Okay, here's my view.
The Good:The animation was decent. I found that for a short test the animation met my standards and was smooth enough. The effects were also decent. I am not experienced in special effects, but as a viewer, I found the effects to look suitable. The lightning scene with the skeleton was pulled of nicely, in my opinion. The music and sound effects were also of good selection. I also found your use of camera angles interesting.
The Bad:There was light flicker. Not extreme like in some really bad cases, but a noticeable amount. I myself am not free of it, but it needs to go to make the film quality not look cheap. At times, the effects did look fake. This was mostly with the lightsabers, which at times looked flat and 2D. Although it was just a test, it would have been nice to have seen you mask the parts that needed masking. Although most of your camera angles were good, I found there were times when the camera seemed far from the action when it need not be. Oh, and the camera seemed to have been bumped often.
Advice: Even though it is a test, you should try to do your best for it, including masking the scenes you didn't mask, for example. Test are for practising and improving, so give them your best shot. Also try to give you camera a strong stand where a slight nudge will not make it change position, even slightly. Such 'vibrations' in the film aren't nice to see when unintended. I'm afraid I can't give you advice for effects, since I am not experienced in the stuff myself. But I can tell you they need to be improved. Look back at my point on the lightsabers. And try to make your title screen shorter. I found it dragged on a bit longer then I felt it needed to be on screen.
I'm not going to judge the set since it was a test on effects (I believe). But again, since it was a test, please put it in the 'WIP and tests' form, not in the' release' form.
Last point. Every film has pros and cons. Sometimes the cons will outweigh the pros, and people often are not afraid to point that out. However, understand what they don't like, so you know just what to improve on. I found it a rather decent test, but it can be improved.
There are greats that have started with stuff much worse than this.
Last edited by D.J.M. (February 1, 2012 (06:53am))
You can do anything, just have fun while doing it.