Rodney

There is enthusiasm and then there is enthusiasm but I'm not sure we need that kind of enthusiasm for 26 more days. That ain't screamin' thaz crowdin'. If it all fit on one line it would be ideal. I can only imagine if everyone had a signature that size how interesting the forum would be. Nice graphics though! Maybe you could work in an animated gif that alternates between the two images.

A surface will only have one Normal but that normal can be oriented differently based on several things; how the surface was formed for instance and what the global parameters are. If you are that interested... To understand more fully how Normals work in A:M you may want to review Martin Hash's algorithm for hash patches and splines where the word 'normal' is used at least 20 times: http://www.ibiblio.org/e-notes/Hash/Hash.htm While a surface really has only one Normal (used to define the orientation of that surface), each Control Point similarly has the equivalent of a Normal in order to define the direction of the spline. These 'normals' are perhaps better defined as Bias Handles because they handle the given biased/direction of the spline. There is in A:M an extra set of tools that can be added to our toolbar that allows us to toggle on/off Biased Normals. Biased Normals should have a decent write up in the Tech Ref. It is my understanding that Biased Normals is still the default.

As much as an circle can be a circle it is a true circle when lathed in A:M. Having said that... there have been times when the math (magnatude) has been off and lathing a sphere hasn't always resulted in the optimal circular spline. When you add other splines to that one it can also cause the original spline's magnitude to adjust (try holding the SHIFT key down while adding the new spline to keep the old one in place) If you are lathing with less than 8 Control Points you may want to increase that number to ensure you have enough CPs to maintain that spline.

Nice render! (and characters) Love the general lighting, atmosphere and the film grain effect also.

David (that is to say captainrex-david... not itsjustme-david), As a general calibration you might also note that your forum avatar is equally dark. It appears black if I'm looking at it straight on. If I tilt my laptop's screen I begin to see the alien in the avatar. This makes me wonder a little if the issue folks are having on all sides of the question has at least something to do with the angle they are looking at their monitors. I confess that generally I find that folks like Robert have their settings a little too dark (images that appear okay to me are for them invariably far too dark) but having said that, it does appear that your monitor's settings are set too bright. Actually, there is. If you are the only one in the world whose monitor is correct then it might be better to have your settings tuned wrong. This change would then automagically have the effect of setting everyone else's monitor settings less wrong.

Yup! Done. I'm good to go for another year.

Alrightly then. You all have convinced me. With two days remaining I will not risk a day without A:M... time to renew my subscription. This is a good opportunity to test how long it takes to update. Somebody time me!

It's good to see that one finally squashed. It's been a recurring issue since... well... since as long as I can remember. Of course, now that you've mentioned it, I do recall the old workaround was to switch between OpenGL and Direct 3D. It seemed to stop around v13 but then again maybe I stopped trying to render out wireframe renders...

I'm sorry to hear of your loss Kat. I am reminded of that old saying 'And he being dead, yet liveth'. May your warm memories of your daughter's love and laughter strengthen you always.

The blue is more calming... if scary is the goal then I'd push more toward the grayscale... and for any color more green and red in the spectrum. As Mark Largento mentioned above 'form should follow function' so you might want to consider heat sources and silhouetted shapes/overlays that help to give a feeling of confined/limited space. You seem to be getting some of that vibe in the grayscale rendering. (The glow isn't working however)

Looking good Lloyd! I can't wait to see all these characters in a line up!

This relates to the rotational orientation of the patch. A way to test this out is to apply an image to a patch with that image indicating direction and then start flipping the normal back and forth multiple times. While flipping normals note there are more than two states, which is what would be the case if it was a binary choice between forward and backward (it behaves closer to what is observed when using Rotate Image but unlike rotating the patch image it does not invert the normal from the top surface of the patch to the reverse). It would be possible to color code the normal (visual spike) in order to be able to better visualize the orientation and rotation but I'm guessing there is even more going on here than my pea sized brain can absorb. This has a lot to do with the order in which a spline is laid down (i.e. a spline's and therefore a patches default orientation). To test this you can draw a single spline from left to right and then extrude that spline down into a patch, then Right Click and Apply Image. Go back and draw a new spline but this time draw from right to left... extrude to a plane... and again Right Click and Apply Image. You should see that in each case the images are inverted from each other. So... what does this mean? Basically, it means that the direction that you draw splines matters. It matters because the direction of the spline(s) will determine the orientation and rotation of the normals. The normals in turn control the surface properties... patch images, textures, etc. ...and the orientation thereof. I haven't tested but I believe some of the plugins that average normals look through a series of normals and eliminate the oddly oriented ones through the process of averaging them out. A program/plugin can also determine which normals are not correctly oriented by playing the old game of 'which one of these things is not like the other'. Now a question I might ask would be... Is there a way have the orientation of a spline/normal always point to one location? The simple answer is 'yes, but no' mainly because of the nature of an object in three dimensions and we tend to think of (visualize) normals in terms of two dimensions. I believe this is where things like weighted CPs, fall off and such comes in. How to better control this stuff? Perhaps we need to learn better how spline orientation works but this is a complicated thing because while a single spline can only have one (linear/path) direction the patches derived from it can have any number of different orientations (at least six non linear directions... that is to say non continuous orientations... if I understand this correctly).

Wow.... I missed Jason's birthday bash? Howendaheck did that happen? Hope it was a happy one!

David is back in the house. Oh, yeah. Great to see you here again!

