This stuff really pi55es me off...

[baccaman21]

I was having a look at this thread in the indiegamer forum.

Am I being harsh? Does anyone else rate them?

I've only just joined indiegamer so I can't comment (yet), personally I think the guys barking up the wrong tree... is animation better if it's smooth? It needs to flow, and read, but smooth like the way these are means more memory footprint and slow gameplay...

It has nasty aliasing surround the entire character and is... well - smudgy.

Opinions?

[Ryan Cordel]

While I can say it looks quite eye pleasing with so many frames (Although I'm sure even Metal Slug wasn't as overkill on THIS subject.), the whole thing, as he said that was vector made, kind of kills the whole thing of putting worth (Although working for hours isn't exactly easy.). I agree on the thought that some frames could've been axed, some of them extended to give a fiercer, resulting in a more realistic look to them, and on the subject that the overdose of anti aliasing on the character really makes it seem more of an odd (No offense.) 2d Flash game.

[ptoing]

Metalslug has good keyframes and nowhere near as many frames for standard walks. The elephant which walks really slow has something like 24 frames but he is an exception because, OMG, he is slow and to convey that properly you need more frames.

Those are complete and utter rubbish imo. The run has no weight to speak of and the attack lacks punch.
I could not care less tho really. If people like this rubbish, let em have it.

[AdamAtomic]

yea these are total crap, i bet 5 million dollars that these were cobbled together in flash with straight tweens and saved to .gif, end of story.  Thus the aliasing, high frame rates, complete lack of actual shading or detail, polygon primitives only construction, etc.

[Froli]

Haha 40 frames for a simple attack animation. I guess he wants to make some quick bucks eh? 

[ndchristie]

lol, this stuff is garbage.  but if people are willing to pay.....

[AdamTierney]

I like em. They're swishy and have no weight, but they have a nice flow to them. Not the style I'd use in a game, but interesting to watch.

[Helm]

the biggest problem with this isn't the butter animation for me, it's the auto-aa that makes everything a blurry mess. There's a reason people work straight on pixel level at such resolutions.

[ndchristie]

i can't say id play a game with no timing, it gets uncomfortable.  look at Wild Arms for an example of a decent game with uncomfortable timings.

im not sure why people think that more frames and super even spacing makes things nice! its crazy!  i know im not a good animator, but i know that there should be snap in some places and drag in others, not this faucet effect.

edit: wow, im such a rhode island boy at heart, it took me 30 years to figure out why firefox put a red line underneath "fawcet"

[sharprm]

The thing about tweening between keyframes i found in 3ds max is it was a pain to keep the feet from going through the floor (in character studio, you could have the feet 'locked' on the floor which was great). The thing that is bad about that animation is how the feet go through the floor. Another thing is it looks like the length of the leg segments are different for each leg ie right leg has a really small shin. The right arm doesn't bend at all so it looks stiff. Its also stupid how the shoulder pads don't rotate, but maybe its WIP. Not that im an expert...etc. etc.

I think an interesting point is that courses like the one he has done might be out to make money more than delivering a product (ie. people like shrek, lets cash in on that, it doesn't matter what we teach them as long as they think they are getting a good deal)

[baccaman21]

Hmmm... well I'm glad i'm not the only one.

Thanks peeps, I just needed some resassurance.

[Helm]

However, please alert that user of this threads' existence for two reasons: not nice to talk behind the back of someone, and also he might find the critique in this thread useful for his art.

[baccaman21]

yeah... I'm intending to helm... I've got less than a 48 hours wait until I can post on the Indiegamer forum...

[ndchristie]

If he hears anything, it should be that a better attack can be made in 3 frames than his one that takes 30.  He's shrewd in knowing that people are attracted to smoothness, but it will catch up to him in the long run when he tries to get a real job and can't animate.

I almost said i can see simple animations like this being used in an RTS, where individual characters are less important, but then i remembered that no, characters with 30 frames every second can't be used en masse, so there's no practical application and it ends up looking.....cheap.

EDIT: not to mention the fact that rts characters benefit greatly from snappy animations which add a sense of excitement to what would otherwise look like a big brown game of jacks.

[Conzeit]

http://johnkstuff.blogspot.com/2007/11/flash-vs-traditional-vs-asia.html  ...=) who'da thunk I'd become such a suckup for someone?

In short.....

"non-creative types believe that having a lot of inbetweens is what makes quality and they are willing to spend a lot of money for drawings that no one sees. At the same time telling the artists who do the key poses to not ever make anything new up."

"Computer animation is perfect for producers who fear creativity, because it is so hard to make customized poses in the first place. But it's easy to make it smooth. It's all about the "tweening"."

