‘Red Dwarf- Animated’…New Online Series

[karcreat]

…Being created by fans for the fans!

Have a look at the opening credits for series one, and some partial test animation…

http://www.youtube.com/RedDwarfAnimated

-K

Topic

[karcreat]

Funny you would ask that…;)

We just added a new clip to the RDA site…

http://www.karcreat.com/RedDwarfAnimated.html

…in the Audio/Video area, a test for Cat’s mouth and chin movements and voice matching to animation…several lines of his in a row (sans the responses), the scene is from Starbug’s cockpit, about the middle of the pilot episode (‘Timehole’)…

Pete informs me we are awaiting some lines from Ben before we can proceed along further, but the pilot should be done pretty soon…;)

K

[lego7770]

Loads of animation work at the moment. We are storming on with the first episode, now all the voice work is complete. Character designs, for the most part are done, except for one or two things we keep finding to make things better.

Thanks for your support with this folks; we have met so many talented, friendly and helpful people on this site. Keep the comments coming, good or bad it?s all noted

Keep watching

P

[redhead85]

Can’t wait to see it all in action Pete (but you know I’m biased anyways :-D Going to be quite surreal seeing mine…)

[karcreat]

Some new FX footage up for review!

Starbug approaching the Timehole, from the upcoming pilot episode…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HkK9ybUEx6g

…Let us know whatchoo think!…;)

K

[lego7770]

Wow a tough couple of day?s animation. Not far off finishing episode 1 :)

[lego7770]

Test footage of Starbug picking up the canister. From the forthcoming episode Timehole http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Me7dafQxjCU

[lego7770]

Test footage of Starbug picking up the canister. From the forthcoming episode Timehole http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Me7dafQxjCU

[Danny Stephenson]

You sent this post two days ago mate.

[Dave]

Re-Test footage?

[Pete Part Three]

[Insert hackneyed White Hole reference here]

[Carlito]

So what is it?

Timehole’s the pilot, a short mini-episode just to give everyone a taster for the main series of episodes coming soon.

[Dave]

There’s some pretty impressive competition out there:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b6A6Ub6pfmM

[Carlito]

ooh, that looks nice. Impressive!

Not really “competition” though… I mean, that’s just a CGI shot of Starbug. RDA is a scripted 2D cartoon show with, y’know, plots and jokes and tings. :)

[hummingbird]

To digress for a moment, will you lovely G&T people ever be able to sort out this pagination issue, where you can’t skip to the last entry once the thread runs to more than one page? Or is it just a flaw inherent in the system?

[John Hoare]

It will be sorted. I’ve been too busy to do things on the site at the moment, but once I start my new job in a couple of weeks time, I’ll be on shift work. Meaning: five days off at a time. Plenty of time to give G&T the upgrade it needs.

I know it’s really annoying. Just bear with us a few weeks longer!

[hummingbird]

Thanks, John.
I just wondered if it was something that we were stuck with.

[Danny Stephenson]

It will be sorted. I?ve been too busy to do things on the site at the moment, but once I start my new job in a couple of weeks time, I?ll be on shift work. Meaning: five days off at a time. Plenty of time to give G&T the upgrade it needs.

NO JOHN, this is unacceptable! How dare you get a NEW JOB, when G&T is obvsiously in such dire need of repairs. As you can tell by this point I am speaking ironically and have nothing but good things to say about what you do…

[Seb Patrick]

Not really ?competition? though? I mean, that?s just a CGI shot of Starbug. RDA is a scripted 2D cartoon show with, y?know, plots and jokes and tings. :)

Might be worth saving the smugness until AFTER people have seen whether your one is any good (and indeed, whether the people who did that CGI rendering have actually got anything else behind it – you don’t know for sure that they haven’t, after all), eh? Otherwise it’s just not very nice.

[Carlito]

How is it “smug” to say that a solitary clip of Starbug isn’t competition? There may well be more behind it, but there’s no evidence to suggest that. It’s probably just somebody having a bit of fun. If there’s ‘competitive’ intent, more power to them. Certainly not being smug to assume there isn’t, especially considering that clip has been online for over two years with no follow up.

And RDA does have plots and jokes and tings… I was never presumptuous enough to say they are “good”, though… that is in the eye of the beholder. ALL I was saying is that in comparison to one single clip of animation, our project has a lot more depth, completely regardless of perceived quality by the eventual viewer.

[ori-STUDFARM]

When I looked at the CGI Starbug, I spotted this video on the “Related Videos” section. I played it to Mrs Studfarm who promptly said…”it’s a helicopter”

I’m not so sure….

[karcreat]

Hey All!

