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Kirbopher
Animation Artist, creator of over 100 pieces of Flash animation on and offline. Graduate of the School of Visual Arts, Class of 2011.

Chris Niosi @Kirbopher

Age 35, Male

Animation Artist

School of Visual Arts

New York

Joined on 7/21/04

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There Was This One Time + Rangers News + Foreign Fandubs

Posted by Kirbopher - May 1st, 2009


Hey all, Happy Pico Day and a big 'ol Happy b-day to Tom!

So finally I've released "There Was This One Time", my student film for my 2nd year at the School of Visual Arts. It's been put under the NEO-C account as promised and here to kick off my tremendous workload for the month of May.

So, There Was This One Time, when a bat, a rhino, a ferret and an old man all got together and played a card game.

That was the basic concept I came up with after I created a character for each of the members of TeamFourStar, the people behind Dragonball Z Abridged, which is now linked to on ThatGuyWithTheGlasses might I add! Scott, Lani, Taka and I all got together one night after I had finished designing and came up with the basic concept of them playing cards, none of them knowing what game they're playing and the whole thing ending with Ol' Man Mutton somehow winning and keeping them as pets in a cage. We improved and wrote down the script in a night and soonafter I recorded each of their voices that the character designs were tailor-fit to, along with Masako and the Opening Narrator.

I put every bit of animation skill I had into this one, focusing solely on it every single Teusday during my main class for several hours in a row, so that I could make sure to take my sweetass time with it over the course of several months. RedM was also nice enough to arrange the music for me and having custom-made BGM is a great feeling, thanks Alex!

My one main issue is that unfortunately, it's not quite as "pretty" as I wanted it to be. After completing the version that I've submitted tonight, the .fla file for the movie became corrupted while in the middle of shading it. I'm pissed because it was looking REALLY nice so far and I had gotten about 2/3rds into finishing it...so, unfortunately it's not exactly the way I wanted, but it could've been a LOT worse. At the very least I have a finished product to showcase to you guys and my peers at school enjoyed it too. Sadly though, because the file is corrupt I literally can't make ANY changes, even if I wanted to go back and shade the whole thing again, which I'd be willing to do, I literally CAN'T access the .fla anymore. So with that in mind I hope you'll excuse any little glitches here and there, I know there's one scene where the background didn't fit over the screen and you can see some white at the top. Whoops.

For my first original toon I'm really interested in critique from you guys, my fellow artist, specifically from people who aren't normally fond of my other works. I know that probably sounds kinda lame, like I'm trying to "prove my worth" to the community or something, but I'm genuinely asking for any feedback from you guys. Those've you I know in some capacity that are fellow flash animators, if you'd be kind enough to leave a review, or a comment here, or a comment mentioning that you left a review so I can find it, I'd greatly appreciate any thoughts on this one. Next year we'll be doing a group project a la collabs here on NG, so I'd like to take something away from this project to have in mind for next year. Thanks very much!

______________________________________
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Just a couple other little things before I head out, check the Parody Rangers MOVIE blog for a quick update. Long story short, I'll be finishing the Renaldo Rangers spin-off later this month and as it stands right now, the following parts of Parody Rangers THE MOVIE are no longer being officially sponsored by NG, but I plan on finishing the movie regardless.

Also! Teusday I was surprised and flattered to see some alternate language fandubs of a few of the movies I've worked on! First we have $00pah NiN10Doh! en espanol, where a bunch of friends got together and dubbed the entire thing. Then, even more intriguing was the German dub of $eG@!, of which people are now coining the title "Sonic's Nightmare" on YouTube. They're both pretty hilarious and the concept of having something I worked on in another language in itself is pretty badass :]


Comments

How on Earth did the file corrupt?!

When I was in the middle of shading it the file just started freaking out and now I'm unable to access it at all. Not the end of the world thankfully.

$00pah NiN10Doh! en español. Cool idea, it's a shame voices sound so...crappy (I speak spanish, that's why I know)

Wow your just busy busy busy. When was the last time you had free time? Or is that what you do in your free time?

VIDJA GAYMZ. I just beat the shit outta New Super Mario Bros.

ok thanks for the update brodeo

ur welcum bromide

It stinks that Parody Rangers won't be getting officially sponsored by NG :(

There Was This One Time was great though, and I can't wait for Renaldo Rangers!
You WILL still be submitting Parody Rangers to Newgrounds though, right? (Of course you will)

Yup, wanna support the site in whatever way I can so Rangers'll still be right here on NG.

Is there anywhere where you can give donations? If it the other parts won't be out for a bit, I'd be happen to chip in what little I have. That is, if you need it.

