The Rose Agent Character Pack for Anime Studio is currently on sale at Content Paradise for 90% off the regular price of $39.99 = $3.99! But only until Saturday, June 7th at Noon PDT...
I hadn't taken the plunge so far, but at this price I figured I would pick it up and see what I can learn from Rose. Just thought people may like to know if you don't get the CP newsletter.
Rose Agent Character Pack on sale at CP
Moderators: Víctor Paredes, Belgarath, slowtiger
Well, it *says* that this is the Passport price (Passport is a membership that, I think, costs around $75 per year).
However, I went ahead and ordered anyway and it only charged me the $4... it said. It remains to be seen if they will try and charge my card the membership price (there was nothing anywhere that indicated that would happen so I'm hoping not).
Also, I ordered this after 9am PDT (a few minutes after -- LOL) so it may not be as limited as people think.
BTW, I rig and draw my own characters, and Agent Rose ain't my style at all. But I have been curious for a long time to see exactly how the rigging goes on her so for a few bucks it was worth getting her -- if nothing else it might inspire some other practices for me (hey, I can spend $4 just driving to the supermarket nowadays :>)
Thanks for the heads up.
However, I went ahead and ordered anyway and it only charged me the $4... it said. It remains to be seen if they will try and charge my card the membership price (there was nothing anywhere that indicated that would happen so I'm hoping not).
Also, I ordered this after 9am PDT (a few minutes after -- LOL) so it may not be as limited as people think.
BTW, I rig and draw my own characters, and Agent Rose ain't my style at all. But I have been curious for a long time to see exactly how the rigging goes on her so for a few bucks it was worth getting her -- if nothing else it might inspire some other practices for me (hey, I can spend $4 just driving to the supermarket nowadays :>)
Thanks for the heads up.
D.K.
Just to answer your question...
Rose is not rigged in any manner that I would have used, but it's interesting. She's a vector drawn character whose drawing is all on just one level -- that's right, only one level (per view, that is). So she's rigged via flexible region (and undoubtedly point by point binding) instead of using bone offsets and the region binding I would use.
This makes the file incredibly compact compared to mine (where I have separate layers for arms, legs, accessories) but also hard to deconstruct (perhaps the goal here) and/or edit. It also seems a whole lot more work to me, but maybe that's just me.
Having looked at her in depth I'm now of the opinion she's worth exactly $3 -- so perhaps I lost a dollar <bg>. Then again, as I said earlier, not my style and not really needed for my work.
But I'm glad I finally have the chance to examine her in depth, so to speak, because I WAS curious about her for a long time (and at $40 she was incredibly overpriced for what you get).
BTW, for me the best part was seeing how they rigged and made her long hair move -- not anything I'd ever do in a thousand years in my stuff, but very interesting. The oddest (perhaps not) thing was seeing how they rigged her breasts (yep, separate bones spring loaded -- this gal is *built*).
Just to answer your question...
Rose is not rigged in any manner that I would have used, but it's interesting. She's a vector drawn character whose drawing is all on just one level -- that's right, only one level (per view, that is). So she's rigged via flexible region (and undoubtedly point by point binding) instead of using bone offsets and the region binding I would use.
This makes the file incredibly compact compared to mine (where I have separate layers for arms, legs, accessories) but also hard to deconstruct (perhaps the goal here) and/or edit. It also seems a whole lot more work to me, but maybe that's just me.
Having looked at her in depth I'm now of the opinion she's worth exactly $3 -- so perhaps I lost a dollar <bg>. Then again, as I said earlier, not my style and not really needed for my work.
But I'm glad I finally have the chance to examine her in depth, so to speak, because I WAS curious about her for a long time (and at $40 she was incredibly overpriced for what you get).
BTW, for me the best part was seeing how they rigged and made her long hair move -- not anything I'd ever do in a thousand years in my stuff, but very interesting. The oddest (perhaps not) thing was seeing how they rigged her breasts (yep, separate bones spring loaded -- this gal is *built*).
