artistunknown's movie Reviews on Newgrounds

[Addicktion]

This was fun for a quick laugh.

This was hilarious, mostly because it's pretty unexpected. The pacing is pretty good.; everything starts out slow as if it were a normal day and then the speed increases dramatically as the twist comes in and it really helps convey the joke. Although it's fun for a short gag, that's really all it is, a short gag. I can agree with Haggard, that I would have liked if it were a bit longer and went into a bit more detail as to why he's always drawing penises, but then it would get a bit more story driven and I'm not really sure if a dick joke could work that well stretched out, heh.

Art and animation were pretty good. The drawings were a bit simplistic and crude looking but I think that helped with the overall feel. That uh... dick was pretty well drawn, lol. The animation itself was all right but the lipsync was really good, so good job with that.

Audio was also good. The audio quality was pretty decent and the voice acting was good and seemed fitting. Then when the music kicks in when the guy realizes what he's done, that was perfectly handled and fit really well, so overall well done.

I liked this. It was pretty decent on the presentation side but really well executed humor-wise. Some smoother animation would be nice, but it's all right where it is.

[Review Request Club]

Markface responds:

Cheers big ears.

[Expiration Hat]

First of all, that play button is a bit small :p I feel like the text and preloader could be moved up a bit so there isn't so much space at the top of the loading screen, and the preloader could be made a bit bigger, adding to the symmetry. That's just a little nitpick though.

On to actual important stuff, the art style is pretty neat. It could use some refinement but it's looking good. The animation is decent. It has nice key poses, but the inbetweens seem a bit lacking. There seems to be only easing and smears but no actual inbetweens. The lipsync was pretty good as well. I liked the abstract backgrounds and they seemed to fit with the animation well, however the background really should have changed every time the camera's view changed. At some points the background did change, but most of the time a character would be on screen and then it would switch to another character yet the background would remain the same. It's a bit distracting to look at. Overall, there's some flaws, but the art and animation is fun to look at and shows you know a bit more than the basics, now it's just time for refinement.

Audio was a pretty mixed part for me. The voices did sound fine and had a bit of variety to them, but the actual audio quality wasn't the best. There was even a few times when the audio clipped. Not only does it sound bad and may even hurt some people's ears, but bad audio does ruin the immersion of the cartoon. Not that the audio was bad, but it wasn't good enough. Either try to get a better mic, if it was a problem with a mic, or play with the audio export settings in flash 'cause flash has some really bad default audio settings.

As for writing, it was kinda funny in spots, but overall it was a bit too random for my taste. I'm not a fan of random humor but eh, opinions ;3

Overall, a fun little short. Still needs a bit of work in everything, but was decent, kinda funny, and shows you have potential. Oh yeah, something I forgot to mention earlier, it was a bit short. Yes, it's best to keep comedy short so things don't drag on, but giving some time to set up a joke and let the audience react to it is necessary. So try to find a good balance between that. It's not really something that's going to be concrete perfect, because again, opinions, but eh, still seems like most people on Newgrounds prefer cartoons that are at least a minute. I think I may have started rambling a bit in this, but hopefully something helpful came from it! Good luck with your future animations, I'm sure you'll get a decent following someday!

gilfgavin responds:

Thanks i will take all of those thing into account

[LOTOE Trailer]

This seems interesting.

While this was a nice parody trailer and the comedy that was there was fun, personally I'd prefer if you were to do a more dark and serious thing.

As for this trailer itself, it was decent. Like I already said, the humor was good. That vibrator joke made me chuckle but was predictable. The models and scenery looked nice, though the animation looks really awkward. I'm not sure how it would be fixed since I don't know a lot about 3D animation, but some movements look robotic and others just look... well I'm not sure how they look but it feels awkward. The lip movements also didn't look too convincing.

I had mixed feelings about the voice acting. There was something about the female voice actors and how they sounded that just didn't sound right to me. It's not that distracting though.

Either way, I'd watch it, and I say go for it. I'd just prefer a more serious approach :p

[League of Legends Parody]

First of all, your description doesn't make a lot of sense. You contacted the animators, not the other way around. Think you're cool saying they're "stupid asses" because they didn't want to help you make some stupid idea for you FOR FREE? You offered no proof that you were professional or new what you were doing. Their not wanting to help you is completely understandable. I would complain more about this whole situation, but that's not what the review space is for.

