Episode – 33 – Re-United Airlines

May 17, 2011 | Filed Under Episodes | 12 Comments

TOPIC: Shootin’ the breeze
GUEST: Jamey Moulton, 3D Artist at Junction Point

Hey there, sports fans,

Re-animated Ryan here, bringing you an ALL NEW, NEVER-HEARD-BEFORE episode of the Re-animators Podcast!!! For the low, low price of free! Kick back and animate to the silky sounds of Rascally “DJ Rab” Rick Blankenship and the smoky rasp of yours truly, along with returning guest and male model, golden-voiced effects artist, Jamey Moulton. Mike was there too!

This episode was mostly just a catch-up for us all, since we haven’t done an episode together since October or November but we try to keep it topical, talking about where we’re all at now, the different kinds of animators, the different scenarios of the next games industry apocalypse and what the worst Pixar movie is.

It was also our first attempt at a live group on the Snowball plus a Skype call and other than some webcam difficulties, it worked pretty much without a hitch, at least as far as recording was concerned, which opens up some more show opportunities for us, like getting some of my Nordic and Dutch friends to do the show (despite our pathetic regularity, our Snowball mic is actually quite the world traveler by now). We’re a little rusty and were in a bit of a hurry to finish so please pardon the bad edits in the second half. Yes, you missed some stuff but it’s okay since we mostly just repeat ourselves anyway.

Show notes:
Michael Carr’s blog on “Animation Nerds” (designer’s animators/animator’s animators)

My apologies for the sad plea for attention in the last half of the show as internet narcissism is one of my pet hates (says @ReanimatorsRyan on Twitter) but really, there’d be probably be more shows like ours if animators weren’t so damn busy all the time. We started doing this show because we love animation, game development and all the nerd media. And we really only found one other podcast that was doing anything close to what we had in mind (www.10thmusepodcast.com). We thought it might be something people would want to hear. But it takes money to host these podcasts and a lot of time and effort to get the three of us available to record at the same time, often across 9 or 10 different time zones, then mix, edit for content, compress, upload to distribute then blog and announce the thing. Some of these shows have taken close to a full workday to produce and share a single episode. Not to mention tapping some pretty badass guests to join us and share their smarts, which we’ve done and can continue to do.

We won’t ask for donations or anything and this is something we do enjoy doing but it would be nice to hear from those of you who feel you actually get anything out of this show, or even if you just like listening to us embarrass ourselves like monkeys at the zoo. Because I can’t speak for the other guys, but for me, my part of our ever-slipping schedule is largely due to a motivational impairment; I could get a fair bit of animation work done in just the time it takes to edit one of these things alone. I love talking shop with Mike, Rick and guests but like I’ve said before, there’s some risk to recording and sharing these conversations and I’m personally on the fence if it’s worth it.

To the many of you who have emailed and commented over our three year history, a huge thanks! You’re a big reason why I’m still along for the ride, for now.

Love and hershey kisses,
Emo Ryan

Episode 32 – Design-imation

March 28, 2011 | Filed Under Episodes | 3 Comments

TOPIC: Where Game Design and Animation Meet
GUEST: Steve Bowler, Lead Combat Designer at Phosphor Games

So I guess this time we are Re-Re-RE Animated?!

This is a show I’ve been wanting to do for a while, and Steve is a guest I’ve been wanting to have on for almost just as long. Steve started as an animator but has transitioned to a design role, which I find infinitely interesting. He also used to be anonymous online, which I also find interesting, since we have often times wondered if actively speaking our mind on this podcast is very wise. But before that, we touch on my verbose nature and the numbers Metacritic now wants to attach to our names.

Sadly, Ryan and Rick couldn’t make the show, but I’m sure we will get the band back together soon. Then we can catch up on whats new and rock your ears with our sweet, smooth melodies.

Show Notes:
Mike’s Applying Animation Principles to Game Design Posts
Mike’s Posts on #AltDevBlogADay
Metacritic now rates Developers
Steve’s Article on the Standoff feature in Strangelhold

Episode 31 – Ubercast!

December 14, 2010 | Filed Under Episodes | 3 Comments

TOPIC: Surviving and thriving as an indy studio
GUEST: Chandana “Eka” Ekanayake, Art Director and John Comes, Creative Director; Uber Entertainment

Thanks to my super power of nomadic homelessness, I was able to dust off our Snowball microphone and record an ON-SITE podcast in Kirkland, Washington with Mike and a couple of the minds behind Uber Entertainment and their game, Monday Night Combat, which is available on XBLA and coming soon to PC via Steam! Rick was geographically unable to attend but you’ll hear his sweet, soothing sounds soon enough, now that I’m back in Austin.

