Question for Blender users... collab worth it??

[mitchelhunt]

When doing a collab online, its often useful to have the team's phone numbers so that you can talk to them directly. I've done a few online projects before, but never finished them. It wasnt because the others lost interest, I was just too swamped with school.

If you are really worried about people losing interest, then pick your team carefully, and talk to each person for a while before adding them. If they do eventually lose interest, then you can always get someone new for the job.

Alot of people will do things for free, just to put something on their portfolio, so I dont think you have to worry about people being sceptic over not getting payed.

Have you used Blender before? I haven't used Maya, but I've been told that it has an extremely different interface, so you should make sure you've got the hang of Blender before starting anything serious.

Hope I could help,
Mitchel

[MichaelR]

Well, I actually think, that quite many would join that project even if they don´t get paid.
With the problem of losing interest:
Why should they lose interest?
but even if, I think there are enough Blenderheads around the world, so that you won´t have to worry.
But you should stay in constant touch with the people working with you, but in times of Skype, ICQ, MSN, etc..., that shouldn´t be a problem I think.

When looking for participants, I would join, if I have the sufficient skills. ;)

michael

[masater]

Well, If those blenderheads are true open source users, they shouldn't mind helping with project for free, as long as there will be some kind of "payback" to the community, like tutorials and makeing ofs. :)
I think I could help, if it is an interesting project and if my skills are good enough.

[Stefce]

Hi neuromancer1978,

First of all i want to wish you good luck on your project!
Choosing Blender as a tool for making short movies is not a bad idea at all. This was proven with the creation of "Elephants dream" (http://orange.blender.org/) , most of which was done with Blender. There's also another project, this time a full lenght commercial animation film called "Plumiferos" (http://www.plumiferos.com).

Considering the fact that you have a complete idea about what your movie will be about, with a completely designed characters and stroy, you shouldn't have much trouble getting people on your team. I would reccomend you to come to the blenderartists.org forum where you'll find many tallented artists who would be happy to be a part of such a project. As long as you show that you're serious about it and you have worked out every aspect of the production people will not lose interest in it.

I'll second what was said in the previous posts, that communication is the most important part when working on such a project. Make sure that you've done everything you can to make people easily understand your idea and you won't have any problem keeping their interest.

Hope this was helpfull, and again, good luck with your project!

Stefan.

[neuromancer1978]

Wow, wasn't expecting that good of responses, very cool! I think I was just thinking pessimistic for no reason at the time. There are some things I need to work out though, mostly just file sharing / storage issues. The communication factor would be worked out easily.

I am gonna go to blenderartists.org soon and start asking the same questions, and maybe I will even set up some kind of website or blog or something. Guess I better get cracking at it!

Thanks guys for the positive responses!

[shr1k]

Look for a guy named enrig at blenderartist he ran a large movie project. I don't know its currant state but they made allot of progress last year. I think his site is blenderprojects.com? Good luck with your project I will watch it and contribute if I can.

[FreakyDude]

I'd join (and stay) and do it for free, if i knew i had the time to spare, which I never do.
I see a lot of cool things like this i can't "dig into" because I know i haven't a long enough timespan to finish it anyway. Gets on my nerves sometimes.
My point, you could find enough people to help you, just don't blame it on blender if they don't stay, Real life isn't a bitch, in fact i love it, but it can get in the way of these things. goes for any app or project btw.

[harkyman]

One thing I should mention is that just about every other week on blenderartists.org, some 13 year old kid is showing up with a post about looking for volunteer to collab on a ROCKING GAME! or a totally kewl anim. To actually the attention of the quality people there, you'll have to show something to differentiate yourself from the constant stream of flash-in-the-pan project "leaders". Maybe some links to prior work, list of projects you've already completed, etc.

[neuromancer1978]

One thing I should mention is that just about every other week on blenderartists.org, some 13 year old kid is showing up with a post about looking for volunteer to collab on a ROCKING GAME! or a totally kewl anim. To actually the attention of the quality people there, you'll have to show something to differentiate yourself from the constant stream of flash-in-the-pan project "leaders". Maybe some links to prior work, list of projects you've already completed, etc.

I totally understand that, which is why I have waited about 4 years to bring this to the net. I wanted to originally get a bunch of local people in on this, so we could sit face to face and do it together, but in the past 4 years I have only gotten 2 people in passing and once again stuck on it alone (mostly because I moved 2,000 miles away). The characters themselves have been set in stone for almost that amount of time, but it's the story I have re-written over and over to get something that DOES stick out, and from the few people I have told about it - they loved it. I do have prior work, have been involved with a few other projects, so I am not so worried about that.

I am making serious effort to at least work the other aspects of this out, like data storage, some kind of central hub should I choose not to make a thread on CGTalks collab section, and so on.... I think I am pretty confidant that the story and the idea would hold up, or stick out as something serious and not just a "flash-in-the-pan" project. This is why I asked the question, to get advice from all sides. Again thank you, it is making me think... :)

[RedSquirrel]

I'm sure if it's a good story then hell yeah, there will be loads of people looking to take part even the non Blender users.

I think you should just go for it. :bounce:

Just out of interest do you have an idea of what the style or look of the animation will be.

[neuromancer1978]

Just out of interest do you have an idea of what the style or look of the animation will be.

Well it will be stylized, but still rooted in reality, at least in the terms of texturing and the actual environment. But at the same time the characters are very stylized. I am not going for an NPR rendering at all, but it would feel like a cartoon. I guess I would have to do a quick render to give an example...

[MichaelR]

would be great :)
as already said by others:
If you can show that you mean it seriously, then you´ll find enough people, including me ;)
The only thing I think such an project would fail in is in bad organisation or because of too less communication.
However,
looking forward to see some material :)

michael

[neuromancer1978]

Well I believe I have started it, however I am holding off creating a thread on the Collab section - I am at the coast, on a laptop with a mouse that doesn't like Blender (haha), so I can't really do much in the way of 3D modeling right now. However though if anyone feels like checking out the production log (blog...whatever) you can do so here

http://holidayshear.blogspot.com/

The first post is a bit long though, it's really the history of the idea behind this short.

While I am here though I am working on more drawings, and if I think they are good enough I'll scan them in and post them on the log. It's the most I can do right now until Saturday night when I return home in Portland.

[neuromancer1978]

Not sure if anyone is aware of it so I thought I would mention it, but this project I have been talking about has started in the Collab thread. So if you feel like checking it out here is the link

http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthread.php?t=408975

Hope to see you there :)

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