I’m goind to do a fun experiment and just answer the clickbaity title that Ace Dragon does so well without wasting time reading the post:
Yes.
Betteridge’s law applies.
This is a dumb question.
Pro-quality animations at today’s specs (1080/24 or 4K/24) aren’t possible on consumer hardware either.
Pro-quality means they are using professional hardware, almost by definition. Any production with enough budget will use hardware that’s better than what consumers can afford. This is a simple truth of money, it applies to sound, cameras, actors, directors, and literally anything you can think of.
So, no, it won’t, because “pro quality” will always mean “pro hardware” until the day that computers are so powerful that complete, high-resolution, perfect photoreal simulations are computationally trivial.
In other words, until your phone can do photoreal high-def rendering, this answer will continue to be “no”.
I tend to disagree here, as the term professional gets blurrier everyday, and a good example is the independant artist making a living on a 6 nodes Helmer renderfarm, or even a single CPU (although it makes no sense for a professional to only use his workstation for 3D render), he makes a living off of his work, therefore it is professional work, even though it is rendered on something costing around 3000$ or less!
^ we’re talking peter-jackson level animations here, though.
It’s certainly possible to make a living with other types of production with consumer or prosumer hardware, and that’s also always been true, although moreso lately.
But if we are talking about “hollywood-level CG animation” then no, it was never possible in the first place.
the tech might get there, but while i enjoy tech, the art is more important to me. I’d rather see a normal film on a normal screen than some giant imax. While the imax is visually impressive, it is too easy to disconnect from the story. One of hte critical reviews of one of hte 48 fps jackson works (im not a fan of his subject matter, so wont ever be seeing hte hobbits, rings, avatars, etc - i suffered through the first lotr, but would much rather watch bad taste or meet the feebles) was that the suspension of disbelief was lost. Like, we know that film is fake, and then we get into it. When the work is indistinguishable from what reality looks like, how does one know what they are watching any more?
Perhaps this is just me being old in my mid 30s, but 1080/24 is perfect for me. One of my favorite films is 24 hour party people, which was shot digitally and isnt even HD by today’s standards. However, I saw it in 2 different cinemas and was impressed by how much it looked like film. Higher frames are of course better for capturing fast motion, but 24 fps seems about perfect for anything else. Would a cat’s purr be improved if it doubled in frequency? If I had hte choice between 4k and good sound, i’d go for the sound…
The story is the most important element of film. The best cg is useless when the story is trite, boring, unbelievable, etc. I found tim burtons batman to be better than christopher nolans dark knight…
I agree on most of what You said, but as I mentioned, it gets blurrier everyday, and in that 10 years time frame, its likely that it will get even more so, and that a single artists or small teams, will get to a point where they will produce Peter Jackson’s type of work, as the technology will eventually top at some point, as there is so much believably that can be produced in a studio!
I hadn’t heard of that law, interesting read!
I’m not sure, but I watched the latest Hobbit movie in 3D at 48FPS, and I found it far better than when I had watched the second one in 24FPS 3D.
However, I’ve been an avid PC gamer, currently run a 4k monitor, and I like things that feel more real (even if less ‘cinematic’) ie 60 vs 120 Hz in games, or 48 FPS in the Hobbit. I also prefer things at higher res/better quality.
None of that detracts from the need for a good story, but IMO a combination of both is more interesting to me 
I like high frame rate. I chose to watch third Hobbit film in 24 fps because 48 fps was only in 3d. I wouldn’t mind 3d if glasses didn’t dim the image so much. There’s a shot of the battle where camera pans and it’s a big blur. I thought to myself that it would look much better in 48 fps. In high frame rate every tiny movement is noticeable which can be weird at first, but I think people would get used to it. I make animations in 30 fps which could be a nice compromise. Also Cameron talks that he might use HFR in action shots while in dialogue it would stay 24.