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Yes, because when Gorman says "a xenomorph may be involved," he's not talking about the movie's aliens. He's using the word—correctly—to refer to an unknown non-terrestrial form of life. He's basically saying, "There may be non-humans of some sort down there."
(The fact that the marines had never before encountered the aliens and Gorman is using "xenomorph" as a generic term is easily provable, since the marines clearly have no fucking idea what the aliens are, how they reproduce, or how to fight them. If Xenomorph-with-a-capital-X actually referred to the movie's eponymous aliens, then none of the marines would be shocked and yelling "WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT THING" etc etc when the Xenomorphs-with-a-capital-X actually show up.)
Nobody seems particularly surprised that "a xenomorph" is involved, so it seems pretty clear that they've encountered other xenomorphs (i.e., other alien life of some sort) before.
Also, they mention Arcturians in conversation ("It don't matter when it's Arcturian!"), and that seems likely to be another non-human race.
If you want to go slightly non-canonical, the Colonial Marines Technical Manual mentions several times that there are lots of non-human sentients in the galaxy.
If you want the honest answer: Lucas planned for there to be a sequel trilogy focusing on Luke searching the galaxy for his long-lost sister. However, when they got around to writing/filming ROTJ, Lucas was going through a messy divorce and wanted to take a break from Star Wars to raise his kids.
So, instead of fleshing out the storyline in any meaningful way, they decided to just wrap it up and make Leia Luke's sister. There was no overarching plot laid out ahead of ROTJ for Leia and Luke to be related, it just kinda... happened so that they could wrap up loose ends.
The look on Rick McCallum's face is priceless.
Also, I LOVE the Plinkett reviews.
"WHAT'S WRONG WITH YOUR FACE?!" I couldn't stop laughing. I spit out this line every now and then as a reaction to something minor, and it still gives me a good giggle.
BTW, I would heartily recommend "The Secret History of Star Wars" by Michael Kaminsky:
It's a superbly researched and annotated book that focuses specifically on just the writing and production of the first six films. Kaminsky's prose is concise and dispassionate, and really just lets the facts stand by themselves.
I read it in less than a week and it's one of my favorite books of its kind.
Respectfully, I think you're missing the key element in why Easy Rider (1969) was so impactful. It wasn't about the technical filmmaking, but rather how the film was made as well as the social context that the film was coming out in.
It was made for very little money with almost no studio influence. The film itself is practically a giant middle finger to the establishment and the studio system of the day. Like you, I'm actually not much of a fan of the film but I can still appreciate the context and historical importance of it.
If you're interested in film history around this era of Hollywood (Scorsese, George Lucas, Francis Coppola, etc.), I highly recommend Peter Biskind's book Easy Riders & Raging Bulls.
No. Star Wars was meant to be a single movie that Lucas made when he couldn’t get the Flash Gordon rights. After it blew up, they made plans for a trilogy, and put “Episode V” in front of ESB. Around that time, Lucas started talking about how he has always planned it as a grand trilogy of trilogies, but that’s not true, they made it up as they went along for the first trilogy.
There are quite a few sources for this but here’s a good starter:
I was reprinted in 2012, so get you one!
For 2D animation, I think the first exercises are;
- Character turnaround - an animation of your character from different angles so that it rotates
- Ball bounce (with squash and stretch)
- walk cycle
I'd really really recommend getting your hands on a copy of The Animator's Survival Kit . It's pretty much considered the animators bible, and I'm pretty sure there are PDFs out there if you can't afford it right now.
It goes into a lot of detail on keys and how they relate to timings specifically. In fact, pretty much everything in there shows the keys used and key poses, and how to achieve weight.
Alternatively, if it's mainly the 'illustrating' side of things you enjoy rather than the 'figuring out how to make things move gud' aspect then something else you might want to look into is motion graphics, and starting out with making some of your existing character illustrations move around a bit with After Effects.
Toon Boom Harmony is another software looking into if you get a chance - especially as you already have a grounding in 3D. From my understanding, it's the same workflow as 3D animation only with 2D rigs instead. I'm pretty sure shows such as The Amazing World of Gumball, Rick and Morty, Family Guy and The Simpsons use it - but it's far more common in industry these days than traditional (hand-drawn) animation.
