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This then makes me wonder why is it that all these directors come out with films from the same school of thought ... Is it that their schools all teach the same concepts as if it were an ideology? Is it that the producers who have no appreciation for originality, no courage for change seek out only directors who are willing to follow the herd? Something (my own experience perhaps) tells me that they would answer that it's what the audiences desire. Like the audiences of opera, the audiences of animated features aren't interested in new directions ...

My Slocum film just got rejected by ITVS/PBS with the explanation that it does not look like a film children would want to watch for an hour... what makes them know this? It's because my film takes a different approach from the standard kid's fare... it's simply different from all the films listed above, which explains why all films for children look alike; producers don't have an inkling what children are interested in ... or to put it in a different way, all producers do what everyone else does; they follow the leader that caters to the most common denominator, the masses. Bad is Good, children and Old is New.

There's already a tedious discussion about this list of directors over at CartoonBrew (http://www.cartoonbrew.com/feature-film ... films.html). I don't think that any discussion about how these 100 Mio $ features are made is of big help to us - I suspect that if I were asked to direct such a project, I'd very early surrender to all decisions the producer and other execs make. Still I should be able to deliver a good enough result under a restricted set of artistic choices, and that's what these directors do, despite all complaints about mainstream and whatever.

You could say it's because of the producers or whatever, you shouldn't care. They may be really thinking that they are making the best movies as they like them and having a lot of fun in the process (this is scaring heh?).

But yes, the producers are not creative, and their job is to be sure that the directors understand that common people are the same.

isd wrote:But yes, the producers are not creative, and their job is to be sure that the directors understand that common people are the same.

I agree; producers are like politicians; no guts, no spine, opportunists who read the temperature of the public and give them what they think the majority wants. And they are right; most people want to like what they think everyone else likes and there will always be plenty of directors willing to please the greatest numbers too.

I have heard that targetting 20% (not the largest populace you can) is also a proven business model as well.
I guess Tarantino doesn't think percentage or success before fun. And guess what, kids like it very much
But no parents will go to the theater with them, and since they are the ones who have the purse... you understand where is the origin of the problem.

This is a great tutorial for pen basics artfx. I found from this, Is the less anchors there are, the better other shape. Also the longer the arms are the steeper the curve becomes. Each arm, anchor. and even the path itself is easily changed. The Add anchor tool adds anchors, and the Delete anchor tool removes anchors.

vncntblackk wrote:This is a great tutorial for pen basics artfx. I found from this, Is the less anchors there are, the better other shape. Also the longer the arms are the steeper the curve becomes. Each arm, anchor. and even the path itself is easily changed. The Add anchor tool adds anchors, and the Delete anchor tool removes anchors.

I'm not sure I understand what you mean here. Is there a link you, perhaps, forgot to include in your post?

Since this came back up, though, I figured I would mention that I haven't given up on this process and have continued to refine my methods in my efforts to find that balance of fun, speed and a look I am happy with. I've done a lot of experiments since I last posted and will continue to do so until I know I am there.

Although I probably should put too much attention onto the works of other people, I recently watched just about all of Bill Plympton's films and read a lot interviews with him. I like what he is doing and what he has achieved. I agree with a lot of the reasons why he does it.

I am getting closer to the point where my experiments will happen on short projects rather single isolated images or scenes.

In fact, I think it was a bot, because this "person" posted some messages on monday (strange posts, btw), and then, nothing...

Elodie wrote:In fact, I think it was a bot, ...

I think so, they are more and more chatting "nonsensally" on many forums, ... just making noise.
happy times ...!

A useless exercise, it seems, if the bot is not providing a link to anything. One would at least think that the purpose of the bot is to promote something, as most bots seem to be attempting to do, and so this one accomplishes nothing.

artfx wrote:... One would at least think that the purpose of the bot is to promote something, as most bots seem to be attempting to do, and so this one accomplishes nothing.

it's a "concealed" promotional for adobe PS, "add/delete anchors" are PS tools afaik

vncntblackk wrote:... The Add anchor tool adds anchors, and the Delete anchor tool removes anchors.

hmmm, not frankly promoting, but slyly deviating the purpose to make a (concurrent) product taking up as much room as possible,
... croocked methods imo !

artfx wrote:A useless exercise, it seems, if the bot is not providing a link to anything. One would at least think that the purpose of the bot is to promote something, as most bots seem to be attempting to do, and so this one accomplishes nothing.

I've removed the signature and the user web site.

REVISITED

I'm so torn on this issue. When I draw on paper, I hate to have my arm in the way and sometimes blocking the light, but my drawings look 10x beter than on the flat Wacom tablet. This is why I think about the Cintiq. Looking back to when I was very productive in animation, it was when I had the Motion Computing Tablet PC. I am simply faster and my drawings look better.

On the other hand, my current tablet is very small. When I firs stated, I got the Wacom 9x12 tablet on Paul's recommendation. I now use a tiny tablet because I am always traveling. It's a tough one. Drawing on paper is still more fun, but then I can't do as much with the drawing.

I have acquired a laptop and the small Intuos 4 tablet to carry to my classes. I also keep TVP on this laptop just the way it comes out of the box -- I have carried over from my daily workflow perhaps just my key commands. On this setup I can't draw anything the way I can on my work setup that has three 24 inch wide monitors a 9x12 Intuos 4 tablet and lots of plugins and shortcuts.

If I had to spend the rest of my days traveling with a laptop I would just develop a different style of paperless characters that would come out of the tablet and the new lifestyle -- never the other way around; to force my domesticated setup style upon the pocket edition one. It's like the difference between drawing with a piece of charcoal and a pencil. I think you might be too hard on yourself by putting unrealistic demands on your setup. I would suggest you either stop traveling or carry larger pieces of equipment in a suitcase -- or the third choice; over simplify your characters which might turn out to be really cool and fast. My guess is that you would have to change your type of stories as well. I suppose this is where we part with writers, who can write even when living next to a dumpster.

I think the third choice, or basically, "...develop a different style of paperless characters that would come out of the tablet and the new lifestyle" is probably the best way to go. I may have an opportunity to try the Cintiq this week, but that doesn't mean I'll actually get one or that it would be ideal for my mobile lifestyle anyway. If I want to create now I should do what works best with what I have.

If only Apple had a real tablet PC... Maybe in the fututre I'll give the Modbook a try.