Instrumental Anime Project

pen-pen2002 · Post by **pen-pen2002** » Sat Apr 10, 2004 7:29 pm

It's in the spirit of the project so I don't see any problem. Plus it would be a wee bit pretentious for us to disqualify Beethoven from a mostly classical music selection.

Speaking of which we could really use a jazz piece. DWP, those jazz recordings you put up were excellent, I haven't heard them all yet but I thought boy meets horn might work well for a humorous, exaggerated courtship.

My progress has slowed down a bit, hopefully I can get going again this weekend. I'm not used to working as part of a project alongside other people, that's going to motivate me to get done a lot faster.

Speaking of motivation/inspiration I'm thinking of uploading a copy of Fantasia 2000 (600MB.) I just watched it again for the first time since I became an AMV creator and I see it in a whole new light. it is somewhat bittersweet. On one hand it is incredibly inspiring due to it's beauty and even the ones I didn't like as much made me think wow I could do something like that. On the other hand it is discouraging because, by comparison, it makes AMVs seem kind of limited. I highly recommend you guys watch it if you haven't recently.

It also mentioned in the movie that Fantasia was originally meant to be an ever evolving performance, different each time. It was supposed to have some old ones in each show, plus new compositions. That seemed kind of cool, we're not just emulating this movie, we are contributing to Fantasia as a whole. In that vein maybe someone should do a song that was in one of them. The short one with the flamingoes would be perfect, get a comic break in too. Another possible title would be Fantasia something (hey if we're going to steal music and video we might as well steal the name

)

As for length I don't know if this is applicable but the first time I watched it again Fantasia 2000 actually seemed short (It's over an hour.) This is probably because of the variety (Humor/serious, jazz/classical, old/new.)

Org Profile · Post by **Otohiko** » Sat Apr 10, 2004 7:54 pm

Well, of course it's unfair to compare us to the real thing - they get all the animation they want, where and how they want - not to mention, the best technology and artists they can get!

But at least we get to do what we want, even with the limited means

/wishes the permissions would come in soon already.

***

I've been thinking about possible effects, especially to sync the main rhythm to, and what I've come up with is possibly using really narrow, symmetric colored lines (left/right or top/bottom) of the screen that flash and change position according to the music... but I don't know if they'll work yet. Time to experiment...

/really wished the permissions would come in soon so someone could tell me if I'm on the right track here

rose4emily · Post by **rose4emily** » Sat Apr 10, 2004 11:03 pm

files moved, permisions set.

all apologies for the delay.

Org Profile · Post by **Otohiko** » Sat Apr 10, 2004 11:04 pm

No probs, good to see it up.

I just wasted 3.5 hours of my life trying out effects for the main rhythm - they just don't work. They distract. I think anything beyond basic editing here is almost a crime. Besides, maybe, a few overlays here and there....

rose4emily · Post by **rose4emily** » Sat Apr 10, 2004 11:46 pm

any ideas on what could be causing the following problem:

i have gone through my video and done a frame-by-frame sync between the picture and the waveform to make sure it has really rock-solid timing in all the important cuts and transitions - but:

in the final encode the video seems to cycle between being right with the audio and about a half-second a few times over the length of the video. if there was a consistent lag, i could just do a timing offset on one of the channels, but because it's a variable lag i can't think of any simple way to fix it. as i've mentioned, i matched the frames to the waveform in my editor, so the original timing should be the problem, but rather the encoding.

could it maybe be a keyframe / non-keyframe thing?

rose4emily · Post by **rose4emily** » Sat Apr 10, 2004 11:48 pm

that, and i can't get text under size 28 or so to not look like crap.

Org Profile · Post by **Otohiko** » Sun Apr 11, 2004 9:42 am

It definitely sounds like a keyframe issue here. I know how to deal with such things in premiere (especially since it has a clear 'Keyframe and Rendering' tab in the project settings), but I'm not sure how it's dealt with on your side.