Quick question for those of you following this project…

We recently received a very polite inquiry from Grant Naylor, asking us to please not use their Red Dwarf logo and the theme music from the original show…other than those two small points, they did not seem to take issue with our work, for which we were quite grateful.

We have since replaced the logo with one that reflects the animation aspect of our project, (I’m actually very happy to have done this, since we wanted it to be clear to viewers that this is an animation venture) but there has been some concern voiced among our group that fans will not respond well to our episodes if we use different music for the opening/closing credits. The thought seems to be that without the theme music, fans will be ‘turned off’ from wanting to watch the episodes we create…I would love to hear from you all on this point…will different theme music in ‘Red Dwarf- Animated’ put you off from wanting to watch our episodes?

Thanks in advance!

-K

[Seb Patrick]

Use the music from the US pilot instead. I doubt Todd Rundgren would mind.

[Ridley]

Can’t you dispense with the opening titles and just have the episode name on screen instead? Like Parallel Universe. And Duct Soup… kinda.

[karcreat]

“Use the music from the US pilot instead. I doubt Todd Rundgren would mind”

(Trying to type whilst both laughing AND barfing)

Ummm…no.

:)

K

[karcreat]

“Can?t you dispense with the opening titles and just have the episode name on screen instead?”

Awww, but THAT’S no fun…we really want to have opening titles each episode, so there is a similarity to the original show…besides, I love opening titles for shows…;)

K

[hummingbird]

Does this just apply to the main theme music, or would it be possible to use other music from the show?

[Dave]

Different music every time: Lister’s guitar solo, hammond organ, decimalised Hol Rock, etc

[Ian Symes]

Surely using *other* pieces of GNP-copyrighted music will be just as problematic?

will different theme music in ?Red Dwarf- Animated? put you off from wanting to watch our episodes?

I can honestly say that the choice of music will not affect the likelihood of me wanting to watch these episodes whatsoever.

[peas_and_corn]

I will still watch it even if it didn’t have the original theme music.

[ChrisM]

Yeah, I don’t think it will make any difference. Actually, having your own credit music could be a good thing from a creative point of view and to give the animation it’s own identity. Even if you look at a lot of authorised cartoons of other shows (or vice versa, live action films based on something originally a cartoon or comic strip) they’ll have their own music.

[Seb Patrick]

See, this is the thing, though, that – and don’t take this the wrong way, but – sort of sums up the inherent problem with doing stuff like this. As has just been demonstrated by the fact that GNP have asked you not to use copyrighted material – you’re not making Red Dwarf.

Now I’m not saying this applies to all fan-fiction, fan-films or anything like that. They’re valid forms that serve a particular purpose – and can be especially helpful in aiding young writers in finding a voice without having to build everything from the ground up. And after all, the New Adventures were, for all intents and purposes, fanfic – just fanfic that got a licence from the BBC, because they didn’t know what else to do with the property at the time.

But there comes a point when what you’re doing stops being an amateur tribute to a particular property that you’re a fan of, and becomes outright imitation. And then the question becomes: what is it that you’re trying to do? It’s especially relevant when a property is actually still ongoing (and Dwarf may have been dead for most of the 2000s, but I think the majority of us consider it “alive” again now, at least for the moment and no matter what may or may not happen in the future). Look at the guy doing that “Doctor Who 2009” thing. What’s his motivation there? He may claim that it’s to give Doctor Who a full “season” in the year off – but given that the show is still in production, he’ll only ever come off poorly alongside it, and the only impression I get is of someone who desperately wants to be Russell T Davies and David Tennant rolled into one, but never will be. Now I’m not comparing you directly to him, but it does strike me that when you’re at that level of production competence, it’s a little insulting just to work entirely from other people’s concepts, settings and character developments instead of building your own.

The thing is, looking at the material you’ve put out so far – you’re clearly talented animators, and you’ve got good voice artists (I can’t comment on your scripts until you put an episode out). This is talent that could be put to good use – if you want to do a sci-fi comedy that attracts Red Dwarf fans like yourselves, then why not make it entirely original? So that it becomes your own property, that you’ve fully created, and that you’re free to do whatever you want with? Look at Jump Leads. I’m sure Ben won’t mind it saying that that is hugely influenced by Dwarf. As such, it’s an ideal thing for him to talk to RD fans about, and I’m sure he’s attracted many new fans that way. But it’s not a carbon copy, and not a ripoff – it’s just that if you like one sci-fi comedy with a particular style of humour, you may like others (in much the same way as I bet a fair few of the people that tuned into Dwarf‘s first episode had been fans of Hitchhiker’s, or Dark Star, or even Spaceballs.

