The Round Stable

(?) · by **Isaak** (?) » Fri Sep 23, 2011 7:45 pm

(With thanks to kefkafloyd)

[Snazzy header image goes here]

Updated 10-09-12

Introductions
Right! ... err... hold on, let me just move that thing over there... just a sec... aaaaand... Perfect!
I think.

Welcome to a journey, of sorts, into video editing, motion graphics, filmmaking and ponies!
A couple of months ago I embarked on an adventure with the release of Race Like Rainbow Dash, with the goal of really getting to know the tools at my disposal and learn the wonderful art of filmmaking.
This led to the creation of the Mane Cast series which has over time become this playground where I experiment with pacing, sound, composition, colour and whatnot. So far all that playing has led to four videos. I’ve done more, but the Mane Cast has been my focus, with every video bringing something new to the table.

This is a thread where I share lessons learned, offer insight and create a platform where you’ll be able to give valuable feedback I can put into my work and workflow. This thread isn’t exclusive to the Mane Cast series though as I’ll use it to post updates on videos in the far away and mysterious future!

Anyhow, let’s get to it!

Current Project(s)
Headphone Pony

Dev Blog

Shine Like Rarity
Beginnings & Music
Creating the Opening Sequence
Pacing

Strive Like Applejack
Killing Your Apples
Plant Our Tiny Seeds (and starting anew)
Behind the Scenes Livestream/Q&A

Click here to view video.

Headphone Pony

Announcement
High Level Scripting

Tutorials and Other Entries
After Effects - The Roto Brush
Ideas and How to Catch Them
Language in the Land of Film

Me on the Web
Youtube
Twitter
Livestream

Tools of the Trade (so far)

Videonerdisms

Things I’ve learned/improved on

Things I’d love to learn/am learning

Things I'm grateful for and humbled by

Finished Projects

Pinkie Pie Brings the Noise

My Little Expendables

The mAne-Team

Race Like Rainbow Dash

Play Like Pinkie Pie

Learn Like Twilight Sparkle

Love Like Fluttershy

Shine Like Rarity

Strive Like Applejack

-----

Alright, let’s get this show on the road and see what happens. It's become this absolutely insane thing I've yet to fully grasp, but I’m just gonna go for Good, that’s the plan.
Enjoy the sights and sounds.

Here we go.

(?) · by **Isaak** (?) » Fri Sep 23, 2011 7:46 pm

Shine Like Rarity Entry #1: Beginnings

Announcing Shine Like Rarity the ‘devblog’, of sorts. Shine Like Rarity (SLR) is the fifth in the series of the Mane Cast trailer series and is I estimate around a third along the way to completion. Though my estimates are almost wrong in hindsight, so take that however you like.

A bit of background info to start things off: Love Like Fluttershy was for a long time to be the last of the trailers, I had pretty much every one conceptualized with appropriate music chosen and the like. Shine Like Rarity was to be the fourth in line, though after lessons learned discussing Learn Like Twilight in the videocomments I found that the song I had chosen for SLR was wholly unfitting, so I had to rework it.
Given how Love Like Fluttershy was pretty straightforward I opted to make that instead which turned out to be the shortest time I’d spend on a video and was a great rebound to boot.

SLR was pushed way back to the drawing board and after Love I started to scout for appropriate music. Interesting note: after Love I got several messages of people suggesting songs which greatly helped in forming a mental soundscape. Also interesting, the title itself was suggested by a youtube commenter. Its working title was ‘Create Like Rarity’, which doesn’t quite roll of the tongue that easily...

Anyhow, the search for music was on! After scouring the web, extensive listening sessions I had decided on four songs, three of which didn’t make the final cut. SLR is very much a video where my creative starting point was the music, unlike the previous installments which bounced off character dialogue or imagery.
For testing purposes I imported them into Vegas and cut them to see if I could create a nice arc building up to a climax and to visualize a couple of ideas I had.

