JOURNAL: Arigatomina

previous page next page
  • d.gray-man ~ Yes. 2008-05-06 21:47:18 Kanda.

    I like the manga better, since I knew Allen would end with a girl's voice. Just once I wish more series would take after YYH. You can have a young main character with a guy's voice. They don't *all* have to be women voice actors. And 15 is post-puberty - his voice would have changed by then. Just a head's up.

    But there's some nice filler in the anime, I admit freely. Kanda's missing for a long time in the manga, so those silly little filler episodes featuring him were a nice touch. I'm still wondering what the deal with the flower petals is, though. I don't remember seeing that in the manga so far. The part where he repels the akuma poison hit me as wrong, too. That implies he's cursed and I *definitely* should have noticed if I read that in the manga. He's a little hypocrite if he was discriminating against Allen for being cursed, all the while sporting one of his own. [I think he's cursed, and a little hypocrite, I just don't remember seeing it in the manga and I don't trust anime as "canon" about background information that hasn't been revealed in the manga yet.]

    I'm not liking the Naruto references. Voice acting aside, Kanda's got the "I can't die until I find that person" grudge and the sharingan (black, but the three circles are there and that's more than close enough), and the new improved Allen's got the duck-butt hairdo. It's not right. Sasuke's got enough problems in his own manga without being drug into this one. Still...

    Pretty black-haired asshole swordsmen are so my type. It doesn't hurt that Kanda *always* ends up with his hair down, his clothes half torn off his body, and splattered in blood. So my type. And his grin in ep 79 (?) kills me. Love~

    Hiei, Sasuke, Kanda - all three of which just so happen to be rivaled to characters with female voice actors. Do we smell a conspiracy? Why, no, I do believe that's the sickly sweet scent of cliche. Are you complaining? No, sir. I'd rather the rivals be properly male, but if they feel female voice actors complement the dark-haired assholeness, I shall deal will it. I stand ever firm in my conviction that pretty assholes are automatically uke whether their rivals are voiced by girls or not. What else do you do with a pretty asshole, after all? ^_^ 
  • addendum 2008-05-05 12:27:26 What the org needs is a common enemy. A community where members attack each other will unite if it has a common enemy to hate and defend against. Just look at the United States. The best time to be an American is when something horrible happens and everyone leans on each other to get through it. When the tube was new, the forum united against it rather well, at least until the feeling went from threatened anger (they're attracting attention and they're not worthy) to dismissive acceptance (they're not hurting anything here). A natural disaster (the OT closing, the Evanescence/Creed banning) is good for community spirit, excepting a few cynics who refuse to share in the group commiseration (they came for you, but they're not coming for me).

    A large part of the problem is that the org has no rival super power to contend against. No one is threatening it. The natural disasters are few and when they do happen the "they didn't come for me" mentality holds strong in the more active cynics so there's no real "I'm next" panic to unite the micro-communities. If someone with the power to do so threatened the org, it would be shocking (and amusing) how quickly all the petty squabbles disappeared. What the org needs is a terrorist attack. 
  • re: Driftroot's 05-02-08 journal entry 2008-05-04 23:49:23 That's "re" mind you, since I still don't condone the old chatting in Journals thing. I don't change any more than the org does. ^^

    I liked that entry, especially the comments about how the org doesn't change. I thought it did for a long time. Since around 2005 when a very loud group of new people showed up in the forum and quickly (so it seemed to me) became mods and contributors and active voices who held more sway in public opinions than the 2003 crowd had in their (our) hayday. I had a sudden epiphany - "Something is happening. Am I witnessing a wave in the making?" And I balked at it. I complained to myself about those changes all the way through 2006 and into early 2007. Then I gave up. It was all about the people, the forum, and not the videos. I was hanging around to read the drama, not to watch amvs.

    I've been browsing the forum this past week. Just reading some threads, getting a feel for the community, checking up on familiar names, and noting who wasn't posting anymore. It's funny. The org hasn't changed at all. Looking at it now I feel as reluctant as I did when I made my first loud post in 2003. Where's the "we make amvs, isn't it fun" feeling I was looking for in a COMMUNITY "dedicated to the creation, discussion, and general enjoyment of fan-made anime music videos. "

    General Enjoyment of AMVS. What part of the forum is dedicated to that?

