Charles Tinney - Animator - Robot Entertainment - http://chazamation.com
Comments:
jchristo
a. This animation is great. Your actions are clear and the staging and composition helps to define the character.
b. I really only have an issue with the beginning up to frame 142. The reason is because my interpretation of all of the action the character does until that frame is from a weak character, in contrast to how he is displayed in the rest of the animation as strong and commanding.
c. When the character “wakes” at the beginning of the animation he looks in two directions; the first almost directly at the camera and then screen right. I feel like you could lose the first look entirely. Have him move from one pose to one other pose rather than have three head poses. The transitions from head pose to head pose are really fast, again this gives me the perception of a weaker character. If you slowed them up and toned them down I would feel more confident of this characters power. Less movement would leave me feeling like I’ve witnessed a stronger character. This is really important when I see the eyes fluctuating, though ever so slightly, they are constantly moving. A stronger character would have a gaze; an unfaltering solid stare. I think the same could be said about the camera in this first shot, it is moving a lot too. If you toned that down as well and gave us a solid firm position for the camera this would all help to sell the power that this character commands. You might also think to move the camera angle down and give us a slight up shot to show a subtle sense of power.
d. The 2nd shot, frame 81-142 the character is very agile in his movements, almost as if he has no weight. You could hold the contact positions longer, have the feet and hands stay on the ground longer when he jumps forward. Here with weight I believe would be good symbolism for power.
e. On frame 267 the character is in anticipation for another hands high pose. This pose is hard to read for its silhouette value, distance the character is away from the camera, and the camera movement. What I think would help is moving the screen right arm out, mirroring the screen left pose. I know they say in animation school no “W” posing, but I think moving the arm out would only help legibility here. On 297 when we see the character again through foreground arms, I think he should still have both arms raised to help sell that he is still summoning creatures.
f. The screen left arm on frame 390 is blocking the character’s face and slowly moves out of the way, you could probably drop the arm to a different pose and keep the spacing of it moving slowly/evenly back to the pose on frame 415. Though on frame 415 I would move this elbow out a bit so the hand isn’t pointing directly at the camera and the silhouette is clear.
g. Same frame 390, I can’t tell where the bicep ends and the forearm begins on the screen right arm. You could drop the elbow down so there’s a bend there and better silhouette.
h. Again good job, and congratulations!
terryliu
a. I think this is a really great piece that displays the attributes (devastation, destruction, annihilation, death) of the god of War very well. I like how you show all of the action from a distance and then the final shot is a close up of the character. Though, I think this could have worked better if at frame 502 you didn’t cut to a close up, but used a medium shot instead, building up to the final close up shot. I also feel like this cut on action (the head turn) happens a little too late, as if there’s a lag in the cut. The head turns and seems to stop turning; then there’s the cut. When we have the new camera shot, his head is still turning, and then finishes turning again. It’s like you have the action occurring twice here, and could be fixed easily by cutting earlier.
b. The skeleton/undead guy walk cycle at the very beginning of the shot feels like everything (leg key poses, arm key poses, body key poses) are all hitting at the same time, and would come off a bit better if the these extremes were overlapping.
c. When the god first comes down into the screen at frame 54-60, the chains coming out and obliterating the undead, and the camera pushing forward all seem to be the same timing. (There may be 1 or 2 frames difference but it feels the same.) Like clockwork or metronome the action happens at regular beats. You could vary this up so it feels more naturally paced and to give more rhythm to your animation. Hit the anticipation to the chain kill, and hold it there pushing it into a further extreme…hold it longer and…..NOW attack. The anticipation here is so small and does nothing to really build up for the coming attack.
d. After the camera push is finished around frame 96 the character starts shaking his head and looking upward. I would love to see an anticipation for this action, just a quick squashing down before he starts to rear back. The spacing when the character begins to uncurl his back is very linear and could use a fast out of an anticipation and a soft accent into your final pose. The head shakes themselves seem okay, but the last two have very hard up accents; having those back-to-back makes it look poppy and unnatural. When the character starts his action of rearing back, it would also be good to give the arms a stronger action and more powerful pose; like he’s really whipping them out and flexing his muscle. At the end of this shot the character looks screen left and brings his swords closer to one another. It would be great to see a grunt, snort or some sort of I’m ready to fight behavior to show a bit of the personality of the character.
