The Power of Poser!

I have talked to several people about making their own animated series and telling their own stories.

There are many people with large ideas on what they want to create but sometimes they are limited in what they can do in way of TALENT.   Some folks no matter how hard they try will never really ever be able to draw, 3d model, etc.  But that doesn’t mean you cannot tell stories.

I remember in 1998 when I first saw Poser.  I believe it was Poser 2.0.  It had some ugly looking models and such but at that moment I could see the potential.   It made my imagination fly.  At the time I couldn’t model.  It was out of my skill set.  Poser at the time was very limited but then came Poser 4.0.  From that point on I was totally hooked.  I think I’ve bought every Poser version that came out since except 11 at this point.  I really want 11.

But starting from 4.0 it allowed me to start making all kinds of animations, very quickly.

I wish I had all my animations but here are some animations I did with Poser 4.

I know not the best but those were my first attempts.

Here is a link to some more work.  No just remember there was no streaming back then so I had to build it more on being able to get it small enough to be online.

http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/146408

Now I know those are quite crude but it was years ago.

The reason I write this article is I know there are tons of storytellers out there who want to tell a story.  I’m sure you would love to have artists help you create all these cool worlds.  But the truth is they won’t.   It is a lot of work and you could go on for decades looking to create a team of skilled folks who you will work together with to make a cool project and usually only then it is a short or some fan film.

No you want to tell stories and so do I.  The truth is Poser made me understand and see that I could do it on my own if no one else would help me.

Combined with ZBrush and other methods Poser is a very powerful tool that could help you bring your stuff to life especially if you apply a little imagination and ingenuity.

Now there are other folks in on the game as well including MakeHuman, Daz3d and Iclone.

Poser for a comic?

I really like this method used by these comic book creators.  Poser may seem like a cheat but I’m really wanting to tell stories.   Noticed in this webinar that Brian said he can do about 6 pages per day.   This gives you speed and quality that you would not normally be able to get out of hand drawn work.

You can apply the same principals in this video for Anime or Manga.    I hope you enjoy this awesome Webinar.

Make Anime with FREE software

Sometimes you may feel all these cool tools are needed to make your own animation and that it costs TONS of money but the truth is there are tools out there which are totally free of charge and are very capable of helping you create and tell your story.

I’ve followed this team around for some time and have enjoyed watching them work on their project.   I’m posting this here so you can see what free tools they use and check out the tons of tutorials they have that can help you create something cool today.

http://morevnaproject.org/

Check it out.  Your list of excuses as to why you cannot make your own anime is getting smaller and smaller.

Click Here!

Cause when I think Anime I think Osamu Tezuka

How can we talk anime without talking about the man who created it!  Here is a great documentary about Osamu Tezuka.

The Challenges

Making animation is not easy.  It is a labor of love.    It takes time, energy and you have to really stick to it.  I wanted to take this time to talk about the challenges that will get in the way of you making your own anime and how you can overcome them.

The 3 basic challenges are

Money

Time

Talent

I see these as being some of the biggest challenges.  Not in that particular order.  They do go hand in hand.  Each of those 3 elements is required for every animated production.

You need money to buy time and talent.  You need talent and time to make money.    They are all connected.    Lacking any of these will be a problem in your storytelling endeavors.

For example if you are really talented at animating you still need money to live off of but if you to make money you need to take time off your project to work.  Work then wears you down and you don’t have the time to animate like you wanted.    It is a vicious circle but one that can stop.

It really hurts if you have little of all three which is where I find myself.  My drawing style is not where I would like it.  I don’t have time to make animation as I have adult bills and have a full time day job.

There are solutions to these challenges.  Do not let the challenges turn into excuses.  Acknowledge the challenge and attack it.  In the next articles we will attack each of those 3 major problems.