SalvationRaid

The following was an independent film production I worked on myself using Flash 8, Microsoft PowerPoint, Paint (PC standard), and Microsoft Photo Editor. The project originally began as a private experimental animation that I started to further my skill in Flash 8, which I was completely unacquainted with at the time, however when my Multimedia teacher Mr. Fitzgerald informed me of the DV Voice Program I decided to change the focus of my work from ’superheroes (which it was original geared toward) to something more historically relevant.

Process of Creating Animation

All scenes began as hand drawn illustrations that were then transferred into the computer using a desktop scanner. The drawings were saved under the Black and White scheme and stored as a Windows Bitmap Image, which is readily compatible with all computers.

From there the image would next be cleaned and colored using the Paint Program that is available on all Windows run PCs. (This process will be elaborated on later)

Next the image backgrounds would be made transparent using Microsoft Photo Editor’s transparency tool. The image must then be saved in a format that allows transparencies (GIF or PNG, PNG taking slightly more memory but providing much better quality)

The image can then be imported into Flash 8 and animated using various techniques. Most of the animations I did were frame-by-frame animations, meaning I edited a series of single frames and imported them individually into the timeline. This was a painstaking task that is extremely time consuming but provides quality motions.

I won’t go into detail about how to use Flash 8 but the program is fairly easily to pick up on once you get the hang of it. I didn’t use any template or procreated (usually by the product company) cuts or transitions. Everything you can see I made myself.

Backgrounds

The backgrounds used in each scene went through a slightly different process. First they were drawn by yours-truly using PowerPoint’s Freeform and Basic Shapes tools. The shapes’ fills were then added and shaded in PowerPoint by editing each object’s Fill-effects.

After all the individual objects are arranged and color coordinated they must then be grouped as a solid object, copy-and-pasted into Paint, and saved in any format. (preferably BMP)

Bur or warping effects can be added using various photo editing programs such as Photoshop, although they are not essential. The image must then be converted to a PNG and imported to Flash 8 under the bottom layer.

Converting Hand Drawn Images

As stated before most animated objects begin as hand drawn rough sketches which are scanned into the computer and then saved as a Black and White BMP. Here the image is dirty and colorless but can now be worked with.

Next the Image must be traced using various colors so that each individual segment of the drawing may be given a different outline when it comes time to color the image.

Now in order to remove the black particles from the colored lines, the image must be inverted. Switching black imperfections to white particles. Now save the image. Next the canvas must be cleared and then refilled with solid black (default black). Now use the ‘Paste From’ option to import the inverted image you had previously saved. Change the fill options from solid to transparent and then set the image down on the black background. The once white particles, being transparent, will then become black. The image can now be reinverted and you can see the visible difference of the cleaning.

Now the image can be colored. The un-unified segments of different colors allows you to easily change individual parts of the outline without altering the entire picture.

Some artistic skill in now needed to add shadowing and some color variations.

Save.

Now change the entire background of the image to a single UNUSED color, in this case a greenish-blue will work fine. Now open the image with Microsoft Photo Editor or any other photo-editing program and make the background color transparent. Save as a PNG and then import the image into Flash 8. And that’s it.

Director’s Comments

First off let me just say that I was pressed for time throughout the entire course of this project. Animation is very time consumiing and with only myself doing everything I spent more than a few sleepless nights trying to rap things up.

Second of all, the abrupt ending shown was not my original intention. I had planned for the girl character to die yes, (to remain historically accurate) but the end was meant to be much more animated and dramatic than it turned out. I barely had enough time to complete the last scene the night before it was due. -So my apologies.

Scraped Plans

While the superhero angle did not prove appropriate from this competition I would like to state my unbridled admiration toward the brave missionaries around the world. Who in their own right are superheroes. -Before starting this project I did manage to finish a few posters for the scraped super hero animation however. Hope you enjoy.