These three songs were:

Hyper Go Go - High (Hybrid Remix)

Click here to view video.

Direct Link

I was specifically interested in the bit after 05:23, with some awesome, electronic piano keys sweeping back and forth joined by a broken beat. Also intriguing was the singing, which would open the door for kinetic typography (remember this, this is important).
I felt though that the song didn’t quite reach a fitting climax, it doesn’t really offer anything to build up to visually and deconstructs itself without much fanfare.

This is Rarity, she NEEDS fanfare.

Atlantic Connection - 1979

Click here to view video.

Direct Link

was another choice and was a song which came to my attention during Love Like Fluttershy’s production. It’s catchy, groovy, jazzy, energetic and makes me say “classy”. The build-up from 03:00 is great and I had imagined big party with DJ-Pon3 spinning and ‘Rarity’s best moments’ being shown on a big screen in the background. Rarity would take center stage, coming out of the shadows as the build reached a climax etcetera, etcetera. Also, the ‘record stop’ from earlier in the song would provide a nice way to show a comedic side of Rarity.

Like the first song though, after the build-up it doesn’t quite go any further. It’s a great song, but it’s more a smooth dancefloor roller you can nod your head to, not quite what I was looking for. Continue then, I would.

Plump DJs - Torque of the Devil

Click here to view video.

Direct Link

Soundwise it was on the mark. It has this classy club sense, without becoming (too) cheesy and provides some great hooks to latch onto visually.
Its lyrics though: “Yeah... you’re killing me!” That and ponies?

N... o.

The right song choice came when I had a bathroom epiphany: there was one song I listened to quite a lot a couple of months ago and its chords came to mind when thinking about choice #1.
I really liked the idea of visualizing piano keys coupled with text and making a Play Like Pinkie Pie 2.0 of sorts. Thus I rediscovered

Ellie Goulding - Starry Eyed (Russ Chimes remix)

Click here to view video.

Direct Link

The juicy part starts at 02:16. It has everything: the appropriate lyrics, the classic sound of the piano, the perfect build from 03:00 onward before it all goes

EVERYBODY'S STARRY EYED

and

WHAM! Dun-dun-dun dun-dun-dun dun-dun-dun!!!

after some careful editing I ended up with a 01:30 song quite fitting for Lady Rarity. Thus editing would commence!

Continued in part deux with a look at what I have so far and me actually showing something, to be posted... err... whenever!

(?) · by **Artificer** (?) » Fri Sep 23, 2011 7:50 pm

Will watch this thread in the future. Definitely looks interesting. Best of luck, Isaak.

(?) · by **DashyBrownies** (?) » Sat Sep 24, 2011 4:13 am

That's great.

I started to do a PMV a while ago whilst season 1 was still airing, learnt a lot by just jumping in, but then struggled and, erm, got distracted by customizing instead and eventually forgot about it.

Will watch this closely for inspiration and direction :flutterdear:

(?) · by **reidransom** (?) » Sat Sep 24, 2011 6:14 am

I made a few videos, but didn't know what I was doing, so the first 2 didn't look so great. The last sort of half one I started was looking OK, but then my trial of premiere pro ran out and I didn't want to crack it since all my other Adobe stuff is legit and I wasn't sure if it would mess with that. Anyhow, gonna read through your stuff, cus I kinda want to make another.

(?) · by **Isaak** (?) » Sat Sep 24, 2011 10:03 pm

Thanks you guys

Creating the Opening Sequence
(note: these posts are me playing catch-up to my current work, they’re actually about things which are a few weeks old. Current progress will be posted in dev blog #3...I think)

(Also, may be screen heavy)

With the right music for the project cut and ready I set out to fill in the blanks. This means listening to the song, a lot, and building an arc. For a couple of days I jotted down notes in my pocket sized notebook, working out ideas for specific parts.

