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ernesttx

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Posts posted by ernesttx

    Subject 99 on hiatus

    in Subject 99

    Posted

    Small update:

     

    Land purchased and paid for. Small cabin studio built and paid for. Probably a month away from getting electricity up and running. Roughing it at the moment but all is good. 2014 should be a great year to start again. :)

    Subject 99 on hiatus

    in Subject 99

    Posted

    Thanks, Dpendleton77. I plan too. At the moment, I am in the process of building my studio; so, all my time is taken up working other job and building. Soon, though, I hope to have everything done in a couple of months. :)

    Subject 99 on hiatus

    in Subject 99

    Posted

    Hey Rodney, I'll be putting Subject 99 on hiatus for a while. In the next couple of months, I'll be buying my land to build my studio. So, in essence, I won't have much time in the foreseeable future to put forth on production. I appreciate your time and effort on this forum for me. So, if you need to archive it or take it off line, then that is fine. Thanks again.

    Ernest

    Continuing?

    in Subject 99

    Posted

    I received an IM from Rodney yesterday inquiring about updating this forum thread. It got me thinking about this series again and what I needed to do to continue it, if that was something that I wanted to do.

     

    I began this series in the spring of 2006; mostly as a challenge to myself to see what I was capable of doing with my skillset at the time and all my experience and knowledge up until that time. Also, I was unemployed at that time. It was also my initial venture into single person production, scheduling and marketing a product as an artist to see if (at that time) it was a profitable venue for self-sustaining an existance.

     

    A few things became clear quickly. Each episode (roughly about 4 to 5 minutes a piece) took roughly 4 to 5 weeks to complete. That's about 1 minute of complete and edited animation a week. I was working about 10 to 12 hours a day for 7 days a week. Not bad, if I didn't feel like doing anything outside of that. Or, for that matter, anything outside.

     

    At that time, there were only a few distribution outlets that I felt catered to profitability. YouTube was one, but, at that time I was rejected from Partnering with YouTube since I really didn't have the viewership. I tried Lulu.com to sell videos via download, but, that was more of 'How to Drive Traffic' to their site and hoping people would want to buy from an unknown artist. That was more a marketing challenge. There was Vimeo, but at that time they didn't have their pay-per-view installed. There was always DVDs; but, I would have to have more content to fill up a DVD versus 1 or 2 5-minute videos.

     

    Having to wear all the hats in a production like this, somethings will have to be sacrificed, if one wants to meet a timely distribution. If I am honest with myself, I would have to say that (on viewing the series again) the animation suffered the most. I didn't allow enough time to build key poses or build in dramatic poses. Also, some modeling is not up to par, as some of the props are mediocre. But, as I said, it was a self-imposed challenge. What were my weaknesses, what were the obstacles to a full production, how best to distribute and make a profit? All questions that needed to be asked and surveyed.

     

    Last January 2011, I decided to upload all episodes to my YouTube channel. As of this writing, I am edging towards 12,000 views. Not bad for an aging unknown.

     

    So, now I sit here and comtemplate where to go from here. I have to take into account that I have done alot of other video work since starting the series, mostly live action, music videos, and more visual effects work. Currently, finishing up a music video. I am also currently developing other series (3 others) and working 40 hours at a company. So, that doesn't leave alot of time to commit and concentrate on a full production type series like I had before. Also, I have plans on buying some land and setting up an animation/VFX shop at the end of this year.

     

    So, I ask myself, does this series (in its current form) have something to offer an audience? Perhaps, if the YouTube views are any consideration that there is some interest there.

    How much current time do I have to commit to it? Once a few things are complete, I could have more time.

    Is this more of a personal interest and commitment, than one that will be profitable somehow? It is my first series, so it does hold some personal interest.

     

    Much like the executive decisions that ended series like Firefly, Terra Nova, Flash Forward, etc. a decision needs to be made, in order, to move forward in one direction or another. I'll post again in a couple of days. I feel I need more soul searching.

     

    What do others think? Is there a time to end a production? Is it time for a new series? Is there any interest out there? I do have plans to continue this series. Perhaps in another medium (graphic novel?) or live action. I feel that with my current schedule it will be difficult to be more timely with submissions. Should this forum thread be trucked away like a crate in an Indiana Jones movie?

     

    Executive decision time. :)

    Demo reel

    in Open Forum

    Posted

    Hey Xtaz, just viewed the video.

     

    First thing I would do is crop the drawing / painting segment and get rid of the Photoshop? menus and border. Those items are not important to the creation of the drawing. It looks like a time lapse recording for a Photoshop tutorial. Let the viewer focus on your drawing of Lau.

     

    I didn't see the dissolve quirk as much as Rodney indicated. Perhaps a tweaking of it with his suggestions.

     

    Overall, it is nice. However, it does lack any motivation for the audience to take action. I like the smile idea. But, yes the overall "message" to the audience will need to be communicated. The video may need to be a bit longer to include more information about what this video is, what project it's a part of, and the grander vision.

