Animation Competition discussion thread

[weebl]

We've decided to run another fun competiton. To enter you'll need flash to enter as what we are doing is giving you a tune and want you to animate it.

The FLA is here (http://www.weebls-stuff.com/compos/marrow.fla)
The SWF so you can listen to the tune is here (http://www.weebls-stuff.com/compos/marrow.swf)

The tune remains our copyright and entries should only be submitted to Weebl's Stuff. If the winner is good enough to go on the site then it will win moneys!!

You can enter more than once.

Spread the word.

[eidderf]

It'll probably make it easier for people if you post the lyrics, in case they want to animate them word for word.

[Tiggs]

Have you seen my prize winning marrow?
I keep it right here in my prize winning barrow
That i got from a man who lives in Harrow
His shops called Harrows barrows for marrows
I went with my my mum it cost a tidy sum
To get from where we live
To the store where we got the barrow for the marrow
It cost more than a fiver

How did i do?

[weebl]

spot on.

Eidderf is just a deafy deafy deaf deaf.

[sirch]

Monehs you say? That got my ears listening.

Shame I can't animate, but I'll give it a go and fail like usual.

[Mercury126]

Ill try but ill probably not enter as I know it will be utter shite.

[Fish Finger]

I really love the song, very catchy.

It's very unlikely that I'll enter, but when's the deadline?

[weebl]

whenever

[Boyinabox]

Yet another incentive to try my hands at that perfectly legal copy of Flash on my PC.

I think I may just give this one a try, but it won't be very good. :p

[rubberfishy]

First entry!
http://img122.imageshack.us/my.php?image=marrowrw9.swf
:)

[Boyinabox]

That was quite possibly the funniest thing I've ever seen.
In a "Plan 9 from outer space" way.

[Haroshi]

If I was to do this, it would take me at least 2 months.

I hate being a perfectionist. :(

[Kiwi Man]

Ah! There is a discussion thread! Needless to say, I am entering. Can I ask though Weebl, (as you pretty much have to have the music as an event sound otherwise it loops badly, and because it's an event sound it goes out of sync,) is the way to see if it's synchronised properly just to preview the Flash in an HTML and then time it to that? Or would it vary on different computers? I ask this because when you test it normally, the music goes with the music differently than it does in a web-page. (As I'm sure you know.)

[katt]

somedays i am tempted to dl flash and try my hand at animating because it looks like a lot of fun and i love art. maybe i will someday.

[weebl]

kiwiman: don't worry about looping it. I will sort that. animate everything to a stream

[Spankhorse]

I would enter, if I had Flash. Or a scanner to get all my pretty pretty pictures onto the computer.
I suppose I could try the trial version of Flash with MS Paint pics. But I won't, because that would be horrid.

[MijetMan]

the first link, what that for? animation software?

[Tiggs]

the first link, what that for? animation software?
Its for use in Macromedia Flash. You can download a 30 day trial of it from here (http://www.adobe.com/cfusion/tdrc/index.cfm?product=flashpro) if you want to give it a try.

[eidderf]

I'm slowly creating an entry, it won't be done for a while though. I doubt it will be up to winning standards but it should look fairly nice.......hopefully.

[adcoolguy]

I would enter, if I had Flash. Or a scanner to get all my pretty pretty pictures onto the computer.
I suppose I could try the trial version of Flash with MS Paint pics. But I won't, because that would be horrid.
Please, Please, Please delete the rest of those posts.
I might give the old animating a go, if i have time.

EDIT: great tune, I got it going, and probally will for about an hour.

[Kiwi Man]

kiwiman: don't worry about looping it. I will sort that. animate everything to a stream

Ah, okay. I've done a preloader already though so I'm assuming I didn't need to do that either. Ah well, it's reasonably unique so I'll probably still include it.

[jonffm]

Temptteedddd...it's been ages since i've done me a flash project mind..

