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Post by Ola Schubert on Nov 11, 2008 11:21:32 GMT -5
Ok folks, this is a big day! I have been working on one scene for the intro of Nim´s Journey for some weeks now. I feel very pleased with the result, and I am very glad that I now have found a style and a quality that will set the standard for this production. The clip you are about to see is still a working copy, and there are a couple of glitches that you may spot. But I wanted to publish it anyway as you have waited so patiently for so long. It is mostly a long slow camera movement where you will be able to see the titles, I just added a couple of them for you to see. I am not sure for how long I will have the clip up, but anyway, please enjoy! www.goober.nu/journey/forum/Proboard/video/video5.htmlOla
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dorothee
New Member
driven by heart
Posts: 4
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Post by dorothee on Nov 11, 2008 11:51:46 GMT -5
Dear Ola,
this is great, really great work, the mood is "whow" don't know to say in english, amazing.
The texture of the tree and lighning, the rain and the whole scene is real and unreal in one,
and the topic of all, the amazing crow, how it moves and spread the feathers and behaves like a natural authentic crow. this work awe so. Great work Thanx for
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Post by Esn on Nov 11, 2008 14:47:52 GMT -5
I keep humming that tune now! It's such a great tune... Now then, I really like this scene (by the way, it's bigger than my screen resolution; I had to change my monitor's resolution to view it), but beyond that I'd like to write some impressions: -the very beginning of the video (zoom out from the hole in the tree) is a bit choppy on my computer - is that just me? -there's a white section on the left edge of the tree at the very beginning that looks like a remnant of an outline. -the detail on the bark is really fantastic... -What would make it really fantastic is if you could add some raindrops running down the tree bark (well, if you made a few, you could repeat the animation in other places). Just a few, to make the rain more realistic. Some good examples of rain running down surfaces to take inspiration from: this film at 1:44, this film at 0:19. -what is it that the crow raven is eating? It's so bright-coloured compared to its surroundings, and I can't make out what it is... -the crow's raven's vocalizations before we see it are a bit too rhythmic and predictable; it's as if they're timed for every X seconds, and it seems to be the same squawk each time. I think it should be a little more varied... -The scene feels weirdly empty after the crow raven flies away. I agree with what the poster on the blog said; it seems like with the "new section" in the music the scene should somehow change as well, but instead it just stays the same and zooms out slowly. - Maybe it would be more effective to first move the camera away from the tree stump after the crow flies away (maybe right, or up), and then slow down and begin the zooming out? That way the viewer shifts his attention to the faraway valley, in conjunction with the new section in the music. (section A has ended, section B begins). I'm not sure, it's just a thought.-EDIT: Actually, since you're going to have credits in this sequence, it probably doesn't matter; the viewer will have enough to look at as it is. So never mind. But it's really nice in any case. And the animation of the crow raven is great. I suspect that it's a bit of an ominous start, also: is that something related to a pixie that the crow raven is eating? EDIT2: -to expand on the raven's vocalizations bit - I wished for a bit more personality in what the raven was saying. If you listen to animals, you can often make out what they're thinking. So, for example, if the raven was eating maybe it would have not only some loud, high-pitched squawks like it currently has (which I believe are confrontational for ravens - "I'm here, I've won" etc.) but also some softer, lower-pitched squawks as if it was enjoying its food.
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Post by Ola Schubert on Nov 11, 2008 16:29:18 GMT -5
dorothee, thank you very much! I am glad that you liked it.
Esn,As usuall, thanks for your words. The choppyness is your computer not really coping well with the big format.
The piece of white there is not supposed to be there, one of the glitches I had not noticed, thanks.
Regarding the raindrops I have given it a thought, and that will indeed be a effect I will add.
Regarding to the food it is eating, it is supposed to be a bit subtle, and not really obvious. But I think I have to make it more obvious anyway. What you are seeing is the waist and one and a half leg of a pixie...(not Nim). The blood is supposed to run along the tree, but right now it is to dark I think. One of the things that have to be updated.
