So I decided to take a break from animation, which is a bit at odds with what I said about fixing the jank in the big animation. Despite the break I'm still working along trying to make things happen, and I'm really happy with how the new shaders look. I think they retain the style I was trying while making them far more stable.
I'm happy to share the set-up I used in the past vs Now with the last 2 images. It's a pretty big transformation and I think it'll show.
Now for a final note, since I'm going to share what I do have done for the current scene in the attachment as usual. It may look a lot more janky as opposed to the usual WIP I share, but I didn't want to go another week without sharing animation.