Jeetman

Just watched the short from your link Satyajit and it is EXCELLENT!! very good story telling my friend!!! George

I don't know what 9/11 has to do with the piece and maybe you should re-read what I wrote; "if your against this hanging of Saddam then your an apoligist for the Saddam tyrancy" is a complete misquote and frankly a distortion of any reasonable interpretation of what I wrote. “but leave out the belittling and divisionary talking point to smear anyone with your opposing views.” Isn’t that precisely what you are doing? You are entitled to your opinion, as am I. I agree 100% with you Bruce. Your film is a good way of saying I hope a guy who has caused terrible anguish, torture (real torture not that Abu Ghraib stuff), pain and insurmountable suffering is receiving a just punishment.

Hi Rus, Also being a teacher and practitioner of the Martial Arts, I have one question.... You say you value life. So are you saying you value a the life of Saddam? Are you aware of all he and his two sicko sons have done? If not, please read up on it. It's absolutely demonic. If this guy did the things he did to your family do you really think you'd feel the same? People decide to learn how to defend themselve for different reasons but my main reason was I refused to be a victim of being bullied or worse possibly have to deal with a situation where someone is planning on taking my life. If I'm ever in a situation where a person is trying to do me or my family bodily harm or temping to kill me, I will not hesitate (in self-defense) to take that person out any way I can. I have never been in a situation like this thankfully but I'd think as a teacher and practitioner of the Martial Arts, you'd feel the same (maybe not). I have no love or respect for any individual who has no problem with taking a persons life. Saddam did that (according to the news) on a regular basis and on a massive scale. The last estimate I heard was that he was responsible for about 170,000 killings. Imagine all that pain he caused families. Sorry. I too value life. I value the life of every decent, responsible and caring or (uncaring for that matter) human being but I have no care or concern for any individual who kills people for their own profit or pleasure. This guy was a sick dude and I'm glad the Iraqis executed him. George

You did a great job with the devil animation and the flames are a great touch. Personally after learning all this guy has done, I have no problem with this animation however, a PG13 rating is a good idea. Kudos on the animation and I agree with dborruso, I hope it is true! George

I'm sorry I didn't see this sooner or I would have responded immediately. Keith, I wish you the best and I pray that your surgery is a big success and I'm looking forward to working with you again. Best of wishes my friend, George

Hi Al, Based on the statement above and If less is best, I think this may be the best way. [attachmentid=22639] George

Looks good T-Dogg! I'm glad you're not giving up on this. When it's completed, you'll have a great feeling of accomplishment and a kick ass model to use in Batman projects!!!! Remember, the model is only the beginning. George

Satyajit, The main thing you have to do is have proper sentences. I made these changes so that the story would rhyme better and have clearer grammar. If you use it cool if not no biggie. George [attachmentid=22052]

Jim, This is the best explanation I've seen that explains very clearly the anguish I went through when I first tried to animate with A:M. I almost gave up because it was so frustrating to me. I could do things like the "making rabbit walk" and "It's a pitch" exercise just fine but when I did the "door is stuck" exercise I was confused as to why It wouldn't (the animation) do what I wanted it to do. I of course now know exactly what I was doing wrong. I just wish I had this explanation then hehe. Also, the concept of each part of the model (I.E the hand, forearm, head, etc) having it's own key was confusing to me. Jeff Lew explains on his DVD a quick way to make a key (other than the "create key" button). You just give the part or parts you need to move a little nudge. It creates a key at that point. The real control is when you understand the spline view of the timeline. George

Dhar, Outstanding work my friend!!!!! It's something to really be proud of I love the lighting, setting, the sound and the animation is excellent. You ROCK!!!!! I've always liked Louis Armstrong. George

I'm not sure I understand your question so I'll explain how it should work and maybe that will give you your answer. If you want to add sound to your animation there are 2 ways I know the latter works the best for me. Add sound to an action. Add sound to a choreography. To do these next steps you need to have the libraries, properties and timeline windows on. After you create a scene in a choreography (or action), click on the sound tab in the libraries window. select the sound you want and drag it over the choreography. You should see the wave line in the timeline, if not, then go to the properties window and find the sound there. click on the sound in the properties and you should now see it in the timeline. When you play the animation, you should hear the sound. You should also be able to "scrub". However, I have found that I can sometimes lose the sound when I scrub (move the animation slider back and forth). You now can adjust the timing in the timeline to where you want the sound to play and when you render, you should hear the sound. I hope this helps. George