Any donations would be greatly appreciated. If you feel like throwin' a few bucks my paypal is Kirbopher1111@gmail.com

Don't you dare give up on me mayun! I WILL KILL YOU IF YOU GIVEZ UP!! 3:<

SUICIDE IS NEVER THE ANSWER.

Wasn't that bad, but not worth watching. It's just something you've seen before.

About the dragon ball abriged; i recognized you as brussels... or was it sprout... anyway the point is you and tomamoto make a great sinister duo... Team Four Star should use you guys more often or make you a regular cast member, you're just hillatious...

I might be someone in Season 2 of DBZA, we'll see.

Vegeta! I can fly.
Ack. Yes you can Nappa.
It's... 1006. Really? Yeah kick his ass Nappa.

I didn't know you helped write DBZ: Abridged.
Also get in a deal with That Guy with the Glasses to post stuff there. You got him in one of your videos and all that.

I don't. THEY helped write something with ME.

lol you finnaly realease $00pah NiN10Doh! in spanish
Good work!

I didn't "release" $00pah NiN10Doh! in spanish, it's a fandub, i.e. a fan did it.

Hey try to always keep some updated backups when working on something relatively big... you'd have a way out of the corrupting issue, haha.

Good luck with your projects!

There Was This One Time was really good. A bit shorter than I expected it to be. Maybe I've been expecting big collabs, or movies from you more lately. :P

you should make a cartoon where a dog falls down a flight of stairs

pico day?
i didnt find out what said that is pico day O_O

Review for There Was This One Time. Score 6 out of 10

There's real effort but little imagination.

Considering that you are studying character animation in school I'm surprised by the crude designs and flat personalities that were in this short. Maybe your peers in class were not critical enough? I don't know, but here are a few things I might suggest as some constructive criticism and the art of animating characters successfully to an audience. And please take it with a grain of salt as I mean for this to be helpful, and you asked for some real critique with a non-bias eye from a fellow animator (although you don't know me heh).

1. Random animals as characters. I don't know if this was your choice or if these animals were assigned for class, but the combination is so random that it seems like you could have chosen them out a word jumble in a hat. They could have been a gorilla, armadillo, and rabbit for example and it would have had no real effect on the cartoon, which is a bad thing. Genuine characters that are meant to read as real "best friends" will have at least some commonality traits that help give some semi-believable logic that they would hang out together. Look at the semi-randomness of "Cow and Chicken" and it's believable that they are siblings because they are both "farm animals" and treat each other like siblings. Or in animated films like "Over the Hedge" a turtle, raccoon and squirrel would hang out because they are "wood creatures" with a common enemy, even though in reality these animals would never try co-existing. See what I mean? Or pairing friends should at least have something in common interests...like "they all play in a band"..or something obscure like "they all love peanut butter". They just can't be calling each other "pal" or "buddy" to be believable... they need motive. Also you could use more direct interaction. Have them nudge each other while joking, use their physics to comical effect (ex. rhino steps on ferrets tail while putting his card down and apologizes, or bat is sitting the wrong way (because he's blind) and one friend corrects him. Little things like that subtly enforce the idea they really are friends. If you are serious in making a set of characters with stronger character, I recommend studying cartoons that have dysfunctional buddies like (Ren and Stimpy, Catdog, Buzz Lightyear and Woody) and observe why they go well together besides differences in personally and learn from that. Most of the time one compensates a flaw in the other to help them out physically or emotionally so that the relationship feels genuine.

2. Chemistry and personality. Each one of your characters were one-dimensional stereotypes. It's very cliché to make the big character the dumb one, the small one jittery and fast talking, and the one with glasses and coat as the snob. Think outside of formulaic structures. One of the first things directors like Brad Bird do in their films are to make characters that *feel*, because if the audience doesn't care for them, then the viewer won't care what they say or do (no matter if it's a funny or sad situation). Example, it's a different experience if a guy gets hit with a rock and he frowns, versus a guy gets hit and winces his eyes, turns his head slowly, scans the foreground, and sighs with a frown. All your characters did was talk fast and move from one pose to the next. And considering you stuck them in a plain black room with nothing else to focus on, their chemistry was the most important factor in getting across. Right now it's like a bad sitcom where three people act as vessels to throw back one-liners in hopes a few hit the "funny meter" and *cue audience laughter. You seemed to have spent more time writing dialogue and probably scripting out just enough action to fit it when you should have spent more time storyboarding the flow to include anticipation and thought, pacing the cartoons visual to include non-verbal actions, and fleshing out character believability to the audience. I think only the Rhino had some genuine personality because of the little things he did like draw a picture for his friend, and act like he was intelligent when saying "triple word score" like he was so sure he was winning. Haha, those parts made me laugh pretty well. But you need to add more substance, because he can only go so far with a pasted grin and blank-eye stare, and it's a thing that is overdone to death on horrible shows like Family Guy in replacement for actual comedy and acting. On a positive note, while I watched this I felt you WERE putting effort into all these guys, it just came out luke-warm. The humor and acting are forced for the most part, and I think it may be because you never had any real passionate connection to these characters on the inside...except that Rhino...I think some true personality seeped into that Rhino but no one else.