Sounds like you’d be into Truffaut’s book/interview with Hitchcock (https://www.amazon.com/Hitchcock-Revised-Francois-Truffaut/dp/0671604295/). That will probably inspire you to see Hitchcock’s collective work.
A subscription to criterion would probably do you well too.
Check out the critical studies film program at USC.
first of all, you are insanely talented. animating characters with realistic proportions like these is super hard so great job!!
I do think some of your walkcycles still look a little rough though. If you would like to learn to improve them, consider buying the Animator's Survival Kit: https://www.amazon.nl/Animators-Survival-Kit-Principles-Classical/dp/086547897X/ref=asc_df_086547897X/?tag=nlshogostdde-21&linkCode=df0&hvadid=430671742064&hvpos=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=7488386459259133356&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=c&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=1010659&hvtargid=pla-395340047230&psc=1
Good luck with future projects!!
https://www.amazon.com/Screenwriters-Complete-Writing-Formatting-Selling/dp/1935247212 - This is a good workbook-style learning tool.
The Screenwriters Bible has everything you will need for the proper formatting of your script - including montages and flashbacks.
It is the resource we used in film school. I keep it on hand for all my scripts. It is very helpful!
I devoured Future Noir throughout the ‘90s, so finally being able to watch the Workprint was a literal dream come true.
If you're already painting in photoshop, thats a great place to start animating!
Here's a great tutorial on workflow tips for animating in Photoshop, by a really talented animator named Alex Grigg: https://vimeo.com/80851591
I'd say play around for a bit just making things move around before getting into more technical animation training. Approach it like you would draw flip books in the corner of a textbook. Just make things move around and experiment. Once you've played around a bit, and gotten a feel for using photoshop to work across a timeline, I suggest checking out a book that is one of the standard textbooks for classical animation, "The Animator's Survival Toolkit," by Richard Williams (he was the animation director on "Who Framed Roger Rabbit"). You can find it on amazon here:
Hope this helps!
Your arms are moving on some nice arcs. But your legs are really poppy towards the end of the loop. The head seems to move at the same rate of the arms and it’s making it feel robotic. When humans run there’s an up and down motion of the whole body. Like so: walk cycle If you’ve don’t have the Animators Survial Kit by Richard Willams, I highly recommend buying it in some form. Amazon link to paperbackIt has all sorts of useful information.
overall its a solid start. you just need to brush up on the 12 principles of animation.
hope it helps!
This really helped me when i learned animation.
I guess the only tip I can give from my recent SFM experience is to have some sort of anticipation before the character does an action. It's little stuff like that which makes the animation better. I also recommend getting this book
Hope this helps.
the great bible about animation: The Animator's Survival Kit http://www.amazon.com/Animators-Survival-Kit-Principles-Classical/dp/086547897X
buy it, read it, praise it༼ つ ◕_◕༽つ
edit: or borrow it from the library
The Filmmaker's Handbook by Steven Ascher is the closest thing I can think of, although it covers all aspects of filmmaking beyond cinematography so may not get into the level of detail you're looking for.
this book has very good and in depth lessons on walk and run cycles, as well as other animation principles
this book will help a lot
Some of the best traditional animation in history, with animation directed by the great Richard Williams, who literally wrote the <strong>book</strong> on animation.
Don’t believe anything Lucas has ever said about having all the movies mapped out. Read The Secret History of Star Wars and you’ll see the parent poster is correct
https://www.amazon.com/Secret-History-Star-Wars/dp/0978465237
Heh nice, they acted out the description from the United States Colonial Marines Technical Manual suffix.
The Animator's Survival Kit by canadian-english animator Richard Williams.
I've read several books on screenwriting including Save the Cat and The Screenwriter's Bible (an earlier edition).
None of them will teach you how to write a "great" movie, but that's not the point. The point of both books is to teach you the format, beats, and rules of screenwriting. Then it's up to you as the writer to craft your screenplay using that information.
I don't think you can blame Synder, Trotter, Field, or any other writer who had a screenwriting book published for every formulaic script that has been produced. The blame for that belongs elsewhere.
I appreciate it, if you want to learn a walk cycle, this book was really helpful for me
The Screenwriter's Bible is my go-to cheat sheet. Also, check screenwriting.io.
Heh, I was looking through my book on Blade Runner to find the original script's soliloquy when all I had to do is go to wiki. LOL Thanks!