Anime!

nope ... That would be too easy :)
I don't have flash, although my computer did come with every adobe product on the planet. Maybe I can still use illustrator in after effects.

I was trying to draw out the frames with tracing paper by hand, when I scan the images together my shading looks weird when its animated. :(
I was thinking about getting one of those https://www.digitalgraphicsresources.com/index.asp?PageAction=VIEWCATS&Category=93&gclid=CJ6u2fvz-JcCFQMCagod6yVMCg... I figure if I make 2 animations it will more than pay for the device.

Thank you for the idea though, maybe I can experiment with flash.

what will the chars do? You might only need a few poses, the anime char don't have allot of movement. Well depending on the type and school of style

I was trying to do a simple looping animation of a char walking with 3 frames, and a close up of a face with 3 frames. Your right though, DBZ has a lot of fight scenes where they just seem to use still images with FX, the only thing that animates is the mouth. lol

very very basic tutorial of flash layers and motion tweening creating a walking stick man http://www.computersight.com/Software/Flash/Flash-Tutorial-6-Layers.39800

tablets are great if you can draw, look on ebay or kiji for a second hand one, got mine at about 1/4 retail and works like a charm.

Kim

p.s. when you make your first million from Anime, I'll look for my cut ;)

yeah three frames will never be a good looking walk cycle do you have the Muybridge books they have nekid people but you can see detailed walk cycles in a frame by frame or almost frame by frame... The problem with a 3 frame walk cycle is you have all the landing points really none of the tweening as it's called. Sorry if you know allot more about this and I'm not treating you as such.
That's what I love about 3D you can do pose to pose animation with decent results. Maybe make a 3D char for this idea. People get really fast at making poly chars the blocky look of them wont be the worst for anime since it's not for a video game you can smooth it out all you need. If you ever want to get into looping char stuff lightwave is pretty nice for that there motion mixer is great it will let you blend a run and a walk in graphical form. I did a whole package back in the diz of looping char work in LW...

3 frame is very very basic as I said, you'd need far more to actually make it look realistic, taking into account the bending, and squashing that is require for a detailed animation, which I'm sure you're used to using 3D Max ....ever try the hopping desk lamp animation in Max, that and a character head winking an eye were the first animation projects I did in 3D Max. Now if I only had a better PC I could try the hack again. They don't make it for Macs do they?

donno never used a mac, never done char in Max just in Maya and Lightwave.. I really like Nurbs for Char stuff. If I had to pick one out of the three to do high high quality char stuff it would be Maya, great program. I have not done char any thing in years though. Just hard to find the money in it, I have a few ideas for shorts though so I might try my hand at it again some time just need the time.

I figured if I got the three frames to work I could add 2 extra keyframes.
I guess Im over my head a little.

I don't know much about 2d animations, ive never met anyone that does it, but Ive always been OK at drawing. I know the show "bill" on nickelodeon, and Aqua Teen Hunger Force are made in after effects, but that animation is super cheap,,,, all though the drawings are pretty good.

I do like 3d, but I SUCK at making characters, Im better at making buildings, cars, and effects. I need to take an online course in it, because thats something I cant seem to figure out on my own.

CS4 after effects you can import all layers from illustrator as well. I tried an animation, but couldn't get it as smooth as I could in flash.

there's many styles of anime, I've seen some that are very chopping looking but works well for the show (early south park is a prime example), so it just depends on what you want. It's fun to just see what you can make that I get a kick out of and how I learn programs.

as for 3D, you have to think in 3D or it will never work for you. That is the problem most people have with it, they can't see every side mentally and therefore can't create it visually.