From the start I knew I wanted to try out a couple of things: kinetic typography and rotobrushing in After Effects I also wanted to build upon Love Like Fluttershy’s (LLF) use of silhouettes & character colours but create something more slick, perhaps minimalistic, yet timeless. I felt Love’s opening was too... I’m not sure what the word is... ‘loose’? Too loosely defined?

Hmm...

Anyway, with that in mind I set out!

The song’s dominant instrument is the disco-esque piano, so at first I wanted to visualize that using actual piano keys. so I downloaded a CC licensed piano photo from Flickr, edited, cropped and ended up with this image.

I threw each separate key in Vegas but quickly ran into a few things.

1) The image is photorealistic and therefore clashes with the show’s artstyle. It also implies that the piano would be playing the right notes and as I can’t read notes nor play the piano...
2) There were too many keys in the image for too few notes being played (I know that much), meaning a couple of keys would not be used to begin with.
3) The image is very static, it’s “piano keys” and the audience would expect them to behave like piano keys. I wouldn’t be able to throw the keys around and make them do crazy things. If I wanted to combine this with kinetic typography I needed something I could play with.

Basically the idea itself was good, I just needed a better execution.
So, I fired up Photoshop and started to make my own visual identity, based on the character’s colour scheme and lessons learned from LLF.
I started with something basic.

The background started out as plain ‘Rarity white’ but I quickly added some depth with vignetting, a trick learned from Learn Like Twilight.
I struggled a bit trying to come up with a way to introduce the video’s elements. This wasn’t helped by me not being really sure what those elements were going to be... What were going to be the dominant shapes? How would these move across the screen? What kind of typeface?
Colours were more or less a given and I was going for a look similar to Play and Love, but how everything would interact and move across the screen...

The first breakthrough came when I tried using the MLP logo with some early, rectangular shapes, as I had been pretty much for the entire series. Quickly though I found the logo to clash with the rest of the style.
The logo is rounded, almost text-bubble-y and uses a cartoony font while the rectangles were... rectangles. It didn’t quite fit with the minimalist approach I had in mind. I tried changing the logo’s colours, but that only made it boring.
I want to tell my visual story in a coherent way and trying to combine the logo with what I had in mind wouldn’t satisfy that need.

I therefore liberated myself from this constraint and for the first time in the series, went on to completely create my own style. After half a dozen iterations I ended up with something I really liked.

(note: not 23,976 fps, gif is closer to... 1 frame per decade (at most))

As a rule the Mane Cast Trailers need to include the title of the show, the pony’s cutiemark and the pony’s name. Two of those are met in the first second.
It also establishes the forthcoming look and feel of the video, familiarizing the viewer with the typeface (sans serif), the words flying in and out of the frame to the music and the use of images.
The stripes topping it off the were the last addition which helped define the first 15 seconds, which look a little something like this:

Instead of a piano key I have a Rarity purple rectangle fading in and out and sliding across the screen to the piano. Along with that Rarity’s silhouette fades to new ones as well, implying motion.

To keep track of the piano and myself sane I used a little trick to ensure timing each element was spot on:

It’s the grayed out track in the middle of my ginormous layer stack. In it are clips of text with numbers on them, numbers telling me where the piano is visually. 1 is to the left, 2 left-center, etcetera.
I then copy pasted the different sequences across the first 45 seconds and created a guide I could animate objects to in Vegas.

Handy, as things turn pretty crazy in the opening sequence:

I could go even more in-depth, but I think I'll just leave that to your curiosity

Onwards!

(?) · by **Isaak** (?) » Sun Sep 25, 2011 10:54 am

Alright you guys and gals, I have procured a Livestream! Now you can make me incredibly nervous while I work!

You can find it here and in the updated OP.
I'll be streaming my screen to your beautiful faces later today, or to be precise my evening and the American afternoon-ish. My timezone is GMT+1 (Amsterdam), but I'll announce it here when I start.

Disclaimer: I HAVE NO IDEA WHAT I'M DOING, so things may explode violently after which it's likely they'll explode again some more.

