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the default export settings are terrible. go to your publish settings and change it around. you want it to use more colors, alpha, and dither solids.

At 3/12/13 09:20 AM, MikeyS9607 wrote: What's with hall noobs putting Studios in their username?

thanks grumpling

At 3/11/13 04:48 PM, Jawnduss wrote: Is there anyway to keep the filter effects? such as blurs, but drop the actual filter?

blur the image in photoshop and bring it into flash as a png. might make it run slow depending on the color image of the pic though.

At 3/11/13 04:33 PM, Jawnduss wrote: I have a really large movie clip incorporated in a tween, and the only reason it's so large (in memory) is because it has several other movie clips inside it that also have filters on them. but this make's the run time of my tween become elongated due to lag. is there anyway to compress it, but keeping all the filters and MC's intact?

the filters are what's killing you. embedded MC's within MC's dont cause too much strain on the swf, but filters will 10-fold

At 3/11/13 03:21 PM, kobraideas44 wrote: Oh yeah right i forgot to add the please, but is there any link to give me?

madnesscombat.net

also @metalBooster: you should start using the line tool for your cars. you've got a good form and practice, but the brush really ruins it.

every version of flash ever is 32-bit in case you guys are wondering

only illustrator, inDesign, Audition, and Photoshop have 64-bit versions. and they also have 32

there are a LOT of routes to take from concept to animation.

a few good things to do is take your concept, and draw him in as many different positions as you can. jumping, running, sitting, etc. as well as different expressions.
This will help you keep your character on model throughout the animation.

You should also decide what style you want to take with your animation. Anime style usually involves a more extremes based animation where there are less inbetween frames and fewer subtle movements. sitcom style animation focuses heavily on non-moving backgrounds and longer dialogue moments. traditional/disney style usually takes the longest as everything is very fluid and a character never stops moving whether it be a foot tap or hand movement.

practice your main characters doing ordinary movements, and work on the timing for these movements until they feel natural to you. and don't try to work an animation straight through. start with the smaller or easier parts. this will give you more practice while you're making progress on the animation itself

At 3/8/13 09:46 AM, torithefox wrote: tossing salt and summoning a monster
Here are 2 test animations for something I wanted to do. sorry for the atrocious body jittering in the 1st I quickly filled it in so it wasn't just a arm. It originally ran at 15fps but I tweaked it to run at 24 which leads me to the question: Is it common to extend frames instead of redrawing every single one?

looks pretty cool! i'm guessing at the tail/bottom of the beast is smoke? that's going to be difficult to time the smoke's movement and growth. can't wait to see a finished product!

and extending your frames is perfectly natural. most animator's double-frame, which is the right way. i usually animate at 12FPS since i was raised on flash 5 and that was the default, then extend each by a frame and bump to 24. this keeps the same timing that i wanted if i had double framed from the start. then you just slide in the inbetweens where you need them, or extend some spots for easing and spacing.

At 3/7/13 10:37 AM, HaloSimon wrote: Hi, I am doing a 3D animation for my game intro. If you are interested in this, please come to the link below and give feedback and comment.
http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/612616

looks like a good start. some of the movements are a bit stiff/need to be eased. and your grammar can use some work in some spots. try using a more dramatic camera and less still shots and you'll have a much better piece

At 3/7/13 09:21 AM, ravalos wrote: Hi there!.Well im doing a animation in 640x360 size.But i want to save and publish it at 1280x720.How can i do this automaticaly? I mean,duplicate the size of the animation.I see that you can change the size of the animation when you publish it in avi or something like that,but i want to see if i can change the size BEFORE publish it.When i go to properties of the documment and i change it,the space work become bigger,but the frame is the same size than before,and i have to make it bigger manually,so,is there a way to duplicate the size in a few steps?

Thanks.

resizing upon publish is actually a DPI multiplier, and since swf's don't deal in DPI it can't be done. you should always try to work at or close to the actual size you want, and make adjustments later on.

At 3/6/13 03:23 PM, ShireSpeare wrote: Hi newgrounds

First of all, i want to make clear that this is not a audio stream/event kbps issue.
I haven't ever experienced this before so maybe someone else knows.

I have voiced some lines and placed them in flash on the timeline. When just playing on timeline the sounds are all clean and clear, how ever when i publish preview to see how it all works out some of those exact same lines sound extremely bad. Horrible really. I don't understand what is wrong, it is rather frustrating and i'm afraid i have to voice them again and rearange a already perfect timeline setup. Including animation. Can anybody relate and know if there is a way to fix it?

I use audacity on a few lines, to adjust them. Maybe it has a something to do with it. idk

Thanks in advance.

if they sound fine outside of flash you won't need to re-voice them. I'd say just double check your preview AND publish settings since they're different. also check that they are set to events not stream. stream is good while animating but for any post production or final product you want it set to event so it's not trying to sync to frames

here's a universal we can all agree on

At 3/2/13 06:47 AM, PeterSatera wrote:
Be aware, drawing in the exact centre of these frames when inbetweening will erase any use of easing you may want to create from one pose to another.