Oh, one *last* item just in case anyone is ever tempted to buy Rose at her normal price.
She isn't rigged to do facial animations in any manner -- not even phonemes. Instead they give you a file of phoneme positions drawn so you can move the mouth vector shapes to match (I guess). Now, you could create your own switch layers but you'll have to do the work. Same for any eyeblinks, eyebrow moves, etc. -- all on your own here.
And in all the demo files they accomplish animation the traditional way -- moving the vectors point by point. It makes for some very convincing movements, but for a beginning animator this is no "out of the box" solution.
On the plus side there are some lovely shading effects that go into Rose that are worth examining (once again, if that is your animation style -- it doesn't help me any). She also has some pretty cool and detailed swords (but they ain't the hardest thing in the world to draw :>).
She isn't rigged to do facial animations in any manner -- not even phonemes. Instead they give you a file of phoneme positions drawn so you can move the mouth vector shapes to match (I guess). Now, you could create your own switch layers but you'll have to do the work. Same for any eyeblinks, eyebrow moves, etc. -- all on your own here.
And in all the demo files they accomplish animation the traditional way -- moving the vectors point by point. It makes for some very convincing movements, but for a beginning animator this is no "out of the box" solution.
On the plus side there are some lovely shading effects that go into Rose that are worth examining (once again, if that is your animation style -- it doesn't help me any). She also has some pretty cool and detailed swords (but they ain't the hardest thing in the world to draw :>).
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synthsin75
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Yeah, I'd have to agree with mkelly. Rose isn't very useful. Aside from not being setup for lip-sync, her skeleton/drawing isn't even designed for much movement at all. (I.e. joints distort when bent much and some break entirely from the character)
I agree with mkelly. Even at $4 she's overpriced, at least as being advertised as a 'fully realized' character. Now $4 for the awesome shading techniques, maybe. But for the original $40, I'd expect a 'fully realized' character to come lip-sync ready and perhaps with a walk cycle.
My two cents.
I agree with mkelly. Even at $4 she's overpriced, at least as being advertised as a 'fully realized' character. Now $4 for the awesome shading techniques, maybe. But for the original $40, I'd expect a 'fully realized' character to come lip-sync ready and perhaps with a walk cycle.
My two cents.
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synthsin75
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Yeah, the more I think about it, the more I realize what a ripoff this was (not for me -- I'm okay with the $4 :>).
I'm no great artist, and certainly can't do the blends that are done here, but any of my dozens of characters are more fully rigged (with walks, runs, emotions, etc.) than Rose. And none of them took more than a few hours to construct. Any one of them would be a better value than Rose. As synthsin75 says, it would take a whole lot of work for this character to be useful in any way.
I feel sorry for anyone who bought her for the full price but, worse than that, it could leave anyone with a very bad taste in their mouth for AS and what it is capable of doing.
I'm no great artist, and certainly can't do the blends that are done here, but any of my dozens of characters are more fully rigged (with walks, runs, emotions, etc.) than Rose. And none of them took more than a few hours to construct. Any one of them would be a better value than Rose. As synthsin75 says, it would take a whole lot of work for this character to be useful in any way.
I feel sorry for anyone who bought her for the full price but, worse than that, it could leave anyone with a very bad taste in their mouth for AS and what it is capable of doing.
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synthsin75
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To be fair, if you can pick it up for $4, I'd definitely recommend getting it. If only to have a wonderful example of Sang's excellent shading and coloring effects.
I assume that Sang uses mostly point motion in his work, so it probably is fairly complete for his work flow. If I remember correctly, he even does a lot of manual lip-sync. To each his own.
I just can't get over the fact that it use to sell for $40. That's almost as much as AS Standard. What's worse is I almost bought it at that price. Boy would I have been steamed.
I assume that Sang uses mostly point motion in his work, so it probably is fairly complete for his work flow. If I remember correctly, he even does a lot of manual lip-sync. To each his own.