    The Gen AMV section is a place to pick apart amvs, compare hardware/money, make fun of or ignore newbs with their repetitive "where is/what is___amv??" questions, and snipe/spam till it's locked any attempt at a civilized (and interesting) discussion regarding the general enjoyment of amvs.
    The Announcement forum is a circle jerk, dogpile attack, or silent treatment for anyone posting there.
    The recommendation forum is a circle jerk where the only people who read the threads are those looking for links to their own vids and newbies.
    The AMV Suggestion forum is almost exclusively used by newbies who don't realize the people making amvs on the forum don't go in there because they're busy with their own ideas.
    AMV Contest - do I even have to mention this? Half whining and biting and sniffling at contest results, half advertising threads full of pointless "I'm in!" one liners.
    Opinion Exchange? Give free ops so people like you or so you can criticize with impunity. Spam your crap vid all over the place since no one on the forum is going to watch it otherwise. Half the people in there only want numbers, so even the ones reviewing because they "enjoy" it are wasting their time.
    MEP section... Excuse me while I laugh. No. Circle jerk that would be better done in a private room (forum) where the rest of the org doesn't have to watch. Clique exclusions to those "under qualified to participate". Groupings of bad editors who make up their own projects since they get cut from the good stuff.
    Heads UP - advertising.
    GEN Anime... Now here's one where people might be enjoying the hobby because they enjoy the hobby. Mostly populated with newbies chatting to each other. As long as no one drops in to bash them and get their threads locked, this section could be a balm for the forum.
    Anime Series Discussion - same as Gen Anime, though there are a few more hardcases dropping in a bit more often.
    Anime Screencaps. What's the point of that section? No, really, what's the point? Link them to www.animegalleries.net and let that be the end of that. This section has nothing to do with amvs.
    Anime Conventions - advertising, loosely related to amvs (some anime cons have amv contests).
    Convention Exchange - who's going where, loosely related to amvs (some cons have amv contests).
    General Music - oddly enough this section gets a lot more sniping than Gen Anime, maybe because it's cooler to be a music snob than an anime snotb.
    The Tech help sections. Oh, we have a crapload of those. A few elitist discussions and a crapload of repetitive "how do I ___????" newb questions that get the same answers and links times infinity.
    Site Feedback - a place for newbies to post their opinions and get shot down for being stupid and presumptuous, and for a few diehards to bring up improvements that will never be made but should be. The only time it's useful is when Doki's around.
    Site Help. Snort. Yeah.

    The only section that could be about the "general enjoyment of amvs" is the Donator's forum and the last time I was in there it had more to do with movie reviews, crack threads and chatting about everything *except* amvs.

    What section of the forum is dedicated to a community's shared enjoyment of amvs? There are plenty of micro-communities, but each one is pitted against the others and when you walk into the room you see little bunches of dogs growling at each other with a few strays salivating as they look on hungrily from the corners, some pups (most often female) prancing from one group to the other, and a handful of lone wolfs stalking disdainfully through what little free space there is.

    That's what the org looked like to me in 2003. It wasn't welcoming, it wasn't pleasant, it was threatening and distasteful and I couldn't believe *this* was the "community" I'd be spending my time with if I wanted to be an active amv fan. Looking at it now I see the same thing. I see some familiar faces, feel some nostalgia for the absent ones, and wonder why I jumped in despite my reservations five years ago. I'm still inside now, I'll never really get out so long as I like anime - I might get an urge to make an amv tomorrow and wouldn't I feel stupid if I quit only to come back a day later. But if I were new, I'd steer clear. If I could warn newcomers, I'd recommend they stay off the forum. There's a negative atmosphere in there. Too personal, too much ego and competition, and it makes the creator more important than the creation. I lost most of my enjoyment of amvs because of the people making them. I can't disassociate the video from the personality. Instead of promoting my enjoyment of amvs, the forum killed it for me. I doubt I'm the only one. It's sad. 
  • hunh 2008-02-21 13:38:33 My "Dark Half" video was fucking cool. o.O