[Faktablad]

In my opinion, the attack animation is much better than the run.  It's got great balance and nice motion.  It still looks like the sword has no weight, though.  And it's way too slow, maybe not for real life, but for a game.  The blurriness combined with the black outlines makes the whole sprite take on an ugly shade of gray. 

I don't like the run at all.  It looks like the sprite is cross-country skiing in slow motion while submerged in a pool of molasses on the moon.

[MrMister]

The ones on his site are even terribler.
This guy has no morals. Those really couldn't be used in any game..

[robotacon]

http://johnkstuff.blogspot.com/2007/11/flash-vs-traditional-vs-asia.html  ...=) who'da thunk I'd become such a suckup for someone?

In short.....

"non-creative types believe that having a lot of inbetweens is what makes quality and they are willing to spend a lot of money for drawings that no one sees. At the same time telling the artists who do the key poses to not ever make anything new up."

"Computer animation is perfect for producers who fear creativity, because it is so hard to make customized poses in the first place. But it's easy to make it smooth. It's all about the "tweening"."

Sorry to highjack this thread but John K having a blog is like sweet candy poured straight down my eye sockets. And interesting enough he bring up buffer colors in this post. (If I've understood the term correctly that it)

[baccaman21]

The ones on his site are even terribler.
This guy has no morals. Those really couldn't be used in any game..

I don't agree. Morals isn't the word. It's fair enough for him to have been trained by 'ex disney/pixar' animators... (I can lay claim to at least one of those) - but if it's games that these anims are supposed to be aimed at then it's not animators from the movie industry that are relevant... sure they have their place, but there's more to game animation than being able to render a squillion tweens in 3.5 hours.

The 3 Words I've always used to explain what I consider to be quality, well designed and well crafted pieces of games - and these words can be used interchangabley across the mediums and disciplines be it a 2D or a 3D environment, the Characters within that environment, the backgrounds that make up that environment, the animations of the characters or environmental effects... and those 3 words are SCALE, PACE and DYNAMISM.

This should be a fore of you mind whether you're trying to create a swooshy anim or a snazzy camera intro, or even the style of the font. If you lack any one of these then the overall result is weakened.

SCALE is applied to the Size of the piece and can be wholey subjective... to big though and it can overwhelm - too small and it can be insignificant.
PACE is applied to the overall feel of the peice, timing, weights, and so on, generally within the animation context but equally so in the overall FEEL of a product. (I'm talking beyond the realm of Pixel art here and moving into game theory)
DYNAMISM is applied to the overall movement and whether it has FLAIR or is ambitious in what it's trying to acheive. (a great example of this recently that really broke the mode, was the camera shake in Gears of War - it added a great sense of dynamic reality)

But back to these pieces... There's a certain amount of Dynamism I suppose, but the Pacing is all wrong.

I think the thing that disturbs me the most is that all I see is a load of separate sections that are hinged and rotated and flipped in order to create an idea of movement... but the movement itself is bland and uninspiring. And sloooooow.... Granted, I suppose the thinking is, well, you can play them at 30 fps and the movement will look fantastic... that's the theory... and I suppose in some respects that might be true... but with respect to video games... memory restrictions amount for a lot.

And with all that in mind... it's not morals that I believe is missing... It's experience.

[Jad]

Man, I dunno, I'm not very fond of JohnK's blog. He just disses about everything I like and tops it off with 'Flintstones is the only good show there ever was' kind of opinions.

Can someone please explain why I should try to wrap my head against this guy, me, who totally loves anime, pastel colours etc.?

.. And I absolutely loathe the flintstones

[Sherman Gill]

Don't be that way, babe (That's your new nickname ). He hates anime because it's pretty much the equivalent of inbred mutant rednecks, only it's a lot more popular.

[ndchristie]

the main reason he hates anime is legitimate, it's because it is most often barely animated (select works aside).  Most of the expressions and characters are stock poses and often multiple characters will share mouths, eyes, etc.  Usually when a character is talking, only the "mouth" moves!  Most of the oldies he's bringing up are much more interesting than that.  Still, he oversimplifies (it's a blog, not a novel!) in ways that might put people off......

as for colors, his annoyance is more with the indecisive rainbow vomit that can be put out.  even the Flintstones used quite a bit of purple.

my big trouble with his work is that many of the expressions he presents are unreadable, so i can't always see his point about the "acting" as it comes across in his examples.  He is better off sticking to using others.

[Froli]

Man, I dunno, I'm not very fond of JohnK's blog. He just disses about everything I like and tops it off with 'Flintstones is the only good show there ever was' kind of opinions.

Can someone please explain why I should try to wrap my head against this guy, me, who totally loves anime, pastel colours etc.?

.. And I absolutely loathe the flintstones

He admitted that the use of color palette/theory in anime is superior than how western cartoonist apply them. And as for his critics in Anime, there are still some exceptions like Gurren lagann or flcl etc..

