Flintstones Forgery

Here's my little experiment in using Flash to get a classic Hanna Barbera look. The idea started when it ocurred to me that I had all the basic ingredients to work with, from soundtrack CDs that provided clean music and sound effects cues, to the "First 14 Episodes" laser disc set that had one episode with a second audio track featuring only the dialog- perfect for extracting lines. I used screen grabs of the backgrounds, but recreated the characters and animations from scratch in Flash, using frames and cycles from various episodes as guidelines.

The basic approach was to string together what few lines I had that were generic enough to be used in a variety of ways (nothing specific to that episode's story, which unfortunately was heavy on guest characters and very little Betty or Barney to use). The lines eventually formed into what I ended up with. I also made the choice to just slightly subvert things with Wilma slightly off her rocker, Barney's XL nose, and a couple Fred expressions HB never really tried. The tone of Fred's "what're you doing here?" makes that moment seem strangely paranoid, but it was intended for a completely different type of scene, so I figured I'd make him look panicked about it.

I wish the Laser disc set had offered more epidsodes with that alternate soundtrack, I could have had a lot more lines to choose from and could have gone on a little longer. On the other hand, it's probably for the best that it kept the experiment short and sweet. I have my own characters and projects to do and too much more could just end up being a waste of time better spent.

There were two other Flintstones projects done at this time. "Dull Day In Bedrock" is still available on YouTube as well. It's much shorter and simpler by design, but it's amused a few people along the way. "Shake Your Betty" was by far the most viewed and commented of all my clips, but it's now removed due to the music used. It wasn't a tremendous loss, though, since it was also a less than mature lark and a way to exploit a simple cycle over and over. I'll cover that one in it's own post, though.

Here's "Flintstones Forgery"