3D MODELS THEORY

Hello everyone!
Well, I was just chillin' out, dancing (or whatever I was doing XD) my hearts out in Kani Cove... see, my seal already has its Valentine's Day stuff:

But then it occured to me as I was cycling through animations: Do you know how many frames/images they would have to draw to do this? The motion is absolutely perfect, so in other words the FPS (or frames per second; each frame is a seperate image) must be really high.
Each animation is about three seconds long and loops. Let's say it's 24 frames per second for a 3-second animation:
24 * 3 = 72
That's 72 frames they would have to draw for ONE CHARACTER doing ONE ACTION.
Plus, each character has its own set of actions. And each action has its own 1-3 second loop. So, let's see how many frames for one animal. I'll do a wolf, since the seal... that one has the most by far.
ACTION/# OF FRAMES*:
Standing Forward/24
Standing Backward/24
Sleeping/8
Playing/72
Dancing/72
Hopping/48
Sitting Forward/1**
Sitting Backward/1**
Walking Forward/24
Walking Backward/24
Walking Left/24
Walking For-Left/24
Walking Back-Left/24
*This is assuming 24 FPS. All numbers are rough estimates*
**These poses are not animated**
I haven't repeated the ones that are just mirrored (for example, walking right is just mirroring walking left). I KNOW there's more than that, though. But let's see what our grand total is!
24 + 24 + 8 + 72 + 72 + 48 + 1 + 1 + 24 +24 +24 + 24 + 24 = 370!
370 FRAMES, PEOPLE!
And that's for one LAND-ONLY animal with NO ITEMS and BASIC COLORS.
Add an item, add another 370 frames or so.
Change the colors (they may be able to avoid this... it's specifically the items that add the frames I think), and add another 370 frames.
Want a different animal? 370 frames (minimum) a piece.
So, let's see: we have around 20 animals, well over 300 items (because rares still have to be animated on the animals) and 40 colors, not to mention patterns and stuff. That's well over 10000 frames!
So that's where the 3D models theory comes in.
In other words, every animal has their own 3D model that the AJ HQ team designs. Then they animate them in special ways, add different skins for the markings... kinda like FeralHeart. And they have the items with 3D models, too, so that they can just add one or the max of four and it will animate on its own.
Then they just make them look cartooney. Some models can be realistic enough to do that.
So, I'm not sure if this is right, but it means one of two things is true:
THING ONE: AJ HQ uses this 3D models technique and saves lots of time.
THING TWO: AJ HQ spends FAR TOO MUCH on their animation department XD
Bye for now!