     

    I still like Lau :)

    Zeco

    in Work In Progress / Sweatbox

    Posted

    Oh yeah I like that rendering :) that's almost the look I'm trying to achieve hehe 'course I need some toon lines :yay: is all that hand painted textures? or just painted, they don't have to be hand painted ? muahaha

    A new player in the 3D game...

    in Off Topic

    Posted

    Not to overshadow the post and while I'm sure that CS6 with be a huge update to those used to layer based compositing, I would offer to have a look at eyeon's Fusion if interested in import of 3D items and manipulation thereof. Plus, they are having a big sale right now on Fusion and Dimension for 1 price.

     

    Fusion offers true 3d import (.obj, collada, FBX, objects and cameras), import of .obj sequences, and animation data such as mdd from this plugin (http://www.rpmanager.com/FuCacheLoader/wiki/doku.php?id=cacheloader) and various render passes (normal, depth, UV, etc)., World Postion Pass, etc. Plus, creating materials right in Fusion (phong, blinn, etc.) and creating lights and cameras in true 3D compositing environment and particles.

     

    Dimension is a great plugin for stereo and optical flow type manipulations (ie, very slow motion from standard video frame rates , rolling shutter fixes, and one user is working on possible planar tracker type node.

     

    Just mentioning this for anyone looking at buying a compositing program and wanting to compare current prices (both Fusion and Dimension for $995) and features. Note: yes, I have Fusion and loving it.

    Toon Renderer or Renderer in General

    in Showcase

    Posted

    Ok, basically just removed everything in the Hash folder in HKEY_Current_User and re-installed v16 64 bit. It seems to be working fine now. So, I'll wait for v 17 final release hehe Now, could someone point me in the direction of being able to render a shadow pass. Everything I'm trying just produces black images. Trying to save EXR or PNG buffers for color, shadow, depth and alpha. Thx

    Toon Renderer or Renderer in General

    in Showcase

    Posted

    John, it is all projects, with varying render settings (image type, length, save folder, alpha/no alpha, Toon/no Toon, multipass/no multipass, etc.). Originally it was happening in v17 64, but then I tried v16 64 and it was happening there. I didn't even have v17 32 installed. So, that's what led me to codecs. But, there shouldn't be recent projects from another bit version listed in another version unless AM is reading from a master recent files file.

    Toon Renderer or Renderer in General

    in Showcase

    Posted

    thanks mtpeak2, I checked all versions v16 64, v17 32 and 64 and all were pointing to the right folders. Ok still weirdness, I am in v17 64 bit and open a project and save it under another name, I then exit the program and then start v17 32 bit and check recent files opened and the original file and the newly saved file are both listed. Is this normal??

    Toon Renderer or Renderer in General

    in Showcase

    Posted

    Ok just re-installed v16 64 bit and it seems more stable. I'm wondering now with the installs and re-installs, I kept noticing that the recent projects were coming up with the same files I had been working on. Is there a master type file that AM reads from that is somewhere else (maybe lHKEY_Current_User or something that tells it which files were recent)?? I'll keep an eye on things. Also, under HKEY_Current_User>Software>Hash, I still have registrations for v12, 13,16 and 17, AM Plugins. In AM Plugins, there are folders for AVI, JPEG, LWO, MDD HXT, OPENEXR, PNG, etc. would this folder be over written when installing v17 64 bit and cause errors with all versions? or does all versions read from that folder?? hmmmm

    Toon Renderer or Renderer in General

    in Showcase

    Posted

    Well, 32 bit seemed to work better. But, different image codecs performed differently. jpeg seems to work, but png, exr, bmp causes crashing. Avi's give this error: AVIFileCreateStream error: and then Unable to save file [path URL]. so it makes me think it's a codec issue, but I have no idea how to check those. or where they would be. I've done reinstall of v17 32 and 64 bit hmmmm

    Toon Renderer or Renderer in General

    in Showcase

    Posted

    Well, 32 bit seemed to work better. But, different image codecs performed differently. jpeg seems to work, but png, exr, bmp causes crashing. Avi's give this error: AVIFileCreateStream error: and then Unable to save file [path URL]. so it makes me think it's a codec issue, but I have no idea how to check those. or where they would be. I've done reinstall of v17 32 and 64 bit hmmmm

    Toon Renderer or Renderer in General

    in Showcase

    Posted

    yes installed to different folders. I've had v16 installed for a long time and no issues. But, I even had issues with v16 and trying to render. I'm wondering if it's a codec error, because I did get a weird avi error. I wish I had saved the screen capture. Maybe if I do it again and try rendering an avi. But I have 32 bit installed and it seems to be working much better. So, maybe re-install.

    Toon Renderer or Renderer in General

    in Showcase

    Posted

    Anyone having issues with rendering out images from within A:M 16 or 17beta 2? No matter what I am trying, it crashes 80% of the time. I have tried different settings, different models, different projects. I have tried png, exr, avi (of which I get a v16 error in v17??) so I have no other idea what it could be. And to top it all off, I was rendering several images just over the weekend and no problems. I have not installed any software between then and now. I have rebooted several times, ended unneeded tasks, etc. I'm at a loss. Just wondering if any known issues. Thanks in advance.

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