I guess it's about being flexible. You can do both anime and theoretically correct human anatomy or proper animation.. Hell, I guess you can even merge all this stuff if you want to <easier said than done though>. But to me, it all boils down on doing what you love.

[sharprm]

Hope im not dragging things too OffT, but has anyone seen meet the Robinson's. When I was watching it, I found all their arm movements nausiating, they fling them around for no good reason. And when she picked up the baby it should have been really tender movements but it just looked clumsy. After reading that guys blog, think im more aware of how important poses are for animation.

Maybe the attack animation would benefit from stronger key frames.

[Helm]

Anime isn't all bad obviously. There's people innovating in that artistic field like anywhere else they just do it - as usual - against the grain. It's the 'churn them out we have a schedule to keep' anime that makes the whole field look bad. One should watch Mindgame, Cat Soup and such to see extremely innovative uses of animation in japan, they shouldn't only watch giant robots have sex with each other like most anime.

My problem with anime isn't so much with its animation as it is with the typified aesthetics of 'coolness' that they're spreading. In the end my problem is more with people - especially young artists - that buy into that sort of thing and end up drawing robots having sex with each other on deviant art to get 'favourited' for 10 years of their life instead of legitimately trying to become better for the own esoteric ambition. So it's not like if we eradicated anime it would be better since there'd be something else equally vacuous to fill its place.

[Jad]

Umm, yeah, well, about JohnK, I like what he writes, but then he posts pictures of disney characters while saying "These expressions aren't even remotely representing human emotions"

and I'm like, ok, I still think they do but sure, cool, I'm listening.

And then he posts some hideous oldamericanscreamonthetopofyourlungs/hanna barbera twisted garbled mess of a picture with a mind-bending posture and a face that I can't make out.

And then I kinda don't get it. Which is sad because the man knows how to put your thoughts down into text. I wish I shared most of it with him.


About anime, well, um, I think the average quality of anime is downright worthless, but hey, you've gotta be selective about that shit. (: I mean, evangelion is one of the reasons why japanese limited animation is not really a stinking piece of shit. And shows like ouran high school host club are just so well done that even if you hate the aesthetic, you can SEE that it's well made. (I happen to love it like a little girl, though, I don't know what's into me)

But Helm's point totally stands, though I think that most of these kids eventually learn how to think for themselves. It's more of a problem with people than a problem with anime.

Which is just what you said anyway :O

[big brother]

The biggest strike against the Disney characters is their bland, generic design and poor construction. The expressions are obviously not a conclusion from the study of an actual human but from an adaption of another cartoon interpretation. For instance, in Disney/Pixar/Dreamworks cartoons, you will see the artists use squash/stretch on the eyes and mouth, rather than refer to a real and specific expression (see caricature). Ironically, these are the high-budget, feature-length productions, but you can see a lot more creativity and artistic expertise in some of the uber-cheap Hanna-Barbara cartoons.

[Faktablad]

There's people innovating in that artistic field like anywhere else they just do it - as usual - against the grain. It's the 'churn them out we have a schedule to keep' anime that makes the whole field look bad.

I'm finding that to be true about any area of art.  (It's the same way in music:  for example, I generally disliked country music until I discovered that the majority of the country music I've been hearing is processed and formulaic.)  When a lot of love and commitment goes into creation, that's when you get works of art that really shine, and are beautiful, no matter what the type or style.  But any type of art and music that is commercially-driven with no artistic ingenuity or effort turns out to be soulless.

[Helm]

hm I'd say it's to be expected that like, 90% of what one is exposed to from a type of art is crap, 9% of that is worthwhile and 1% amazing. From the anime I've been exposed to (and it's been plenty, as I studied cartoons, comics and animation at school) it's more like 98% was worthles, 1.9% was worthwhile and 0.1% was excellent. It's that sort of percentile difference that makes me dislike anime more than I dislike other sorts of animation. Akira and Grave of the Fireflies and Cat Soup and whatnot are seriously islands in the ocean of feces that is churned out of studios there daily. The reason is simple: for them animation is a much more popular and wide-spread medium than for westerners. There's niche anime for everybody, literally millions of viewers. Most of them are idiots, and idiotic art suits them fine.

[Jad]

hm I'd say it's to be expected that like, 90% of what one is exposed to from a type of art is crap, 9% of that is worthwhile and 1% amazing. From the anime I've been exposed to (and it's been plenty, as I studied cartoons, comics and animation at school) it's more like 98% was worthles, 1.9% was worthwhile and 0.1% was excellent. It's that sort of percentile difference that makes me dislike anime more than I dislike other sorts of animation. Akira and Grave of the Fireflies and Cat Soup and whatnot are seriously islands in the ocean of feces that is churned out of studios there daily. The reason is simple: for them animation is a much more popular and wide-spread medium than for westerners. There's niche anime for everybody, literally millions of viewers. Most of them are idiots, and idiotic art suits them fine.

