Saturday Morning Bloodborne Some constructive criticisms:
- The shot near the beginning where the camera is focused on the hand as it turns is a little janky, but otherwise impressive considering how well the lineart of the hand are drawn. Animation that focuses hands is difficult, let alone simply drawing an anatomically correct hand at all, so it's understandable.
- The animation of the monsters at around 0:15 should have more inbetweens, even if the style you're going for is limited, 80s-style animation.
- The compositing (specifically the white glow) on the girl at 0:25 is so overproduced that the details of her face are made somewhat indistinguishable. The details are actually made more visible when the transition fades and then its made clear for those split seconds. If anything, it should be the opposite. That still frame of the girl is really well drawn, but it can only really be seen when it fades out.
- At 0:30, the background and the character's shoes are colored so similarly that you can't really distinguish what's happening unless you really focus hard on it. The viewer shouldn't have to do that to understand what is happening on-screen. Had the character's legs and shoes been made brighter or the background made brighter, or even different colors, the shot would've been more clear and readable.
- At 0:34, the villager-zombie-guy with the hat has a beard that is the exact same color as his hat and the two kind of meld together into some crazy hat-beard combobulation. If either the hat or beard were made different colors or different shades of the same color, it would be more clear.
- The same goes for the main character's turtleneck, face mask, hair, and hat. It is all one single shade of desaturated, dark brown and, paired with the fact that the lineart is black, it makes it really hard to tell what the character looks like; excluding the face, it's as if the upper half of the main character is a silhouette.
- At around 0:46 during the main character's epic sword sheathing sequence, the animation could have used more inbetweens as well as lengthening and easing when he swings his sword during the extremes of the animation so that it isn't so choppy, especially for a scene as cool looking as what you have made.
- At 0:50, the mega monster is mostly black and the mostly black background is directly behind it in the composition, so it makes the parts of the monster's body that are black difficult to discern from the background.
- Same goes for the two characters right afterword where the main character looks behind him at the other guy with grey hair.
- When the camera zooms in on the mega monster at 1:00, the camera could have used more easing so that the zoom isn't so jarring to the viewer.
- At 1:05, I just don't know what happened in that shot there. The monster got stabbed, but I don't know from who (I presume the main character, but I can't see him), and the monster is oddly placed in the composition.
- At 1:08, the main character's clothes are indistinguishable from the background.
- At 1:09, the read for the grey-haired guy is difficult to see since, again, there's a lot of black on black coloration. The first time around, I thought he was the main character. Because the designs of the grey-haired guy and the main character are so similar (both are downed in black), I couldn't tell them apart.
The cartoon 'The Real Ghostbusters' redesigned each Ghostbuster by giving them different colored suits, different colored hair, different body structures, etc. in order to visually differentiate each character, even though the source material, the live-action movies, had them all wear the same colored uniform, the characters all have the same colored hair, etc. The level of detail in the actors is based on real life (since it is a live-action movie). With cartoons, the level of detail is naturally dwindled to mere symbolism since that's what a cartoon is; details are lost, so its easier for characters to look the same if they are designed similarly. The redesigns of the characters were especially helpful for being able to recognize characters from far off. That kind of redesign would be super helpful for when the grey-haired guy slices the mega monster.
The same idea applies to 1:14 where the camera quickly pans up on the main character. I couldn't tell if that was the main character or the grey-haired guy since their designs are similar and that the shot was way too quick. If the designs were different, then that quick pan shot would be more defendable.
- At 1:10, the action of the monster where he drops the main character from the pain of being slashed is way too fast and the animation it lacks fluidity. Again, the ability to distinguish characters is made difficult due to using similar colors. Same with the main character and the background when the shot changes to reveal that he's fallen on the ground. At 1:17, the shot where the monster is bleeding should've lasted longer, as well.
- At 1:13, can't tell what's happening since the shot doesn't reveal enough information to show what's happening on-screen.
- At 1:16, I couldn't tell what he pulled out since the gun is dark and his clothes are dark. In the following shot, the gun and the background are both very desaturated, so it appears that the gun and background are melded together.
- At 1:22, it looks like the main character pulled something out of the monster's skull, but I can't tell what it is since that object is black and it's shrouded in black.
