Thursday, 26 April 2012
Last minute sound change
As I uploading the last of my sound to my animation I decided to scrap the 'Shh' sound after the creak sound. I did this because there was way to much going on sound wise and it didn't really have any relevance to my animation. Now you can actually hear the creak properly and there is a good pause in between which there wasn't before.
Wednesday, 25 April 2012
Influenced by Tom and Jerry
Because I wanted my animation to use sounds as those found in past cartoons, example; Warner Bros, I had a look on youtube for animations like that and thought that Tom and Jerry would be the best as there's a lot of movement in it and no talking which I found was relative to what we're doing. I wanted to recreate these exaggerated, slapstick sounds in my own to make it speak without actual words. Here's just one of the many Tom and Jerry cartoons on youtube I found;
You need only watch the first 30 seconds to understand what I'm trying to achieve, but to get the full extent it may be an idea to watch the whole thing. :)
Maybe not as intense as this one, but I am considering using the piano for some of the movement...
Tuesday, 17 April 2012
Why won't you import wma?!
Had a bit of a problem in that whilst recording my piano chords on my computer it automatically saved them at wma. Being wma, Flash refuses to import them and so I remembered that it imports wav files perfectly happily and so I searched for an free online wma-wav converter. Found one here; http://audio.online-convert.com/convert-to-wav and was able to convert all my files to wav. Flash then happily imported them, much to my delight. Problemo numero dos solved. :)
Websites used for sound...
Of course one site could not just let me have all the sounds I want so I had to do some snooping...well quite a lot of snooping, here is a list of the websites I used for the sounds in my animation. Sounds created my yours truly were the result of my inability to find exactly what I was looking for without paying. Google simply did not understand what a 'sliding down window sound' was and so I had to make my own for example.
http://www.grsites.com/archive/sounds/ - Spring , Slide/Whoop and Floor creak sound
My own piano and recording device - for all the piano chords (from middle c-a) relating to all the footsteps as well as __-__ prior to pounce
Window wiper scraped up and down window - The sliding window sound at the end
Me going "Sh!" - Well, the shushing sound right after the floorboard creak
http://www.grsites.com/archive/sounds/ - Spring , Slide/Whoop and Floor creak sound
My own piano and recording device - for all the piano chords (from middle c-a) relating to all the footsteps as well as __-__ prior to pounce
Window wiper scraped up and down window - The sliding window sound at the end
Me going "Sh!" - Well, the shushing sound right after the floorboard creak
Of course being me, I'd have to be pedantic...
Anyway, so now that I finally had the sound up and running trust me to want to edit the length of the sound, cutting at it to get just the right portion of sound at just the right amount of time. I didn't know how to do this of course and so went to google and put in most eloquently; cutting sounds short in flash ..needless to say, this brought up a winner as the very first result; Editing sounds in Flash CS3 for Dummies. Right up my alley! So, anyway, a few curses later and we are on a roll again, and I owe it all to this website...http://www.dummies.com/how-to/content/editing-sounds-in-flash-cs3.html
Of course something had to wrong...
I had a go attempting to download and upload a sound file onto Flash just to test before I actually went ahead putting them onto my real animation just so that I would know what to do when the time came. The first site I went onto; http://www.freesound.org/ (which you have to sign up for) and I tried downloading a floor creak. Downloading went fine but when I tried to upload the sound to Flash it said there was an error upon import because the file couldn't be read. I searched this on google to find out the issue and many said it was owed to copyright issues, another said there was something amiss with the sample rate (at this point I was left even more confused than at the start) so I just decided to try another website. Went to; http://www.soundjay.com/, downloaded another creaking floor board sound and uploaded it happily to Flash. That seemed to fix it, and I didn't need any other technical expertise either! Unlike freesound.org, sound jay's effects were really good quality and were uploaded by admin of the site, not just people using their own recording devices at home and so each sound was really clear. Problemo numero uno solved.
Saturday, 14 April 2012
Left foot foward...
