PIED3's movie Reviews on Newgrounds

[Made In China]

I really liked everything apart from the character design. The music was ominous but not over dramatic, it had class and gave the animation a sincere mood. You're art style is nice and i liked the black and white sketchy backgrounds with the red blood. Perhaps a few other splashes of color here and there would have been nice? The pacing was great and the cuts and imagery were really nice, some interesting references in there (i noticed shrodingers cat, the scream, c'est ne pas un pipe, van goghs starry night) and an unusual sense of purpose not normally found in such fast paced flashes. I really liked the imagery of the wine glass smashing and coming back together and the semi-plot of the mans visit to the doctor and struggle with his illness gave me a central thread to keep hold off throughout this surreal adventure. But i was really put off by the character design! The simplistic stick man style just looked really out of place and childish. Not that there's anything wrong with childishness it just didn't fit with the rest of the flash.
An interesting submission and a fun watch, good work!

[The Colonists New Earth]

Well it's certainly a decent flash and you shouldn't feel so dissatisified! I agree with you about swfs though, i've always had difficulty synching sounds and exporting things properly. You're art style is pretty nice and you have some decent frame by frame, though there is a real lack of actual animation is this. It almost becomes a slideshow! I also really dislike the use of photographs, it really detracts from the immersion and makes the art really dissonant and distracting. Find one style that works and stick to it, i think you have the art skills to draw everything and have it look great, but perhaps you just didn't have the time?
The concept was okay but i think the execution was very cliche. The music particular made me cringe, the song sounded far too similiar to the massively over used "Escape" by Craig Armstrong and whilst it certainly has an "epic" feel to it , it also undeniably has a commercial and sterile feel to it. To be honest i have dislike for soundtracks in general and feel that a good piece of work should conjure up strong emotions without resorting to telling the viewer how to feel with musical cues. The reaction scenes when the colony gets online where nice but i think it would have been more realistic to see a few people cheering, or atleast some other reaction than just mouth agape eyes wide. Is this a concept you are going to continue with? I think it could be very interesting.

Goeliath responds:

Probably should've explained more in the description. The colony project was practically a suicide mission, everyones mouth is open because they fleet was presumed dead after contact was lost. News came so sudden that nobody knew how to react.

Yes im doing animations with less epic music in them and more overall animation. The pictures were a new style i wanted to try out. Didn't like it. However, i wanted this timeline animation to get out.
Some of the pics were photoshopped which i personally like, but to a certain extent.

I really appreciate reviews like this though. It gives me a really good understanding of what other people feel on the animation.

This is a concept that i have been coming up with for a long time. I only recently started to animate it. The real animations will take place in the year 2773 when first contact is made with another sentinent species.

[Red]

I'm hoping this sort of thing will be the future of NG and it certainly looks like it will be. A branching out of media to include all kinds of beautiful and interesting animation regardless of what program (or programs!) it was made with. I thought your character models were a little too jolly for the concept and subject of the animation. And that is a thing i often dislike about 3d animation, it always looks a little too clean, a little too round, a little too video-gameish.
I liked the blend of 2d art on the tv and in the picture frame with the 3d world and it definitely added some interesting contrast. The actual animation was decent though i thought the acting was a little too dramatic (wide eyed looking for a beer, exagerated hand gestures etc.). The gloomy lighting was great and fitted the pieces tone in a way i think the music failed too. Again i thought it was too dramatic and not downbeat enough.
As a whole i thought it was an interesting concept pulled off quite well, good stuff!

Iznvm responds:

Thanks for a great review sir... now that I'm enabled to upload mp4s, you can guarantee more 3d submissions (future ones probably wont be as depressing as this)... as for the character design, I agree with you. I modeled the character before I had a full idea of my concept, and since I had a relatively short deadline with this, I just went with what I had instead of remodeling. Some of the gestures I may have taken too far, but its an animation, ya gotta over dramatize things=)
Im glad you liked it though... you can expect more 3d toons from me in the future.