3. Design. Good character expression comes from the head and eyes, and then the rest of the body. This is because the human mind goes straight to the face for visual labeling. The eyes of a character are the windows to its thoughts, and the body movement defines the character's overall personality. Your ferret suffers the most in this aspect firstly because I couldn't figure out what he was. His stub body and bush tail read more like a bug, fox and a dog. If the narrator hadn't said it was a ferret I would never had guessed that's what he is. His black gradient eyes were very distracting and on many occasions it blurred into the black background so much they couldn't clearly be read. Same goes for the black floating eyebrows (that looked like antennas) getting lost in the background. The bat was okay and although the face was boring, his acting was strongest. I liked how his ears drooped in certain actions and the hand gestures he made while talking and fixing his hat were great. Overall those were all pretty clear. I think the rhino's horn could have been drawn better since it looks like a flat triangle pasted on the top, and a good horn would have a more rounded base that sinks into his meat, but it's a minor thing. Just a bit more subtle movements in-between all the jerking around would have helped too. And make them blink a little. Try to remember they are supposed to be living things, so a few breaths, blinks, and subtle nods would make them seem less like puppets with many eye twitches and mouths and more like living characters. Overall I highly suggest redoing the ferret (look at real photos for reference or the comic strip Get Fuzzy-which has a ferret) but the other two were good...and the old man was um... strangely like a messed up DBZ or anime character. I don't know why he read that way to me, but he did... haha sorry about that.

Overall, it's a great animation technically (nice and smooth fbf!) but it needs more fleshing out of character development, looks, and acting. Again I hope I wasn't too harsh on you, because you most definitely have the potential to get better and better as you keep practicing. And try looking at good character animation that doesn't rely so much on dialogue to get their personalities across. The Triplets of Bellville is a good example to look at. All the characters are done in pantomime and so their gestures, body, and movement need to tell everything. There's also a test I remember my professor used to do in order to see if the students work holds water in terms of character: Watch it silent. If I can still understand the cartoon completely silent, then its character animation is strong. Geez, sorry for the long review. Good job and keep it up! :)

Hey this was pretty awesome, thanks very much and I appreciate the long review.

A lot of what made this cartoon what it was had to do with my collaborative effort with my friends that worked on it with me. The characters were based on original voices of theirs that I really wanted to make use of for a cartoon instead of a video parody, so the animal choices I came up with were based on the development of those voices, their acting that went with it, and the dynamic I have with them. This also applied to the comedic timing as well, since the script was written by all of us as a team.

As far as visuals go, I've been told I work pretty well with combining simple shapes to make some good character designs, hence for Hony's horn looks more like a slapped on triangle than a realistic looking horn. Even more so with Jeeta's design, I think my mentality with him was to go with something more stylistic looking than simply "make a cartoon ferret" and in the process he became my favorite character to animate of the bunch.

But yeah no don't apologize for givin' a long response, that's what I asked for and I got it. I think the others on board would really be interested in seeing this too so I'll be sure to pass it onto them as well. Thanks for takin' the time!

my god......an alter ego account on newgrounds?

i have to tell tommar and ego bout this.....
not ross....he and i are fighting atm lol.....

anyways dude i sent you a pm the other day that im now free for voice acting since Xionico, and jake n miles are currently piled with work

so yeh dude pm me back i got an AIM account
halfXlife36 and we'll talk
(i also have skype and gmail but i dont think you bother with either of them)

l8s

What happened to your blog about animation and the like? Is that one still going?

That's awesome $eG@ got dubbed other languages.
Anyways...
Holy crap, you sound like your very busy!
It may seem like your "projects" aren't going so great, they should turn out just fine. I know your most likely get the stuff done and done well.
Keep up the good work, you have really good animations.
The third Brawl taunts was done really good in my opinion, but why did it get a score of 3-something?
Can't wait to see the new animations etc you'll post here (Actually I can wait, I don't like putting people under stress).
Okay, uhh, see ya?

Hey kirbopher, just popping in to say what up, keep making your movies because a fellow new yorker wants to see more of them!

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