Sijun Forums :: View topic - New web page design for clay animation stuff

richtoon · junior member Member # Joined: 22 Mar 2001 Posts: 38

Hi,
I've been working on redesigning a portion of my web site...Well....Okay... Only this one page but it is a little different....It's about Clay Animation. It is very Neverhood-ish in style.

Please let me know what you think...

Oh!! And BTW if any of you know how to stop an embedded sound by clicking on a rollover button, please let me know!! For now you kind of have to hit the STOP button on your browser...sigh....

http://members.home.net/richtoon/RichtoonClay.htm
Best viewed at 800x600

Richtoon

Briareos · Posted: Wed Jun 13, 2001 2:35 pm

I love it! Traditional animation mediums rock! Your tests look better then most peoples finished digital animations.. but I wont get started on that... hehe.

nickmarksdotcom · member Member # Joined: 17 Feb 2001 Posts: 244

very original. I can't recall seeing someone do this. I like it very much. My only suggestion would be to center it in the middle and length.

Nick

richtoon · junior member Member # Joined: 22 Mar 2001 Posts: 38

Briareos- Thanks for the compliments!! I was to be honest a little worried about if theis falls under the category of Finished Works...There is very little "drawing" involved. I only changed the colour of the title in Photoshop and that's about it. I took a chance.

nickmarksdotcom- If you ever get a chance to see this old '95 Dreamworks video game called the NeverHood, you'll see how I was influenced by it. That games options screen was made out of clay though it was all one colour. And to be honest, I am rather happy with the wonkiness and drunken symetry of the interface. It adds an earthiness that you rarely see inthe design heavy word of the wide web.

BTW here is another shot of the clay sculpture used to make the web site.

Richtoon

Siftland · Posted: Wed Jun 13, 2001 8:07 pm

I've played "The Neverhood" and immediately thought of that when I went to the site....I love claymation and your stuff looks great!.....now only if you could make my cursor turn to clay....hehe....

richtoon · junior member Member # Joined: 22 Mar 2001 Posts: 38

Siftland-Thanks!! I loved Neverhood! It was really quirky and frustrating and funny. As for the cursor...if there is some Java Script outthere that can do it...let me know and I willadd a clay cursor!! (Preferably if it is one of those insert image in this field box type of deal. Me no good with Java.

But I would do it...if there is such a thing!!

Thanks again!

Richtoon

pixualize · Posted: Wed Jun 13, 2001 10:42 pm

Absolutely fantastic!

This really makes me nostalgic of the hot Texas summers during middle school when I would while away the afternoons with my Super-8 camera and a couple of clay aliens whacking each other to bits with toothpick "lightsabers".

The site and the clips are great. Are there any plans in the works for a featurette?

Radiater · Posted: Wed Jun 13, 2001 11:40 pm

Hey Richtoon,

That page really got me excited about seeing your site! Can't wait till the rest has that look. Looks like you've got your work cut out for you.

Radiater.

richtoon · junior member Member # Joined: 22 Mar 2001 Posts: 38

pixualize-Hey! Do you still have those reels? Maybe you should digitize them and put them on line...As for featurettes...eventually. My biggest problem right now is the lack of space needed for the set and lights... I have a studio but my music stuff, computer and animation/drafting table takes up all of my space. And I have kids that get into everything...very bad for clay animation....they'd bump into the light and knock over stuff on the set. I'm still figuring out what is involved in that end of things. I do have about 3 stories/scripts ready to get starded on...but its all about the space issue right now.

Radiater-Thanks!!I'm anxious to see how it will all turn out also. I'm a little worried about the other pages since I will keep adding new material to it (Links, Movies...). So I don't think I'll be able to have as many fun buttons and screens. It would have to be a little toned down, Like a clay background image and the content. If only there was a way to do decent semi transparent GIFS that could float anywhere...then I could just take digital pictures of a clay button ora clay screen and place it anywhere I want because it would be ancored by the semy transparent shadows.....sigh. Don't know how to do that either....if it is even possible...I always thought that you had to flatten it with your BG and slice that image to be used on the web so that it looked semi transparent...But then I may as well design the whole clay page like I did last time.....oh well...thinking out loud.

Thanks guys!!

Richtoon

agent44 · Posted: Thu Jun 14, 2001 8:32 am

I have never seen a site quite like that.
A+ for being unique!

Gambit · Posted: Thu Jun 14, 2001 8:36 am

That is some interesting stuff. Way to go!

Sc00p- · Posted: Thu Jun 14, 2001 8:57 am

Very nice Rich, I like how well lit it is (doesn't look like some sort of amateurish photo), and the originality of the whole thing. I love the theme and it takes me way back to those little clay shorts I used to watch when I was a kid; I loved them then and now I not only still love them, but have a respect for the whole medium. I just wish it were a tad cheaper...what brand of clay is that?

I went down to Wallack's (you know where that is) last summer and bought some sculpie, it was really fun and my little figure came out well...this interface you've done makes me want to go do that again.

Critique ::

1) Perhaps though, you should maybe have this in a popup, or center it on the page, so it looks a bit more natural, instead of having it tucked into the top left corner. Or was this just temporary?

2) Some more interaction in the links would've been fun, I really wanted to squish that clay down, where right now it just shifts slightly. Then again, that might ruin your nice little setup there, squishing other colors into it :)

Anyway, thats just my thoughts, keep it up, the site's great thus far

richtoon · junior member Member # Joined: 22 Mar 2001 Posts: 38

agent44 -Thanks that's great! I got a good grade! Woo-hoo!!!