Though, I have a horrible feeling that i'll spend an age on it, then Zekey will pop up and pwn us allllll. :D

Meh, might be fun anyways.

*Opens flash and gets-a-doodling*

[Spankhorse]

Oh, bloody frog-hats.
Okay, sorry about the however-many-times-I-posted. Here's what happened: I tried to post once. It didn't work. Honest, I could have sworn it didn't. The screen just sat there. I even checked. Nothing there. Alrighty, so I tried again.
My uber-apologies, and I've reaped the consequences. I'm officially in the double-negatives now (but that's okay, because we all know that two negatives make a positive). Thanks to Weebl for executing his ultrapowers!

EDIT: Thanks to the wonderful (and sexy) two who gave me sympathy reputation.

[Fish Finger]

Zekey will pop up and pwn us allllll. :D

That reminds me, Zekey HAS to do this.

[RevJ42]

Hmm. I'll try my hand.
Progress: have synched up all the music to bars. I couldn't do anything with the tempo it came in, so I made it to 120 bpm.
Are we allowed to remix it? Or do anything like that?
I really can't think of any original ideas. Hmm. I could just animate the story, and hope that my animation of it's better than others. To work!

[Drattigan]

Woo and yay.

I shall enter and make the best damn marrow you ever did see!

[/over exaggeration]

[Kiwi Man]

Hmm... I wanted my images to be nice and simple, but now, as always, they've got more fine detail than I would have liked them to have the further I've progressed though the whole thing. And if I get rid of the detail, it looks stupid. And if I keep it there, it looks less cartoony and more like I'm trying to draw it all realistic like. ARGH! Oh well, I have a plan which may draw attention away from the detail... It'd better work.

EDIT: Do you want entries posted in this thread, or just e-mailed to you?

EDIT2: Gah! I just had the most annoying thing keep happening. Okay, I had a graphic on one layer move from one place to another via tweening. Directly after this, on the same layer, I had a drawing object that I'd just finished in a, until seconds before, blank keyframe. A few frames later I had another keyframe which also, (obviously,) contained this drawing object, and as soon as I right-clicked and chose 'create motion tween,' the drawing object somehow turned into the graphic from the previous tweened animation. I re-tried the whole thing several times despite knowing it wasn't going to make a difference. Eventually, I turned the drawing object into a movie-clip and it was ok. Then, to see what would happen, I made another keyframe in the very next frame, made a drawing object, added another keyframe and tweened it, to see if it changed the drawing object into the movie-clip. It didn't. Am I missing something or is that seriously 'wtf!?'?

[kuwong]

I so badly want to try this, but i dont have flash or the artistic abilites to even begin to try. Nor do i have the imagination. Good luck to everyone else though.

[Mr Salek]

I with my my mum it cost a tidy sum
I went with me mum it cost a tidy sum.
Sorry, had to point that out :)

[Tiggs]

I with my my mum it cost a tidy sumI went with me mum it cost a tidy sum.
Sorry, had to point that out :)
:ssh: Nobody had noticed that!

[terrorbite]

:ssh: Nobody had noticed that!
But people might've noticed:

Have you seen my prize winning marrow?
I keep it right here in my prize winning barrow
That i got from a man who that lives in Harrow
His shops called Harrows barrows for marrows
I went with my my mum it cost a tidy sum
To get from where we live
To the store where we got the barrow for the marrow
It cost more than a fiver
:D

[kuwong]

Have you seen my prize winning marrow?
I keep it right here in my prize winning barrow
That i got from a man that lives in Harrow
His shops called Harrows barrows for marrows
I went with me mum it cost a tidy sum
To get from where we live
To the store where we got the barrow for the marrow
It cost more than a fiver
Simple edit, but worth saying. Sounds like "me" rather than "my" though.

[eidderf]

Once we finished our animations, not that I have, how do we enter them?