Hear! Hear! Happy Birthday!

Thanks for putting in the report Matt. I use patch images a lot too and ran into this issue. I can't recall if I submitted a report before or not (I expect not). I would imagine it could be a considerable thing to code as patch images are very versatile and have a lot of variables.

That Paunk show is funny (and entertaining) stuff! Looking good Mark. Best of luck!

Thanks Lloyd. Doodling in A:M is sure fun enough to resubscribe. In grabbing the images above I ran across the attached variation on 'The Mystry Rider'. I had to laugh because I had forgotten I had even created this one. I need to find the original models because I think this one would be fun to return too at some later time. I hadn't modeled much before laying this one aside. the duck's head... the bull... and a cactus or two as I recall. I mocked up a basic pinball type swf file... (the pinballs... were bulls of course... and the cowducks have to keep them in line) And... of course... guest starring the voice of Robert Downey Jr. as the sheriff Clyde.

I encourage everyone to post and post often but I don't tend to do that myself. The irony is not lost on me. Here's a few random doodles that I found laying around... (Note: I'm not particularly a fan of eyestalk characters so I must have been channeling the Tinkering Gnome here for the frogduck) The female body was a exercise in using minimal splines... as well as a cloth test (as I recall). The rubic's cube was to answer a question... "What if someone invented the rubic's cube back when whittling wood was the primary method of creating games and toys?" Perhaps we would end up with something made of wood and marbles... Bandito was a quick test in lipsync (and for use of the Amplitude plugin)... style aping the ever talented Mark Largento and his take on the Muppets. Wrecking Ball is more of a test for how boolean cutters can bring down a building (the main part of the project would use Newton Dynamics and Cloth). Alienhead is an example of a typical doodle that doesn't even get to the stage of being rendered out (rendered for posting here though). I've done a couple versions of Pixar's Car characters but this is the only one I found. I have one that is more 'realistic' lying around. ...and I'll end this post with an early proof of Concept for the title character of 'The Mystry Rider'...

Hmmm... let's see... Of late, I've been testing for a couple different projects... kind of like putting bait in the water to see if some sort of fish might bite. A few days ago I was working with Lloyd on his 'Woke Up Dead' project. At times I've used his movie to test the waters for using A:M as a storytelling and project management device. (Note: This can be a bit frustrating because A:M was never designed with that kind of esoteric stuff in mind. Personally though, I think it's just a matter of time.) I'm in the early stages of designing a logo for a friend who wants to sell honey (this will mostly use Coreldraw but I might end up modeling some bee hives). I played around with a short story idea for a new origin for 'The Incredible Hulk'. This would likely be more of a straightforward comic book (with lots of photoshop effects rather than animated. I experimented with a classic printed comic book style for this one. (This project would primarily use the 3D models as references for drawing) It's been about a month since I did anything with 'The Mystry Rider'. (There are some story points that need to get worked out before production gets a green light). It's been about two months since I did anything with 'Tuckertown'. (I suppose you could say that this is my primary comic strip idea. The need for continual humor and refrigerator style jokes is the primary obstacle for this one) The recently announced animation contest has me modeling robots with a one minute animation in mind. In the past week I've doodled and spelunked around with A:M and generally had a great time. Today I experimented a recurring idea of a building that can change into one of many different styles (there is a cityscape project waiting in the wings that I'd like to complete so that the generated models could be used for backgrounds/props). Today's experiment focused on using booleans to cut windows into the building's sides. And now there are only nine more days until my subscription expires... I know for a fact you are right.

Watching with great interest. I'm not so sure it was the hand gesture as much as his movement backward that was suggesting 'the force' had been used to compel him backward. Upon seeing his movement I too was wondering what type of power was being used. The trouble in gauging that of course is in us not knowing what you know of the story. For all we knew... 'a force' might have been used. With your feedback suggesting that the intention was more of a rejection and him as if to say, "No thanks dude" his sudden movement backward (twice) does seem too exaggerated. It doesn't read as a rejection and reattempt as much as a blast of unearthly energy propelling him backward. I won't comment on the walk cycle because it looks like you are well on your way to fine tuning already. Over all I like what you've got going. Every time you post, your animation seems to become smoother, more accurate and natural. All this practice is paying off for you!

If there is a 'stuff' file released with a particular version you should install it. Those files generally fix or install things that aren't directly related to A:M but that help A:M work optimally on all the various machines.

Whiile I've never worked in a bakery I can appreciate your comic on many levels. (So many levels!) My first instinct is to say... hey wait... what about Parallel Worlds? I wanted to see that! But seems that you are like me (and everyone else here in the forum) with respect to having a closet full of projects waiting in the wings. Ace Co Entertainment seems like the perfect vehicle for developing and presenting these. Keep up the creativity and creating those characters Dan... that's what Animation:Master excels at. You know I'll keep coming back here to see them. Aside: Over the last couple years I've been considering how best to work on a dozen or so (personal) projects simultaneously and I haven't quite found the ideal recipe... although I do know that it relates to serialization. It looks to me like you've began to launch out on that very thing.

It's great to have you with us sahold. Pull up a comfy chair and makes yourself at home.

Yes, I was getting this Zoom to Fit all the time for awhile and it needs to be optional. I agree that this is an annoying behavior most of the time and it won't be on for me much of the time. Where this can work rather well is in a model were you quickly set the dimensions from all angles and then 'color' (i.e. spline) inside the lines.