    I just re-watched it - I got a new monitor recently so all my vids look faded and pale now. I always knew my old monitor was much darker than it should have been. I used it for so many years I just got used to it. But Dark Half looks *better* now that it isn't so dark. I did the coloring on my work computer, so everything turned blackish when I brought the frames home to animate. Anyway, first time watching it in about a year and that's my immediate response. "What's wrong with those people, that video is fucking cool. o.O"

    I don't know what I was thinking. Letting people convince me otherwise with all the "South Park animation" references. "Artists" going on about my simple shading as if they could carry more detail from one frame to the next without inconsistencies. Editors pointing out the too-thick lines as if they'd ever done fanart in their lives, let alone tried to animate that fanart. That was my style at the time. All of my fanart has those thick lines, simple coloring, and 'canon-ish' characters. I liked it that way until I put it in a vid on the org and listened to the feedback. Now it turns out I still like it that way. I haven't done fanart in a while, but if I did, it would be in that same style. My style.

    It probably helps that I'm back to watching it as if it were an entirely serious vid. When I was making it I thought of it as a serious and "cool/dark" vid. It wasn't until I posted it on the org that I got so embarrassed that I started laughing it off and looking at it as a funny vid. It's not funny to me anymore. Or embarrassing. It's wicked cool and I don't care what anyone says to the contrary. I did that. Took me half a year, but I did that. Wow. I was bad ass. ;p

    I need a song. With a nice variety of slow and fast. Preferably with a male singer. A good length song - around the 5 minute mark. With lyrics that are either so specific to a "story" I could tell with multiple pairings or with lyrics so vague I can make up any story I want and get it to match. I have all the sources I could possibly want. I've been going wild with the doujinshi collecting - any yaoi situation I could think of I'm bound to have an example to use on my bookshelf somewhere. I have a nice new scanner so I could actually hand-draw some of the scenes and avoid most of that hand-cramping mouse work. I've learned a few shading tricks that will shut up the "artists" without making things so complicated they'll never flow from one frame to the next. And, damn it all, I really want to do that again. Bigger this time.

    I just need a song. Last time I started with a fanfic. I had the scenes I wanted to use to tell the story. I drew the base frames for those scenes. Then I found a song that would "sort of" match and animated to fit the timing and filled in the blanks with new scenes. It turned out cool, yes, but I think it would have been better if I'd started with a song and drew the scenes (and the story) to match. I don't want to "sound-track a movie" again - I want to make a video to go with a song. Now if I could just think of a song.

    Typical roadblock. I've got tons of songs I want to use for vids and I can never settle on a single one of them. Every time I say I'm going to sit down and pick a song I end up listening to my playlist of favorites and daydreaming about *all* of them instead. Meh. I need to start doing vidlets when that happens. I could still put them into a collective vid and do something with them. It would get rid of the distracting plot bunnies and let me concentrate better.

    On a related note, I hope my old editing software and codecs are still around. I haven't done anything with that stuff in forever. I'm just assuming it all works as well as it did when I dropped it cold turkey. o.o;; 
  • discri, concluded... 2008-02-13 16:01:13 Apparently the thread I was posting in to argue with the 'woman' was locked because it wasn't intended to be a place to "insult others' opinions." Yeah, they were talking about me. I was insulting the deaf girl. I didn't say a single thing that wasn't the obvious truth to anyone with a brain. I didn't learn that she was deaf until her last post. Before that, we were simply debating whether grammar was useful enough to "force" people to match it, or if it was so useless the standards should be lowered (or dropped completely) so they'd be easier for people to meet. I guess now that she's outed herself on that forum as a "poor defenseless and highly opinionated deaf person" anyone arguing counterpoint is mean and insulting and how could anyone pick on a poor deaf girl.

    Meh. She's been bring up that "lower the standards so they're easy" crusade in every single writing thread on that forum. At least now I know why. It'll be easier ignoring her rants now. Though it kills me to tiptoe around someone that loud just because she pulled the "minority/handicap" shield.

    And, leechy confession, I haven't donated to the org since I stopped making vids last year. OT was kinda boring the last time I was in there. Let me know if it's livened up since then and I'll tip some money in the pot to get my access back. Otherwise, I won't be donating again till after the vcas. I only have one vid I plan to make this year and I won't be starting it for another month or two. ^^; 
previous page next page
Current server time: Dec 28, 2024 05:22:20