I mean, let’s say RDA turns out to be brilliant. What can you do with it from there? What if someone sees it online and wants to turn it into a series? Your only reply is “Sorry, we don’t own it”. And you’re back at square one, because even if your potential is noticed you’ve still got to go back and create something original before you can sell it (although I know you do other original stuff, Kevin). I know that having the name “Red Dwarf” on it makes it a bit more likely to attract casual viewers – but it also leaves you open to stronger criticism if it doesn’t live up to their expectations. If it’s something entirely original that holds similar appeal to Red Dwarf, it just strikes me that you’d have a better chance of creating something you can run with.

Or, alternatively, there’s the other route – go the whole hog. Put together an actual proposal (without scripts or plot outlines, mind, because I’d wager they’re legally not allowed to look at those) and send it to GNP. If you think you can do a bloody good Red Dwarf animated web series, then why not see if it can be done officially, perhaps even with the proper cast doing the voices? And such things can run concurrently with an ongoing series – look at the official Who animated stuff.

This is all just my opinion. You can entirely ignore it if you want, and you may find it incredibly patronising. I’m not doubting your motives, either, I think they’re entirely sincere. And this looks like a good project. I just wonder if it’s not a bit of a waste of the work that’s being put into it.

[Dave]

>This is all just my opinion

It’s difficult to disagree with it.

[karcreat]

“Does this just apply to the main theme music, or would it be possible to use other music from the show?”

We want to avoid using ANY music that was used on the show, to keep Grant naylor happy…after all, they have been so nice to US….;)

K

[lego7770]

I dint know what my motives were when I started out on the project.(I still don?t) I had been working on other R.D animations (a bit like the mobisodes) for quite some time.
Some of them were posted on here, and got what can only be described as a tepid reception

I was invited through posting the above animations on here to join fictionshed forum who do some amazing pod casts based around Babylon 5, as they were working on a R.D project, unfortunately as they are very busy lads that project was put on hold and the script remains unfinished

That?s were I met Kevin who already had a script and animatic done and it has gone from there

We posted our early work on here and loads of folk offered help and advice, that was well noted and the quality of the animations, through constant revision, have steadily been improving.

It wasn?t to try and emulate RD as the project has, I hope, our own stamp on it.

At the end of the day I?m a plasterer not an animator, and while work is slack it is all done for fun, and to keep me busy. I have, since the start of the project, had a delusion that I we could make our own original series and possibly offer it for sale. But at the moment I am happy to keep working on RDA as a form of therapy.

The other aspect that it has brought unexpectedly is a great deal of friendship and support from other like minded fans who probably wouldn?t have even spoken without the project.

P

[karcreat]

Seb Patrick…

You make good, valid points…but just to be clear, the main reason we are doing this whole thing is…FOT THE FUN oF IT, period…;)

Well, THAT…and its a challenge to please the fans, get it to look/sound right…but Ive always been very keen on ‘imitations’, IE, spoofs, parodies, etc…just look at my http://www.karcreat.com site, or my http://karcreat.deviantart.com/ acct, with all the parody artwoerk there…getting down a particular ‘style’ is always a challenge, and I’ve actually been lucky/successful enough at it to fool a few pros (Doc Hammer thought my ‘Venture Bros’ animatic and storyboards were ‘the real deal’…and IMO, that kindda thing is better than $ ANY DAY of the week!…;)

So basically, I can answer your inquiry by stating that yes, we are doing it for the fun of it and for the fans, the best possible audience to gauge our potential success…you asked ‘What if someone sees it online and wants to turn it into a series? Your only reply is ?Sorry, we don?t own it?.’…this just isn’t important to us (well, to ME anyway!) as I DO have plenty of my own, original work to also keep me busy…sure, it would be flattering to get a response like that…but unless it was Grant Naylor ‘approaching us’ to do an actual series (unlikely at BEST!)as you described, its just icing on the fun cake…;)

Basically, we do things like this for the fans, for the experience in learning the animation/editing process…and because we HAVE to…if I DIDNT do creative stuff like this for an audience, I’d likely go loopy…;)

K

[karcreat]

Well said, Pete…;)

K

[redhead85]

> Now I?m not saying this applies to all fan-fiction, fan-films or anything like that. They?re valid forms that serve a particular purpose

Everyone has hobbies. Mine? Writing. I love it. My spare time is spent writing RD fanfic as it keeps my creative juices flowing, I enjoy it, and (admittedly for the sake of my ego) I love the feedback that I get. People have been incredibly kind about my work, and have been asked if I’m a professional writer, which I was very flattered by.

> and can be especially helpful in aiding young writers in finding a voice without having to build everything from the ground up.