The sound is not really supposed to be like this, I have put it togeather quite quickly. Those are the only sounds of ravens I found, and if I find fundings for this project, I will have professionals do the sound(:
The slow camera pull when the crow have left the scene is not supposed to be like that, it will be a quite quick pullback and we will follow the camera down into the forest and... you will see once I get there. So don´t worry about that part.
I also know a great musician that will write the score for this, the music you hear now is not at all synced with the picture.
/Ola
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Post by Esn on Nov 11, 2008 22:06:40 GMT -5
Well, I hope the final result won't be too different because I love the way the current music works with this scene. Now that you've mentioned it, I see what it is. I even see the flow of blood. However: I think the biggest problem with the blood is not that it is too dark (I don't think that's really a problem), but that it only flows along one passageway so that I did not perceive it as flowing. If you had the stream slowly moving in a visible way down the tree (creating new rivulets, so to speak), I think I would have noticed it then, and regardless of the dark colour I would have known that it was blood when I saw the raven pecking at the body. I think it might be best to keep it somewhat subtle... the problem for me is that I didn't recognize the foot and legs for what they were until you told me, so perhaps make that clearer... maybe by making the form of the foot & toes a bit more prominent, so that the viewer sees clearly that it's a foot (maybe even zoom in for a bit while the camera moves up, so that we get a closer look). Are you planning to have auditions for the voices, also? I remember a fair amount of dialogue in the script. I'm sorry for referring to the raven as a crow, by the way. I'm just more familiar with crows. I'm afraid that I got even you mixed up, since you referred to the "crow" once in your post.
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Post by Esn on Nov 12, 2008 19:55:52 GMT -5
After watching it a few more times, I think I noticed some more of those bugs that you were talking about. -One of the raven's wings seems to be transparent when it's picking at the pixie. -As the image zooms out, parts of the background have edges to them (also, wow, I didn't notice at first that the trees at the bottom are on a separate layer and move at a different speed) -I agree with chucky on the Anime Studio Forum about the movement of the talons being a bit unnatural But I didn't notice any of those things initially (or even the first few times I watched it), because my attention was in a different spot.
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Post by Ola Schubert on Nov 13, 2008 5:21:07 GMT -5
There you go(:
And the blood running down the tree is in front of the pixie, so when he is picked upon the legs goes behind the blood. Also a bug that has to be corrected.
Ola
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Post by Esn on Nov 18, 2008 21:12:57 GMT -5
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Post by Ola Schubert on Nov 20, 2008 6:44:55 GMT -5
Haha, good to see the discussion there(: Don´t beat up eachother too much. The advice to learn from this would be, "don´t publish anything if it is not finished". Anyway, there is alot to do with this whole sequence, but I will first sort out the main bits, and then turn my attention to details. Right now I am working on the camera movement from the tree, I had to re-arange the entire scene in After-Effects as I had been working on such a large scale. In some minutes I will get my first hint if the motion works or not, after 10 h of rendering. ;D
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Post by Esn on Nov 20, 2008 13:23:33 GMT -5
Right now I am working on the camera movement from the tree, I had to re-arange the entire scene in After-Effects as I had been working on such a large scale. In some minutes I will get my first hint if the motion works or not, after 10 h of rendering. ;D Wow, that seems a little insane... so you have to wait 10 hours to get some idea of what the scene looks like? Sorry, I've just never had to deal with the whole "rendering" thing yet, so I don't really understand; in Flash you can just preview your animation from a certain frame...
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Post by Ola Schubert on Nov 21, 2008 5:35:39 GMT -5
Wow, that seems a little insane... so you have to wait 10 hours to get some idea of what the scene looks like? Not to get a idea what the scene looks like, more how it behaves(: As there are so many images and layers it is impossible for the computer to play the movie in real time, so the way to go is to render the scene. This specific scene is so huge so I also have to work with half the quality. This makes it difficult to spot little mistaces and artefacts in the scene. And also the camera movement is quite complex, so I have to check that motion is really smooth. So I am not exporting it until I feel confortable that I have done as much as I should And while I sleep, the computer work ;D
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