LOL Thank you Dhar. In the final production, he'll get bashed on the head causing him to lose concentration and the X-Wing to fall. I know my brother in law Kirk (the assistant director), will ask me to do another shot of this but this cut is done. Actually that is my nephew Alex. My Sister's husband (Kirk) Asked him to be the Jedi specifically because his hair is so long. Ken, thanks. For some reason I couldn't import the AVI so I did what another person suggest and converted the AVI footage to TGA's through a program I use for graphics editing called Paint Shop Pro. It ships with a 's sister program called animation shop which is a very basic program that exports TGA sequential files from different file formats (AVI, GIF, etc). Other than that, it was all done in A:M. the awesome X-Wing (which I did not model. I got it from the donated models site), lighting and of course the animation. The file I wanted to attach to the post was too big and I don't really have a website so I compressed it through a pretty good (very cheap compared to Adobe) editing program called Video Explosion. I'm planning on setting up an FTP site eventually. So all in all, I used 2 other programs but only to import and to compress the file. For some reason, I couldn't render a MOV without losing the rotoscope proportions and consequentially losing the camera placement. I'll have to figure out why some day. I did modify the X-Wing by adding 2 bones (one at each beginning of the wing) to create the shock impact bend. Without it, it looked too floaty. Thanks Nancy, I really appreciate the compliment. As soon as Kirk and the lead director are done with their editing, I'll link the final production if I can. George

I can't add anything more than what Ken, Dhar and Case did. Just that you're doing good and keep up the good work! George

Case that looks excellent!!!!!! It's coming along really good. Can't wait to see the movie. George

Here's my finished clip. I meant it to be a WIP but I had it done in about 2 days. [attachmentid=21470] George X_Wing_Levi.mov

In my last post I commended you on the case not thinking you were going to model the actual case LOL. So I'll clarify my statement.... Good job on the "cartridge" and the "case" looks great too!!! You should post a render with the cartridge in the case. George

The project is really looking good. I really like the camera work and the station shots look awesome!!! I'm not understanding the meatball part but I'm sure you have your reasons for this. Keep up the excellent work!!!! George

I agree. Of the color choices you show in the earlier post, the light blue and orange seem to be the best combination to me also. George

I commend you on such an elaborate project. Although there are areas in the animation that could use some improvement (as Martin and Ken H have suggested), I think you are relaying the story quite well. Keep up the good work!! George

Hey Case The skateboard looks great!!!! You mentioned that the skateboard is modeled does that mean the wheels are on it too? If so, render a different angle that shows them. Looking really good my friend!!! George

Looks really good Dude!!!! The only question I have is how hard is it to show emotions like anger on a cyclops?

I'm not an expert at bump maps and you may know this already but I believe that when you flag a decal as a bump, the shades of the decal dictate if it's recessed or protruding. The lighter colors of the bump map protrude and darker ones recess. I think the gray color you're getting is actually the model color because the bump only controls depth. If you assign a material color or just a color to the group, it should change the color and still show the bump depth. You can try to do what I did which worked pretty good. Place the same "modified" decal over the bump decal but make sure it is flagged as a plain decal. I did this for my Sponge Bob model. Instead of modeling the pores of the sponge, I used a gray scale bump and then took the same gray scale layout and saved it as a new file. I then changed the gray color spots to an olive green and flood filled the rest with the same yellow color I used as my sponge material. I then placed the new decal (as a plain decal) right on top of the bump map which worked perfect. I attached a render. I still need to do the sides but you get the idea. I hope this helps. Jeetman

That is a great render!!! I really like the textured look and the label on the case. Good Job!!!! Jeetman

Thank you Teresa! Victor's tutorial is awesome!!! I love the way he breaks it down and explains exactly how the movements are applied and the reasoning for each pose. Ken, You're application of the techniques on Scarecrow is really good too!!!! Jeetman

Dude, It looks really good but I agree with Luckbat. You should experiment with metallic materials to get a more realistic look if that's what you're going for that is. Keep up the good work!!! Just curious, how long did it take you to make it? Jeetman