Or rather, there's niche MANGA for everybody.

And there's anime that caters to Nerds and Young people and sometimes Grown-up people as well as Families.

But there's no anime catering to the normal salaryman, there's no serious anime about foods, etc. Anime is mostly a medium catering to nerds in modern japan O:

Well, for me, the 90 - 9 - 1 scale totally works for anime, though.

I guess I just am like that (: Maybe it's more like this:

50% things I hate
40% things that just suck
9% worthwhile
1% awesome

(:

[AdamAtomic]

But there's no anime catering to the normal salaryman

To uh be all internet-ish and throw one anecdotal piece of evidence in the face of your sound and reasonable post, i think Porco Rosso was designed specifically for salarymen?

[Frychiko]

The reason is simple: for them animation is a much more popular and wide-spread medium than for westerners.

Perhaps that's simply because of a higher population of otakus here, as anime still belongs only to the domain of Otakus in Japan. Unless it's popular anime that everyone grew up with like Anpan-man, Doraemon, Sazae-san, Chibi-maruko-chan, One peice, (no pokemon), possibly dragonball(z) and several others, regular people don't watch anime here.

[Helm]

Perhaps my knowlege is flawed. How many people watch what is considered a 'hit' anime show every week?

[Jad]

But there's no anime catering to the normal salaryman

To uh be all internet-ish and throw one anecdotal piece of evidence in the face of your sound and reasonable post, i think Porco Rosso was designed specifically for salarymen?

Miyazaki and Ghibli so doesn't count as 'anime'

[Frychiko]

Perhaps my knowlege is flawed. How many people watch what is considered a 'hit' anime show every week?

I haven't watched anime for a long time so I can't answer that. Most of what I have learnt has come from talking to English students, young and old over the years.
Apart from school / young kids I've just found adults have little interest in anime (naturally, although reading manga is a different story) unless they are geeks, so it's no different from the western world. Anime like sazae-san and chibi maruko-chan take up popular time slots (Sunday - around 6pm) and have done so for a long time. Pokemon / Naruto and all other anime have their own channel and sometimes I flick by that channel but mostly never recognise what anime they are showing.

Oh, I forgot to mention studio Miyazaki films, most people are familiar with and have watched these films too.

Here's a quote that I agree with 100%:

"Actually, I think Vanye's point was a bit different from your reading of it. He was saying that, unless you're a kid, anime is not naturally common in Japan, though it's probably more common there than American animation is here in the United States. While manga is ubiquitous, anime is still considered for kids and younger teens by most Japanese people, and if an adult in his twenties said to other adults "I'm a big fan of anime" I think people would look at that person funny, supposing he might even be an "otaku" (used here in the stereotypical negative sense, as opposed to the idealistic positive sense). Publicly expressing one's like of anime in Japan is less like a Japanese adult in America saying "I'm a fan of American sitcoms" and more like him/her saying "I'm a big fan of Tom and Jerry".

In Japan, saying that you liked a few anime shows when you were younger is not so conspicuous. Saying that you enjoyed the latest Ghibli feature is okay, too--roughly equivalent to saying you enjoyed watching the latest Disney animated film. Saying that you just bought the deluxe DVD boxset of Lain will possibly earn you a reputation as being obsessed and possibly antisocial. -_-"

[Helm]

I see. I find it extremely interesting that manga is 'ok' but anime is for antisocial rejects.

[baccaman21]

it's amazing how far off topic this thread has got... I might rename the "let's discuss Japanese popular comic book art and animation Thread"

Incidentally... I spoke to the chap in question when I orginally posted this... and, well... he was grateful for the advice but begged to differ on his principles... he's attempting to create a sprite within a game, that use a squillion frames played at 30fps that moves smoothly from any sequence to any sequence - fair enough if the whole things vector based... but I think there's gonna be a hellluva lot of frames if it's gonna be hard coded...

ho hum... I wish him the best of luck. If it weren't for people pushing hte boundaries then we'd never get anywhere if old farts like me keep people back so fair play to him...

As for anime... I STILL love Akira (even though it confuses the hell out of me), Ghost in the Shell (the first one) can't fault it, Bubblegum crisis still resonates for me, Spirited away (magical, whimical, lovely), Princess Mononoke (for the same reasons) and most of the other gibli stuff... I've grown out of the majority of the other stuff... having had to do a beyblades game, and done games specs for yu yu hakashu and yu gi oh and various other anime/anime inspired kids cartoon/merchandising/game carrying 'adverts' I have to say I'm with Helm... there are the exceptions and I can't fault the classics but for the most part it's derivative shite used to sell cards, toys, figures and shamefully video games... welcome to the 21st century media merchandising machine.