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Re: The Button

Greenscreener wrote:

If you're having a hard time understanding the film, it's probably because you don't understand the underlying allegory. mini/wink

Which is letting building collapse because you couldn't be bothered to do your job properly is A-OK?

It made very little sense, the dialogue was iffy and the animation wasn't great. The effects were nice but lighting was pretty bland.

Less "It's bright!" or "It's Dark" would be nice. Layered lighting or different coloured lights and shadows would make it better.

Keep trying though.

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Re: The Button

Letting the building collapse was not the point of the movie, and it was not A-OK. As far as the lighting goes I went a little overboard with color correct, so yes, a lot of the scenes where probably lighter and darker than they needed to be.

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Re: The Button

Stellar job with the special effects and the editing. There were some flaws that kept me from loving this video however.

-The animation wasn't good. Especially the walk cycles which didn't seem realistic enough. the rest of the animation wasn't horrible, but it wasn't great either.

The animation knocks a few points down on the film, but other than that, I give it a 4/5. I really feel this needs more views than it already has.

Great work and keep it up.

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Re: The Button

I thought this was a great film - very well done and exciting!  I was so into the story/action that I didn't notice any flaws, and I found the voice-acting to be quite believable.  A very impressive film.  I hope you win the contest. mini/smile

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Re: The Button

I think, as I saw in many other post, it's clear that the animation wasn't the best. Fine, it wasn't my main problem with this film anyway.
I have to agree with tobias and walrus, the story was a bit confusing, and I was expecting a lot more. I think that the story, more than confusing, is compressed: 15 minutes is not enough to tell this story with the correct pace, putting all the details needed and making it work all together perfectly, that's what I think. The story itself is interesting, and has a lot of potential, but it's hard to tell. VFX was great, voice actors fit the role and animation was fine (I don't really care about one or two flaws in the walk cycle).
What I liked the most in this film was the beginning, that probably helped to make it look like it was going to be a lot better. Seriously, that part was awesome.
Overall, it was an enjoyable movie, not spectacular (except for the VFX, they were impressive), but for a first brickfilm it couldn't have been done in a better way. I would give this 3/5, plus half brick for the effort. After all, the problem wasn't the story, but the way it was told.
Good luck with the contest.

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Re: The Button

Awesome!
The effects were brilliant!
How did you make the mouth animation?

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Re: The Button

Pritchard Studios wrote:

too many brickfilms are just meaningless!

I disagree.
If the animator had fun making a brickfilm, it had some point.
Even if it is pointless to anyone else.

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Re: The Button

Total agree.

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Briks's Website

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Re: The Button

That's great movie from great animator. Maybe FPS can be little higher, I think. But I love this film. It's suitable long and the mouth movements are amazing! I like special effcets true, they rock! Overall very good film! Yeah.

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Re: The Button

MPfist0 wrote:

I think, as I saw in many other post, it's clear that the animation wasn't the best. Fine, it wasn't my main problem with this film anyway.
I have to agree with tobias and walrus, the story was a bit confusing, and I was expecting a lot more. I think that the story, more than confusing, is compressed: 15 minutes is not enough to tell this story with the correct pace, putting all the details needed and making it work all together perfectly, that's what I think. The story itself is interesting, and has a lot of potential, but it's hard to tell. VFX was great, voice actors fit the role and animation was fine (I don't really care about one or two flaws in the walk cycle).
What I liked the most in this film was the beginning, that probably helped to make it look like it was going to be a lot better. Seriously, that part was awesome.
Overall, it was an enjoyable movie, not spectacular (except for the VFX, they were impressive), but for a first brickfilm it couldn't have been done in a better way. I would give this 3/5, plus half brick for the effort. After all, the problem wasn't the story, but the way it was told.
Good luck with the contest.

Yeah, I wish I had more time than 15min but the festival I'm entering it into didn't allow anything above that unfortunately.

Thanks for the comments guys, positive and negative. I think I've got a good idea what I need to improve on.

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Re: The Button

Great video!

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Re: The Button

Tobias wrote:
Pritchard Studios wrote:

too many brickfilms are just meaningless

Ehm...I do not slightly think you're right in that one.

I think he's correct.

This film is just another eye candy film that suckered all you guys into drooling over it's pretty visuals when there was meh voice acting and a lack of a decent or clear story.

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Re: The Button

Amazing film! I loved it!

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Re: The Button

The film was not what I expected, I'll say. But it wasn't as good as most people say it is, or as bad as others say it is. When the film opened up with the blurb about a city in the pacific, I was anxious that you would tell about a corrupt society. The whole theory was hard to understand, partly from the odd and out of place voices. Some dialogue was cheesy for me, "the question is, when are you..." I would have liked it more if the story was about what you talked about in the beginning, use the beginning to set the mood and topic, not the setting alone. The visuals were great, but at times, overpowering and inappropriate or irrelevant to the scene. I didn't think the mouth and face animation was needed in this case, and the animation does need work. I see this film like Picturesque. The viewer falls into a trance with the stunning visual work and effects, but they become too entranced with the visuals to notice the weak story or poor voice acting/scripting, for you it was voice acting. Not a bad first film, don't worry, but there is room for improvement.

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Re: The Button

It was good.  Great voice actors and special effects but the poor animation and story dragged it down a bit.  A very good job all around I think, you have a future in special effects for sure.  It's just the story that needed work.

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Re: The Button

I think you should make a directors cut of the movie, making it longer, so that the story can have more time to be told, instead of being condensed down to 15 min.

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Re: The Button

Very well animating and i like the animated faces!

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Re: The Button

we need to know how you did that lip sync, it was spot on!

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Re: The Button

Pritchard Studios wrote:

...Too many brickfilms are just meaningless...

Tobias wrote:

Ehm...I do not slightly think you're right in that one.

...did not (even?) slightly...

KinzCove wrote:

I think he's correct.

(BTW Kinz, who is "he" supposed to be?

Coyote Creek Films wrote:

If the animator had fun making a brickfilm, it had some point.
Even if it is pointless to anyone else.

I didn't say pointless, I said meaningless.



But maybe I should explain what I meant by that.
I meant that many brickfilms do not have a lesson or message. They are usually just silly, short films that are made for a few laughs, and then you forget about them. And though that isn't really a bad thing, it is nice to see a film with a moral truth contained in it. That, and as a Christian I see way to few films that have anything to do with the Bible.

Now don't get me wrong here, I do enjoy films that are funny and entertaining, (Who doesn't like Zombie: Genesis?) But like I said before:

I really liked the Biblical undertone, too many brickfilms are just meaningless, but this had a lesson to teach.

So, did I clear up some things, or is it still about as clear as mud? mini/tongue

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Pritchard Studios's Website

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Re: The Button

Interesting. I'm impressed with your work, but I see much room for improvement as well.

The danger with allegory, in my opinion, is that it's hard to create a perfect metaphor that accurately encompasses whatever it is you're trying to turn into a story. As someone deeply familiar with the theological basis for the film, I found it a bit predictable and a bit ill-fitting at times. I also was struck by the fact that it would be very hard to understand the message/story if it were not for this familiarity.

The production aspects showed promising skill, but a need for development. The voice acting was inconsistent - some voices were done adequately, while others were a bit lacking. The visual elements of the film were enjoyable aside from a few particularly bad masking jobs.

The cinematography was probably the best feature here. The framing was nice and the lighting, while not always as subtle as it should be, was fairly polished. The animation was mostly decent, though there were too many rough patches.

So, to recap, despite the somewhat prevalent flaws, I thought there was a lot of promise in the skills you've displayed. Keep working at it - I'm interested to see what you'll produce in the future.

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