Get me? :)

common curse of the onion skin

there's a reason there's a web-safe colors palette after all :P

i said they can help by eliminating things drawn on screen. of course the size and such is the same because it's loading the same object, but it's not drawing the same parts. and i said the FPS is miniscule if at all but it does make a difference.

i understand where you are coming from but you're only looking at one part of what i was explaining to him. and the fact that i agree you won't get a big frame boost by using a mask

looks very good, can't wait to see some of those scenes finished

is this not done yet?!?

here's a few tips to reduce lag:

instances. whether you are using something twice or once, if it's an unchanged image, make it a movieclip. Once flash processes something as a movieclip, it only draws it once. This isn't true for symbols and graphics though.

filters. if you absolutely have to have a blurred element on your stage, it is better to blur the image in photoshop and import as a png. flash is not optimized to use filters in real time so it causes a lot of chug.

never use groups. they're pointless except for organizing. once an image or element is finished, save it off as a movieclip.

don't leave symbols off stage you aren't using. the swf isn't "drawing" them in the scene, but they are being stored for immediate use by the program. this is the difference between a RAM heavy animation and a processor heavy one.

there's tons of writeups out there about optimizing and such, i suggest reading a few and developing some good habits

peter you are half-right. the way an swf works is by choosing what to draw, so a mask can speed some instances up as the swf knows not to draw what is outside of the mask, but masking a jpeg or png works exactly the opposite, as it has to draw the entire picture file, then choose which parts to show. it's a double edged sword in many aspects, but to mask or not to mask will never make a noticeable change in FPS

MUCH better with the guide. also watch your scaling, you've got the idea of foreshortening when the arm comes perpendicular to the camera, but you want the hand to scale larger instead of smaller since it's coming closer to you.

stuff like this is where rotoscoping becomes great practice

that 3d run looks pretty cool! a bit too fast, but i like a lot of the elements like the scarf and face. i'd say slow it down a bit and ease out between the extremes and you've got a great concept animation

boiling isn't necessarily a bad thing, its a preference. i for one, hate it lol.

when you go back in to clean up your lines, try moving parts that can be moved, not re-drawing them. only drawing and redrawing the parts that you absolutely have to give a much better end product and better character continuity

tl;dr

too much for a approval basis, not enough server to allow everything. we are in a pickle. but you can't tell them "post whatever you want in any format!...except for you, you, you and you"

At 2/25/13 09:37 AM, Jojishi-X wrote: What are good animation programmes for beginners (or a bit higher), which don't consist of stickmen

flash, toon-boom, anime-studio

check them all out and see what works for you. industry standard is flash but slowly becoming toon-boom.

fire is actually one of my favorite things to animate. once you decide the style, you just think of it in a practical sense. the base it hottest so has the most mass, and the heat pushes the smaller bits upwards. your highlights or as devilsgarage said, "details" want to morph around the fuel source, be it a log, wick, or whatever the source of the flame is.

one thing that's easy to fall back on is "breathing fire" like what you did, where to complete the loop your flame projects upwards, then seemingly back down. try and avoid it and have a constant flow. i've got a couple different examples here.
the first is a torch where you can see the source and flow
http://www.newgrounds.com/dump/item/4b7bc6810049125984e7373d feb21127

the second here is a larger flame, say on a building or campfire. the source isn't as defined in this case. also this animation is double framed so mind the chop. also notice the right-most flame has a directional flow to the right, to show that the wind and fuel source acting on it are constant.
http://www.newgrounds.com/dump/item/d361dbdc040ab8be6189e006 6b826c2d

good luck and i hope to see more!

At 2/21/13 09:34 AM, SwishTheRTS wrote: And idk how to fix it l:/ i want to be a better animator(this isn't my only problem I just suck at the moment /x) ) but it keeps looping....I'm using Flash CS6....Help please...?

on the last frame you need a stop command

click on the last frame of your animation, and in the "actions panel" type

stop();

here's a breakdown of the steps i go through for the animation if anyone is interested. i've always been told i have a weird approach to things so i'll give insight on how i do it

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EBV8_jomUXs

At 2/21/13 12:55 AM, DeadBroadcast wrote: Has anyone else applied for this gig?

i dropped one in. we'll see

At 2/20/13 10:26 PM, KhanhCPham wrote:

At 2/20/13 11:00 AM, Max-Vador wrote: cup and fluids

http://www.newgrounds.com/dump/item/25c1d32624229ef9b0d82f34 92ad7c4b

it appears to have a form change on the roll but its very well done. Animating strict geometric shapes tend to drive me nuts because even the smallest detail error can put it off.

Singing my song brother It's such a weird perspective but I'll go back in and take a look at it