[Kiwi Man]

Not that I'd know, but thinking about it now, it'd probably be better to e-mail them to Weebl, because otherwise, when people have posted theirs, and someone else posts theirs afterwards, people might start complaining that people stole their ideas. So it's probably better if people don't see each others ideas until entries close or whatever.

EDIT: Garr! >:[ On the same layer that I was having problems on before, I have now drawn some more stuff in a new keyframe, (just after the thing that I had to turn into a movie clip to make work,) and it refuses to show up in the swf until I group it or turn it into a symbol. AARRGGHH!!!! I don't really know why I'm keeping you posted on my progress. I'm probably hoping someone will calm me by telling me what I'm doing wrong. (Even though I'm not doing anything wrong.) Oh well, only a few more seconds of animation to do now.

EDIT2: Ah! The problems must have been RAM related. When I started work again today, without doing much else on the computer, I tested the movie again and the thing didn't disappear. Excellent. Not long now.

[Kiwi Man]

Bump & Double Post.

I'm very nearly done, so I need to ask, do you want me to give you the plain SWF, with no preloader or looping Weebl, and just the animation with the streamed sound set to repeat once?

Oh yeah, do you have a quality of sound you particularly want the entries to have?

[Smidge91]

Post them up here aswell, so we can see what they're like!

[eidderf]

I've done most of my entry, got to finish the last 2 scenes and then go back and add some little things, I should be finished before the end of the week hopefully, don't hold me to that though.

[weebl]

I'll need FLAs for looping purposes. however you should link to swfs for initial viewing type stuffs.

[waggit]

Wish i had a wacom tablet, during with a mouse is to hard be that at 400 or 2000dpi

[Smidge91]

Draw the images first and then scan them in and trace over in Flash.

[SlaughterDog]

Hello all, this is my first time on the forums here.

Is it too late to enter the contest? When is the deadline? I want to enter the contest. Unfortunatly I bought the cheapest mouse I could find and it tends to move the cursor over 2 pixels at a time. Besides a Wacom tablet, the only thing I lack is talent lol. But that's why I tend to rotoscope things :(

So I take it we send the .fla and .swf to weebl via email? I saw the stick figure one, and I think I can do a little better than that (I have been trying to teach myself Flash for years now).

Kiwi man, seeing as this is a contest and I need everything I can get going for me, I can't offer in depth help on your problems (used to happen to me as well), but here's a hint: movieclip.

I noticed you have it set as a flash 5 profile. Can we save it as a flash 8 .fla?

Ohh there's an automerger on these forums! I have to post once more just to see it in action again!

[Kiwi Man]

I've done most of my entry, got to finish the last 2 scenes and then go back and add some little things, I should be finished before the end of the week hopefully, don't hold me to that though.

Yeah, I've just finished drawing everything, all I need to do now is the rest of the mouth movements as I have a guy singing the song in the toon. It's a horribly boring job, and you can't listen to music because you'd have to stop it every few seconds to test what you've done. I definitely feel for Peabo when he does all the mouth movements in On the Moon. So anyway, I should be done in about a week too. But I might not be.

[SlaughterDog]

Is there a deadline? I'm just getting started

Damn, I knew I was a bad artist but this is comeing out just awful!

[eidderf]

I've basically finished mine, I may add a few more little bits but apart from that it's basically done. I'll probably enter it sometime over the weekend.

[Bisyss]

Is there a deadline? I'm just getting started
It's very unlikely that I'll enter, but when's the deadline?
whenever
Plenty of time!

[SlaughterDog]

I can't think of any backgrounds, right now I'm tempted to copy some of the toons on weebl's site and just put gradient hills and a japanese-style gradient ray sun.

[eidderf]

I've entered my entry. I'm sorry if there are any sound problems or anything, I synced it to the best of my abilities.

[The Grandmaster]

Show us it!

[Midget]

I've made a start on an entry.

A question for weebl though, I suck terribly at sound in flash, so if I mess it up, will you be able to loop it properly when I send the FLA?