e. On frame 131 you cut to wide shot of the character and start an anticipation to an attack. I think it would work better if in the previous shot the character starts the anticipation, and then you have a cut on action and finish the anticipation in the wider shot. That way you have a visual motivation for a cut. Not that it’s hard to follow, but it would help these actions read more clearly. Also, this anticipation pose could be pushed much more and held longer. On frame 142 is your most legible silhouette for this anticipation, and that’s just seems to be an inbetween pose. I think a bigger build up with this anticipation (and a clearer more defined silhouette) would help this entire action sequence. Which is awesome action. The build up to it needs to contrast the action. As your anticipation goes the opposite way showing the audience that something is about to happen, if you have a fast/intense action, you need to draw the slow points before it out as much as you can. It helps with the change of pace by going from cold to hot, rather than cool to warm. It would add some great contrast and texture to your animation. Which feels very repetitive and one speed; an even rhythm.
f. During the action sequence before the camera move, the timing of the actions seems the same (before frame 250). You could keep the timing and vary the spacing on some of this action, or vary the timing of some of the actions; making some shorter and others longer.
g. When the character starts to spin attack on frame 347 the arm and chains are parallel to the horizon line, which is parallel to the camera line. I’d break up this parallel here with attack starting down and working diagonally up as he spins 360. You can have the guys fly across the screen diagonally too, which will help sell that line of action and break up the parallel lines. Same with the spin that starts at frame 423.
h. When the character is airborne at frame 441, the frame looks like it’s literally holding and not changing. You can push this more and have it slow in or have even spacing moving the hold to an even more exaggerated pose. Overlapping the action on some of the arms and legs would help keep the character alive here too.
i. Before the character flies off at the end of the animation, on frame 542 you start your first of two anticipations. The first where the arms are up and the character is stretched out. The second on frame 555 when the character squashes/kneels down and the wings fly up. The first anticipation is held longer than the second. I think it would be better to hold the second anticipation longer than the first. The character flies out of screen so quickly, and moves through the 2nd anticipation so quickly that I hardly have a time to read what just happened. (Though I know when the shot changes). But my mind is playing catch up. You have the character go UUUUUPPPPPPPP, down, UP. I feel like a stronger more legible way would be UP UP DOwn down down down down down down UP! The 2nd pose is the stronger of the two anticipation and is underutilized. You could also have the character go down, then have the wings come up. This would give the wings their own screen time for a beat or two, and then fly out. Make it known that the character is about to use his wings.
j. Overall great work! I think your silhouettes and timing and spacing, rhythm and texture needs some work.
Yarmolik
a. I really like this, but it is weird in a very cool way. Although I’m confused by it, I watch it over and over again to try and see what’s going on.
b. Around frame 350 the character slides in from off screen right. It’s not very clear to me if he’s being dragged in by the white orb, or if he’s sliding to a stop because he ran there. I just don’t know that’s going on. It seems like that pose could be stronger too, to help convey what’s happening.
c. The overall animation style is very cool, lots of holds and then fast actions. The action that feels weird to me is when the character starts to land around frame 517. He moves really fast to that in the air held pose, but then moves really slow out of it to a landing animation. He looks like he lunges back slowly and awkwardly during that movement. It seems intentional because afterward he jumps off really fast. I think it would work if you kept the same fast – slow – fast – slow action.
d. This is a very abstract animation, and I like that!
yctc1213
a. I think this is a funny and well done piece of animation, and a nice use of one camera shot as to not over complicate things. There isn’t anything glaring wrong about this but the concept seems a bit flat for an introduction to a god. The god character seems confused that he was awakened or released from his prison. Maybe he should come down and intentionally kill the human (rip in half or something) instead of accidentally (I see it as an accident becomes he never looks at the character on his foot) squashing him. It’s good, but the tone seems like flat comedy which is not the expectation for god of evil.