Also coming up, a look at how SLR is paced in devblog form.

(?) · by **ozone** (?) » Sun Sep 25, 2011 3:57 pm

Oh snap, I'll try my best to be there. It'll be interesting to see how you work. I must also steal all your secrets.

And don't worry about things exploding, that's what makes livestreams great. :v:

(?) · by **Isaak** (?) » Sun Sep 25, 2011 6:34 pm

I'm Live! I think....

Is this thing working? It says the channel's offline on my end.

(?) · by **Nissl** (?) » Sun Sep 25, 2011 8:48 pm

It was working for me when I hopped on just as you announced you were closing up shop, although it was stuttering a bit. Enjoying this experiment so far.

(?) · by **Isaak** (?) » Sun Sep 25, 2011 9:02 pm

Thanks Nissl, I had some hiccups early on it seems. I think the stuttering may be me RAM-previewing my project, that eats my CPU.

Thanks to every other viewer, this could well become a weekly weekend thing, maybe more frequent.

(?) · by **adecoy95** (?) » Mon Sep 26, 2011 7:53 pm

This is really cool, i like reading more about your behind the scenes!

I noticed you were trying to line up the piano beats to the music, and i think i have a way for you to do that there is a Red Giant plugin for after effects called SoundKeys. It works pretty much like this. It adds keyframes based on this image here:

(http://i87.photobucket.com/albums/k125/ ... ndkeys.png)

It is pretty simple to use, its not going to line up scenes, but it will line up your effects/keyframes to music. I put this together as a sort of quick and dirty example for you:

http://youtu.be/F-_oL6SX2gY

Its kinda hard to tell what the second soundkey is doing, i probably did not choose a very good effect for it, but you can see it near the end in any case.

(?) · by **Isaak** (?) » Mon Sep 26, 2011 9:16 pm

Hey adecoy, welcome to the forums!

I've played with Soundkeys, though that was before any serious editing shenanigans. I've tried it in conjunction with Trapcode Particular, a particle effects plug-in, to make a visualizer of sorts though that didn't go anywhere.
For this project I went with the completely archaic method I described above, which is basically timing premade assets to the waveform. I'm already done timing the basic assets, now I need to fill the blanks

You don't necessarily need Soundkeys for it though, as this video demonstrates:

Click here to view video.

Renoise & After Effects part 1 (Direct Link). Ignore the Renoise bit there, the good stuff comes when he works his AE magic.

I'm currently working with After Effects, though only to really get a feel for the interface and its possibilities. It's a beast of a thing and I'm only scratching the surface.
After the Mane Cast series I think I'll take an editing sabbatical and learn the shit outta it.

(?) · by **adecoy95** (?) » Mon Sep 26, 2011 10:28 pm

Isaak wrote:Hey adecoy, welcome to the forums!

I've played with Soundkeys, though that was before any serious editing shenanigans. I've tried it in conjunction with Trapcode Particular, a particle effects plug-in, to make a visualizer of sorts though that didn't go anywhere.
For this project I went with the completely archaic method I described above, which is basically timing premade assets to the waveform. I'm already done timing the basic assets, now I need to fill the blanks

You don't necessarily need Soundkeys for it though, as this video demonstrates:

Click here to view video.

Renoise & After Effects part 1 (Direct Link). Ignore the Renoise bit there, the good stuff comes when he works his AE magic.

I'm currently working with After Effects, though only to really get a feel for the interface and its possibilities. It's a beast of a thing and I'm only scratching the surface.
After the Mane Cast series I think I'll take an editing sabbatical and learn the shit outta it.

Thanks, im glad to be here! And your totally right about not needing SoundKeys to do it.

Also, what song did you originally have for this? and why did you decide not to use it? i know you said that you scrapped it after the reception to learn like twilight, but was there another reason?

i would also kinda like to know more about your several day note-taking process, what kind of ideas you threw around would help give me insight on how you decided on your current design.

