As I mentioned in my last post I have been working at Clemengers, and it has been rather exhausting. I was jumping from flash banners to website designs, mobile app layouts and back again. Its always good to experience new things while freelancing, but because the work place is a little ways from here, waking up early and getting home late can take its toll. I finished my contract there yesterday but they assure me that I will be back during the coming weeks, so at least I know I have more work on the way.
Since I got today off work I decided it was time to grab myself that new Macbook for freelancing, so I did. Nothing crazy, just a standard 13 inch, with an extra 4gb ram to push it up to 8gb. Also since somebody had ordered in a custom one with a 750gb HDD and then decided once they saw the small screens that they didn't want it (did they really not know that 13' isn't as big as 15'?) they sold it to me at the same price as a standard model just so it wasn't sitting around. Currently installing the master suite so Im ready to work when the work comes in. I was originally going to buy a small bamboo to go with it but i've been told a bamboo design refresh isn't far off so I decided to put getting it off until I know whats happening for sure.
Also since I had the day off I started work on this months Loopdeloop. The months theme is Spooky, and I decided that I want to pay tribute to one of my favourite animation sequences of all time. Not that you will be able to guess what it is from these two screens below.
Since I don't have any other real animation news this week I thought I would go back in time to my very first flash cartoon (to hit the internet at least). Welcome to the year 2004 and a little film called "I Am Gerkinman" (Worth noting is that the original version was from early 2003 and has been lost to the sands of time, this is a slightly updated version made just for newgrounds.)
The cartoon was not my first attempt at flash animation, but It was my first project created in Flash 5 (I had been using Flash 4 up until that point and had no access to the internet). It was written and animated for a visual arts assignment. And was for the most part, little more, for the first half anyway, badly rotoscoped animation from The Animatrix.
It told the story of Gerkinman, the sole survivor in a country town after what appeared to be robots went wild and wiped out humanity. As stated earlier, the first part of the animation was mostly badly traced video from the film The Animatrix. While its certainly not something I am proud of looking back on, I do find it interesting that despite the fact the intro is so frame by frame animation heavy, that I didn't go back to doing traditional animation for several years after this flash.
Of course that could also have a lot to do with the fact that it was all done with a mouse, not the most practical tool for doing frame by frame animation. It also featured a bizarre mix of the line tool and paint brush tool with no consistency. Of course I can put that down to being self taught and really having no idea what looked good or bad, at the time I was too blown away just by the fact I was making images move on the screen.
Something I do admire a little going back to it now is the fact that I had put it lighting effects, something that I do currently forget to add in from time to time. This next clip contains R2-D2, I think I had put him into the shot because the video I was tracing was so pixelated I couldn't make out what the robot looked like. Most people thought it was just a funny pop culture reference.
Something else thats funny about this sequence is that it contains a lot of colours that I heavily rely on now in my work, something I didn't even realise until I went back and watched this animation today. I cant quite remember what the colours where like in the original Animatrix short, maybe they were the same.
The sequence also featured music by System of a Down, which I admit to liking in high school. I believe before I made this animation I had made another one using another of there songs "Toxicity". Quite often when I go back to these old animations the most jarring things aren't how bad the animation and character design is, but rather the music.
And thus ended the mostly rotoscope ending of the intro sequence of "I Am Gerkinman". As we see the last of humanity loose there struggles against the ever dangerous line tool. Watching this clip below, I dont know why the guy didn't just side step whatever that thing is. Ah well.
So now all the fighting is finished we finally get introduced to our hero. Looking sad over what is supposed to represent the destruction of mankind but is more like a blue and green mess.
He doesn't stay sad long tho, because he is an idiot, which is the one trait that has stayed consistent throughout his seven year existence. Something he did use to do a lot was make his own sound effects over the top of what he was doing. When I saw Clouds with a Chance of Meatballs (great movie by the way) and noticed Flint Lockwood running around making his own sounds I couldn't help but giggle and think back to this flash cartoon. It also is a great display of why you shouldn't tween people dancing.
Next we are introduced to another new character, and one that has sadly been neglected over more recent years. His name is Spactafunk and he is a psychic seamonkey from the future. He originally looked much like an ape but for these flash cartoons I used Mewtwo from pokemon as a major design influence.
We are also introduced to a Probe Droid. Something that just floats around and scouts I suppose. Looking back at it now its probably the least horrible looking thing in the whole cartoon. I still find the idea of a robot floating around with a sad smiley on its chest a little amusing.
Of course he finds Spactafunk and this an epic battle is begun. Turns out the probe is packing heat, and lots of it. The idea of small characters with large amounts of weapons is a comedy staple and a concept I still find entertaining. Its a shame the timing on this take of it is so off and the direction is so flat.
Spactafunk isn't having any of that tho, and being psychic he does some stuff that only a psychic seamonkey can do. Strangely this shot is the only one after the intro sequence that contains anything that remotely resembles camera work. It was also supposed to be a reference to the general idea of Dragon Ball Z but looking back at it now I dont think it was conveyed very well.
So after this little display of powers Gerkinman demands to know who Spactafunk is and makes a strange expression.
And then Spactafunk explains that he is indeed a psychic seamonkey from the future. This sequence also had a bunch of horrible visual gags, such as a gnome coming up in the corner with a "Hi Mum" sign to a fish and space ship flying past in the background. They are certainly a type of joke that I am glad I grew out of.
All of these bad visual gags send Gerkinman into a frenzy. Also worth noting is that despite the fact the first half of the film is full of sound effects and music, the second half has a very sparse audio landscape. So maybe thats why he looks so upset.
And then we are introduced to Louis, a purple penguin and also Spactafunks side kick, as you probably guessed he too is from the future.
One thing that did make Louis different to a lot of my characters at the time was that he didn't speak english, I basically made a bunch of horrible bird sounds and and then put subtitles on the screen. Since these characters could not speak his language they too read the subtitles in order to know what was going on. This is one of the third wall jokes that I think still sort of holds up, and its something I might even return to in the future. Subtitles... handy.
And now that all 3 of these to be heros are together, they go to find the key to the future, or story, or something. Turns out that key is a chick, it is stated in dialogue but its horribly showed in a visual sense in the shot below. Really? What the hell am I looking at?
And that conclude the first Gerkinman episode. Its always a little strange going back to look at old animations or other projects. I currently have 78 Newgrounds submissions, and while I doubt I will do a retrospective on each of them, I think I might go through all the significant ones. Anyway, if your still reading, hope you found this sort of insightful and see you next time. And if you want to watch this bizarre piece of my animation history, then click down here!
JUST CLICK IT!
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