Making an opening...

[Princess Akina]

Well, y'know those openings that you see in visual novels?
Like this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?list=WLBDF ... tlpddJxPPI
or this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?list=WLBDF ... vkFiQnVoTM
or this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?list=WLBDF ... fS__4-0aUU
or this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?list=WLBDF ... fS__4-0aUU

Those look really professional. I am just wondering what program (if there is even a program that can do this sort of thing o.e) can be used to making openings/videos that can be placed in Renpy? Of course, they don't have to look so professional, but just a simple one will do. Heck, one like X-Note's or the Clannad visual novel is really good. Although since X-Note is a flash game, would the opening in it be made with flash as well?
Anyway, if there isn't a program like that out there, what sort of coding/programming/whatever would be involved?
Thanks.

[leon]

You could try something like http://animoto.com/; free version allows up to 30 second videos. Check out this thread too - http://lemmasoft.renai.us/forums/viewto ... =4&t=10999.

To include the video in Ren'Py you just need to convert it to a video format (like .MPG, .AVI or .WMV). Flash animations aren't supported in Ren'Py, but you can convert them to standard video.

[Taleweaver]

Those look really professional.

Those _are_ professional. There's a software company behind Starry Sky, and they can afford to spend real money to hire professional artists and animators.

Some pieces of professional software can, to some extent, make up for the lack of a team of pros. Adobe After Effects comes to mind.

[Fawn]

Please ask these kind of questions in the Asset Creation: Music, Sound and Movies section. Topic moved.

[Shoko]

That first video reminded me how freaking over produced that Starry Sky opening is. The game is so underwhelming compared to how dynamic the opening is!

I think it should be pretty easy if it's one big animation. That, or some kind of image manipulation software that can convert to video. Definetely requires time and attention to detail (in my opinion), but it's not something "difficult."

If you do make an opening (which is an awesome idea), if you show a CG which animation in the background or something, I'd suggest putting it in the final game as well. It's kind of annoying for me to see something like falling rain in the back of a CG in the Little Busters! opening then get to the CG in-game and it's no animation whatsoever.

[sake-bento]

I use Anime Studio, which is one of the cheaper animation programs available. I know some people have actually animated things in Ren'py using ATL functions, which work pretty well.

[Auro-Cyanide]

I *think* most professional VN openings are made in After Effect (or use the exact same effects that you can achieve in that program). Hell, the entire opening sequence for Kung Fu Panda 2 was done in After Effects. After Effects is pricey though. I have access to it because I use it at work, and it is pretty amazing, but probably only if you are serious about animation. There are quite a few free or cheap programs people have mentioned, as well as the actually programming option.

Either way, you will need to make sure to plan out your graphics. Seperating things out on to layers for things like CGs will help a lot when you go to animate them.

[Kokoro Hane]

I tend to make my VN openings using MAGIX Movie Edit Pro 15. If you know what you're doing, you can make some pretty professional-looking stuff. Or at least semi.

[Starshine]

Those look really professional.

Those _are_ professional. There's a software company behind Starry Sky, and they can afford to spend real money to hire professional artists and animators.

Some pieces of professional software can, to some extent, make up for the lack of a team of pros. Adobe After Effects comes to mind.

Yes, i agree just by looking at that Starry Sky opening i can see it looks like an official game. All the people who work on those games have exsperience too, the japanese are very good with these visual novel games, and games in general. I suppose a good opening could be made in Flash, depending on hard you'd want to work on it, and if the format didnt work you could always get a convertor, depending on what program your using, when creating your game.

[LateWhiteRabbit]

I *think* most professional VN openings are made in After Effect (or use the exact same effects that you can achieve in that program). Hell, the entire opening sequence for Kung Fu Panda 2 was done in After Effects. After Effects is pricey though. I have access to it because I use it at work, and it is pretty amazing, but probably only if you are serious about animation. There are quite a few free or cheap programs people have mentioned, as well as the actually programming option.

Either way, you will need to make sure to plan out your graphics. Seperating things out on to layers for things like CGs will help a lot when you go to animate them.

Yeah, most all of this kind of work and animation is done in Adobe After Effects. It looks like Starry-Sky used After Effects for all their openings as well. It is (relatively) easy to produce dynamic animations like this using still 2D images using the program. After Effects has 3D and Z-Depth features that can be difficult to fake or produce in pure 2D work environments or game engines. Like Auro-Cyanide, I have a copy of the program from when I was doing film work. If you aren't dedicated to animating or film effects, the $1000 price tag is probably going to be pretty steep for you. It might be better to hire someone who owns and is familiar with the program to put together an opening for you.

And I second the suggestion to plan out graphics and keep CGs and other graphics in separate layers and broken apart for uses such as these opening. It is what I am doing for much of the artwork in my game. You can flatten it out for use in-game, but you'll want to keep a file with the individual elements on their own layers so you can do dynamic things like parallax camera movement in openings or movies.

As for why more of these things aren't done in the actual games, most of the effects require an actual 3D environment, and can't be fully faked with 2D scrolling elements.