Software Research

I will be discussing a variety of programs on the market for each stage of my production.

The stages of my production I will be looking at are

·         Spriting

·         Drawing and Editing

·         Animating

·         Game Making

·         Editing (Post Production)

I will be talking about each of these stages and explaining what programs are available on the market for this stage, talking about some features of these programs, before finally choosing which program I want to use.

My first production stage would be spriting, creating sprites for the ‘gameplay’ part of my TV advertisements. Although my final output would not be an actual game, but more the promotional package, creating these sprites in the best way possible is very relevant to my production.

After researching, I have found two potential software packages for this stage. The first one being a program by the name of Cosmigo, this program is used by professionals such as EA, UBISOFT, Leap Frog and WayForward and features aspects such as the onion skin for animating and grids for more specific pixeling  and tools for creating fonts. This program costs £50 but has a 30 day free trial for experimenting and trying out this software.

The second spriting program I have found is Graphics Gale, this program is free with limited features, this program, very similar to Cosmigo, has similar features such as onion skin for animation, grids for precise pixel work and many other different and useful tools. Even with limited features, this program is very easy to use and can produce professional outcomes with no cost at all.

In terms of drawing, I have identified three possible programs I could use for this.

Easy Paint tool SAI is a relatively new Japanese program, designed to be an easy way to draw professional looking drawings without a complex interface. A 30 day trial is available on it’s website, including an English language patch for overseas users. After trying out this program for a few weeks, I found it is a very effective way to work. Allowing me to produce pieces like (show artwork) and (show artwork). I really like this program and think it will definitely be one I will be using in my production.

The second drawing program I researched was one by the name of Gimp. This freeware program has many similarities to photoshop, can be used to edit photographs and also to illustrate and draw freehand. This program, being free is very useful for production, however, after using it to draw for a little bit, I don’t think the interface is simple enough to draw effectively, and it lacks the smoothing and marker tools that SAI has.

Finally, Paint.NET is the third one I researched. This program is again free, and more designed for drawing than Gimp. The interface is a lot more complex than that of paint tool SAI, but this gives you many tools to experiment with, one of the plus sides to the software. I do like this program but believe it would take quite a long time to figure out how to get a professional feel to things drawn in it; therefore it would probably be best to work using SAI due to it’s professional finish and easy interface.

When it comes to animating software, I identified 5 programs that I could use.

The first program was a freeware program by the name of Synfig studio, this program is very good for animating lip synchs during animations. The program takes quite a while to get used to at first, so would require me to watch quite a few tutorials to begin with. Unfortunately this program isn’t used very often in a professional context.

Flash, the second piece of software I found, is increasingly being used outside of colleges and universities and is being used in a much more professional context. My Little Pony, friendship is magic is a very good example of this, a professionally produced TV show being produced in Flash. After playing around with this program for a little bit, I really liked the interface and how easy to user and beginner friendly it was, the only downsides to flash is the export quality in some instances, but this was the only downside I found.

Pencil, a freeware program similar to flash but designed for Macs was another one I tried out, although this was a very simple and hassle free program to work with, the only downside to this program I have found is that it is not great for colouring your animations, as the name suggests, much better for just sketching and getting a feel of the movement in frames.

Toon Boom studio is a newer animation software that has only surfaced in the last few years, it is more complex than flash, usage wise, but it is now becoming widely used by aspiring animators worldwide, some productions have already been made, using this program. It does look like a very nice program to work with, however the interface is somewhat more complex than I am looking for as a beginner.