Glorious news, Mystik3eb (Dan Scannell) and me are working on the creation of the original theme song to be used in the newer and improved intro animation to Chrono Trigger Unglued (and like the ending credits sequence, I only have to make it once and then can reuse it for free later on). Those who like this fact can send praise to him and wish him the best of luck in the composition of the song, because it was REALLY nice of him to offer to do it for free. Those who don't, please only send your complaints to me as my mind was long ago made up to have an original theme song long before he volunteered to do it for free (and Cryo loved it too when I pitched it to him... even when it still was going to cost money).
Furthermore, for the record so as to assuage the fears of those of you opposed to the idea of an original opening, I wouldn't have accepted just anyone who claimed to be free and willing. I only accepted his offer after a review of his music which showed that his talent level in both singing and lyrics, as well as his recording quality ability, were all good and up to par with what I desired. You see, I'm a stickler about audio which is why I was willing to pay money to have it made in the first place*.
Oh yes, Mystik3eb yourself... YOU ROCK!
WARNING, THOSE WISHING TO FOLLOW AND SEE WHAT THE ASTERISK IS ABOUT, YOU ARE ABOUT TO SEE A RANT THAT YOU CAN FREELY SKIP. UNLESS YOU WANT THE SERIES TO BE VOICED WHOLLY FROM HERE ON THAT IS, AND YOU CAN STILL FREE FREE TO SKIP IT THEN EVEN. UNLESS THAT IS YOU THINK IT'S ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY THAT THE SERIES BE VOICED AT ALL COSTS, THEN YOU MUST READ. LASTLY, IF YOU JUST LIKE READING RANTS FOR THE HELL OF IT, DON'T LET ME STOP YOU NO MATTER WHAT YOUR OPINION IS. THERE IS NO CUSSING, BUT I WON'T DENY I'M A LITTLE BITTER ABOUT WHAT I SAY IN IT.
*Which is also a reason I'll probably never switch to voicing the series as most free VAs in the flash scene gets way too haughty on you if you ask them to rerecord a line. Whether it was because of bad audio quality was bad, or they didn't say it right, they'll just claim you can just fix it in a sound program. Thus if you don't care to do so, it's not their fault.
Yeah, I hate to break it to those people, but a sound program isn't a mircale working piece of software if the recording is just bad and/or completely wrong to begin with (and if such software exists, it's beyond the budget of any indy project). You volunteered, that's a commitment to act professional so don't give me the I'm not paying you anything excuse as voice acting isn't a single take business. Don't want to do it right? Don't volunteer at all!
You have to practice professionalism you know. You can't just magically turn it on like a lightbulb the day you try to get the real deal job. But go ahead, since you want to be a dick please do build up those bad habbits now so that you're stuck with them when you need that job and I'm having the last laugh. And if you disagree, just remember that disagreeing with someone doesn't mean they're wrong. Look it up now if you actually want that job someday.
That is of course all assuming they have the proper equipment for clean recordings at all, and lord do they ever get nasty when you reject them because their equipment isn't good enough. But that's not really a big issue if the equipment is no good you don't have to deal with them at all if you don't want to after you first tell them no (just remember to delete every e-mail they send without reading it and block them on your IM).
Of course not every free VA with an ounce of talent is bad, some are actually quite good. The law of the universe dictates that they will become utterly unable to do it if you accept them. Yes, the fact you accepted them for the part, coupled with the fact they aren't a dick, will cause cosmic forces to fuck up their life so you're stuck with the back up team of dicks. Thus you can't win at all, unless you know everyone of you VAs in real life and are willing to keep them on a short leash by physical means.
Do not use the fact I haven't animated much in the past to claim I don't know what I'm talking about. I did once help someone manage auditions and sound collecting for their own project and it was an experience I'd not soon want to repeat. I do not kid here, in fact I probably understate the facts of all that happened during those screwy times. Furthermore I've seen it happen hundreds of times to other projects. I don't wan't to try and be the one in a million exception that happens once every blue moon.
DISCLAIMER TO THE RANT YOU JUST READ IF YOU REFUSED TO SKIP IT UNDER THE ADVICE OF THE FIRST DISCLAIMER EITHER BECAUSE THE RANT APPLIED TO YOU OR YOU JUST FELT LIKE ReADING A RANT ANYWAYS:
All of the above rant assumed the person I'm talking about had, or was able to produce, the right kind of voice that I sought for a character to begin with. Those who were told they idn't have the right kind of voice, amazingly, seemed to accept that very well most of the time. Yeah, sadly I said most of the time (but it was still a major improvement over the behavior of the ones we were actively considering).
Thankfull only one one person tried to claim I didn't know what the character sounded like and demanded that I fetch the animator for her. She thought she was better friends with the animator than me, and I didn't know who she was if I had the never to deny her the part. Which was funny as it was an animation project based on a story I wrote myself, and furthermore I had known the animator for years upon years and she had only known her for a few months. The aformentioned animation project never came togeher because of many such problems like this during the pre-production.