Also, should we add a preloader or will you be adding the weebls-stuff preloader?

[weebl]

I'll sort all the codey side of things

[SlaughterDog]

This wasn't supposed to be for halloween, was it? I kinda blew the halloween deadline.

[Kiwi Man]

How many times!? Currently there isn't a deadline!

[weebl]

He's not the smartest tool in the shed.

[Kiwi Man]

You did say 'smartest tool in the shed' on purpose. Didn't you?

EDIT: I've gotten of my butt for three-quarters of an hour today and I'm very, very nearly done. I may have gotten more done if I'd gotten home after school at the normal time, (not 7 o'clock,) but oh well. If I get off my butt again tomorrow I should be done in under an hour. (Oh the irony, 'getting off my butt', when to do work on the computer you have to sit on it. Unless you're weird.)

[Smidge91]

Any chance you could show us yours eidderf? Set the standard?

[eidderf]

I don't want to set the standard, everyone will make better entrys than me, after the comp is over I'll put a link to it in my fan-art thread if I lose, sorry.

[Smidge91]

Heh, ok. :(

[SlaughterDog]

How many times!? Currently there isn't a deadline!
I know there's no official submit by deadline, but I never heared the term 'marrows' before and a Google define brings up pumpkins.

[eidderf]

This is a marrow
http://img503.imageshack.us/img503/6165/marrowew2.png (http://imageshack.us)
Well technically that's 2 marrows.

[SlaughterDog]

This is a marrow
http://img503.imageshack.us/img503/6165/marrowew2.png (http://imageshack.us)
Well technically that's 2 marrows.
Good, because I also have one of those, and it dances and pelvic thrusts.

[Kiwi Man]

Yay! My entries all done now, I'll probably enter it tomorrow as it's 11pm and after 24 I'll be going to bed.

But I'd just like to find something out; I notice with Flash the file sizes seem to be a bit erratic. Like, for example, I saved my entry every so often under a different file name so that I can go back to the different stages I got to if need be. When I saved, let's say, version 4, it was maybe 7,000kb. However, after adding more things to it, and saving it as version 5, it might have been only 6,000kb.

Actually, before when I finished the toon, version 8, (the last version,) was about 5,000kb according to the little subtitle things you get under the filenames of stuff in Windows Explorer. This was significantly less than the previous version, despite there being more in it. I then went 'back', and then double-clicked the folder containing version 8 again, and then it was somehow back to the approximate filesize of the previous version. The filesize I would have expected it to be. (Although, it's still smaller in filesize than some of the other, much earlier, versions I think.)

I was just wondering if this happened to other people, to Weebl perhaps? Or is there something I'm missing which causes this. (I'll add that even if I go into the files properties for a more accurate measurement of filesize, it's still weird. Oh yeah, and the same thing happens for the swf files, not just the fla's.

[Smidge91]

Perhaps it's just because of Flash's compression once you save it as a swf? I suppose as long as you can watch it, it doesn't really matter. How about posting it up here?

[Kiwi Man]

After the competition's over I think.

EDIT: Ah yes, just a bit of advice I will share to those of you who it may help; (I eventually worked this out when I made my entry,) you'll want to keep the amount of blurring in an animation to a minimum, as it drastically increases the amount of effort required by your computer to play an animation. In my entry, the animation became very jerky and eventually I worked out that it got jerkier the more blurs I added, so just a hint for you people if you need it. (I'm sure you won't, it's probably just that I'm just a Flash noob and was relieved when I solved the problem.)

EDIT2: All sent now, I actually added a tiny bit more this morning. And Smidge; I'm not going to post my entry yet, but I'm sure you'll be able to work out the url. ;)

[Bilbo]

hmm, I started this but then I got boreded.
But since theres money, I'm gonna start againz!
I need to buy some more inflatable women.
How much moneys?

