No, god, please, no.
This is the second attempt at writing this, as the last time, I went on it to check a feature and it bloody crashed. That is a genuine issue I have with this; the website crashes so often. Want to copy all the objects from a pannel? CRASH. Want to crop a decently large image? CRASH. Want to... add a character? CRASH! The latter of which is the thing that happened just now. Sure, projects are autosaved, but this could be problematic as all other tabs close down alongside it. Thankfully I had barely written a paragraph, but jesus christ it is annoying.
Let's have another go at this then.
My school, for some reason, has decided that using this website would be a good way to show its iMedia students the wonder and whimsy of creating... dental PSA's. Whatever, that's another thing. Regardless of what the context is, I've had my head held close enough to this dumpster fire to know how it would feel.
To get an idea of what a product of this site looks like, picture this. You're in public, sitting almost too perfectly still on a bench, staring directly forward with unblinking eyes, holding a phone directly upright as if taking creep shots with your right wire -- I mean arm -- along side two others, both doing the exact same, poses matching to the atom, except one of them is absolutely balling their eyes out. Still staring foward, though. You then notice man with an overzealous expression Garou slides at a 45 degree angle across your vision.
Okay, let's break this down. Staring directly foward.
If you're reading this, you're most likely a terrestrial vertibrate with a neck. Do you like that neck? How does it feel to do really cool and acrobatic things with that neck, like... nodding. Be thankful that you're capable of doing that, because the characters summoned into any god forsaken universe can only control their wire -- I mean neck -- like an electric motor. They can look directly forward, directly forward with a slight nod to the left, or directly forward with a slight nod to the right. This, of course, is not helpful, but only for rare situations that not many people need to illustrate like... looking up, or perhaps... looking to the side.
One of them is balling their eyes out.
There are very few expressions, which can be difficult to deal with more complex feelings like... sadness. Well, there is one for sadness, only it's the "I accidentally killed the one who's been closest to me for eighteen years" sadness. Similar thing goes for happiness, and pretty much all of the other facial expressions. It's like colouring with a 10-pack of pens; you can get an idea across, and with the right concept it's good, but as soon as you need anything slightly more complicated, you can't. Suck it up, lol.
Phone directly upright, 45 degree walking.
Hey terriestrial vertibrates reading this. Do you like having the ability to walk perpendicularly to the objects around you? All the more reason to feel sorry for the concoction of wires and balls that exist in the universe of Storyboard That. Because, yet again, they don't have such a privilage. There are four angles these creatures are allowed to access: the "I'm mad at you" angle, stare into the reader's soul, and 45 degrees eitherside the latter. "That'll be enough," said absolutely no-one. Have you ever heard of this crazy concept of someone not like a Michael Jackson rip-off? Yes? Good look putting that image in your head onto this, then.
Objects are fine though. They're allowed.
The Garou slide. We all know it, we all love it.
There is one walking frame. Just one. So, that means that if you want a pannel in which a group of people are walking, they appear as if they are marching. It's sounds fine, but my god is it surreal when you actually look at it. Oh, and if you want any amount of people, one or multiple, to be walking for more than one pannel? GAROU! It might be better to just make every comic on this be set in a fantasy world where people can hover about a metre off the ground, because that will probably look more believable than treadmill pavements.
I admit, I'm writing this out of anger because I have to finish my abhorence at home, and I need a break after five minutes of tinkering. Wish me luck, and I'll leave with this.
No hate to the creators of this, of course. Me being wry. But I could go on for hours, no hyperbole. Anyway, my main problem with this is that it's being used in classrooms as a serious alternative to... drawing? I can't draw people to save my life, but I'd rather present a comic I drew on stage to be scrutinised by a crowd of millions than show something made with this.
Please, just let me draw. That's how comics and graphic novels alike are made. I've been thinking of things like this as a genuine reoccuring problem in my iMedia classes, as a few times before they've cheaped out on creative tools like this for no reason. Ugh.