b. I also had to watch it a few times before I got that the nexus was even opening at all, much less coming from where the sword was withdrawn.
c. The animation is good, but the concept is teetering on comedic and serious, and I wish you had chosen one or the other.
arizin
a. This is good, though I think the awakening part would come off a bit better if it was an entire army walking over him rather than just some random guy that happens to sit on him.
b. There’s a jump cut on frame 274 that I’m not sure is necessary. You have a lot of camera shots that could have probably worked better placed elsewhere such as a close up of the leg/arms coming out of the ground or a midshot/closeup of the torso face area of the god. Maybe at the end the god could have gotten right up to the human face to face, and we could see a close up of that; akin to the aliens movie where the alien is face to face with sigoureny weaver.
c. I like the idea and concept, but you could have pushed it to be bigger and grander in scale. Good animation.
rhdndeodhkd
a. Good work. All of the dissolves add a bit of mystery.
b. The first dissolves happens over about 5-6 frames and feels really abrupt.
c. During this first shot the screen left arms starts moving before anything else. So with the abrupt dissolve I only have a fraction of a second to orient myself and see the character’s face, and then his arm starts moving and my eyes dart to look at that. I would leave his arm relatively motionless that way I have time to focus on the face of the character and start to take in who this person is and what’s going on in the scene.
d. In the second shot there’s more of the same type of distraction; the moving orb/light above the character. It’s moving really fast and my eye wants to keep darting back and forth between that and the character. I also feel like you could have held this shot a bit longer and panned down some more.
e. In the third shot the spacing of the poses seems even when the character is rearing back in anticipation of the punch. I’m not even sure why he’s punching the ground, is it to fire himself up to break out? Could that punch been better serving attacking the pole he’s attached to? None of the poses feel strong or have good silhouette value when he’s pulling with his screen right arm at the chain. It seems like his center of balance is off too when he starts to stand up and his screen left leg is still behind him. That leg should come out and balance him more so he can tug more firmly at his bindings. Then when he’s giving his greatest tug you dissolve to the next shot of him standing there. I feel kind of left out, I saw him struggle but I don’t get to see his victory. I don’t think this cross dissolve works well here; you’re cross dissolving on an action and it gets disorienting when fading that action in with another shot. I think a cut to black and then fade in to the next shot would work more clearly.
f. When you finally dissolve into the next shot on frame 395, you start moving the character immediately. So I don’t even get to read where we’ve dissolved to and what has happened. If I pause it, I see that he’s standing there, the skull pole is broken, and he’s no longer chained. But if I play I have only a few frames to read all of that information. It passes by too quickly.
g. When the character is hanging and leaping in the air you’re moving from one pose on frame 410 to another frame 424 very linearly (even spacing). Breaking the action up by overlapping the different parts (torso, legs, arms) from each other and modifying the spacing would help turn a mundane movement into a purposeful one.
h. After the character punches the ground around frame 450, you move the screen right arm at the same time as the screen right leg, the action of the arm is blocking the action of the leg. You need to separate these actions out so, 1) they aren’t happening at the same time, 2) one isn’t literally blocking the view of the other.
i. One frame 516-517 you cut/dissolve again. I think this should just be a cut, because you’re not necessarily showing a long passage of time. I also think the cut comes too late. It should happen around 494, the action here motivates the cut to the top down shot. Hit the cut with the action so the camera helps tell the story of the character.
j. The staging of the shot that begins at frame 516 doesn’t work with your previous shot. In the previous shot the character is in the middle of the frame, thus that’s where my eye is looking. In the next shot he’s on the left hand side of the screen, and his face is in the upper left. You should keep the character positioned (relatively) in the same spot shot to shot, so my eyes don’t have to dart around trying to find the character.
k. The last action when the character swipes the screen is cool. When he starts swiping on frame 633 I’d move the screen left arm down some so it’s not overlapping and sharing the same screen space as the swiping arm.
l. Overall I felt that this character could have broken from his bondage at any moment; I wish you played up the restraints more and possibly added a guard or two. Good work.
