Score: 9

"Very Nice"

submission: Tarboy

date: December 18, 2009

It felt fresh and new yet it also felt retro. The section in the dark reminded me of the pink panther. I have to admit, this is very nicely original. The animation was also very smooth, the art was satisfying and I have to admit that this is pretty good.

Score: 10

"You are untouchable"

submission: the Last of the Dashkin

date: December 9, 2009

This confirms what we've all known forever. You are truly the most talented animator on newgrounds. I can't think of anyone here who has the experience to give you a fair critique, you are beyond all of us.

You remind me of James Gurney, he made a series of illustrated books called: Dinotopia. What he did was create the pictures first of humans living in a utopia with dinosaurs and then made a story around it. I'm not sure but I get the feeling that something similar happened with you and your story.

More power to you, you and your work give us a window in the future of entertainment on the internet. Maybe one day it will surpass the respect that TV and film gets and if it does, it will be likely that your work will be mentioned to our grandchildren as a spear point for a new era in entertainment and story telling.

Score: 10

"Not what I expected...good job!"

submission: Microcosm

date: December 1, 2009

When I saw the title I though that this was going to be about the terrible PC game from the FMV days of gaming back in the 90's. What I found was a cleverly executed and witty animation. That graphics were simple but then again they didn't have to be complex for what the purpose of the film seemed to be. Unoriginal though some parts may be, you did something very creative with them and made something new out of them. I like this a lot and it definitely stands out from the rest of the stuff around here these days. Great job!

Score: 9

"Writing seems to be a strong point of yours"

submission: VG Exiles - Episode 2

date: August 31, 2009

I'm not going to whine about the animation and graphics not being perfect or Deviant-Art quality, besides I think you already know what could be improved, but what caught my attention was the gripping writing. I'm not saying it's Pulitzer material, but it's more interesting than Alvin Earthworm's work. As far as originality, I don't care, I say there's still an opportunity to make an interesting crossover series and that they're not jinxed.

Also the voices were very well done, the cast really pulled your writing together in spite of the shortcomings of the graphical and animation departments (meaning all the parts after the sprite fight). On the fight scene itself, it was very visually interesting. Once again I'm not an art nazi who freaks out and subscribes to the over-used "unoriginality" excuse, and as such the fact you were using sprites didn't ruin it as far as I'm concerned. Good job, as far as free entertainment goes, this was fun to watch.

Score: 10

"Very nice"

submission: Lil' Hoots

date: June 25, 2009

What's so interesting about this is that it is a nice mixture of writing and animation. The animation was a bit slow at times, especially with the lip syncing, but it wasn't so bad that it made me lose interest altogether, in fact some of the more subtle movements you animated were rather impressive. From basic eye movements that seemed to be more expressive and like your standard cartoon. Effectively, I think you've got skills that are not too different from a professional's.
However what I really enjoyed here was the writing. Now I'm not the type of guy who's normally into children's stuff but the fact that you could still have an interesting animation and basic premise while still keeping it interesting/available to a large audience (not just teens and adults) is something very few people here even try to do. It's definitely a challenge that goes above and beyond the norm of newgrounds. So for biting off more to chew I think you deserve some credit.

What I think you might want to work on in the future is making your characters more detailed. Harder yes, but you don't seem to be a stranger to challenging yourself. It isn't a major complaint and I personally didn't care too much, but the more detail you can animate, the more conditioned of an animator you'll become I suppose. Keep on challenging yourself!

Also, the blue owl made me think of jigglypuff O_o.

Score: 8

"Eye Catching"

submission: Music Is An Epic Thing

date: June 1, 2009

I have to admit, what you did with the loading screen once you click play took me by surprise. Also, I just want to say this right away, I don't care if it isn't flash, Newgrounds doesn't have to be made up of just flash, to hell with un written rules.

To the point though, the visuals were interestingly assembled in a sort of 3d collage. I thought it was relatively clever. I'm not entirely sure where the music came from so it sounded new to me at the time which helped your video in my opinion. If felt grand and powerful just like the message you've given to this piece "Music. It's and epic thing,". You sure had me convinced of that by the end. Now I'm imagining that you're interested in improving yourself so please forgive me if I seem rude but I'll point out some faults to it that you could improve on.

1: The beginning felt slightly dragged out. I understand that this might be blamed on the music but for the sake of an audience, it was lacking in terms of a hooking stimulant. Something (like that loader animation) needs to grab the audience and after the loader fades the overdose of white sort of gives an impression of blankness and un-excitement. Even though you placed a firework animation in it, the beginning was more strange that hooking.

2: let's investigate your use of pictures. Now your message here concerns music and you have pictures of speakers, CDs, and hands. This seems to bring up the idea that you only consider modern and digitally made music to be music at all which can be confusing. That's not to say that modern music isn't good, it just seems that you're going for a broad concept and yet your subject material is relatively limited considering.