[SlaughterDog]

I toyed around with blurring but my drawing is so basic it really is overkill anyway. I better get working on it now though.

Can pumpkins and other assorted gourds be considered a marrow as well?

[Kiwi Man]

Can we have like all the people who are definitely entering this say so? Because there's been a lot of people who have said they'd give this ago, but I'm not sure that anything's come of it. I'm just interested in who's doing this. :ninja: So what if I'm just sizing up the competition?

Would I be right in saying that the only people entering are Eidderf, Me, Midget, SlaughterDog and possibly Bilbo?

[SlaughterDog]

Can we have like all the people who are definitely entering this say so? Because there's been a lot of people who have said they'd give this ago, but I'm not sure that anything's come of it. I'm just interested in who's doing this. :ninja: So what if I'm just sizing up the competition?

Would I be right in saying that the only people entering are Eidderf, Me, Midget, SlaughterDog and possibly Bilbo?
I'm definately in, unless tomorrow Weebl says he wants it done immediatly. When I work, I work. I can't wait until this is done; I really want to see how mine stacks up to the others.

edit (double post actually, unless someone else posts first):
It's no big secret that I'm a horrible artist, but I tried to draw a salesman and it was so bad, I had to resort to using some cyan and red to make him drooling and freaking out, to help mask the fact that it looks like 5 year old tried to draw Mccully Culkin. I was going to take a screenshot and post it here, but there was not one second when the flash opened before I saw it and immediatly closed flash in discust.

[Drattigan]

No, no. I started making a FLA too.

I shall enter and make the best damn marrow you ever did see!

Remember? REMEMBER?

('Course, I probably won't finish it. Like everything I start in Flash. :P )

[sirch]

Well I can't until I find another perfectly legit version of Flash as I have changed my computer since the competition began!

[Joe G]

I may have a quick bash at this:) I know I'm very late but hopefully the deadlines quite far off. And I probably should have checked but do we just submit the whole flash .doc or just the .swf please anyone?

[SlaughterDog]

Flash .doc? I never heared of that. Either way, send weebl the authoring document so he can put his WeeblSync on it.

[Joe G]

well I've started my entry and the backdrop is quite good for me since I must have the shittiest mouse in the world, but if I get my skates on I can have it done this time next week, so lets hope the deadline stays open for a bit even though I'll never win since my flash skillz are shall we say average? but what the hey I enjoy it!

[ThortheClod]

I should really check here more often.

I might enter, depending on whether or not I get an idea before tommorow evening

[sirch]

well I've started my entry and the backdrop is quite good for me since I must have the shittiest mouse in the world, but if I get my skates on I can have it done this time next week, so lets hope the deadline stays open for a bit even though I'll never win since my flash skillz are shall we say average? but what the hey I enjoy it!

Win and you may be able to afford a new mouse.

Oh the Irony.

[Joe G]

Nearly done but how am I meant to get it to weebl? Through PM or through the sites contact us as I haven't got his e-mail and you can't do attachments on those two. Should I send him save file link or something?

[SlaughterDog]

Try http://mediafire.com

[eidderf]

Nearly done but how am I meant to get it to weebl? Through PM or through the sites contact us as I haven't got his e-mail and you can't do attachments on those two. Should I send him save file link or something?
Just put the swf on imageshack and send him a link to it.

[Joe G]

Just put the swf on imageshack and send him a link to it.
Oh and I guess then he decides if he wants the authoring document I'm with you:)

[bmfy.]

I just started making my one yesterday, although after reading the whole of the thread, I think I might have trouble with the techy (by techy I mean everything apart from the drawing) side of things.

We do have to add the sound on ourselves don't we?

[SlaughterDog]

Weebl provides a .fla with the sound in it. As it is just an animation, I don't think anything techy needs to go into it, and weebl wants to handle all that stuff anyway (I'm assuming it's just syncing the sound and addind a preloader if you didn't put one on already).