Decided to change which 'foot' moves forward first. It was going be the end letters 'nce' but then I decided to change it to the first 3 'pou'. I think this is because it would have annoyed me to no end if the end of the word came before the first, considering we read from left-right. ANYWAY, here are some pictures of a cat using their front right paw (our left) just to back up my claim and prove that not all cats advance with their front-left first. :)
Adding sounds is easy
Found a really simple site telling how to upload sounds to your flash file!
Now to find a website giving away free tunes. Hm.
http://grok.lsu.edu/article.aspx?articleid=7352
Now to find a website giving away free tunes. Hm.
http://grok.lsu.edu/article.aspx?articleid=7352
Little hunters
Here's a better video which is in a more cartoony style and actually shows you from two angles so you can see it better. Notice the bottom wiggling? I definately want to capture that.
Wednesday, 4 April 2012
Furry Font
I decided to download a nice furry font instead of making my own. One, because it was more time efficient, and two because it would look much neater than anything I could recreate by hand. I had to download a font because Microsoft word didn't provide me with any and so I came across a couple that I liked from a website, downloaded them, and finally tested them to see what the word would look like. Here are my findings;
VTKS 36
Shock
Shock Thick
Wood brush
Honcho (I know this one is not furry but I thought it could work for a cat because its quite a cute, and dainty font)
The first one I couldn't do unless I wanted all my text in capitals, which I didn't and so that one had to be ruled out even though I probably would have picked it if it did small letters.
The third I didn't like too much because it looked to spiky and I wanted the fur to be slightly softer and not resemble a bear or something. Additionally it's hollow in the middle which I didn't want.
The fourth one barely looked furry and looked more like a plain font and so I discarded that one and the fourth I would have loved to do but I was strict in that I wanted a furry font as it would mimic the word better.
That left the second one (Shock). I like this one because it's completely black, not hollow and the fur is not too spiky. Luckily for me it actually came in small letter as well otherwise I would have been to choose Shock Thick.
website: http://www.fontspace.com/category/fuzzy
VTKS 36
Shock
Shock Thick
Wood brush
Honcho (I know this one is not furry but I thought it could work for a cat because its quite a cute, and dainty font)
The first one I couldn't do unless I wanted all my text in capitals, which I didn't and so that one had to be ruled out even though I probably would have picked it if it did small letters.
The third I didn't like too much because it looked to spiky and I wanted the fur to be slightly softer and not resemble a bear or something. Additionally it's hollow in the middle which I didn't want.
The fourth one barely looked furry and looked more like a plain font and so I discarded that one and the fourth I would have loved to do but I was strict in that I wanted a furry font as it would mimic the word better.
That left the second one (Shock). I like this one because it's completely black, not hollow and the fur is not too spiky. Luckily for me it actually came in small letter as well otherwise I would have been to choose Shock Thick.
website: http://www.fontspace.com/category/fuzzy
Changes to Storyboard
and why...
The changes to my storyboard from my first draft to my final draft can be seen here;
1. I changed the setup of the actual word (Pounce) into two forms, instead of one, where the word splits down the middle to reveal two new parts. I did this so that I could change the movement. (See below)
2. Instead of having the word lift up on one side and slam down on the other (which would have been quite robotic) I now have the two sections of my word (POU and NCE) alternating at moving upwards and forwards. This is to mimic the movement of an animal more so to look as if each section is a paw, and they are walking forward.
3. Instead of having two different fonts morphing into each other I'm just going to stick with the one font (Shock) throughout as I learnt that you can't morph text into each other, even though I would have liked to have the slender font at the beginning (Honcho/Baskerville) leading onto a majorly fuzzy font at the end. This way however, I suppose the audience will now be able to recognize the text as being an animal because of the consistent font.
4. Additionally, in the final screen (where it fills the screen) the text would be small with a capital. I then wanted to go into full caps but because I can't morph text in Flash I might have to leave the text in the final storyboard as small letters (even though I drew them as caps in the end)
5. I planned to have a tip toe sound for when the sections were walking forward (which I'll keep) but I also decided to add a wooden floor creak for when the text is lifting up really slowly to also make it appear as if the text is walking on a real floor (giving the illusion of a domestic animal; cat) and also to make it more comical as you see it a lot where people are trying to be quiet but the floor gives them away by creaking.
