Ironman, Mt. Rushmore, GoAnimate Quick Apps

What used to be called 'Type a Video' animations is now known as 'Quick Apps' on GoAnimate. The apps have been upgraded to include a limited range of facial expressions and, if you're a GoPlus user, some apps will even let you use your own custom Lil' Peepz or Comedy World Custom Characters.

That's how I came to make Ironman Vs Metal Detector...

Ironman Vs Metal Detector by etourist

Like it? Create your own at GoAnimate.com. It's free and fun!

If you've seen my previous post, Cleaning Out my GoAnimate Account - Unused and Unfinished, you'll recognise this sketch as a kind of sequel to the Super Charge/Superman metal detector sketch in my Unused and Unfinished animation. In fact that particular scene is directly referenced in the Ironman sketch.

You may also recognise my Ironman character (well as close as you can get to Ironman with GoAnimate's Comedy World Character Creator) from my Charlie Sheen animation, Charlie Sheen agrees to Rehab. I've been looking for a reason to use him again since Comedy World characters cost real money to buy and he only had a cameo role in the Charlie animation.

Ironman Vs Metal Detector has been received remarkably well (55 recommendations in 5 days) for a Quick App animation. Typically Quick Apps struggle to get views due to their visual similarity. Except for the script people have generally seen all the animation many times over.

I like to think it's the script writing that has been the major player but I'm sure it didn't hurt that both characters are custom Comedy World Characters and therefore haven't been seen many times over. Also Ironman's popularity with two kick ass movies may be something of a draw card too.

Long Time Waiting...

Another of GoAnimate's Quick Apps takes popular culture and familiar icons/items and gives them a voice with Talking Picz. I first used this theme in Smart Phones - Lost. This time I take an alternative look at Mount Rushmore with its Presidential sculptures. They're not really a tourist attraction, they've just been waiting for so long they've become one...

Long Time Waiting... by etourist

Like it? Create your own at GoAnimate.com. It's free and fun!

Mt. Rushmore from the Canadian Side.

This animation was inspired by an image that's been doing the rounds of social media for a while now called 'Mt Rushmore from the Canadian side' which forces you to think differently about the monument in a very humorous idea.

I happened to be looking at the Mt Rushmore image on GoAnimate and suddenly thought the arrangement of the heads look remarkably like people queuing.

I did a bit of research on Mt. Rushmore and discovered that each head was dedicated in a different year (those are the years mentioned in the animation) with Lincoln's head being dedicated before Roosevelt's. Giving a bit of factual credence to Theo's queue jumping.

From there I did a bit more research on each President to see if I could incorporate more historic references relating to each one such as Theodore's catch phrase 'speak softly but carry a big stick' and linking Jefferson to his authorship of the Declaration of Independence.

It's always risky linking humor to historical references because it can kill the joke flat if people don't know what you're referring to. Hopefully my references aren't too obscure or there's still enough there to find funny if you aren't familiar with the history.

Comments

Eight 2D Animation Apps For Your Phone or Tablet Mobile Device

M obile productivity apps have become so capable that they can be great alternatives to their PC/MAC equivalents or serve as great tools in their own right when you're away from your desk. While some apps simply mimic their desktop counterparts, others offer well thought out, touch-friendly interfaces that are easier and more fun to use. Every so often I check out what's available for 2D animation for Android devices, since that's what I use, that can complement my workflow with Reallusion's Cartoon Animator 5. Some may be available for Apple devices as well. Below I've listed six free (F) apps (with optional paid (P) upgrades) on the Google Play Store that you might want to explore. Some are just fun apps on their own while others may be useful as part of your workflow on bigger animation projects. Not all are exclusively animation apps and could be used on any production. JotterPad (F/P) The name JotterPad makes this sound like a notepad application but it's ...

Inochi2D - Free Open Source 2D VTuber Avatar Rigging and Puppeteering Software (Part 1)

Inochi2D Creator - Free Open Source VTuber Software. If you've been looking for a way to live perform as a 2D cartoon avatar on camera, whether it be for a live stream or for pre-recorded content like educational videos, then VTuber software is a low cost (or even no cost) option worth looking into. In my previous post, How to Become a VTuber - 2D and 3D Software for Creating and Controlling Your Avatar , I took a brief look at the relatively new but completely free and open source Inochi2D which I thought showed great potential for my own needs of creating a live performance character rig for my own TET Avatar that I use for all my promotional materials. While it is possible to live perform my character using Cartoon Animator itself, Reallusion's MotionLive2D capture system isn't great - with lip sync in particular. More importantly though, I can't exactly teach people how to use Cartoon Animator if I'm using Cartoon Animator to control my Avatar. What is Inochi2D...