[Corn_Fest]

Hoo boy.
I've been working on one where the main theme is BONE marrow

>.<

I didn't know that they were a squash type thing

[SlaughterDog]

I didn't know about the squash type as well at first, but I did some research on the 3 words I was iffy on; marrow, barrow, and harrow. I did think about making it bone marrow, though, just to be different.

[OzzApe]

Techy question: Is it okay to up it to Flash 8 or keep at a maximal of 2004?

[sirch]

Doesn't specify a marrow.

[SlaughterDog]

Techy question: Is it okay to up it to Flash 8 or keep at a maximal of 2004?
I already asked that and weebl didn't answer. I beefed it up to 8.

[Corn_Fest]

Doesn't specify a marrow.
True. Back to work then!

[sirch]

Like OMG Eidderf won. It's great!

[SlaughterDog]

Dammit weebl had you announced a deadline I would have finnished my entry and submitted it. I know it wouldn't have won, but still I wish you had told us that you were going to pick some one soon.

Just for shits and giggles, here's what I had:
http://img98.imageshack.us/my.php?image=marrow2flaxd5.swf

[stav]

If Eidderf did all that himself then I am really impressed

[weebl]

Dammit weebl had you announced a deadline I would have finnished my entry and submitted it. I know it wouldn't have won, but still I wish you had told us that you were going to pick some one soon.

Just for shits and giggles, here's what I had:
http://img98.imageshack.us/my.php?image=marrow2flaxd5.swf


I wouldn't worry too much then. :P

Anyone fancy another competition like this?
I have a nice christmas tune.

[Kiwi Man]

Yes another competition please. :) Congrats to Eidderf too!

[Drattigan]

A CHRISTMAS TUNE?

A new competition would be awesome Weebl. =]

[joshwah]

Oooh! A new competition would be nice.
I may actually enter this one instead of just wishing I was any good at Flash. :rolleyes:

[OzzApe]

Ooh foobars... Just when I was almost finnished...

Well done Eidderf...
(although, oddly enough mine has some of the same elements - but can assure it is just a coincidence...)

[Toph]

http://img293.imageshack.us/img293/4083/marrowow3.swf

That's all I'd done so far. Bare in mind it's my first proper animation.

I would like a Christmas one very much Weebl!

[eidderf]

Thanks for the congrats.
I'd probably enter another competition if there was one.

[Joe G]

Well I also barely got anywhere with mine:mad: but at least I know mine would never have won but well done eidderf and I would definitely try harder in another one and maybe even finish! (maybe we should have a deadline week in which you must hand in your entry?)

[ZekeyLizard]

Congrats Eidderf

When you showed me it a bit back I knew you were gonna win.

So huzzah!

[SlaughterDog]

I wouldn't worry too much then. :P

Anyone fancy another competition like this?
I have a nice christmas tune.
If you do, howabout setting a deadline? There were some people that just started twoard the end.

[joshwah]

Aww. I hate deadlines... I'm a secondary school student, what do you expect?? :rolleyes:

[Seenastjour]

Anyone fancy another competition like this?
I have a nice christmas tune.

I wouldn't mind giving it a go. Sounds like it could be interesting with a Christmas themed thing. :)

[Sammy Bonza]

I wouldn't mind giving it a go. Sounds like it could be interesting with a Christmas themed thing. :)

Indeed it would, i'de definatly have a go if there was a Christmas one ;)

[cyber_turnip]

I'd give a 2nd one a go. I'm finally getting to grips with flash, on a very basic level you understand.

[Kiwi Man]

What's the bet Weebl will upload the tune for us a day before Christmas, just to give us an extremely stressful and mad rush to get the toon done before the deadline? :p

[CuRl3y-BoY]

ooooh a competition!
i will now be able to show off my (non existent) flash skills!!
meh sounds fun...

[Hazel_Parasite]

This seriously should become a traditional thing here. Too bad I missed the last one, but I'll be sure to pounce on the next.