We're ALL Visual Effx

The Reporter states the obvious:

For most of Academy Awards history, animation and visual effects have competed in separate categories. But as the line between VFX and animation gets increasingly blurry, animated films ... could emerge as contenders in the VFX category.

... Not since Tim Burton's 1993 stop-motion classic The Nightmare Before Christmas has animation earned a VFX Oscar nomination. This time, 2012 could be the year.

Animation as a visual effect? Seems right and natural to me. The sci fi live-actioner Forbidden Planet from M-G-M had a lot of its visual effects rendered by the (sub-contracted) Disney animation crew.

Can't get more animationy than that. Even Planet's star Leslie Nielsen later played the cartoon character Mr. Magoo.