**Lightsaber Choreography Contest V Has Begun!**

Just a suggestion from a fan of lightsaber duels. This year, I'd really like to see more fights that show what a real duel would look like. I'm getting tired of fights where people think the more hits per second they get the better. The fights just look cheesy and way to planned out! That's why I enjoyed the fight in ESB so much. It wasn't very fast, but the Luke and Vader were putting everything they had into each blow, and seriously looked like they were trying to slice each other to bits! Please think about this when you're making your duels!

Ok, I'll stop being annoying now *leaves*

 

The only thing stopping me from an entry right now is the -20 degrees outside. But, I will try my hardest to get an entry in.

 

Wouldn't that give you an unfair advantage?

 

what happens if you win?

 

How do you figure that?

M. Scott

 

Choreography all starts in the mind and then is played out by actors. Where in live-action people would be praticing and spending time learning their moves, he would be animating. I don't think it's unfair... maybe for him

 

yeah, we've been delayed for 3 days cuz of -25 degree weather.

I was actually hoping of competing in this

 

When you animate characters, you really aren't bound by the laws of physics or other environmental factors. If you decide to animate, you could have your actors do more "interesting" things than you would be able to do easily in live action film. From the standpoint of being able to manipulate your environment (the way I was looking at it), he does have an advantage. Now that I think about it, animate the characters would be a much more painful and time consuming process than having live action actors as TrowaGPO2a hinted. Looking at it from a time budgeting standpoint, he probably doesn't. Should've thought about the disadvantages of the idea, o well...

 

Yeah, but he could do it in Poser and it wouldn't be nearly as difficult, and that wouldn't really affect his score. I agree with you, it does seem like an advantage. I think it should be at least partially live-action, or else it kinda messes with the spirit of LCC. I mean, without the laws of physics...these things could get crazy...

 

Nothing's stopping anyone else from using CG doubles in an otherwise live-action piece.

There's no rule against animated entries and there shouldn't be. Choreography is choreography and the best choreography will shine. Being able to break the rules of physics won't automatically make for better choreography, it's all in what you do with it.

M. Scott

 

Hey, I'm not entering anything, so I don't care, the better they are, yay for me the viewer. But it does seem to be leading down a path where the ones with VFX knowledge will be making the winning entries in the long run, and I just always thought that LCC should be above that.

 

The best choreography is the best choreography. It's the ideas that are important.

M. Scott

 

Wasn't there an older entry with a 'cylinder-man', that is a character without any real shading? It didn't do very well, but it was a cool concept. Then there was Hat's bit where he fought himself.

The fun part for me is doing the choreography, but if one of the animators wants to do a digital fight, I say knock yourselves out.

-Vaportrail

 

m2v is a Quicktime codec I think....at least it is on my Mac.


EDIT: "MPEG-2 Playback File Types: .mpg .mpeg .vob(2) .vro .m2v .m2a .m2s"

so it's a MPEG-2 codec.

 

Except if I give you the .m2v and .mpa files, you'll have to mux it back together.

 

I'm just done with writing down the direction.
e.g.:

01m:36s
'They fight'

01m:40s
'They walk into the building'.

I'm matching/timing the fight to a musicpiece. I haven't started the choreography yet. Probably start that in about a week or two.
If this is to become what I want it's gonna take a great deal of work.

 

True. I never worked with a .mpa file before, only .aif and AC3s. It shouldn't be a problem, but are .mpa's compressed audio? Because if it is, DVD Studio Pro will compress again into AC3, doing God knows what to the quality of the audio.

 

That was me, three years ago, LCC 2.5

 

I've lost count....

...Sound Off Ladies! Who's definitely joining?!
//Drill Sargent

 

I'm entering.

 

//Raises right hand gently like a sissy girl doing da cha cha//

...meaning I'm also entering.

 

Right, I'll probably convert the .mpa to wav/ac3 before hand. And yes, I will be entering.

 

I'm in.

 

Aye.