We don’t normally like to pimp specific companies but Uber is a company that anyone who dreams of starting their own game studio for AAA style, bigger budget games, should be paying attention to. They are small, independently owned and they own their own IP, yet they made a fully 3d modeled and animated, Unreal 3 engine game which is more AAA than XBLA. Eka and John were kind enough to share a bit about their success with Uber and MNC and as usual, we get plenty of developers talking games and games industry!

Mike, Ryan and Bacon Vodka

===MONDAY NIGHT COMBAT GIVEAWAY CONTEST!!!===

Thanks to Eka, John and all of Uber Entertainment for their generous donation, we have four codes for FREE copies of Monday Night Combat to give away! There are two ways to win:

CATEGORY 1) We want to see or hear YOUR pitch for a holiday themed game for any platform. It doesn’t have to be any of the December holidays so you guys who just can’t get enough of Arbor Day are in luck. Please keep your pitch to a maximum of ONE PAGE of written text or a ONE MINUTE recorded audio.

CATEGORY 2) We want to read or (much more preferably) hear a game or animation themed holiday song or poem. It can be a game song to the tune of a Holiday song but preference will be given to songs that integrate both like “How WaLuigi stole Christmas” or “Pikachu’s first Hanukkah”. Songs will be graded higher then poems but a good poem trumps a crappy song.

HOW TO ENTER:
Format your finished submissions as an ATTACHMENT in .doc or .txt format for text submissions or .wav or .mp3 format for audio. Please no .zips, .rars or anything exotic. Please don’t put your text in the body of the email.

Email your submission to reanimatorspodcast@gmail.com before JANUARY 5th, 2010 Please no more than three submissions per person. Winners and winning entries will be announced, read and/or played back on the air of our first episode we record in the New Year. Honorable mentions may also be announced or presented on the show.

PRIZES:
The best overall submission will receive TWO copies of Monday Night Combat for Xbox Live, one for themselves and one to gift to a friend. To be clear, the winner could be from EITHER category but there will not be one from both. The best, single entry of ALL entries is the winner.

The 2nd place winner of each catagory will receive one free copy of Monday Night Combat for Xbox Live.

Show Notes:
“Single player games are finished!”
Warsoup

Another brilliant animation!

December 6, 2010 | Filed Under Cool animations | 2 Comments

Hey gang, Ryan here.

It’s been a while since we shared any great animations that we’ve stumbled and I got this one from some of my Gobelins summer school friends this morning. Great might not be an adequate word to describe Ryan Woodward’s “Thought of you” . I think it’s best described as beautiful.

Thought of You from Ryan Woodward on Vimeo.

Episode 30 – Saved Game

November 29, 2010 | Filed Under Episodes | 4 Comments

TOPIC: Faith and Religion in Games

GUESTS:
Christian Sheppard, Animator at Junction Point
Caleb Zart, Animator at Raven Software
Paul Robbins, Animator at Insomniac Games

With both Rick and Ryan off experiencing the true meaning of turkey, I recruited the ghosts of jobs past to help me out this episode.  And even though there is a common adage about talking politics and religion being the best way to lose friends, I’ve found the exact opposite to be the case with these three.  So while I know people can be wary of discussing religion, I think it is a great area that can be explored when crafting more serious, fully realized games.

So after we give our definitions of religion and faith, we speak about their history in games as well as their potential.  We ask if games should have a religious or spiritual agenda, and what is our moral responsibility as game developers.  We also wonder what it would take to create a digital soul for a game character.

So give it a listen, and let us know what you think.  We tried our best to touch on most major beliefs so as not to alienate or anger anyone too much.  Unless you are addicted to WoW, in which case I’m pretty sure I alienated you something good.

Show Notes
Christian was previously on episode 21
Super 3D Noah’s Ark is the Doom clone I mentioned
Mass We Pray commercial by Dante’s Inferno marketing
Extra Credit expands on Mass Effect 2 ethical dilema
Gamer Dad post entitled Game with God
Left Behind: Eternal Forces
This Charles Schultz picture wasn’t mentioned during the show, but I came across it today and it just seemed fitting

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