Skaijo's movie Reviews on Newgrounds

[Welcome To Gameshop]

AMAZON

DOT COM.

[Amazing Professor Layton]

SO much more of an improvement over "Link at Home"

Though Link at Home was a great first crack at animating, I think this is the first flash where I can really appreciate and trend the work you've completed. What a technically massive improvement you've pulled off.

The three biggest things I noticed:

+THE SOUND SYNCS WITH THE ACTION ON SCREEN. Great job in switching over that Sync/Event issue from last time. I still suggest that you fix that issue in your other .swf and replace the file here (as well as on DA) so when your future fans ultimately want to see what you've made in the past, they can comprehend it.

+The animation quality is even throughout the work. In Link at Home, the level of animation near the end was noticeably better than during the first half, and I think I can only connect that to you learning the fundamentals while you were still making the animation, and not going over the first half again to "even it out" in terms of looks. In this work, the poses, lipsynching, and overall look remained consistent. Great job.

+Really nice sound mixing. That's something I just started to learn to appreciate since I'm still learning it myself. You're working on so many levels, not just with your art, but also with your sound--and there's been dramatic improvements in both. But really, I love the care you made into making the sound file, the music doesn't overpower the voices and the ending theme was a nice touch too and expertly faded in.

Improvement Suggestions/Things You Might Like to Work On:

Now that I've seen multiple of your projects, I'd like to help you out with some things to try out in the future.

+You need to embrace a more dynamic camera. Try to incorporate zooms and slow pans in what you do to make scenes more dramatic. Don't forget changing to other perspectives. Read about the 180 Degree Rule on wikipedia and check out the .fla I sent you before as it should have some good starting examples. Continue to experiment with perspective.

+Add more easing/bounce to your animation; easing is when something accelerates when it starts to move or stop; bouncing is self-explanatory. I think some easing could have been added to Layton's hand-movements with some slight full-body bouncing just to give off more movement to the animation.

I'm flattered that you made this--please continue to experiment with whatever YOU want and continue to spread out as a flash animator.

LordCanas responds:

Many thanks, dear miss. I actually rewatch your stuff a bunch of times, I've learned this way also. Drawing other camera perspectives and angles is going to be quite a lot of work but I'll try it. I think I'm going to make an "Amazing Professor Layton" series out of this.

[Link at Home]

Let's Talk NG for a bit:

NG is weird compared to a lot of other sites you can host videos on because the judging is done by experienced animators, hobbyists, and talentless cynics alike. The judging is uneven--so numbers and rankings don't matter or equate to squat. Always remember that. Same for the reviews, a detailed thought-provoking critique should never be summed up to a finite numerical amount. And there's plenty of that here. Views are just another number, an empty statistic--real money is in the comments. And not just quantity of comments, but thought that have been put into them. It's really rewarding when someone I've been inspired by drops in to talk about my animations for a bit.

That said, this is a great site for exposure and developing an awareness for the drastically difference audiences you'll grow compared to sites like youtube or deviantart. My advice is that you use DA as a soundboard for what to improve on and build a supportive fanbase (block any dicks instantly--keep that filter strong), make those corrections, and submit to newgrounds (or post in a NG opinion forum for more critique) for the most unbiased critique.

Also, never read any review below an 8.

Never respond to anything that isn't a 10.

Reading enough poison comments can actually make you feel bad. Especially when 80% of the people comment here don't understand the craft. If someone has something very profound to explain to you in order for you to improve, they'll do it via PM (that happens pretty often, and those messages are far more supportive and open to extended conversations). So just skip overy anything that can be potentially abusive to keep this hobby fun.

That's about it.

LordCanas responds:

Thank you very much for your kind advice and support. It means a lot to me, especially coming from someone like you. I do understand how important comments can be, numbers like views or favorites just aren't the kind of feedback which really help to improve. It's all about the reactions which make any work really worthwile for an artist besides realizing his own visions.

I won't go down that easily, that I can assure you. I always strive for new challenges and new achievements, such as completing a really hard project or making "that one thing you always wanted to". I'm all about this. So expect my next flash project already in near future.

[knife training]

Things I would improve:

+The model could use some light shading as the contrast on her is completely flat. You can improve this by adding shadows to detail contours on her body.

+There's a couple of frames where you see the bottom part of her leg as a stump in the loop. You can can fix this by drawing the leg a bit more or adding a dynamic camera that'll frame that out.

+The part where she jumps and kicks is clearly slow-motiony but the effect is loss when the bg keeps scrolling at the same speed behind her. You can fix this by slowing (easing) the background when she jumps and kicks mid-air.

+Just a thought, you can really enhance this spin and chaos in the screen by having particles in the foreground and mid background. For example, the particles could be stars in the background that scroll slightly slower than the purple clouds--or sakura leaves flowing fast in the absolute foreground and slightly more slowly just behind the fighter.

