDog (switched in the second half of season 3 in 2001)
 
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