I just can't get over the fact that it use to sell for $40. That's almost as much as AS Standard. What's worse is I almost bought it at that price. Boy would I have been steamed.
I'd like to add something else (and then not beat this into the ground). Someone PM'ed me asking me to consider editing my remarks in this thread so as not to hurt the artist feelings (I'm guessing the artist does participate here, although I've never seen any postings from them. Then again, I've only been here a little over six months so am hardly a forum expert).
Pretty obviously I haven't done so -- not only do I not believe in this (indeed, on the forums I run I have editing disabled after five minutes) in this case it would be pretty silly as others have already read the comments. I can't say I'm always proud of what I've written (or that I haven't suffered from the foot in mouth disease) but in general I do consider what I post before I post things.
I don't think it was unreasonable of this person to ask me to do that -- and I do understand the point. I'm just not going to do it.
As to the artist themselves -- well, we artists are of course well known for being somewhat thin skinned and I certainly would feel bad if I were reading this about my own work. But let's be fair here -- I am not offering something of mine for sale at this price.
If I were the artist I'd actually look on this in a very positive way -- this is excellent feedback about my efforts and I would use this to make my work in the future even better (or at least price my work accordingly). That's far better than being deluded about the true worth.
And with that we can let the thread die, I think.
Pretty obviously I haven't done so -- not only do I not believe in this (indeed, on the forums I run I have editing disabled after five minutes) in this case it would be pretty silly as others have already read the comments. I can't say I'm always proud of what I've written (or that I haven't suffered from the foot in mouth disease) but in general I do consider what I post before I post things.
I don't think it was unreasonable of this person to ask me to do that -- and I do understand the point. I'm just not going to do it.
As to the artist themselves -- well, we artists are of course well known for being somewhat thin skinned and I certainly would feel bad if I were reading this about my own work. But let's be fair here -- I am not offering something of mine for sale at this price.
If I were the artist I'd actually look on this in a very positive way -- this is excellent feedback about my efforts and I would use this to make my work in the future even better (or at least price my work accordingly). That's far better than being deluded about the true worth.
And with that we can let the thread die, I think.
I woud like to add one thing this discussion.....I think Rose Agent looks great!
The artwork is not where the problem lies. I think the people at Content Paradise still do not know how to present a commercial 2D character for AS. They are still thinking in Poser 3D mode. What is needed is someone to create a benchmark set of files for Anime Studio so that all characters can be presented as a fully viable commercial product that does not require further recontruction by the end user.
When you buy a Poser character you get the full 3D bone functionality, use of existing poser props like hair etc etc. AS characters should be presented in the same manner but as a consequence are a lot harder to create, therefore I think that they should cost more because a lot of people cannot draw but they should be able to create any type of animation they require when they buy a Anime Studio character set.
I am a Content Provider but steer right away from creating AS character products exactly for this reason. The one character based file I did create for CP had approx 30 pre animated character poses and positions in it and that still was'nt enough in my mind but it took damn weeks to create and I have not sold enough of them to pay me for that lost weeks work to date, yet the files been available for purchase for well over 12 months.
D.K
The artwork is not where the problem lies. I think the people at Content Paradise still do not know how to present a commercial 2D character for AS. They are still thinking in Poser 3D mode. What is needed is someone to create a benchmark set of files for Anime Studio so that all characters can be presented as a fully viable commercial product that does not require further recontruction by the end user.
When you buy a Poser character you get the full 3D bone functionality, use of existing poser props like hair etc etc. AS characters should be presented in the same manner but as a consequence are a lot harder to create, therefore I think that they should cost more because a lot of people cannot draw but they should be able to create any type of animation they require when they buy a Anime Studio character set.
I am a Content Provider but steer right away from creating AS character products exactly for this reason. The one character based file I did create for CP had approx 30 pre animated character poses and positions in it and that still was'nt enough in my mind but it took damn weeks to create and I have not sold enough of them to pay me for that lost weeks work to date, yet the files been available for purchase for well over 12 months.
D.K
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synthsin75
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