+last note, if you added a dynamic camera pov, you could shake the view a bit upon each impact to emphasize it a bit more.

GOOD STUFF

Gekon responds:

oh yes, there was a background that gave it more 'camera dynamic' look, but with all blurs and gradients my PC couldn't handle that ;/
by the way, the cloud in the background has a blur filter too, but it seems that it doesn't work? anybody got any hints about this?

[Kitty and Skwrl Ep 1]

It's so cute!

I have a sincere sweet spot for cuteness. This had it all over. Liked the whole project and was really impressed with the level of lip syncing you accomplished which takes a lot of dedication despite the simple details of everything else. The length was really appropriate and left me wanting for more. It would have been nice to see some bg music to fill in all the dead air--and maybe a slightly more enthusiastic VA performance.

Great job.

[Life Sucks at 40 by StiK]

I hate numbering systems.

I like the concept and the smart character design (which based off your past work your pretty damn skilled at). This is a simplified project, and I think you could add a bit more features to improve the UI and storytelling without too much effort.

+There needs to be a numbering "page" system so the viewer knows just how many pages he or she is into. Clicking through the pages one at a time was a bit exasperating once I realized that I never knew when this project would end. A simple fraction of pages read would be helpful once included in the corners.

+First page takes a while, and other pages take less than 10 seconds to finish. It'd be nice if you could structure your stories to balance the time spent on each page.

+Some minimal animation might help per page. I know your capable of fine art, and wanted just make something simple, but a 3 second loop may maintain more interest in each page while the narrator speaks at length.

+ I also suggest eliminating as much text as possible--even for dialog in-between characters. It's hard to read that, interpret the picture, and listen to you all at the same time. It's literally three different forms of communication at once and all nuances are lost in the storytelling. For example, I would opt for symbols or smaller graphics in the dialog boxes rather than actual text.

+StopAllSounds tage should be added in-between the final page and the restart of the new story as sounds overlap into the replay.

Keep at it!

stik responds:

Thanks man. Will do.

[Secret Santa: Elfibuso]

Fun with friends.

It makes for a good laugh when you can share stuff like this with people. Either way it's nice to know your not dead. Nice complex of art, but I wish your animations had more replay buttons--some things deserve to be seen twice. >_<

Like your upcoming Layton sequel. :3

[U.F.O. Catcher]

Woot woot woot. <3

Very very nicely done. This is really the kind of art style I want to learn next. Great twist and great polish all around.

[Flight of the Dragonfly]

Melodramatic but...

Reminds me a lot of my own starting off animation Roadkill vs. Juliet (a muted color animation about an unlikely pair with twists). I think our styles are different but we move from project to project with pretty similar strides. I remember when Bailey vs. Sauske came out and I was about to say how it reminded me of when I did Gordon vs. Evil (yours was better fyi, I woudn't even think to attempt VAing so early <3 ) but I didn't want to sound like a maniac. I guess now would be a better time for that, right? xD

I really liked this animation and where you're going as an author. I hope you focus more on your own characters and worlds more in the future. Though, as a means to be constructive, and I'll admit I'm pretty abstract with my stories too, you have to be careful not to kill off characters your audience barely had any time to connect with at all--because you'll just alienate them. And that aspect becomes all the more glaring the more dramatic your animation becomes.

Also, this suicide brings up so many other questions that are ultimately unanswered in this piece. Why did she want to kill herself in front of her best friend, why so dramatically off a cliff top (fairly gruesome), why didn't the other person stop her (they were standing pretty close if you ask me--and she certainly took her time falling), why did the other person just sit at the edge of the cliff and reflect over their relationship in the exact same place his/her friend just died (how much time had passed between then?), why weren't the police called immediately after, why so many first-person handgrabs lol, etc?

I feel you would have made the point of death and separation just as easily if you had Girl A die slowly and peacefully in a hospital with Person B at her bed side--THEN transition to the clifftop for the dragonfly transformation. At least then you don't start off the animation with a purposefully suicidal character who the viewer has no emotional investment in--but who should feel sad about when that character, for no viable reason, decidedly kills herself. I just feel like the scenario I proposed seems a bit more grounded, certainly less dramatic, and raises less questions while also putting more focus on the mysteriously gendered's character's powerlessness over the situation. :/

Also since we should be more familiar with hair pins than the average NG user, I think you could have made it a bit more distinct--as I didn't recognize it for what it was until I read the Author's Comments. Some extra tell-tale characteristics would have just been helpful. :3

I did like the clean frame by frame animations and interesting effects used through out the animation.

All that said, I like this though. I just think it lacked some clarity and realism to draw even the waterline of viewers in emotionally. But honestly, I can't wait to see where your potential takes you.