How to Become a Virtual YouTuber (VTuber) - 2D and 3D Software for Creating and Controlling Your Avatar

Young TET VRoid Avatar in VSeeFace. In a previous YouTube video I demonstrated how you could use a webcam, Cartoon Animator and its MotionLive 2D Facial Capture system to create a virtual avatar that you could perform live during a live stream. Unfortunately the motion capture performance of this system is very average to say the least, and is even more expensive if you want to add hand motion capture via a Leap Motion Controller . This lead me down a rabbit hole of seeing what other solutions are out there, where I bumped into the world of the VTuber or Virtual YouTuber (creators who puppet and voice an on camera avatar instead of appearing on camera themselves). Specifically VTuber software, which has been a real eye opener for how expensive and far behind Reallusion's upper body motion capture system actually is. The VTuber world is heavily entrenched in the world of Anime so you'll see a lot of 2D and 3D avatars in this style. If fact, if an Anime avatar is your thing, y...

Inochi2D - Free Open Source 2D VTuber Avatar Rigging and Puppeteering Software (Part 2 - Inochi2D Session)

In part one of my deep dive into the free VTuber software, Inochi2D , I focused mainly on Inochi2D Creator, which is used for rigging your character avatar in the correct file format for use with Inochi2D Session, the puppeteering part of the software. The two sides of the software are still very much in development and the documentation, particularly for Session, is very thin on the ground. To the point where I don't think I could even do a comprehensive tutorial because I'm not sure I'm even doing things right, and the software could change significantly in a single update. As a result, in this part of my Inochi2D deep dive I'm changing tact from presenting my finished Cartoon Animator TET Avatar, and will be summarizing my experience of getting Session up and running using OpenSeeFace as the recommended webcam motion capture software. To do this I will be using the TET avatar I created in my review of Mannequin , since that can be exported as a full, ready to go r...

The Ultimate Independent Animator's App and Resource List - Animation and Video Life

Image created with Cartoon Animator 4. Being an independent animator is not like a studio animation job. There's so much more to do that is indirectly related to the actual task of animating. Over the years I've sought out many apps, tools, and services that can help me achieve that one single task, expressing myself through animation. Below is my Ultimate Independent Animator's Resource List for 2024 (last updated Oct 2024). It started out as a list of free or low cost apps that could help you in every stage of producing either 2D or 3D animation, and then just kind of grew from there. You may not have been looking for a Time Management App as much as you needed something to get you started in 3D animation but when those commissioned projects start coming in you'll have a head start on maximizing your time. All the apps and services on this list had to meet two main criteria: They had to be useful and relevant to an Indy Animator/artist. The base app/se...

The Family Guy Method - Animating Talking Hand Gestures in Cartoon Animator

Once you start getting into character animation you learn pretty quickly that people don't just speak with their mouths. Hand gestures and movements play a pretty important part of how people communicate too. The problem is, animating hand gestures and movements is extremely time consuming... and who knows what gestures and movements should be used and when? In Reallusion's Cartoon Animator I use pre-animated talking character motions that I chop and move gestures around so the arm and hand movements 'feel' right based on my own understanding of body language (and I also act out dialogue to get a sense of what arm and hand movements I might make with what's being spoken). Recently I came across a video by the creator of Culpamland Extra , an online animated series, in which they briefly outlined how they animate talking using the Family Guy Method. I'd never heard of this, and if you try to search for it online you'll be hard pressed to find anything. So I...

Jarrad Wright, The Big Lez Show - Who Would've thought Animating with MS Paint Could Take You So Far?

A friend of mine recommended I should check out The Big Lez Show after I mentioned to him I make animations for living. He said the show's creator, Australian animator, Jarrad Wright , just makes episodes from his home using MS Paint. Somewhat shamefully I hadn't heard of The Big Lez Show, but the fact that it was being made with MS Paint absolutely hooked me into checking out. If you've never heard or seen the show then you, like I was, are probably thinking how good could it be? MS Paint has kind of a cult following of hardcore animators but no one would use it as their primary animation tool on a series, right? WARNING - before going any further, you need to know The Big Lez Show and its humor contains some pretty strong language. By strong I mean it's peppered very liberally with the 'F' and 'C' words and is very every day Aussie, blue collar speak. Unapologetically, all of that, is part of why it's so good. There's a good chance you've...

Animation and Video Life

Search This Blog