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So I just got D7 Peacemaker today, in a surprisingly professional looking package. After being mighty pissed that it wouldn't play on my PS2, I dug out the old DVD player and checked it out.
An interesting demo, though the plot was hard to follow. I was mostly just soaking up the great Flash-created characters. What'd everyone else think?
hmmm i think i need to move to America... this is taking too long:) it seems you are the first one to get it...:)
I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it! I want it!
:(
no spam cvo, you should know better :D
Spam? That was a genuine cry for help :p
JS the part-time Mod..lolQuote:
Originally posted by justice strike
no spam cvo, you should know better :D
I'm still waiting for mine..I want! I want! I want!....
No he wasn't. I just didn't want to make anyone feel bad. :DQuote:
Originally posted by justice strike
it seems you are the first one to get it...:)
this isn't fair :( i hate the postal service
I want my dvd!!!!! :D
Yep, I hate the postal sevice too!!!!
Hmm, so it's just me and CNo right now, eh?
Well, whatdya think? I thought all the 3D elements in it were particuarly good, and it was very high grade all around. I think a little lip syncing would have gone a long way though...
It was okay overall, but the excessively limited animation made it hard to follow along sometimes - like which character was talking, since the lips didn't move.
The episode was pretty basic as far as story goes, but leads up to a bigger story arc (for future episodes). Basically, the heroine is called in on the case, goes in a building, and kicks some butt - more or less.
Still, I thought Arik did well, all things considered; it's pretty nice for only a single animator/storyteller working on it, and Xero's music was nice too.
Awww damn. U guys are making me jealous :(
I'm comin' over to one of your houses to watch it. Make sure you have plenty of beer in the fridge... you'll need it :D :D :D
hehe didn't irish people drink guinnes :)
Yeah, but Guinness, Bud, Harp, Grolsch... matters not. As long it gets me p*ssed I'm happy :DQuote:
Originally posted by justice strike
hehe didn't irish people drink guinnes :)
Thanks alot guys for the honest opinions and by all means everyone just...be honest:) My main goal with the first one was to raise some questions. And also of course give folks something they could watch over and over and enjoy. Concerning the lip synching....yeah I feel ya. Believe me if there was anyway to; I woulda, but.....that woulda pushed it off like months. But rest assured that the next one....will have it. It'll be 1 hour and 10 minutes long approximately and have more of basically everything. Of course once again it'll probably just be me on the visuals but I have a system sort of that'll make it possible for me to do twice as much in the same amount of time.
And for folks asking when the next one will be out....I'm aiming at 8 months to a year from now...probably not sooner than that....unless this deal goes through with the madness...then maybe sooner....cause then I could hire some people:)
Ohh yeah and the next one will be [Stage 2 and 3] and be on a Double Layer Double Disc set. Sorry for the playability issue. Our guys do Blockbuster video and such and assured us that their stuff plays on some like 95 percent of the world or something....So I apologize for any inconvienience once again.
"Of course once again it'll probably just be me on the visuals but I have a system sort of that'll make it possible for me to do twice as much in the same amount of time."
Share your 'secret Jedi ways' with us? =)
Heh...well young Padawan<--just kidding. Seriously though I just draw faster and keyboard commands I remember quicker and we have worked on some more organization things so the renders will go faster and...I learned from some mistakes that I have. In a nutshell..Practice makes perfect:)
Broken down as to what makes me go faster though.
[Keyboard Commands]
Learn them well...search for them, discover them for they truly make all the difference in the world. It originally 3-4 years ago..when I first started, like 8 hours to do one picture eg..scan, trace, color. Now it's like 30 minutes. And if it's smaller than full body then like 15.
[Reference]
No need to reinvent the wheel on this one. I would come to parts in drawing [Hands and eye levels etc] where it would take me forever to get them right...then one day I just looked at my own hand and drew off of what I saw and Voila! Faster. Also I check out Blade of the Immortal [Manga] cause Hiroaki Samura already did the perspective with multiple people on the same plane with Background. So I see what he did in certain situations to solve my own. And the same goes for animation and such.
