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Author Topic: August 24th, 2008 - ZFGC Weekly  (Read 2051 times)

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Dantztron 3030

Mammy's Favorite Storyteller!
August 24th, 2008 - ZFGC Weekly
« on: August 24, 2008, 02:16:41 pm »
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Volume 2, Issue 2 - August 24, 2008
irc.windfyre.net #zfgc
This week’s banner courtesy of Kylink and icon courtesy of Hoffy


Hello members, and welcome to another issue of ZFGC Weekly! Here’s what’s in this week’s issue:

1. Community Announcements (Ctrl+F CA0202)
2. Best of the Forum (Ctrl+F BF0202)
3. Weekly Awards (Ctrl+F WA0202)
4. The Big Question (Ctrl+F BQ0202)
5. Featured Member Sprite Collector and an interview with him (Ctrl+F FP0202)

Community Announcements (CA0202)
-- The chat snooper is back (albeit not working at this exact moment!) Its revival has brought a lot of fresh blood activity into the chatroom. You can either be a creeper and hit F5 constantly to see what's going on via the snooper, or actually come into the chatroom and discuss with your favorite IRC client. Direct yourself, young padawan, to irc.windfyre.net #zfgc.

Got an important announcement? PM Hoffy or Dantz!

The Best of the Forum (BF0202)
cakefarts Been Biden His Time
http://www.zfgc.com/forum/index.php?topic=30646.0


An Anatomy of a Fanboy
http://www.zfgc.com/forum/index.php?topic=30632.0
Sometimes they wear dog collars.

The Ones That Got Away
http://www.zfgc.com/forum/index.php?topic=30640.0
date=1219452162]
Note: This thread is not for discussing games that never made it to your particular region, but only for games that were never "officially" released and/or were cancelled.  (In example, talking about BS Zelda, the original N64 Animal Crossing or Sin & Punishment--which is actually released for the virtual console on the Wii--would be inappropriate.)  No links to ROMs.

Nerd Girl I Don't Deserve You/I Don't Get the References You Refer To
http://www.zfgc.com/forum/index.php?topic=30608.0
My old best friend is a huuuuge LoZ fan, she adores Link.

Except she'd rather be playing LoZ than going out with boys :P

my projektz, let me show u dem.
http://www.zfgc.com/forum/index.php?topic=29298.0
I had no idea peope on zfgc were so talented and creative. Lucky this topic was created

Got a topic you think should be featured? PM Hoffy or Dantz!

Weekly Awards (WA0202)
Song of the Week
Darklights "Untitled Random Piece" :
http://www.zfgc.com/forum/index.php?topic=30663.0
http://www.box.net/shared/amve4k4lau

Photos of the Week
QK's Shots From Jasper and Banff
http://www.zfgc.com/forum/index.php?topic=30547.0


The Big Question (BQ0204)
In this section, we'll ask a relevant or interesting question to the community each week, which everyone can discuss, comment on, and generally go gaga over.

This week's question: What was the greatest fangame of all time?

Join the discussion at http://www.zfgc.com/forum/index.php?topic=30671.0

Got an idea for a Big Question? PM Dantz or Hoffy!

Featured Project (FP0202)
This week Dantz bought a whole bunch of drinks with Sprite Collector and shot the !@#$% about photography, art, and everything else. And by drinks, we mean Sprite. Hence the name. You know, Sprite Collector...ah, forget it.