(?) · by **Isaak** (?) » Tue Sep 27, 2011 6:58 pm

adecoy95 wrote:Also, what song did you originally have for this? and why did you decide not to use it? i know you said that you scrapped it after the reception to learn like twilight, but was there another reason?

That's a secret :3:

(for now)

After Learn I took a good and hard look at my then current music choices and saw that Rarity's choice didn't fit lyrically. It does fit some other things in some particular ways...

i would also kinda like to know more about your several day note-taking process, what kind of ideas you threw around would help give me insight on how you decided on your current design.

I work with what I know and add to that new things and evolve it from there, so I work on this edge where I draw from a pool of existing knowledge from one side and jump into the other and try completely new things.

The biggest influences are the previous Mane Cast Trailers:

The biggest thing I wanted to add to the mix was Kinetic Typography as this was the first (and only) Mane Cast Trailer song with actual singing.
It would also fit nicely with the minimalist look I was slowly forming in my head and it hadn't been done before in Pony related media as far as I knew.

So, the creative sandbox was pretty well defined when I started out: kinetic typography, motion graphics like Play but better, colour scheme based on Rarity's, vignetting, rotoscoping in AE and some other things.
I also had the music itself fit for vid so I could mark sections where I wanted to implement certain things.

I've been saving this for the Pacing post, but now's as a good time as any. This will be back:

(note: only a tiny part of my layers are shown)

Those are the different sections of the project and they're what I started out with as a guideline (I'll explain each section in the pacing post).
They were at first mere notes in my pocket notebook and I later on marked them in Vegas using simple text.

With the colours already defined I just went in and tried things. I had timed the notes so I could use that as a skeleton to which I could attach different parts.
I created basic shapes in Photoshop and animated them in Vegas and along the way I had several ideas:
"Hey, what would happen if I let this slide between these two positions?" "Hmm... the kinetic typography has a blur effect as the words fly in, I wonder how that'll look?"
"You know what would be awesome? If I let this fly in from the side and then have the whole scene zoom in on a whole new thing!"

I treat the tools at my disposal as... Lego you could say, combining them and seeing what happens. Happy accidents, is that the term?
There was a guideline I tried to abide to, which was "new elements push away the old elements" but at times I consciously didn't follow that to maximize awesomeness.

There were times where I would get stuck with where the shapes would come from, how they would exit the frame, where the words would be. If that happened I roughly sketched out a storyboard to prototype new ideas during my daily train ride and tried them out later in the evening.
So through playing with my tools, using my existing knowledge and learning new things I arrived at what I have now.

That's about the story of it, if anything's unclear just ask. I learn from analyzing myself too

(?) · by **Maple Leaf** (?) » Thu Sep 29, 2011 4:51 pm

This has been bothering me for a while.

Isaak wrote:Videonerdisms
720p, 23,976fps, uncompressed AVI, no interleaving

Twenty-three thousand FPS on uncompressed AVI? Wouldn't that implode your average machine?

(?) · by **Concerned Reader** (?) » Thu Sep 29, 2011 4:54 pm

Maple Leaf wrote:This has been bothering me for a while.

Twenty-three thousand FPS on uncompressed AVI? Wouldn't that implode your average machine?

That would be a comma being used for a decimal point. Sony Vegas does this for some reason.

(?) · by **Headless Horse** (?) » Thu Sep 29, 2011 4:55 pm

I've been assuming it's German usage (i.e. it's 23.976 fps).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/24p#23.976p

(?) · by **The great M** (?) » Thu Sep 29, 2011 4:56 pm

German flips the thousand seperator and decimal marks. For example, 1.000.000,5 is one million point five.

E: Actually, some other languages might too. No idea.

(?) · by **Maple Leaf** (?) » Thu Sep 29, 2011 4:59 pm

I had heard myths and fables of cultures doing this but this is the first time I've seen it in practice. Huh.