Gambit -Glad you approve! Thanks!

Sc00p- Thanks Scoop-!! What clay shorts did you used to watch? Do you remember them? As far as clay goes , I buy this oil based clay (never dries). It is 5$ for a 1 lb. package. It is called Plastalina. you can get it at Michael's (next to IKEA off Pinecrest).
Here's a pic:

No one is stopping you from playin' wit da clay! Its not illegal yet....

the Crits... #1 I'm trying out 2 possibilities: A) Build a clay BG and make a tile, that way I'll center it all. and B) force the dimensions of the window to 800x600...I'm not sure which yet...

Do YOU know how to stop an embedded sound with a rollover button?

#2 Yeah the button pushes down when you click on it. So it disappears pretty fast when you get switched over to a new page...I tried having the "over" button be the squished one...and it looked like something else should happen...I'm pressing this button and ....nada. So I just twisted it a little for the over action and squished it for the down/click action..

Keep in touch, Sc00p-!!

Thanks guys

Richtoon

[ June 14, 2001: Message edited by: richtoon ]

FFNeX · Posted: Thu Jun 14, 2001 10:14 am

I love the website!

What's the background song you used in "I am an Alien" called?

richtoon · junior member Member # Joined: 22 Mar 2001 Posts: 38

Thanks, FFNeX! The song is a classical number usually played at graduations scenes in the movies...Sir Edward Elgar � Military March No.1 in D, Op.39: Pomp And Circumstance. Obviously, mine is a dinky midi version....

Thanks for poking around.

BTW if you all don't mind, that Flash animation can be seen at www.newgrounds.com. Just do a search for author with my name (richtoon) and you can vote and/or review the animation. Thank you if you do...if you don't....oh well, I tried.

Richtoon

natec · Posted: Thu Jun 14, 2001 12:02 pm

I love it....looks really cool. Finish the whole site that way!!!

-n

RoadMaster · Posted: Thu Jun 14, 2001 12:10 pm

I'm looking through my claymation links, but unfortunately almost 90% of my old links are down. If you want to see some nice claymation movies there is a site at http://hjem.get2net.dk/kullmann/tigerbean/tbp.html called tiger bean productions, I first learnt about this site from "the red flag" a TFC claymation movie. If I find any of the old links I'll let you know. There was always www.neverhood.com, but their buttons weren't really interactive. If you go to www.neverhood.com now, you will have to click on the "old site" button to see what I mean.

The only claymation thing at the moment I have online was for the gif fight, and that's at http://members.home.net/roadm/images/yummy.gif
I would have more but for some reason @home's webspace has been really evil to me for a while, and I haven't bothered fixing it. In other words, I can't upload anything to my webspace :/

EDIT: oops, I missed one of my other works which has been sitting on my webspace. It was before I got any of the good clay, and I was just fooling around with my new digital camera. It's at http://members.home.net/roadm/images/building3.avi

[ June 14, 2001: Message edited by: RoadMaster ]

richtoon · junior member Member # Joined: 22 Mar 2001 Posts: 38

natec -Thanks!! I plan to make each section more distinct. A separate site for Digital Images (way out of date) a separate site for music..... But the entire Clay stuff site will be in the same theme.

RoadMaster -Thanks for the links!! Your clips were pretty funny. Do more!!

Richtoon

toast! · Posted: Thu Jun 14, 2001 11:10 pm

awesome, an isle of creativity and originality in this world of boring web sites

cheers

toasty

RoadMaster · Posted: Thu Jun 14, 2001 11:22 pm

yeah, that is some quality clay when it comes to claymation, I have 5 packs of the stuff in my room, haven't gotten around to using them much though (although I have made 2 animations, with my guy with the big mouth, 1 that was in the old fight thread, and another for school). Anyway, very nice setup, it came out well compared to other all clay layouts I've seen. I especially like the e-mail logo, since it emphasizes the 3d aspect of it. er... yey claymation!

richtoon · junior member Member # Joined: 22 Mar 2001 Posts: 38

toast! -Thanks Toast!!

RoadMaster -Thanks!! I think I missed that one...I'll have to go poke around. Are your clips on line anywhere else? What other clay layouts have you seen? I actually looked around and never saw anything. Please let me know....I find that clay really good but the darker ones really are messy. I was told that you have to air those out for a long time before you use them.

Richtoon

richtoon · junior member Member # Joined: 22 Mar 2001 Posts: 38

Hi again,

A friend of mine told me that this web page crashes on him when he presses the radio button (he uses Netscape).
Anybody else have that problem?

Thanks for letting me know

Richtoon

Sc00p- · Posted: Fri Jun 15, 2001 10:46 am

Rich,

I watched mostly Wallace and Gromitt kinda stuff. I also had a paid movie network (called superchannel at the time), which featured clay shorts all the time, which I just couldn't get enough of.

Also, a lot of cool clay stuff was done for a show called "Long Ago and Far Away"...do you remember that one at all? It was narrated by James Earl Jones, and had some really fantastic animation.

richtoon · junior member Member # Joined: 22 Mar 2001 Posts: 38

Sc00p-,

I'm a big fan of Wallace and Gromit and other Aardman Animation...Have you ever seen Creature Comfort? That is hilarious!!

I've never seen the James Earl Jones one...I'll have to reasearch for that one...

I used to have superchannel too!! Or at least back then you could tweak the tuner of your TV and get a black and white version....Remember First Choice? The Super Channel used to showcase a lot of NFB stuff at the time....

Its good to hear from you, Sc00p-

Richtoon