Four years of secret stuff!

EDIT: Here's the download link right here if you don't like to read: https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B4NqAkIMZ2ZARWtjV1o5S0cyM1E

Hey hi happy new year!

Remember when there used to be "fbf guys" and "tween guys?" What happened to all the tween guys? Nowadays all the new kids are learning to animate the richard williams way, one frame at a time. But there used to be a pretty big faction of web-animators who worked exclusively in symbols and tweens!

You probably don't remember this, but I used to be a tweener! Actually, most of the stuff I did up until 2013 was pretty tweeny. I think when I started animating (in 2005! holy s*hit!) I didn't know what cel animation was so I just assumed everything on TV was made out of motion and shape tweens. Out of this naivite and my hundreds of spare hours, I think I invented at least a few new techniques for making tweens look like "real" animation (like putting animated movieclips on your lip-sync frames. I swear I did that before anyone else!) Looking back, I think this was the pinaccle of that era. For me, I mean. There were plenty of better tween guys (My favs :o :o :o :o :o :o :o)

Sometime around 2010 or 11 I started doing little tests in traditional frame-by-frame animation, and I eventually fully adopted fbf stuff 'cause it's actually easier in a lot of ways (it was a huge deal to make anything rotate in 3D!) but I kept doing little test animations for fun for a long time. I don't have anything from before 2012 when my last computer died, but I was looking back at all my tests and I decided hey maybe some people would like to see this stuff!

Animation Tests 2012-2016

Most of this stuff is from 2013-14, after which I kinda slowed down on the animated stuff in favor of practicing regular drawing. But I still think there's a lot of value in "doodling" an animation the way you would a drawing in a sketchbook. Some of the stuff you make by accident can turn out to be your best work!

I kind of envy how little I cared about shit like "posing" and "solid drawing" back then. I only started to get into the serious-sam 'theory' stuff around 2015, so some of these old animations feel a little more creative and experimental. I think when you go to an art school and see all the people who are better than you, you start to try and improve in a really specific art-school direction instead of exploring new ideas and seeing what works for you. I think I'm a little behind some of my peers now, but I'm really happy I had 8 years to fuck around before I started really worrying about the competition. Actually, you can see a lot of those fuck-around techniques in practice in peck 2, especially on the more expressive and dynamic shots. I still can't draw as well as these Disney fucks, but I'd like to see any of them animate a scene with coach!

Speaking of which, did you guys see peck n' coach on the site skin? That rules! When I was like 12 I always hoped that I would make one of the "main guys" like in the flash portal graphic, so it was really special to see it up there like they're official newgrounds characters or something. Thanks @pennilessragamuffin !

If you liked my little collection of animation tests, you'll love some of my behind-the-scenes cartoon bundles! You know how Tom is always ending his posts with a plug for the supporter upgrade and that's like his "thing"? I'm thinkin that this is going to be my "thing" for a while. Sorry Tom I need money too!

The two peck bundles come with the FULL .FLA SOURCE FILE for your inspection, as well as an hour-long video were we talk about how we made the cartoon! We try and talk about interesting stuff too, not just stupid shit you learn about in school. PLUS they come with SECRET BONUS CONTENT, PLUS the second video has a SUPER SECRET SURPRISE ENDING. It's so secret, even I was surprised! It was actually very embarassing!

http://k50p.com/extras

2559389_148334271942_tumblr_nputfvrxcR1u8scqmo1_1280.gif

One of my favorite things I've done (2015?)

Comments

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Emrox 2017-01-02 02:45:21

Check this out! I found some of my pre-2012 tests saved on my dump! These were probably the "best-of"s for 2010-11

http://www.newgrounds.com/dump/item/3d04cd85d0063003616ad0bff471d043
http://www.newgrounds.com/dump/item/7744e1a52b57f3bc63431e003aeff595
http://www.newgrounds.com/dump/item/92f009d083c782f62741c5abf5473323

tomek 2017-01-02 03:16:56

That GIF is impressive

Yusuf 2017-01-11 07:53:30

fuckin cool!

dylan 2017-01-30 00:05:28

been meaning to come back and comment on this for a minute now, finally got around to it.

I always was, and still am, much more impressed by those 'tweeners.

to me it always seemed that frame by frame people were either already good at drawing, had a ton of time on their hands, or both. tweening always felt like this exciting "how the fuck did she do that" kind of thing, and with fbf i'm just like "i get it, you draw. a lot."

tweening typically takes advantage of each software package in distinct ways, as well. animation done in after effects is gonna be way different that animation done flash. not just on a surface level of how it looks, but the entire way the project is created and structured changes, which tends to create crazily different styles. the difference between someone that fbf animates in flash and tvpaint? the brushes, that's about it.

i appreciate good frame by frame stuff, sure, but i'm way more impressed by good tween stuff. i guess to boil it down, fbf people feel like the smart kids in class, the ones who always just magically knew their shit, never needed to study. tweeners feel like the kids that bullshit their way through everything and you have no idea how they managed to get that A, but they did.

and to take a stab at your first question: the tweening part of the industry doesn't seem to rely on having a huge base of independent work, it's more based on being able to create/replicate the style the client wants. being good at tween animation (in a professional sense) is more about having tons and tons of styles that you can work in, so you can give the client exactly what they want, which doesn't mesh well with spending tons of time on one film that has one style. some people still do make tweeny films, but they seem more like director type than straight-up animator type.

Emrox 2017-01-30 00:05:28

Thanks Dyl! Always love hearing your take.

You know what's weird? In traditional media, people love when the materials inform the design of the work, like when you can see the individual hairs of a brushstroke or whatever, but when it comes to digital art, people like the work that emulates real, physical art (photoshop/fbf) better than the art that actually takes advantage of the unique properties of digital tools (flash/tweens). Maybe it's because the computerized stuff looks cold and mechanical, but in reality the more "organic" stuff only looks like that because it went through a million more lines of code!

Also, bullshit-guys get a bad rap. I knew this one guy who just barely got through 16 years of school, getting by on only his intuition and bullshit abilities (not patrick btw), and after many, many years failing eventually got to be one of the highest-marking guys in my class. And everyone in class was like "how does he keep getting good grades? This is the guy who doesn't do anything!" But it's not like you can fail for 16 years without learning anything - he'd honed his intuition to the point where he could get amazing marks on a bare-minimum effort, which is pretty remarkable in its own right.

I have something to say about your last point too, but I'm gonna save it for another post I think.