Tell us about yourself and your history here at ZFGC.
Well I can’t really recall how many years ago it was, but it was most likely during the beginning of the Invision forum that I joined though I had known about the EZBoard days and chose to remain a guest. TRM was well under way with his now infamous OoT 2D and building up a strong army of followers who consistently cheered him on, myself being one of them. That was when I had just started to get into spriting. I actually learned what a sprite was on ZFGC and really got involved in learning the tricks behind the LttP style which I previously favored. And of course, to learn anything in art, you have to immerse yourself in countless examples of what you wish to achieve. Hence, the name Sprite Collector came to be. Haha. I worked on only one fangame in my history here at ZFGC and that was MMGB. It was a style I grew to love very quickly. I was originally the main spriter for the project which was taken under by a former[?] member named simply, Zac. Looking back on the project, I’d call the sprites amateur at best in terms of fitting a certain style. They had terrible perspective, too many colors and some were just ugly. But it was a wonderful learning experience and a game I wish had been seen through to the end. Eventually, Zac had given up on MMGB and Hyrule_boy had picked it back up, completely revamping the engines using the sprites of Clocktown I had completed and some of his own. After a long haul, the piece fizzled out and the sprites had gone to waste. I’ve been pretty quite on the forums ever since. I do flip through some topics and check out some fangames at least every other day, though.
Do you do any work on fangames per se anymore, or do you focus mainly on more personal undertakings?
I’m actually not working on any fangames currently and only focusing on personal projects. Some of you may have seen the GB style map I’m working on posted in the “Discussion” forum under “Resources.” It’s something I really like as of now and I’d like to finish it so it can be at least useable to someone. I would eventually love for the map to be used in a proper, GB styled fangame but I’d hate to put any deadlines on myself given my schedule with college recently starting back up and work getting busier than ever. It would really only reflect poorly on the quality. I kind of like to think of the style I’m developing as a more polished, finished GB style in that it has the same color and height limitations as traditional GB games, but a bit more of an appealing visage. Actually, I started a new piece of it the other day featuring a mermaid section which would flow into Zora’s Domain, but I got stuck on some visual aspects and put it on hold temporarily. Otherwise, photography, mostly portraits, and some upcoming school working is what’s on my mind. I really enjoy taking self portraits to pass the time and just some random graphical things like signatures.
You've obviously got one hell of a camera! Tell us about it.
Ahh.. my camera. I do love it. It’s a Canon Digital SLR Rebel XS, 10.1 megapixels with a black body. Takes some really fantastic shots and I’m just getting to learn how to use it. Digital SLR, for those who don’t know, is a great mix between a digital camera and a traditional [SLR] camera, which uses film and is completely manual in terms of shutter speed and the size of the aperture opening. It has an automatic setting and a slightly more difficult to maneuver manual setting in which you can change many things about the amount of light let into the camera and the moment the photo is taken. A shortened version of that long winded explination : it’s more expensive. I had been searching for some sort of upgrade to my old camera, which was a 5.0 megapixel Kodak Easyshare, for some time and nothing within my price range was really showing up. I was flip flopping between Canon and Nikon pretty often, too, which wasn’t making the decision much easier. And then a light at the end of the tunnel; tax returns! Haha.. So finally I had some cash and I went to BestBuy to look at what they had to offer. It just so happened that they had one of the cameras I had been thinking about getting over the entire decision period and with a bonus, it was clearance because the manufacturers seal had been slit open. I couldn’t refuse the offer and that’s what I ended up with! I don’t regret it at all. It’s given me some wonderful shots so far.
On the topic of cameras, there's a classic debate in the photography world even more divided than the console wars are to gamers: film versus digital. Which side are you on and why?
Digital! Digital digital! Embrace technology everyone, film is out! Haha.. To tell you the truth, I haven’t had very much experience with film. I’ve actually only taken one class on black and white photography and it was a highschool course. So, resources were limited and we never used the same camera twice. The tools we had were extremely primitive and each student usually only had about forty-five minutes to get a decent print or two. However, Photoshop is my second home. We’ve had a digital camera at my house for quite some time and it’s just something I had gotten used to. While there may be a decrease in the quality of the image you get, it’s much easier to handle and edit than something printed on film.
A lot of your photography seems to have a certain kind of style to it: whimsical, sometimes colorful, and with high contrast. What inspires you in this regard?
My absolute main focus when I’m taking a picture is color. Just behind that is overall layout and position of the camera, followed by the look of the model whether it be human or not. I like a photograph to have a fluidity, some kind of motion that keeps you interested and looking around. Whether it’s a bright colorful image or something a bit more dark such as my most recent self portrait, I want it to be consistent and all over balanced without one part sticking more so than another. That being said, a great color scheme inspire me tremendously and a lot of fashion photography catches my eye. I can really appreciate the art of the body and the way clothing falls on it. I do like a very precise, clean line in photographs as well. That’s actually something I’m working on, clearer, larger images that still look presentable. I tend to shrink things and then edit them rather than editing the large version for higher resolution printing purposes.
What do you use for editing? Just Photoshop, or something a little more unexpected?
Photoshop of course! I wish I could say that I had something more interesting to play around with, but alas, I’m just like the others. Photoshop is something I started getting into way, way back when, maybe about seven years ago when I knew nothing about layers and was doing everything all on one, hoping I didn’t pass the 20 slated history palette and mess up. I used a bunch of downloaded brushes ineffectively and just kind of slapped stuff together. I found comfort in my friend who had been practicing a bit longer than I had, though she was younger, and had an older sister with a plentiful wealth of Photoshop knowledge. She became my mentor, for the most part, until our individual styles grew and we learned from each other. Just as I did with the sprites, I dove into many, many examples of signatures and graphic art and tried to recreate certain effects by my own means rather than through some of those half ass tutorials they have flying around Google. I’m not anywhere as good as I’d like to be, but it’s a growing skill. I’m taking some classes in college this semester which will hopefully teach me something compared to the prerequisites I had to take last year. I do tend to edit a lot, too. I’ve attached some before and after shots at the bottom of this so you can check out the work that goes into to my pictures.
Back to your individual style: a lot more films and games these days seem to be heading for the "brown and bloom" style, as its detractors like to call it (see: Gears of War.) The style typically involves hyper-realism with washed out colors and a sort of dreamlike glow. Do you think this is just a phase? Is it a positive or negative direction to be taking?
I think any trend in games and photos and film is a phase, whether it be good or bad. Art and advertising is a constantly changing force that will never be settled. There’s always going to be this battle of what’s appealing to the eye and what’s not. As of right now, the hyper-realism is something I’m really interested in as far as gaming goes. I’d like to see where these next-gen systems can take us in terms of art and the direction of beauty. One of my favorite games right now is Heavenly Sword on the PS3. On top of its wonderfully delivered storyline and concepts, the graphics are breathtaking. Realism in gaming is always something that’s been very interesting to me. Good color schemes and a well developed graphical style can really turn me on to something quicker than anything else. 
Your name is "Sprite Collector" so you probably know a bit about spriting. What's your favorite Zelda sprite style, and why?
GB style, of course! I don’t think that I specifically have a reason for liking the style, it’s just what appeals to me most. While MC is much more polished and refined and LttP style was my original favorite, GB just grew on me and stuck there. Maybe it’s because it’s so easy to edit them, there’s something about the simplicity to the sprites that really draws me in. I mostly stick to tiling nowadays rather than spriting and I’ve come to know the style well.
Is 2D dead, or just limited to the handhelds?
I have to say that I believe 2D on any major at-home console is mostly dead. It’s an unfortunate day.. however, games such a Phoenix Wright, Touch Detective, Elite Beat Agents and Pokemon keep the style alive on the DS for newer generations to enjoy. 2D games bring out something very nostalgic in me and I can’t help but reminisce over some of the memories of my Gameboy Color and Sega GENISIS.
Do you have any favorite artists in our community?
I do, actually! None of which I really know on a personal level, but there are a few people I keep my eye out for when looking at the authors of new topics. In terms of spriting, I think quite obviously .TaKam has a wonderful sense of light, color and perspective in the vast majority of his work. He’s very detail oriented and always delivers a nice piece of eye candy whether he’s replicating a style of someone else or creating his own bit of magic. Fox is another artist I see too little from. He has a great originality about his work that is scarce on this forum specifically. He, too, has such a great sense of color and always seems to know exactly where a speck of a complimentary swash will completely transform a sprite from bland to lavishly ornate. DJVenom is someone who I haven’t kept a very close watch on, but what I have seen has always impressed me. His style always has a nice change to it in that in every sprite, you see a slight enhancement that makes the last one that much more inferior. You can tell with each and every piece that his eye is growing and becoming more mature to what looks nice and what doesn’t. Revan is one of the more traditional artists on this forum that can always make my mouth fall open. The portraits and sketches that Revan produces are always becoming better and more finalized. It’s a nice thing to see on a board that is mostly about spriting. And of course, I couldn’t forget CrystalAngel who is my main Photoshop competition on this forum so far. She posts some really sharp digital works of art from time to time and always has such a nice attitude to compliment it. Haha.