So, this is the result of you trying to make the thing, eh? How long did this take, a few minutes? Seriously, that's not meant to be an insult, there's nothing here. There's an ugly thing that looks like a poor trace of a character from the game, then a pretty pixely bitmap of the league logo, and then another character and then it just loops. There's no background, no animation aside from some shitty tweens, and nothing of substance to be found. It looks like there was absolutely no effort put into this. There are no redeeming qualities.

How the fuck did this pass judgement?!

[Remembered - Jordan Allen]

Man, it's a shame this has gone under the radar with a score of less than 3, 'cause it's really good. Not the best but good.

The story was great, for both the video and the song. Everything flowed nicely and seemed very thought out. This had good direction too and was a well put together music video.

Art and animation were all right. The animation was pretty good and there was a lot of movement. The art could use some work though. The majority of drawings were a bit simplistic and the inconsistent line quality and thickness didn't really look all that good. Practice makes perfect though, and from the looks of it, you have the potential and the want to be something better so with time I'm sure you can improve.

The audio was great. Since this is a music video, clearly the only audio present was the song, and what a song it was. I've already talked about the story of it and the lyrics were great too. Everything about it sounded great and I can definitely see the artist being big some day, so good job to both of you!

Overall this was good. Art could use some work but you've shown you can tell a coherent story accompanied by some decent visuals. The animation was good so I'm sure with a more appealing art style this could be amazing. I look forward to your future works, to see how you improve!

Jaybabywolf responds:

Really awesome review, thank you! I've really been working on my art style the past few months and learning from this animation and what could be better. Hopefully releasing something next week for the NATA which is looking a lot better aesthetically, and I'll definitely be sure to pass on the praise to my cousin too :) cannot thank you enough for the praise though, really means a lot!

[I Like Vegetables]

I'd like to start off by saying it's nice to see a flash that has a fullscreen button. It's not often you see that and it's really a nice feature :3.

As far as art and animation goes, this was pretty top-notch. The frame by frame animation was really nice, though the characters were drawn rather simplistically. There were some detailed backgrounds, but a lot of simple ones too. Really nice choice of colors, it made this interesting to look at. The part where the camera moved in a pseudo-3D way when they were by the brick wall looked a bit awkward. This tends to happen when you try to tween 3D camera movements. It's usually best to animate 3D shots frame by frame, even if it is a huge pain. It will end up looking more natural in the long run. This could use some minor tweaks in the art department, but overall it's really good.

The pacing and direction in this felt good, aside from one or two shots staying on screen for a little longer than felt necessary, mainly the conveyor belt shots, but that's honestly a minor nitpick. There was a wide variety of angles and aside from a few instances, the shot progression felt natural and, again, made this really interesting to look at.

The song was interesting; a bit weird but it got a chuckle out of me, and your animation really fit with the music, so this is a pretty effective music video.

There really isn't much I can say about this. It worked well as a music video, was mildly entertaining and the animation was great. There's always room for improvement though. I hope this review was helpful to you, and good luck with your future submissions!

[Review Request Club]

Yusuf responds:

Yeah, I drew the characters like this because it is generally easier for me to animate, and I probably wouldn't have been able to pull off half the stuff I did.
Frame-by-frame on the brick wall shot? I guess I could experiment with that
As for the conveyor belt shot being long - well I'm just kind of lazy and didn't feel like animating something new :P
Thanks!

[The Girl in The Sky]

Well this was fun, definitely got more out of this than I was expecting, and congrats on making a lengthy animation, 5 and a half minutes is quite a feat!

The writing was pretty good. It was a fun story, though it didn't seem to flow well, that's probably a result from switching from the real world to a dream world. The transitions from reality to dream were nicely executed, but what happened within each seemed a bit too drastic of a change. I can understand a lot of time passing in the real world while the dream world stays the same, but it seemed like things happened way too fast in the dream. The story also seemed a bit unresolved, even with that bit at the end. I just feel like there could have been more to it. Who knows though, perhaps now there's room for a sequel? ;3

A lot of the animation was really awkward to look at, especially the guy's walk cycle. Even so, the animation was pretty good overall. Character art was simplistic but it had a charm to it, though the drawings could have been better. There seemed to be inconsistencies in line quality. The backgrounds were really nice to look at. The character expressions were also great. I enjoyed the cameos from other Newgrounds characters in detention. Animation was all right overall, but it could really use refinement.