[Naming Conventions]
Not like an anime convention [Sorry cheap joke...had to go for it] Naming your files and ordering them in a repeatable fashion is the world. When you start something treat it as a project. Make a folder for Old art...and then for New art...break it into scenes what is what. And name it accordingly. I've actually seen come folks name things like
sdrhb765n.jpg
Just so they didn't have to take the time to create a name for it. Result=no one else could use their files and...even they were lost as to what was what. Name everything like this simple.
Frame 1 Scene1=1.fla in folder Sc1.
Or you could name the file
Sc1_fr1.fla
Quick easy reference anyone can pick up on. Audio files. This is especially important on this for the wrong naming convention can be disasterous.
Sakura1.wav=ehh...what did she say? Where?
Sakura[where are we going]sc1.wav<--this only works on a PC.
On a mac
Sakura/Sc1/where.wav
If you have mutiples
Sakura/Sc1/where1.wav
etc..etc.
[Render Heiarchy]
If it's gotta cook then cook the quickest stuff first cause the people wanna eat. Meaning if it's going to have to render the figure out what renders the fastest. If lightwave is going to Render for 8 hours on 10 seconds of a building then try and do it in After Effects. May find out that the same basic motion can be achieved in like 10 minutes.
[Optimization]
If you have some insane piece spoiler-->[The Flaming peace symbol...something like 30 or so layers that were at like 2200x2440 taking something like 460 megs of ram and like 7 hours for 15 seconds] Well you gotta do it so do it but. Set it up to render at night when you crash. And when you do it....do it lossless [Uncompressed Mov..or AVI but I suggest MOV..smaller] Now you have the lossless one. Hide the actual layers [Never delete] and place the uncompressed one in After FX as one layer. Now it'll take 5 minutes to render instead of doing it over and over..because remember..the whole scene with that part=20 hours. If you have a shot or scene that's complete..same rule applies.
I can probably break this down even more but...D7sleepy
But these are the basic principles so. And of course if anymore questions arise I'm happy to answer:)
d7jedi
Hey, those are some great tips Dementia. I remember back in the day when I first starting creating Flash cartoons, the thing I longed for more than anything was a full .FLA file of a big, professional looking cartoon, just so I could study how it was all organized within Flash.
I could never figure out the most efficient way to do things, and I still second guess my own techniques (i.e., "Should I put this animation on the main timeline or inside a movie clip?" "Should the eyeballs and lips be on the main timeline?" "Is it a bette idea to put a character's dialog inside a movie clip?"). I just baiscally always wondered how the hell people dealt with all those fricken layers!
Flash MX's layer folders has made things easier (though not by as much as I thought they would), but I still think there's a great tutorial to be made by an experienced, gifted Flasher just showing step by step the best way (or at least his good way) to set up a full cartoon within Flash. I for one still feel there's must be a much better way to do it than the messy way I pull it off...
P.S.
Dementia, am I right in assuming you'll be sending Stage 1 to some people in hope of funding? Is your plan to eventually create a fully animated (or at least, anime-style fully animated) D7?
Thanks for the compliment! Yeah I agree totally. Arik did an amazing job visually considering it was a solo effort on his part, and even to this day I'm floored by what this guy turns out. I'm anxious to see what stops he'll pull out for the next stages...Quote:
Originally posted by FaeKitty
It was okay overall, but the excessively limited animation made it hard to follow along sometimes - like which character was talking, since the lips didn't move.
The episode was pretty basic as far as story goes, but leads up to a bigger story arc (for future episodes). Basically, the heroine is called in on the case, goes in a building, and kicks some butt - more or less.
Still, I thought Arik did well, all things considered; it's pretty nice for only a single animator/storyteller working on it, and Xero's music was nice too.
-Xero
Hey, JS, have you got your dvd already??????
Mine hasn't arrived....is it because i live in south-america???????
Where is it? where is it? I want my dvd!!!!!!!