Although any machine capable of handling 24 thousand FPS uncompressed AVI would have been a sight to see.

(?) · by **Opposing Farce** (?) » Thu Sep 29, 2011 5:00 pm

Maple Leaf wrote:I had heard myths and fables of cultures doing this but this is the first time I've seen it in practice. Huh.

Although any machine capable of handling 24 thousand FPS uncompressed AVI would have been a sight to see.

Not to mention the hard drive. I know they get pretty big nowadays but the filesize on that thing would be pretty massive.

(?) · by **Aramek** (?) » Thu Sep 29, 2011 5:01 pm

I took a few years of German Language back in college and I never knew that.

I learned something today. :v:

(?) · by **The great M** (?) » Thu Sep 29, 2011 5:04 pm

Actually, looks like a lot more countries flip it than I knew:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:DecimalSeparator.svg

:spike101:

(?) · by **Headless Horse** (?) » Thu Sep 29, 2011 5:06 pm

Maple Leaf wrote:I had heard myths and fables of cultures doing this but this is the first time I've seen it in practice. Huh.

Although any machine capable of handling 24 thousand FPS uncompressed AVI would have been a sight to see.

I was thinking it would have made my level of respect for Studio B's animators go up about a thousandfold.

(?) · by **Isaak** (?) » Thu Sep 29, 2011 5:19 pm

It's a a European thing, yes

As for my editing machine (affectionately called Big Rig):

It's not the bleeding edge, but I can run Vegas, After Effects and Photoshop at the same time which reeeaaallly helps my workflow.

24000fps of uncompressed AVI in HD is... err... impossible.

(?) · by **Dong Strongly** (?) » Thu Sep 29, 2011 5:46 pm

Nothing is impossible if you believe.

(?) · by **Isaak** (?) » Thu Sep 29, 2011 10:18 pm

Well, since all of you now know I'm European...

Pacing

(I actually have no idea how that could be related in any way)

Currently I’m leaving the opening for what it is and I’m focusing on the rest of the video. It provides a nice change of pace and is instantly rewarding as now parts of the project materialize before my very eyes.
In particular I’m working on the ‘Face Build’ portion.

“Face Build?”

Face meaning medium to close up shots of the character. Build meaning it builds up to a climax, timed to the music. It isn’t simply a couple of shots randomly put together though: shots alternate between profile, full face and three-quarter views to keep it varied. Since the duration of these shots is very short, expressions and speed of movements need to be similar to avoid messing up the flow of the sequence and creating a jarring experience.

Now while working on this it occurred to me that I’ve mentioned pacing here a couple of times though I hadn’t elaborated on it. Not to you, but also not to myself. It’s something I took for granted and hadn’t consciously thought of, I sort of ‘felt’ my way through each project.
So I started to look at my current video with my analytical goggles.

Full size highly recommended.

Here’s the video itself, within Vegas, with specific sections marked. The curves illustrate how the intensity of both audio and visuals, though they’re more an approximation and not really measurements. It’s all relative.

The music provides a great, natural way of pacing the video and I’m ‘piggybacking’ the visuals on it to further emphasize the intensity of it. That way the two become one and create something more than the sum of their parts.

Let’s look at the individual parts:

0:00-0:02 Rarity Squee
This is the very first part shown to the viewer. It presents Rarity letting out one of her signature noises and shows her being very, very, very happy. It also, hopefully, mirrors the viewer’s reaction upon seeing this video after so much time.

It only lasts for 2 seconds, but in that short time it manages to introduce the character by showing one of her best sides.The Squee she produces sets up the song afterwards.

0:02 - 0:17 Piano Intro
For it needs to be set up, for a some time in the production the video started here and it didn’t have the same impact. Instead of Rarity being overly happy it shows text moving into the frame and forming the opening title. Though good looking, it isn’t really interesting. It just starts out, not giving the viewer anything. Add to this the music ‘simply starting’ and you end up with the dark side of ‘more than the sum of its parts’.
It becomes boring.