Immediately after, the bird guy has black clothes on a black background with a black sky. Hard to see. The woman that is opposing the bird guy gives me a sense of relief after everything I've seen so far because she is easily readable. If she, and the other characters, were brighter and given more colorful designs, but still retain that angstiness of Bloodborne, that would be an improvement.
I thought that the bird guy was either an enemy that the woman was confronting or another protagonist because of the order that the characters appeared in. It was first bird guy (could be good guy or bad guy, his introduction didn't really show how he was aligned), the woman (obviously good guy because of how brightly she's dressed), then clearly bad guys (they're spooky looking ergo they're bad guys). Had the order been the main character and woman, side by side (with a focus on the woman since she is a new character and the main character has already been established), and then cut to the enemies (the more threatening the enemy, the more focus its given in the composition), then it would have been more clear who's who.
Then the bird guy and spooky guys are unseen throughout the rest of the video which makes me wonder why they were introduced so dramatically in the first place.
- At 1:43, I don't know who the person that the shadowy figure is confronting is! I presume it's the main character since he's the...main character, but his clothes are different. Is that the same hat the main character had before? I can't tell because his hat is black and it's always been surrounded by a black background.
- AND FINALLY, that YouTube-styled outro card where you have your other cartoons is meant to have annotations over them so you can click them so you can immediately be sent to your other cartoons. You can't do that on Newgrounds, unfortunately, so having that outro card is half-meaningless. I say half, because it still lets the viewer know that you have other cartoons, but it's made more difficult because the viewer would have to manually search for that specific cartoon instead of simply clicking on it. But that's not your fault, it's Tom Fulp's fault.
DAMN YOU, FULP!!!
So if it doesn't work, either fix it or nix it. Some ways of fixing it could be by having a differently designed outro card suited for both Newgrounds and YouTube, or have two different versions of the video: one with an outro card designed for YouTube and the other designed for Newgrounds. Or you could nix it and not have an outro card at all. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
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Basically, the most important thing you can take from this review is the idea of visual contrast. At the credits, you used a thin, white, serif font. Using that thin, white, serif font was a good choice because, had you used a sans-serif font, it would've looked more boring since there's not a lot of visual complication during the credits and that a distinguished, serif font fits the Gothic mood of the cartoon; it's easier to read because it's thin and, again, there is little visual complication; and, the most important aspect, it's WHITE text on a BLACK background. Black and white are complimentary colors (technically, they are shades, but, hey, this ain't Art I class in high school, so I'll call them colors), so naturally, it is easy to see the differences between the two colors when paired next to each other. That is (dramatic) contrast. Imagine if that text were vaguely, slightly brighter than pitch black and placed on a pitch black background. It would be pretty hard to see, right? That exact lack of contrast was what held this cartoon back from being *super* awesome, because as it stands right now, it is only *pretty darn* awesome.
I gave you four-and-a-half stars. I would have given you three or less if this cartoon wasn't as ambitious as it was because I can tell that there was definitely a lot of effort made to make this look awesome. The quality of art is great, but the cinematography, post-editing/compositing, and animation really need work. The thing that saves it is the quality of art because I really like the way you drew the lineart of the characters.
At any rate, I hope this review helps you improve your composition/color/character design. Visually, it's super duper important to employ the visuals as much as you can because it's ART, man! YOUR art! So, if you're going to put massive amounts of time into your art, make sure that you consciously get better! It's one thing to subconsciously become better at something through repetition (e.g. animating many cartoons), but it's also important to consciously become better so you can consciously improve your work that takes up so much time. The way you do that is to look at your art objectively and ask other knowledgeable artists for advice, tips, and constructive criticism. The most helpful advice is positive, friendly, and hopeful advice. I could've said that this cartoon sucks because of its downsides, but GUESS WHAT I DIDN'T because this cartoons is actually really great! That and it's *Bloodborne*! I watched the Game Grumps play Bloodborne and I fell in love with this game (or at least their let's play of it. You may've noticed that I don't know any of the names of the characters, so I made up my own. Such a n00b, I know.)
Anyway, I digress.
Man. Animation takes a long time to create and as you make your work, wiggle room for improving the fundamental cores of the art diminishes as you progress through it. So start out strong from a design standpoint and you'll have yourself a kick-butt cartoon. At least in terms of visual design. Sound design and writing in animation are different, but the same philosophical motivation applies.
That's it. I'm done now. Good day, sir.
--- Alex E., evidently an art know-it-all
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