Great animation! There are some flaws in it, but overall it’s a good animation. As mentioned before, the character feels kinda weightless sometimes, and the ‘crouching’ animation is a tad too long. You should also make the poses a bit more extreme, since that’ll read a bit better. I HIGHLY recommend www.keithlango.com for tuts, his are the BEST.
Again, great anim! Keep blendin’.
Add some audio and it would be pro! Kudos:D
I actually quite like your camera work. It’s just the backgrounds and character modelling that needs work. However looking on what you have accomplished so far- that shouldn’t be a problem.
keep up the good work 
I downloaded the file, and windows media play says that it has encoundered an unknown error. Why? I know that there was nothing wrong with the download or anything. Would quicktime be better for avi files or something?
Dude. This is amazing. Like, literally some of the best blender animation I’ve seen, if not THE best.
Keep it up. I went through and had to check out all your other stuff. HIGHLY hardcore.
Very nice! In my opinion, the animation is a bit off because you tried to do it as you saw/remembered it or something similar on a game or a movie. This was already exaggerated, and by basing your work on that, your animation is just a tad more off.
Examples:
The soldiers comes through the window, comes to the floor - and holds the pose for a few moments without even looking around!
He rises up - and the enemy soldiers are just standing in there, looking. Then, they strike a pose before moving forward - not a pose for moving on and attacking the intruder, but a pose for looking good - and the camera changes places before they start coming towards him.
There’s also the fact that the attacking soldier can just stand up after throwing up a resisting enemy with his legs - one would think his balance would be a bit off after that.
Nevertheless, the animation works, and it works very well. It tells the story; it could be better, but it’s enough to get the idea. Details and practise should give you the rest. Good work!
Thanks guys, its awesome to hear such encouragement.
Mr. Man,
heres a blend with the guard armature and the 1st guard’s animation attached. I deleted the keys from all the other animations but somehow, blender doesn’t seem to be able to delete actions completely. Is this a bug? anyways, its kind of annoying. anyways, its a fairly straightforward ik rig, no tricks, hope it helps.
www.princeton.edu/~ddkim/anims/soldier/construct.blend
Van Halen Man,
its encoded in divx, which I don’t think WMP plays out of the box. VLC is a good player that plays just about everything and runs under most operating systems. There’s also the native divx player but I don’t like that too much.
David Mcsween,
thanks for the camera tips, could you elaborate on “cut on action”? I’m not positive on what that means.
LohnS,
thanks, your comments are always encouraging. There’ll be plenty more animation from me, hopefully.
Mrdodobird,
thats an awesome compliment and I’m really encouraged that people can feel that way. Thanks
Endoperez,
thanks for pointing those out. I’m always grateful for directing tips.
I was going to go back and rework this, but I’ve been putting together an idea for an actual short film that I think would be vastly more interesting. An actual one, from the ground up with storyboards and planning as opposed to straight ahead whatever works like I’ve been doing. Still a simple non-organic character, but he will have hands (he’ll need them). Once it gets started I’ll try to attract some of the sound guys here at my school and actually make it something worth watching. This appeals to me alot more than rehashing this animation, even if there are a bunch of improvements to be made.
The story of it will allow me to be a little more extreme in the animations. That’s always been the real draw of animation to me. Something that looks and feels real (not necessarily visually realistic), but is at the same time completely ridiculous. Advent children is an example of what I’m talking about in terms of feel.
If there are a bunch of people that want to see this redone I can spare some time. But more than likely I’ll start with the new one.
I probably wont post WIP’s of the animation, (it’ll be more impressive to watch that way I think), but I’ll post some concept sketches and renders when they get started. Probably wont be done for some months at least, but its a feasible 1-2 man project (unlike my other short film ideas)
.
cheers,
-Don
Whoaaaa!!! Superb!!!
Cut on Action refers to the placement/moment of the edit. It’s about finding a cutting sweet spot for fluid movement of characters. At the moment you have some double moves and late cuts.
eg. a scene of someone standing up from a chair would cut to the wide shot just before they launch upwards. A punch would see the character draw back then cut just before the blow is delivered, a turn to camera for close up would occur just prior to the movement.
This technique simulates they way we perceive motion, always in anticipation. Hire any movie and step through an action sequence to see where the cuts are placed. As a profesional editor (and hack animator) I can attest to there being lots of good rules (that can be broken if you understand why) that make the viewing experience more comfortable for the viewer.
P.S. Europen movies are often palyed out in master shots with much less cutting to the American style of cinema. In this way Close ups can be more dramatic but tempo reduced.
This link is not working for me. Awsome animation! The movements have a great sense of drama, and I almost always enjoy a dramatic show more than a realistic one so i think it is perfect.
Thanks a lot! I’ve been looking over the file and have seen many errors I have done before that can save me trouble in the future! I greatly appreciate you sharing this. It has already helped me greatly.
Thank you!
Very nice animation dude, the final camera switching is perfect !
crit: the initial run is a little wierd, looks like he wears heavy shoes 
but thats about it… the rest is cool
4 stars