Duders Ep2 was done...

Bloody spent the last 5 months animating the motherfucker and then I loose it all.
It was less then an hour away from being uploaded onto NG, but then I get the "flash does not have enough memory" error message and the scene with the actual episode on it hates me and the timeline and stage for it don't even appear. (see screenshot of saddness)

I can't even get to the timeline to try to copy everything to a new blank document. So much work for NOTHING - complete waste of time animating for months. It just goes to show that the more effort I put into something the higher chance their is it blows up in my face.

If ANYONE has ANY idea how to solve this problem ANY help would be EXTREMELY appreciated.
I've googled and googled solutions and asked quite a few people now.

So now I am left with these options...
1. Remake Duders Episode 2 from the ground up.
2. Fuck it and make a few Duder shorts.
3. Make Duders Episode 3 instead.
4. Take a break from the Duders.
5. Take a break from flash.

After I cool down in a week or so I'll probably begin work on something.

Anyway in other news I'm trying to get a job with Valley Television - Everyone wish your fav mullet-man luck! If I get this I'm finally in the film business. Plus if I get myself an actual job I can get the fuck out of university and start makin' money and not spendin' it!

And one final thing.........
I am insanely, super, hugely, more then I can express, INCREDABLY, full-out, very, very, very...
very... sorry to ALL of NG for fucking up Duders ep2.
This was my greatest work yet that you people deserved! I don't even care wheither it would've won awards or not. I promise (even if I gotta break it into parts) I will get these bloody episode done and onto NG one day!

Duders Ep2 was done...

Comments

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JazLyte 2009-02-10 23:08:11

That's weird, never seen that before. I dunno if you animate inside symbols or not but you can try to use the Library to arrange the movie again on another file, it might be faster than a complete re-do. That sucks ass though, if that doesn't work just take a break from flash for a week or so. That shit'll give you headaches.

TheCriminalDuder 2009-02-10 23:08:11

Big thanks.
I animate on the stage though. However I will totally take your advice and if I decide to redo it I'll see what I can take from the library.
lol I got a bunch of characters heads, mouths, and basically just random parts of them and the background saved in the library now that I check it out. I'm usually an organization freak and have a folder of sound FX, music, one dedicated to lines, another to tweens, and etc.
Again - big thanks.

DonkeysBazooka 2009-02-10 23:55:57

That is HORRIBLE. I would have died if I was in your place. I've had 5 hours of work in flash go down the drain, but never 5 months. That would kill all of my motivation to ever go back to it. I guess it's important to always have back-up files :-/
I personally save a new file every couple of weeks with the date on it just in case this kind of thing happens. It's a flash artist's worst nightmare, as I'm sure you now know more than anyone.

Do you happen to have an swf of the file anywhere? Like when you hit "Test movie" or exported the movie in any form? If you do, maybe you can use some kind of decompiler software to covert the swf into an fla.

TheCriminalDuder 2009-02-10 23:55:57

I was an idiot and emptied my recycle bin. So any old .swf I could've decompiled went pop with it.
I'll get a flash decompiler now though just in case I ever run into a problem when I need it. Thanks.

HolyPeanuts 2009-02-10 23:57:10

Oh wow man that sucks, I have never had flash crash like that before....

TheCriminalDuder 2009-02-10 23:57:10

Life is unpredictable I guess. :P
Oh well, it makes things more challanging and interesting. :3

Senti 2009-02-11 00:14:03

I know little to nothing about recovering lost files...I've lost too many to remember.

My only word of advice, and ever since I've heard this I've followed it religiously. Do not save your entire flash movie into ONE flash file. Flash is weird. If you open up ONE document, and create a whole movie and spend months animating, and only save in that ONE .fla the file size is huge, because it like multiplies or copies on top of old copies of the same stuff into the one file. But, if you 'save as' each time you save your work (you'll have a ton of files by the end) not only will you have an incremental timeline of the work you've done, but you shouldn't have thaaaat many problems opening it up...as long as you open the most up to date version.

I'm horribly sorry for the misfortune. I was really looking forward to this, and I know you've worked forever on it. I suggest taking a break, and making knocking out a few shorts to ease the pain (after a week or so much needed break). I look forward to more stuff man, Chin up Derek.

TheCriminalDuder 2009-02-11 00:14:03

I will convert and totally rape that now I think.
With Duder shorts - they're small and I can make them all on one .fla.
With episodes and big projects I never even thought about multiple .fla's and assumed it would be fine even when face to face with obvious problems.
Every big project from now on will be split up in diff .fla and I'll save diff versions with diff dates. :D

Success! Today I have learned great new tricks which will ensure further success and less problems! :D

Jimtopia 2009-02-11 01:30:41

Geez man, sorry to hear that. I don't know if I'd ever be able to go back to Flash if something like that happened to me. >_< I really wish I could help, but I don't really know enough about the situation. If you want you could send me the .fla or something, I could try and export it for you, who knows.

Best of luck to ya.

TheCriminalDuder 2009-02-11 01:30:41

I sent the .fla to someone already.
Turns out theirs currupted date or some sort of error on the timeline of the episode scene where all the work is.
It's fucked.
I got stuff from the library though I can use for the remake though.
I'll be back. The duders will hit the portal soon enough.

Lazy-Dan35 2009-02-11 03:18:11

Well look on the bright side Derek, when you do start Episode 2 again, You have Flash CS4 in all its beauty. BTW have you used it yet, I don't animate much so I dont know much difference between Flash 8, which I used to Program Tetris, and Flash 10.

TheCriminalDuder 2009-02-11 03:18:11

I used it. It's fuckin' sweet.
Huge thanks again.
Duders ep2 the remake - will be great.

Lazy-Dan35 2009-02-11 03:20:14

At least I saw most of the episode, and I know it would have got front page.
Also, Derek those sniper rifles are very well drawn.. :)

TheCriminalDuder 2009-02-11 03:20:14

I lost those sniper rifles. :C
I'll have to trace - er... I mean find a "reference" to draw them again. lol

VACKenny 2009-02-11 12:01:13

I guess this is why I always had trouble making the leap towards bigger and better things in Flash; there's always the chance of things mucking up :(

Good luck, and as always, SAVE BACKUPS. Keep 'em on a thumb drive, make multiple files in a folder on your hard drive, whatever... there's just nothing like working on something for months only for a small mishap to screw it all up. Happened to me a lot in my programming classes.

TheCriminalDuder 2009-02-11 12:01:13

I do have a thumb drive thats like 8 MB.
Thanks dude! I totally can use that lil' thingy to store back ups.

It's amazing though - the smallest thing can destroy so much.
It's all good though. This means the ep2 remake will have much more effort and dedication put into it.

knugen 2009-02-11 14:06:53

I'm not sure if I can help really, but if you want to you can send me the file and I'll make a try at fixing it. I have a few ideas that could work, it's possible you've tried them all already, but there isn't really anything to lose. Right? :)

TheCriminalDuder 2009-02-11 14:06:53

What have you tried? I already sent it to someone and it really doesn't seem like its salvagable.
PM what you were thinking of trying. If I haven't tried one of 'em I'll happily send ya the file to screw around with.
Help is always appreciated.