6. Finally, instead of the text remaining where it was and having the screen fade out, I'm going to have the text slide down the screen to look and sound as if it's sliding down a window. I wanted to do this because it gives a cool comical ending rather than a boring fade out and is something you see in cartoons often.
The changes to my storyboard from my first draft to my final draft can be seen here;
1. I changed the setup of the actual word (Pounce) into two forms, instead of one, where the word splits down the middle to reveal two new parts. I did this so that I could change the movement. (See below)
2. Instead of having the word lift up on one side and slam down on the other (which would have been quite robotic) I now have the two sections of my word (POU and NCE) alternating at moving upwards and forwards. This is to mimic the movement of an animal more so to look as if each section is a paw, and they are walking forward.
3. Instead of having two different fonts morphing into each other I'm just going to stick with the one font (Shock) throughout as I learnt that you can't morph text into each other, even though I would have liked to have the slender font at the beginning (Honcho/Baskerville) leading onto a majorly fuzzy font at the end. This way however, I suppose the audience will now be able to recognize the text as being an animal because of the consistent font.
4. Additionally, in the final screen (where it fills the screen) the text would be small with a capital. I then wanted to go into full caps but because I can't morph text in Flash I might have to leave the text in the final storyboard as small letters (even though I drew them as caps in the end)
5. I planned to have a tip toe sound for when the sections were walking forward (which I'll keep) but I also decided to add a wooden floor creak for when the text is lifting up really slowly to also make it appear as if the text is walking on a real floor (giving the illusion of a domestic animal; cat) and also to make it more comical as you see it a lot where people are trying to be quiet but the floor gives them away by creaking.
6. Finally, instead of the text remaining where it was and having the screen fade out, I'm going to have the text slide down the screen to look and sound as if it's sliding down a window. I wanted to do this because it gives a cool comical ending rather than a boring fade out and is something you see in cartoons often.
Final Word Decision
Out of my three words (Splash, Pounce and Spring) I decided to go with pounce as I already had an idea of what the animation could be like for this word. Unlike spring and splash, pounce is a word generally associated with the movement of animals, say before they capture their prey and so by choosing this word, I have opened up a way of allowing myself to animate this word in a very lifelike fashion which overall would make the word much more relatable and humanistic. I also chose this word because I could also observe the movement of my cat so that I could make it as accurate as possible.
Sunday, 1 April 2012
Critical Thinking
1. Splash
I chose this word as my best because I already have the idea in my head for how I could reflect it on Flash and there is so many different ways you could perceive it. It's also a very simple word and so anyone will understand how the movement relates to it, and vice versa. I think this word could be better than pounce because it would be easy to create but still look quite creative as well.
2. Pounce
I would like to show this word in motion as I believe it won't be one a lot of people will choose to do and there is also many different ways of showing it, however I have an interesting way of making it move rather than just making it leap across the page and so I would have fun with making it seem animalistic (as this is where I got the idea for the word in the first place) I think one is better than Spring because I can make it much more creative.
3. Spring
I wanted to do 'bounce' but I figured a lot of people would choose that one because it's very easy to show so I went with a slight variant where the word is similar but the movement can be altered greatly to depict this word specifically and not be confused for a bounce movement.
I chose this word as my best because I already have the idea in my head for how I could reflect it on Flash and there is so many different ways you could perceive it. It's also a very simple word and so anyone will understand how the movement relates to it, and vice versa. I think this word could be better than pounce because it would be easy to create but still look quite creative as well.
2. Pounce
I would like to show this word in motion as I believe it won't be one a lot of people will choose to do and there is also many different ways of showing it, however I have an interesting way of making it move rather than just making it leap across the page and so I would have fun with making it seem animalistic (as this is where I got the idea for the word in the first place) I think one is better than Spring because I can make it much more creative.
3. Spring
I wanted to do 'bounce' but I figured a lot of people would choose that one because it's very easy to show so I went with a slight variant where the word is similar but the movement can be altered greatly to depict this word specifically and not be confused for a bounce movement.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)