3: The plane. What does it have to do with music? Freedom, sure that ties in with music art and expression and I can sort of see your connection with the flying sensation to freedom but it's a lose comparison at that. However I did see something strange with the intersection of the wing with the fuselage, did you make the plane yourself? Putting in the effort to make a passable plane like that is worth something in and of itself but it seems to distract away from the main idea rather than help it. Maybe a bird would have been better since most people associate them with singing birds and therefore music.

Either way this was eye catching and indeed interesting with some minor problems that (in all honesty) I DID have to go back and see it a second time to pick out points for a critique. Good job, hope to see some improvement on your part in the future :).

Score: 5

"Well..."

submission: Koden X Prologue Part 1

date: April 25, 2009

Here's what I have a problem with:

Animation: Sometimes it just felt rough, it seemed either too vectored or just too rushed. Also the lip syncing wasn't up to par with what it seems you're going for. What I've noticed animators do is create several images of different mouth motions and then try to tie them into the scene. Meaning pre-fab the mouths and then add them in later with the audio.

Acting/Characters: I'm sorry but your characters screamed cliché at me. You have this dude with a DBZ hair-do who is tough and has powers he doesn't understand/completely control bringing up the whole "walking-weapon" deal that seems to be all over fiction these days. For an engaging character push the envelope a little bit, but not too much to the point the audience has no idea who they are. Meaning add something more to the agon with power rather than just control vs. chaos, it's been done to death. Also the token anime girl who is very friendly and dresses and acts like any other character. Conversely I hope you don't jump to the other extreme and have a total asshole girl who just likes to make people suffer for really lame reasons. Balance your characters between the extreme clichés and you might end up with a more unique cast.

Also to help your actors: tell them the emotions, have them get into their characters more before recording. Maybe have them act the scene with each other so that they can insert themselves into the part more and get your 'stage' direction as well as you do.

Plot Flow: It was really abrupt when the characters who the audience just began to attach themselves to after a few scenes got wasted (for all we know). It felt like a waste of time because all of a sudden you introduce another character WHILE creating the plot pitch WHILE removing the others ( maybe for a while I suppose). Slow the story down a bit, the world won't end tomorrow. The last thing you want to do is blast through what could be a neat story by cramming the plot too close together. If you do intend to keep the others alive somehow, it really would have helped to make a hint at that at the end, otherwise the movie feels incomplete. I know it looks like a series but each episode still needs a sense of unity of whatever magnitude. Unify you plot slightly (on a smaller scale) and you should be good.

This seems like it's your baby. I can relate I have one too. Which is why I don't want you guys to sabotage your potential by cutting corners. You really could make this better, but for the sake of a review, there is a lot of room for improvement.

Oh and PLEASE don't get the idea that I'm obsessed with originality, I'm not. I enjoy a nice diaspora of entertainment, artsy and simple alike. I just feel that you guys could be heading for a wall eventually and that you could make this flash series stand out more.

What I did like were the backgrounds, at one point I was reminded of the guy who made Waterlolies, so in that regard: good job!

Score: 10

"Compelling"

submission: In Solitude

date: April 3, 2009

I'm not much of an art-nazi so I'm not going to take cheap shots at the drawing style, in fact I really like this, especially the message at the end. My immediate reaction to it was how so many people these days spend time on the internet or wallowing in the spoils of life that they become physically alone, however there are so many people of this solitude that they are together BECAUSE of their solitude.

The style in general of the flash also could lead to interesting ideas: Life is as simple as you allow it to be. The people you portrayed were doing very little and so their world was composed of little, it became simple just as they had become simple.

This really was well made even IF you didn't intend it to be. I'd say you have a good thing going for you with flash.

Score: 6

"Well..."

submission: Pixtropolis City

date: March 7, 2009

It is clear that a lot of effort was put into this but there were aspects that just seemed to clash with the overall style and break the pattern of the overall flash. The basic idea here (from what I can tell) is that the whole city is in pixel form, however there were certain parts where it just seemed more like the flash was drawn and just left at a low resolution, instead of each pixel being placed where it should be.

Basically, it seems like parts of this were rushed.

HOWEVER!: There were some aspects that actually managed to convey a sort of meaning despite their brevity. For example the one where the guy is walking and seems to be depressed. When all of a sudden it turns to night, everyone else becomes depressed and he kills himself. This really seems to get at an interesting point of how depression effects more people than the initial victim. So to whomever made that, job well done! Having said that, this was one of the flashes where it felt like they were looking for a style. Meaning it looked like a hybrid of regular animation techniques and the pixel theme, it didn't really work for me.

It's an above average film, but not by that much.

Score: 9

"My eyes are bleeding!"

submission: Saturday Morning Watchmen

date: March 7, 2009

But it feels so good! I just got back from watching the movie (which was amazing) and this has got to be the funniest thing I've seen in a while. Good job!