The video needs to immediately grab your attention and tell the viewer what it’s about in the first few seconds.
Therefore the Rarity Squee was added to start on a high note, rather than absolutely nothing

What the Piano Intro does do is introduce the video’s visual identity: the colour scheme, the use of silhouettes, kinetic typography, the way graphical assets move. All while the music is intensifying until Ellie Goulding suddenly starts singing

“Everybody’s”

0:17 - 0:47 KInetic Typography
Starry Eyed, Eyed, Eyed...

This is where things start hitting the fan. The viewer has had a mere 15 seconds to get used to the video’s rules and then things just explode. The background has changed colour, more and more text enters the frame, familiar shapes start twisting and turning, flying away in new directions to be followed up by crazy angles, zooming in, out and whizzing past. It keeps going and going and going...

“And My Body GOES”

0:47 - 01:01 Face Build

BOOM! The viewer is pulled into the word “GOES” and we see Rarity opening her eyes, revealing stars. The beat comes into full swing and is emphasized by timing of the various shots to it. We see some of Rarity’s being happy, exhilarated, scared, depressed, annoyed as again the music gears up for the next layer of intensity.

01:01 - 01:07 Face Build+

Added to the beat is a glorious snare crescendo! Instead of being timed to the bassdrum, Rarity is now timed to the snare, so she’s coming by twice as fast. Furthermore they now take up half the screen and alternate between left and right, nearly overwhelming the viewer with sheer brute yet fashionable power.
That is until...

01:07 - 01:09 Break

A drumfill allows the viewer to catch his breath for about two seconds before it all goes...

01:09 - 01:24 Main

UP AND AWAY. It has all been building up to this. Here the beat, piano, bass all come together and the song comes into its own, releasing its full, delicious retro house goodness for a period of 14 seconds.

01:24 - 01:30 “Shine”

Having shown all it needed, the video presents its title and slowly fades out.

The End.

Couple of interesting tidbits I’ve noticed:

I’m not sure what kind of conclusions I can draw from this, though I have the sneaking suspicion I’m applying a couple of rules of thumb here.
And on that note, this post is over!

(Shine Like Rarity @ ~55%)

(?) · by **Glazius** (?) » Fri Sep 30, 2011 12:27 am

Isaak wrote:Couple of interesting tidbits I’ve noticed:

- It’s VERY similar to Play Like Pinkie Pie in the way it builds. Considering I still find that to be my best so far...
- The video could actually be divided in a beginning (0:00), a middle (0:47) and an end (01:24)
- The ‘breather’ is almost exactly ⅔’s of the way
- I’ve come to appreciate every character more and more as I go through each of their scenes.

I’m not sure what kind of conclusions I can draw from this, though I have the sneaking suspicion I’m applying a couple of rules of thumb here.
And on that note, this post is over!

So i heard you like critical analysis of media.

Spike, lull, build, lull, payoff, drop. It's a good pattern.

(?) · by **Isaak** (?) » Fri Sep 30, 2011 6:53 pm

That episode is pretty much the reason I started to look at my work like that and I highly recommend people working with any kind of medium to watch it.

(?) · by **Isaak** (?) » Fri Sep 30, 2011 9:52 pm

omigoshomigoshomigoshomigoshomigoshomigoshomigoshOOOOMIIIGGOOOOOSSSHH

:awesomedash:

Aaaah.., I'm dancing around like a maniac!!!

(?) · by **MochaBean** (?) » Fri Sep 30, 2011 9:54 pm

Isaak wrote:Aaaah.., I'm dancing around like a maniac!!!

Whoa! That is insanely cool! Congrats, Isaak! :crack:

(?) · by **Wylie** (?) » Fri Sep 30, 2011 10:04 pm

Isaak wrote:

I told you we were going to need a bigger one of those if you made this thread.

Congratulations!

