Looking for feedback for first animation

kevindgreen · Post by **kevindgreen** » Mon Mar 28, 2011 7:47 am

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QvUbcJpMf0k

This is my first animation done in Anime Studio. I would love to get some honest feed back. Some good honest critism will only help me get better. So fire away

jahnocli · Post by **jahnocli** » Mon Mar 28, 2011 11:11 am

For a first animation it's got very broad scope. Unfortunately, this is a crowded genre, and people will compare your work to many of the other examples around (you don't even have to look beyond this forum to see other work like this).

So. First, I think you could scale down your activities and try to improve on some things, like fire and wind effects. Study some real-life examples, and how some top animators have translated these effects to more cartoony forms. Less is more. Try to engage the viewers' imaginations - it's amazing how little movement can generate a convincing effect if it is done right. Samurai Jack is an excellent example of this.

And if it's a narrative, it's quite confusing. For me, the storyline rules all. I'm quite prepared to forgive pretty lousy animating if there is a strong story line.

Finally, there is the emotional side. I know some heroes are supposed to be inscrutable and all, but that doesn't help to sell the story to viewers. I just bought a book ("Making Faces"), which deals with some of the nuances in facial emotion -- quite useful to see how one emotion can segue into another. The face is not always an instantly-changing record of pain, fear, boredom etc.

Hope this helps. It's meant to be constructive...

kevindgreen · Post by **kevindgreen** » Sun Apr 10, 2011 2:41 pm

Thank you very much for the tips. I think you are exactly right about studying natural elements that can enhance my work. Scripting is not my strong suit and certainly something I need to keep working at as well. Cartooning is much more work than I anticipated, but I well worth the effort.