Website

Thanks to my friend Kyle, I now have a website up and running!

It is very barebones with placeholder text for now, but I will be changing that once he runs me through the process. I wonder if there's a way to stream this blog onto the site. If anyone knows, tell me!

Until then... check it out!

http://www.carbonc0n.com/

Words.

Sometimes, I just don't have much to say. it takes a long time to formulate all the words I previously felt was required for a blog post


but... after looking at other peoples' blogs and sketch blogs and blog blogs about blogging..sometimes it's good enough to just post a pic and say "I spilled my soda on this."


I'll be posting unfinished sketches every now and then starting now!...Well..starting next time!..cause now I have a comic that i just finished for a commissioner. This 'tom and jerry'-esque size play is a lot of fun!

I have been commissioned a good amount of these comics between the lazy gamer, Conner...and his annoying roommate Artie. Artie is...well...bite sized. This regularly causes problems for both of them.

As I finalize my barebones website...I may make a section to house these comics.

Where do I even begin?

Shinkuuuu~ HOOFDOUKEN

Well, aside from a complete computer melt down that lasted weeks before replacement parts were ordered, and stuff reinstalled...

I have been doing things

Things...like (finally) getting a centralized website up and running...

Also, things...lots of things...with ponies. Surprised? I hope not.

I have been heavily going to work on flash and commissions, and I'm going to be covering Graphic Libraries in this blog entry.






In Flash, hitting Ctrl + L will bring up your handy dandy Library.

Making things explode is a lot of fun. SO HERE, YOU CAN SEE I DID IT MULTIPLE TIMES.

Inside, you will find all of the reusable bits and pieces for whatever animation/game/application you are currently working on. The parts I use in animations are broken down into three basic types: Movie Clips, Graphics, and Sounds.

A Movieclip is sort of like a contained package of animation and sounds. You can fit entire movies inside of them, and when you export your flash file, they will play on their own, generally looping for as long as they are on the stage. In the working area, however... They will appear to be static images, representing the base location of the animation.

One frame. One Movie Clip. What's inside?

Oh god! There's an entire world in there! with MUSIC!

Another thing unique to Movie Clips is the ability to add filters. You can apply Photoshop style filters, such as blur and glow to Movie Clips, making them useful for sprucing up any animations you may have already completed. I used it here to make twilight's teleport look a bit more interesting than a simple fade out.

Twilight's got CROSS-UPS

I usually used a Movie Clip to contain a completed animation, and contain it within the boundaries of a frame, so that up until I'm finished, I would not have to worry about things going off the edge and being unseen.

Nowadays, I focus on Graphics.

A Graphic can contain animation frames, but will not play any Sounds that are contained inside when exported. The main advantage I enjoy from Graphics is that I can see and control the frames of animation as they are in the working area.. on the fly.

Reusable limbs!...don't worry, she didn't feel a thing.

For my MvC3 inspired animation, you can see here that I've made a folder within the library to keep track of my Graphics. I've made many different states of each body part that can easily be swapped in and out (through right clicking) on the fly, and this has allowed for some smooth and generally headache free animation. Unfortunately, this makes the dreaded Frame 1 of the flash even longer than usual. Imagine building a puppet, and then rebuilding every single part of that puppet about 6 times each, including hair, hands, and mouth.

This Graphic Library grows over time, and as it grows..it makes future animations with your previous puppets even easier.

An Alternative method that I just found out today (Seriously, it's always the really simple things that I miss until I get some fresh eyes on my work way later) is to create the puppet parts in your Graphic Library (for example, TwiFleg1 for Twilight's Front leg, default position..) then have the different parts simply be the different frames instead. This keeps your library compact, and will make changing the parts just a tad easier, especially if your character is going to be talking.

This constant refine, experiment, refine cycle continues to excite me.

What excites me even more, is the amount of people churning out great stuff, as well as possible fan animation teams that are forming. I may or may not join one of them as i'm already busy on solo projects and commissions..But I definitely look forward to what they come up with! I hope you have enjoyed the mini tutorial/self reflection..and here, have some Applejack. (Building the rest of the cast for more fanimations. stay tuned)

Howdy.

This will be the most ultimate of fanart that I have ever worked on for anything, ever. Thanks, MLP..for making art and animation fun again.