Before


After


« Last Edit: August 25, 2008, 02:10:29 pm by Dantz »
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well i dont have that system and it is very hard to care about everything when you are single

Xiphirx

wat
August 24th, 2008 - ZFGC Weekly
« Reply #1 on: August 24, 2008, 09:44:23 pm »
  • Xiphirx
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Quote
And by drinks, we mean Sprite. Hence the name. You know, Sprite Collector...ah, forget it.
[/quote

Worst joke ever..

:D
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  • For The Swarm

Giverny

Christ on Acid
August 24th, 2008 - ZFGC Weekly
« Reply #2 on: August 25, 2008, 01:19:20 am »
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Quote from: Xiphirx

Quote
And by drinks, we mean Sprite. Hence the name. You know, Sprite Collector...ah, forget it.
[/quote

Worst joke ever..

:D



Worst messup ever
:o
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THEGivernyPROJECT
~LynkW-Surrender Global
  • Surrender Global Forums
August 24th, 2008 - ZFGC Weekly
« Reply #3 on: August 25, 2008, 01:19:20 am »
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lol a post i made is on here.
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Dantztron 3030

Mammy's Favorite Storyteller!
Re: August 24th, 2008 - ZFGC Weekly
« Reply #4 on: August 25, 2008, 02:11:26 pm »
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Bumped because our interview with Sprite Collector is up! Read it and comment, as it's probably the best one ZFGC Weekly has gotten yet!
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well i dont have that system and it is very hard to care about everything when you are single

Mirby

Drifter
Re: August 24th, 2008 - ZFGC Weekly
« Reply #5 on: August 25, 2008, 05:19:07 pm »
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That's how he makes those awesome pictures! Alas, I'll porbably ne'er be interviewed for this. Meh. Great interview, despite the joke. And the rest is great too (I was waiting to post til the interview was done) and I'm definitely voting the cakefarts/Bidoof ticket.
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Mirby Studios | Share & Enjoy now available! (Links above!) | Games I've Beaten
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I like-like it :D
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