Audio was handled nicely. The music was really fitting and it was handled very well. There were nice transitions between the musical pieces. Sound quality for the most part was nice, though some sound effects didn't sound too good. I felt that this being mostly silent with no dialog was perfect. Show don't tell is an important rule of storytelling and I think it was executed perfectly here.

Overall this was a nicely done piece. it has everything it needs to be a 5 star submission, but you just need to put a bit more work in the art department and everything will be golden. I really did enjoy this and I look forward to seeing your future submissions and how you progress!

IntoEkinzone responds:

Thank you so much for going out of your way to critique it! you didn't have to do it, but I'm really glad you did. You're right about the pacing and some of the awkward animation. Hopefully I'll improve next time around. Seriously thank you so much, and I'm glad you enjoyed it.

[UMoN- Pandas]

The blurry image in the beginning was a bit of a turnoff, but when it zoomed out to the picture of the panda, it was all right. A pretty decent image, the panda and the grass are probably the best parts of it, though the rest could use some work, especially the bamboo, it looks messy and flat.

The voice was all right, I feel like if there was more to be explained the voice could have been funnier.

There really wasn't a lot to this, and it probably could have been better with more. It was just one image with some slight modifications, and barely any animation. Not everything needs stellar animation to be great, so again, if this were longer it would probably be a lot better. I did get a chuckle out of it.

[Review Request Club]

[Willie D Intro]

It's a decent intro, the text seems to be paced well, but I think the intro should be either clips from multiple episodes (instead of just Hot Stuff as it is here) or it should be completely new animation, made specifically for the intro.

Since the intro is pretty much nothing but reused clips from "Hot Stuff" I can't really say anything about the intro itself. The animation is decent though, you just need some more inbetweens to smooth it out and make it look more natural.

As for the negative aspects, I'm not too fond of the choice of music, but eh, that's just me and it probably is fitting for the type of show Willie D will turn out to be. The audio from "Hot Stuff" being in the background was a bit distracting though, especially the laughtrack. You should probably just have the music be the only audio in the intro.

I'm sure an actual video with a story will be a lot better though. This was a nice, quick little intro.

[AV: The Plague Saga pt 1]

Looking back, this is fun and doesn't seem to be as much of a rehash as I originally thought. I think it can easily fit with the previously-going story in AV and not feel like a rehash. When actually looking at this for critique, and not to watch, it does seem a bit short. Anyways, on to the actual review.

The writing was fun, there was a lot of nice jokes involving all of the characters. King William is still his old self, not really caring until it involves him. Your shot direction has definitely improved, especially with your transitions, like those establishing shots in the beginning. The pacing felt good overall, but while those little "retro" bits with them traveling across the screen and the text explaining what's about to happen seemed to detract from the overall pacing. Text disrupting the flow isn't needed since in the scenes that follow we could clearly tell what we were seeing. They were cute and charming little sequences, but from a direction standpoint they don't work. The intro however, worked well and did a great job of conveying the mood. The ending was also humorous, albeit a bit cliche but it does give some good foreshadowing to what's to come. The credits were also nice with the bonus images and the gags they contained. Overall nicely directed, but there's still room for improvement.

Art and animation were about the same as other episodes, but with slight improvement. There was a little bit more fbf on some characters like King William in the beginning, and there was even actual lipsync as opposed to mouth loops. You still relied heavily on symbol animation though and some art was more simplistic than others. Still though, that's the AV style so it probably wouldn't be good to drastically change it. One instance of jarring difference in art quality was in the intro where you have some nicely detailed images followed by some less detailed images and it was kind of distracting. I feel like a less simple font would have worked better for it as well. There was also a nice amount of visual gags, with pretty much everything Rory doing being hilarious. Overall, slight improvement in visuals, but what was there works.

The music fit well, though the overuse of 3rd party music is a bit of a shame. Still fitting though. The voice acting has improved for all characters, they spoke clearly and put emotion in it. At some points it seemed like there was some slight background nose for some lines or something went wrong with the recording because there was a lesser quality to them. Overall the music was fitting but I would use less 3rd party stuff. The voice actors did really good though so there really isn't a lot more improvement needed.

Overall, this was good. Not as good as some other AV episodes but definitely a good start to a Saga in the AV story that will hopefully be amazing. There was a lot of improvement, but I still felt some bits could have been done better. It was fun though, and I'm certainly looking forward to the next part.

[Review Request Club]

MistyE responds:

Thanks for the review. I did consider cutting out some of the transitional sequences, though I found that they didn't flow as smoothly as they did with them. I appreciate the in-depth critique.