Man I wish this were true! Yes, it would be fantastic to be known in the future for my writing some day, but I am under no illusion that me posting RD fanfic will somehow get me noticed. Actually knuckling down and writing the bloody novel I promised myself I would write and working hard to get it noticed by publishers is the way to find a voice. Fanfiction is either a hobby or damn good practice for honing writing skills. You’re taking an existing set-up and working from there – the vast majority of the work is done for you. It’s pure laziness on my front.

> I just wonder if it?s not a bit of a waste of the work that?s being put into it.

I’ve only written one script for the guys but I loved every minute of it. It challenged me far more than my ‘comfort zone’ of prose writing did, and it will be a great honour to see it given life. Totally worth every hour spent on it. ^__^

[karcreat]

I anyone deserves to be ‘discovered’ as a writer, its Carl.

I agree completely with him regarding the issue of why its ‘not a waste’ as well…how can anything that entertains people be considered a ‘waste’?…;)

K

[redhead85]

> I anyone deserves to be ?discovered? as a writer, its Carl.

Oh thanks Kev :-P hehe

Carl is a fantastic writer, and I’m amazed at how his comedy and ideas just seem to flow so damn quickly, whilst I’m left cursing trying to think of one half-decent gag… I’m sure you guys will enjoy the episodes when they’re out and see them for what they are – homages to the greatness of Grant Naylor but in no way trying to emulate them (an impossible feat without at least one dodgy deal with the dark lord…)

[karcreat]

“Oh thanks Kev :-P hehe”

Oh, now STOP THAT!!…;)

I KNEW the minute I had posted that, that I should have worded it differently, dammit!!…;)

In all seriousness, CDarl stands out to me as he was the FIRST writer who submitted anything to us, and to be honest, we aere not expecting too much as FanFic can tend to ‘be a bit dodgy’ as Kryten might put it…and his work was amazingly well done!

Thats NOT to say that other writers who have done up scripts have not be brilliant as well (hint hint!…;), Carl just kindda ‘stands out’ for me personally…;)

K

[karcreat]

‘CDarl’???

My keyboard is too small, and my fingers are too fat…sorry…;)

K

[karcreat]

Ok, funny thing…

I just pulled up the script submitted to us by ‘redhead85’ (Carrie), re-read the opening…and then couldn’t stop myself from continuing on with it!

Gotta admit…Carrie is very good at this as well, leagues above the usual ‘fanfic’ Ive come across…and as far as the scripts we have received, she and Carl wrote the ones I can quote from as the writing truly stands out…they both have the language and the mannerisms of the characters down PAT, and altho Carrie will claim she is ‘left cursing trying to think of one half-decent gag’, you would never know it when reading her work, it flows easilly and evenly…

IMO, if a writer can pull THAT off, they’re damn good…So I stand corrected, LOL RE our ‘best writers’, I guess!…;)

K

[redhead85]

> Oh, now STOP THAT!!?;) I KNEW the minute I had posted that, that I should have worded it differently, dammit!!?;)

Mwahahaha. It’s too fun/easy winding you up my dear!

> ?CDarl????

Carl’s eeee-villl alter ego. Or a typo.

[ori-STUDFARM]

C Darl run
Run Darl Run
Run….home Darl!

Why? I don’t know! Copious amounts of alcohol maybe?

Is copious even a word?

[redhead85]

> Is copious even a word?

Yes. ^__^

> Copious amounts of alcohol maybe?

Most likely! But it’s making you very poetic…

[karcreat]

Oh, it was a typo, trust me…I aint that clever as a ‘writer’…;)

Wanna hear REALLY pathetic, dear Carrie?

When I read your initial post here RE why you write fan fic stuff, I had just woken up, all bleary eyed and yawning…and I didnt even note your avatar, denoting you as the author…I just PRESUMED it was a post from Carl (as he posts a lot to the RD boards RE our project), thus the ‘If anyone deserves to be discovered’ line…

G’won…laugh long and hard at my sorry butt, I deserve it…;)

K

[ori-STUDFARM]

There was a hen called Ben
He was a peculiar hen
He decided to write poems
that didn’t quite rhyme.
Very similar to this one in fact!

By Ben the hen

Poetic….don’t think so!

;)

[karcreat]

:)

Maybe NOT ‘poetic’, no…but quite funny, yes!

-K

[redhead85]

Ben the hen is a genius. I actually laughed out loud reading that.

> G?won?laugh long and hard at my sorry butt, I deserve it?;)

HAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHHAHHAHAHAHAHA….

*sigh* I should get out more.

[ori-STUDFARM]

Or maybe drink more……or maybe drink less.

[Author]

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