[Sean and Such Ep. 13]

Admittedly i don't think the pacing and script aren't your finest assets but i certainly do think they have some merit. First off for being original, i find it infinitely more enjoyable to watch fresh unique work than i do parodies or sprite animations. Not only that but i like the slower pace of your show and how the episodes have a more relaxed feel than is traditionally found in flashes. I also like the concept of the pet store and the characters that work in it, however there are some flaws.
I think the pacing does need to be a little quicker. Think about what lines the viewer NEEDs to hear and keep those, but cut down a bit on the idle chatter. Think about each episode having a beggining a middle and an end that could be described, as in there need to be more memorable moments that stand out. More conflicts that get resolved (or remain unresolved to arise as conflicts in future episodes). Some subplots that give us some background to the characters would be nice padding to the pet shop antics, let's see a more tender side to joe!
I enjoyed the series and i thank you for your work, looking forward to more!

[Nothing Head Ep.1]

Great atmosphere! The music, scenery and character design immediately drew me into the bizzarre world you have created. The use of camera angles were excellent and i particularly liked the over the shoulder focus change scene (and echoing it at the end was a nice touch). The character design is very unique and i love the sounds he makes as he moves, particulary the frenzied sqeeks and creeks as he frantically dug the hole. The plot was interesting and suitable for an opening episode as it left a lot unexplained yet gave you a lot to think about it. The pull of the distant building on the cinematography and the audiences focus really added a central element to the animation that prevented it from ever seeming entirely arbitrary.
I'm not sure if this was intentional but the lightbulb really reminds me of an abdomen and the whole character makes me think of insects. The blend of styles was excellent and your animation was good too. Looking forward to future episodes!

DannyBacchus responds:

Thank you very much for the review, I'm glad you liked it!

[Typewriter]

Either you specified the wrong file dimensions when uploading the flash or you just forgot to make the background bigger enough but there are some jarring white bars on either side of this quite lovely animation. Another thing that'd be nice is a preloader, it's very easy to download one from newgrounds and stick it in frame one and it makes watching the flash a lot more convenient and user friendly. Another problem is the text is highlightable. This is distracting too and is easily fixed by changing the text type in flash (i think it's "static text" you want, but i'm not sure...). All of these are fairly minor technical details that you can quickly fix and the actual animation was enjoyable. The timing was spot on and whilst the typography got a little boring it was for the most part decent. I liked the paint splashes!

[Pico and the Uberhaircut]

Beautiful! You have a really unique art style, and even the speed of your animation has a freshness to it. Just goes to show that with artfully done keyframes and expressive poses you don't need a high frame rate to have what looks like fluid motion. I notice it's a video, was it not made in flash? Or was does that just some video filter added to a flash animation? Regardless it was a fun watch and a neat animation. Liked the music too!

[Coldworks Art Process 1]

I like the concept and the atmposphere of this flash. You're art is nice and i'm not enough of an artist to give you any advice on that. However a problem that i can point out is that the song restarts whenever you transition to a new part of the flash. It'd be much better if the music remained playing through on a single loop wherever you were on the flash and never restarted unless finished. I also think a few more inbetween frames of your process would be nice, and also a few more pieces of artwork. For a first flash it's decent, good luck with future stuff!

Zanroth responds:

Your pointers are absolutely right.
The music restarting at every frame sort of bugged me too, and I'm looking for a way to make it better on my next flash.
I'll try getting more frames for the next one too, with more descriptions on what I did at every step.

[Gay Advertisment]

Well the art was decent. I don't really like the charactere design of the soup squad (inanimate objects with black eyes stuck on) but the cleanness of the art style and the high frame rate and decent use of tweens sorts of makes up for it. The colors weren't great, a little garish in my opinion and some use of lighting might have made the whole think look a little more exciting. Everything is a little flat and bland atm. The voice acting was alright and the sound quality was fine.
The content was pretty poor, i didn't find it particularly funny or interesting but from the reviews below it seems some people find it amusing so that's alright i guess. All in all okay.

Dosensuppen responds:

Don't worry, it's only a few hours of work.