I suggest you post in the help section, I'm sure someone has an idea...

pen-pen2002 · Post by **pen-pen2002** » Sun Apr 11, 2004 2:17 pm

Well I've watch the ararat WIP a number of times and there are things I really like about it and other things I don't care for. I think a big part of my problem is with the song. from :43 to 1:16 I really like the melody but I feel the rhythm is too loud and distracting. The video seems to fall in-between categories due to emphasizing different parts of the song. Parts of it feel very eastern and parts just feel like your average action video. It doesn't seem to flow, it doesn't hold together. I didn't really feel like it told the story of spriggan and it wasn't really a character profile. most of the first half was mostly mood synch but the second half seems to have more action sync. Things seem to come from nowhere a lot and this is from someone who knows the story.

The opening is just perfect. The elevator was also a good choice of clips. The next section with the scenery and the main character driving works really well. The eagle is perfect. 1:24 is a bit of a jolt with the sudden fighting after not really any buildup to it, but works due to the setting. 1:46 is also a jolt because the setting changes dramatically but at 2:01 it's ok because you can tell he is in an old city plus his demeanor matches the feel of the piece well (am I making sense?) Fight scene is good. I like all the gearing up, it provides some much needed buildup. 3:28 was also a bit jolting. this whole fight scene is okay I guess but didn't seem to fit the rest of the video. This can also be said of much of the second half. The very end goes back to the feel of the first parts though and incidentally is wonderful.

Otohiko wrote:The more solid rock-type beat in that version works better for synching action to.

It seems like the more action there is in a part the less I care for it. The exception is where the music does that... damn, I hate typing about music... you synced an eagle to it the first time. It's louder and more powerful but it still fits.

About the climax, it is the climax of the movie but in the movie there was a lot of set up for that showing the kid being manipulative powerful and evil, and in a sense unstoppable. But none of that was in the video, there wasn't really that much development of striker as far as fighting and never giving up goes (the cool demeanor was defiantly there though.) My point is that it just seems kind of tacked on. For most of the fight scene the beat isn't any louder than it was during the landscape scenes, and the (Violin?) is still there (4:12 for example.) from 4:09 and on is good buildup but it doesn't really work for me until the music picks up to match the action in my favorite shot, 4:22, that was awesome. 4:40 matches the music very well and 4:43 to the end is just scary (in a good way.)

So overall I have mixed feelings. I think it could be incredible but it needs to hold together more and feel like a solid video.

sorry if I was kind of harsh... um... happy birthday?

Org Profile · Post by **Otohiko** » Sun Apr 11, 2004 2:33 pm

Thanks!

I can see most of the things you're talking about, so, again, we'll see how we can get this together.

I've actually been thinking of adding titles at various points of the video, to make it a bit more sensible in terms of plot, until I glanced at my favorite videos list and realized that may be 'borrowing' a bit too much from 'Storytelling'. But now that I think of it... who knows, that might be something to consider.

Sometimes it does seem like the last action bit is too long; now if only I could find footage to fix that... But I like the sync in most places, at least after today's tweaks - with the exception of, like you said, about :43 to 1:16.

So, while I'll try and see where and what I can do better for making it more cohesive - you can check out the '1.01' version I'm uploading right now. It's much better in terms of video quality, and fixed a couple of things I had some issues with.

***

So then, would you say I should try to get the Eastern motif more in there past about 2:38 (the arming scene)? Or, at least do more character profiling as opposed to the action?

In that case, I'll catch a break from it, and come back and look at it with a fresh mind tomorrow

pen-pen2002 · Post by **pen-pen2002** » Sun Apr 11, 2004 2:46 pm

Otohiko wrote: I've actually been thinking of adding titles at various points of the video, to make it a bit more sensible in terms of plot, until I glanced at my favorite videos list and realized that may be 'borrowing' a bit too much from 'Storytelling'. But now that I think of it... who knows, that might be something to consider.

A quote comes to mind: "good artists borrow, great ones steal."

I wouldn't worry about storytelling, who knows it's revolutionary now but in a year it might be a new gerne (then again maybe not

) after all someone had to be the first to use "the seziere effect."

I'll work on my vid and HW today and tomarow I'll get your new version and give it another look over.