PIED3's movie Reviews on Newgrounds

[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.

['Cosmic Love' Storyboard Animation]

Ah that was awesome! The concept alone was enough to make it a brilliant flash but it was well executed too. The character designs are great (i particulary like the oaken look of the girl) and it's nice to see a love story brought back to the epic proportions of classics and gods and not a high school teen romance. You're art is good and whilst some scenes are a little off for the most part it was an aesthetically pleasing piece.
The main thing i loved was how well you fitted the storyboard to the music, not only with great timing but also the story telling and visual plays on the lyrics. I thought the song was packed with ardent emotion and i hand't heard it before so that made it an even more enjoyable experience. As for criticisms i think the scene with the smooth fade from black was jarring after watching a whole animation of a lower frame rate and consistency was more important than smoothness at that point. Also on the more techinical side a preloader would have been nice (and is easy to add) as i did have my experience slightly tarnished by occasional pausing as it loaded. You've shown a lot of talent and i wish you all the best in your future projects!

black-lotus-kitsune responds:

Thank you so much! Thank you very much for the nice comments and critique - I definitely will take your suggestions into consideration :D I will also look into how to do a preloader ^^

[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!

[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.

[YOUR LOVE IS MY DRUG]

Well it's 14mb and you don't have a preloader, that's gonna put a lot of people off. It's really not hard just to download one of the premade preloaders NG offers and stick it on frame 1.But beyond that i thought i was a decent old school flash. It's been a while since i've watched something with cut outs and gifs so that was fun i guess. The synching with the music was good and the imagery was, as you say, terrifying. I feel a little more work could have been done to blend the backgrounds and foregrounds and to give the thing a little more of a 3d feel. It really lacked depth.

7MEK11 responds:

there's a funny story behind why it loops endlessly. as soon as I uploaded the video to newgrounds, I tried to rename the .fla while it was open... accidentally unsaving everything and destroying the file. as soon as it was finished, it was destroyed! I tried re-opening the .swv, but if I do anything the video at all I'll need to sort through hundreds of graphics and rebuild all the movie clips.

I quite like that it's relentless and doesn't give a shit whether you can keep up or not. it's like, now that it's out of my hands, the video has an aggressive personality of its own. but yeah, I agree with everything you said. thanks for a good critique!

this is my first proper flash animation, and it's something I want to do a LOT more of. flash is basically a computer game! I had loads of fun making this, in twelve-hour red-eyed fun sessions. I'll be keeping in mind everything I learned making it (and posting it here!) when I get into the next one.

cheers!

[Brushing Your Teeth]

Some decent frame by frame and an acceptable use of tweening. The colors you chose were nice, and their softness allowed for some exciting contrast in the scene where the boy has spasms as the sugary chocolate monsters attack his teeth. Your sound design was good as well, and the timing was excellent. The synchronisation of the cymbal crashes and the violent smashes was beautiful and the lowering of the music volume as the narrator entered was proffesional done. The tunes were all catchy and the character designs were all amusing. You did it for school so i shan't disrespect the concept to much, and it ket me interested throughout. Good work!

ArtyomL responds:

Thanks a lot! I'm really glad the timing and sound design turned out well, because frankly, that's the hardest parts for me.

[food: a papermation]

Ah, paper is a beautiful medium and you do it some justice with this animation. The entrance walk was perhaps a little choppy for my liking, but i see our beloved MasterAardvark was an inspiration, and suspect the swifteness of your protaganists movements were intentional. Still, i feel a bit more inbetweening and some cushioning (or perhaps just better placed keyframes) could have given that entrance a bit more flow and continuity. The art was decent, though the square heads made me shudder at the thought of JordanDs hideous flashes. The concept was fun, well executed (lovely pacing) and had a satisfying punchline. Looking at the flash holisticly i must admit i enjoyed it and congratulate you on producing this fine piece of entertainment!

Horsenwelles responds:

the entrance walk had about 4 frames cut from it because of the way i had to convert this into a wmv and then reimport it to save space. in fact, there were quite a few lot frames because of hardware issues =(

lets just say it was ridiculous to produce this at all. i worked all day on my birthday to make this lol.

[Sean and Such Ep. 11]

Another enjoyable episode! The writing still needs a little work, but the most part it's funny and entertaining. I agree with Tiki-Turtle about the colours, especially in the opening shots, the red in the background is just to bright and garish and everything is a little over saturated. Try toning it down a little bit to have a subtler and more naturalistic feel. Also the animation is all a little static, it was nice to finally have a shot that wasn't front on and shoulder height (when Sean's leaning over the inspector) and it's techniques like these that i think you need to use more often to give the environment and characters a more 3 dimensional feel (i'm talking physically, not emotionally). The scene in which the inspector is hallucinating was fun, and the transition through the eye was nice. Again, i think a few more original transitions like these instead of just cuts could add some variety and interest to what you have so far. All in all it was enjoyable, and wish you the best of luck for future episodes!

SeanAndSuch responds:

Thank you for all your thoughts and critiques on the episode, we always appreciate those of you who take the time to write about your opinions and what not. This series has always been a work in progress and we are always making changes and shit based on what you all have to say. We're making a lot of changes for the second batch of episodes, more unique shots and angles of the characters is one so we're glad you found that to be an improvement and of course the colors will be adjusted as we have noticed this ourselves as episodes have gone on. We hope you keep watching and enjoying... thanks friend ;)