(?) · by **kefkafloyd** (?) » Fri Sep 30, 2011 10:11 pm

You rule, Isaak.

In fact, I've got a present for you for your awesomeness.

(?) · by **ozone** (?) » Fri Sep 30, 2011 10:35 pm

Woah, Isaak, that is awesome, congratulations! :golfclop:

Didn't Jayson Theissen tweet your PMVs a couple months back? They must really love your videos around DHX, for good reason too.

(?) · by **Headless Horse** (?) » Fri Sep 30, 2011 10:54 pm

The show inspires the fans, the fans inspire the show, and it goes back and forth getting amplified higher and higher until all of youtube explodes in a giant rainbow.

I don't know if I'd even love this show half as much if it weren't for how awesome the staff are about engaging with fans and fan creations. Rock on, Isaak.

(?) · by **numsOic** (?) » Sat Oct 01, 2011 2:43 am

Isaak wrote:omigoshomigoshomigoshomigoshomigoshomigoshomigoshOOOOMIIIGGOOOOOSSSHH

Aaaah.., I'm dancing around like a maniac!!!

you are WOOTIE'S TOP PICK

:chillin:

(?) · by **Isaak** (?) » Sat Oct 01, 2011 8:50 am

Alright, now that I'm able to formulate a coherent sentence, though barely...

I've said it before and I'll say it again: This is insanity, it's the only word I can think of to describe what has happened over the last few months.
I started this with the relatively simple and normal goal of learning a couple of things and trying to make something good and has since evolved into something I can't fully comprehend. It's like I started to walk up a flight of stairs and suddenly I get strapped to a spacerocket and launched into the stratosphere!

FWOOOOOMMM!!!

I just made some videos and this happened... that's how it feels. Or maybe I'm underestimating myself. I'm pretty reserved when it comes to that, I don't want it to go to my head because first and foremost I just want to learn, have a good time and make something good. And then this happens. What does this mean?!

I'm not sure, but it's certainly the best way of being told "You're doing a good job, keep going."

And I will.

Thank you all, for your kindness, hospitality, good talk and encouraging words. You're great people.

kefkafloyd wrote:In fact, I've got a present for you for your awesomeness.

ozone wrote:Didn't Jayson Theissen tweet your PMVs a couple months back? They must really love your videos around DHX, for good reason too.

Yes... he did. Eeeeeeeee!!!

Headless Horse wrote:The show inspires the fans, the fans inspire the show, and it goes back and forth getting amplified higher and higher until all of youtube explodes in a giant rainbow.

I don't know if I'd even love this show half as much if it weren't for how awesome the staff are about engaging with fans and fan creations. Rock on, Isaak.

This is uncanny. This has never happened before, as far as I know, with any fandom based on a television series. At least not this directly, not this interactively (huh, that's an actual word).
And I'm smack dab in the middle of it :starity:

Should I get a Facebook? I'm extremely curious how much interplay there could be here.

(?) · by **Artificer** (?) » Sun Oct 02, 2011 4:11 am

Damn straight. Nice job, man. It's good to hear that someone has been recognized for their work. :jingo:

God I love you guys.

(?) · by **Isaak** (?) » Sun Oct 02, 2011 7:37 pm

I'm doing a livestream again, right now. So go and make me nervous!

(?) · by **reidransom** (?) » Tue Oct 04, 2011 7:39 am

You need to do one of these at a more reasonable hour so I can watch. Like ~11ish PM US Central time.

Anyhow, bout to install CS5.5 (even though my key is only good for AX, PS, AI, and InD) cus I want to dick around in PP a bit and was wondering if you can point me to any good methods of keying out backgrounds and such, or maybe toward some already-ripped-apart pony assets to try and use in some stuff.

Also, as I was preparing to clean CS5 out of my system I noticed I still have all of CS4 installed, and CS3 :v:

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Isaak’s Grand, Though Experimental, Animation Blog

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