TjA's movie Reviews on Newgrounds

[Take a Key for Coming In]

A nice reference to the having to play the entire game over again after completing it once to get the true ending, masked with a nice stylised transition from 8 to vector renditions of the game.

Great animation for a great game. Though it seems more focused on fans of the series and i feel as if people who haven't completed the game won't understand the messages.

Shamoozal responds:

You are absolutely correct and you don't know how tough of a judgement call it was to make gearing it towards the fans of what is becoming an obscure series. Thanks!

["Seeing is Believing" rap]

I had to "jack in" (heh, remember that?) after so long of being inactive just to review this.

I know (or knew) you have (or had) a passionate behavior when it comes to your work, but this is just awful. Simply put. It's not MindChamber.

Note: Criticism drizzled with humor.

The video consists of about 20 or so loops all pasted together with near no real relevance other than it being either a 24 frame "animation" [see: tween] of a skew on a still image, an animation of a fist/arm movement then the same frames again... but reversed or a literal interpretation of what the... artis... rappe... singe... vocalist had just said.

The only time this is different is roughly in 3 instances: the 'lightning arc' effect (FBF or shape tween?) , the ending with the vocalist in some sort of ghetto-meets-KKK-meets-prototype outfit (the blood effects though, nice job) and the chroma keying at the end. Although get some better acting.

Minor gripe: was blobbing over the baseball caps brand logo really required?
Why not...
a. remove it with scissors (they're pretty damn cheap)
b. not where a cap and simply have the hood up like he does in the animated version, albeit without the cap?
Perhaps even a thin beanie hat over the cap with or without the hood?

It seems like you were struggling for ideas, like many directors for rap videos. Due to the poor lyrics (and i can back that up with examples later) you had to rely on "crowd shots" and "stage/DJ shots" constantly. This, combined with the very repetitive loops caused me to lose all interest about 2 minutes in, perhaps even earlier.

Perhaps the title "Seeing is believing" made you take this choice to literally depict things in the lyrics within the video, but I feel the title of the song and the lyrics of the song are both out of sync.

Seeing is believing is referring to something so peculiar that it has to be seen to be believed, right?
That doesn't mean you need to literally have a god beam them self down to the stage nodding their head. Especially how the lyrics seem to suggest the gods disapproval of the vocalists choices but a keenness on his vocals (and "bangin' tracks").

Ran out of characters :(

Lyrics:
The lyrics were really poor and had no word play for which rap/mc-ing is famous for (well that and some other things).
Here's one:
"Left for dead in the game,
On his last live,
you only get one."
First he says "on his last live" then "you only get one". It was contradictory to say "his last live" and that "you only get one". If you only get one, your always on your last life. The third line isn't needed and only brings the lyrics down. At least he got reference to the "the game" of life and a video game in there, though it's so cliché now.

The music felt like one of those Jay-Z songs that state,
"I've not made a single in 6 months, now I'm back and I'm still a wealthy narcissist."
as opposed to the subject matter of quickly changing from someone who isn't a role model but not exactly the worst person in the world, to turn into someone who is "killing challenges with homicidal bars that he writes" who will "lobotomize them while keeping it all insight".

Why in the video he starts to slaughter the crowd with break-dancing moves is beyond my point of understanding.
"so tell your people to run now,
warn a friend,
to sun up to sun down we gonna slaughter them."
This, I believe, isn't referencing the listeners but rather the challengers and their friends.
This is reinforced by the fact he goes on to mention challengers more and more.

Feels like a more fitting visual would be him killing a bunch of "haters" in his audience or so his audience can "see it to believe it". But that's just me.

Audio is a single drum loop, some pops, brass "hits", piano and scratches repeated infinity to point of nausea, Not much to say there. Feels like there's no sub-bass or bass. I have earphones and a sub-woofer to check and they pick nearly nothing towards the low end frequencies.

I had more to write but ran out of space.

