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ANIMATION WORLD MAGAZINE - ISSUE 5.05 - AUGUST 2000

Getting Started On-Line (continued from page 1) George Liquor was one of the first Flash toons to hit the Net. © Spumco. To avoid such curses as dropped frames or pauses in the animation, our general rule of thumb was to animate the graphic on the stage, frame by frame. This proved to be effective but very tedious in situations where the character made a lot of head movements or when simple changes needed to be made. Sure we were getting a highly accurate lip sync, but it was a pain to implement and edit. By playing around with making the mouth shapes into a separate movie clip, we found we were able to do the sync in a separate file away from the animated character. Instead of having to manipulate different shapes on the timeline, the correct sequence of shapes is saved as a graphic element that is simply placed on the character's head. This freed up our ability to edit the character on the fly without worrying about the effect it would have on the already completed lip sync. Some Help Having trouble getting the hang of certain techniques? There are a good number of sites available to you that have step by step tutorials as well as downloadable Flash files for you to dissect. Utilizing as many different sources of instruction and inspiration is the best way to build your skills and stay ahead of all the competition out there. A few include: For tutorials and sample files: http://www.Flashzone.com/ http://www.shockfusion.com/ http://www.Flashkit.com/ A couple of personal sites I like to visit for ideas include: The Secret Garden of Mutabor http://www.yenz.com/menue/garden/intro.html A designer's personal site that makes use of cleaver interfaces and a unique story that relies on searching for clues in order to reach the end. Sarbakan http://www.sarbakan.com/ An on-line entertainment company whose strong visuals and music make for addictive and involving on-line interactivity. The on-line demos of Arcane, a gothic mystery, and Snoozeleberg are both very well made Flash applications that require complete user input to move not just the actions of the characters but the stories that unfold around them. Chaman On-line http://www.chman.com/ A European Flash site for animation and entertainment. It appears they intend to use the site to not only promote their own abilities but to use their projects to promote musical artist and games. A good variety of material. Mono*crafts http://www.yugop.com/ A Japanese design site dedicated to "exploring new forms of expression in Networked situations." Fascinating, off beat, interface designs. Kwesi Ako Kennedy works with animation and character design for AtomFilms out of AtomStudio. Prior to working at Atom, he worked as a freelance digital artist for Pixelwave Corporation. Kwesi attended Howard University and graduated with a degree in Fine Arts. Immediately after Howard University, Kwesi attended the University of North Carolina where he joined the Industrial Design program. Before becoming a senior animator at AtomFilms, James Dalby spent a year-and-a-half as the graphics manager for the Highlander, a student newspaper at the University of California, Riverside. He attended two years of study at UCR, but gave it up to focus his attention on work. Soon after, James spent most of his time as a freelance Flash animator for various Web sites, as well as a full-time animator at Pixelwave Corporation.

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