MindChamber responds:

The rapper had an Idea of his words coming to life, and with it ending with him killing the two people watching his show on tv. I sat down, listened to the song, and worked out a scenario that I thought fit with his vision. Since you gave me zero stars I guess I failed.. so for that I'm sorry.. all the lightning is fbf...

I will try and do better next time.

[Best Burrito Ever]

Very good, has a nice Dexters Lab style to it (Hanna-Barbera is well know this style).
I find it hard to believe your only 12, but if that's the case, well done. You have talent whatever age you are, but always keep practicing and trying to new things. Try to not make references to popular culture if possible, as doing so will date your work and it won't age well.
For example you used the "troll face and lol problem?" memes, however if someone is to view this in the future, they may not understand what it is, and not get the reference.

Well done, good job.

-TjA

p.s. Loved the CN watermark reference at the start and end, subtle but effective touch.

Yusuf responds:

I get what you mean, thanks! :)

[Rats On Cocaine - Ep #10]

Brilliant as always

This episode was hilarious. I love the Rats on Cocaine series and the way you portrayed all the characters. The ceiling cat took me by surprise, as well as the singing orifices. Though how will you out do this episode on the "happens in real life but we ignore it" scale i dont know. Hope to see more episodes in the future.
Is it wrong that i dont find this the lease bit disturbing?
Lets hope so.

ApocalypseCartoons responds:

its only wrong if you live it

[Jim Day 08]

Good

I think it was all tweened, but i guess you put some effeort into the voices and sound effects (they werent bad). The jokes were ok, though fridges and freezers cant be opened from the inside :). I loved the fridge scene it looked very good, you rarely see shots like that in animations. Caramelldansen chiptune music in the credits was a bonus (and the sprite dance). I enjoyed it, hope to see more from you in the future.

Jimtopia responds:

I wanted to try something a bit different with the fridge thing, and, like you said, you don't see shots like that in cartoons anymore.

[Mountain Top]

A couple of things annoyed me...

There was no background score at all, i mean how can you get the audience in the mood with no music? The sound effects were at different sound levels and were not the best quality, you would had done better recording your own SFX.

The animation wasnt bad apart from the replaying, you showed the icicles "sparkling" then proceeded to show it again and again. You only have to show people once that "this object is pointy and sharp". You dont need to show it 4-5 times to let the audience understand that, in fact i dont think any effect was necessary as the audience will understand what going to happen anyway.

This animation could be done much better, and it shows how useless those "beta viewers" you showed it to were not to tell you that.

lavallelee responds:

the one thing i do wish i had was a composer, im an animator not a musician. someday i will have found the perfect composer, until then thanks for the review

[Sorry Tom?]

Alright

The animation was good and the voices were a bit funny. Ended quite suddenly though. Still it wasnt terrible, apart from the credits music.

Rudy responds:

Hah, yeah. Thanks.

[Dolarhyde]

So is this a prelude?

This seems like a prelude to "Robot Frogs", in that case this is a masterpiece of a prelude. If not, this is a creation of the divine exellance and should be worshipped, maybe in bible form, though dvds and blu-ray seem to be the "cool" thing this decade so maybe it should be avaliable on that format. Either way this has the habbit of showing true animation nature and ops to be a front page certainty. Though Tom has got to understand the true meaning of life to understand the greatness of this animation.
Good job, Sirs and may the Robot Frogs bless you on your animation journey.

MRat responds:

Somebody's be doing their research!

[Just a Pilot - Episode 4]

FunnySatisfaction

He got an Australian accent -_-
Anyways try to add more fbf than just tweening everything, otherwise it looks lazy and rushed. Also the easing isnt very smooth. Try to do something with colours also. Other than that the story was ok, im not really into this kind of humor but for people who like that type, then i think theyd enjoy this. Good job, keep improving.

Koalafish responds:

lol, we'll do one episode with just fbf, no tweening at all and colour and it will look RETARDED!

[(k)SikDeath-Episode1]

AHHAHAHAHAHAHHAHA

SO brilliant, all on 1 layer and all fbf.
MASTERPIECE!!!

Simkiss responds:

Hahaha oh god :(