Rodney

A:M gained the OpenEXR image format in v13.

There is a whole forum area dedicated to rigging and relationships so spend some time there. Concentrate on the basics first... it'll help! http://migrate.hash.com/forums/index.php?showforum=43

There are no requirements for royalties to be paid to Hash Inc for anything you create with Animation:Master. Your support via $99 upgrade each year will be appreciated by Hash Inc though and help them deliver the absolute best program to you. Animation:Master itself is a trademark of Hash Inc and subject to licensing. When using resources created by other people you'll generally want to contact them to obtain permission to use their work in commercial products as well. Copyright law applies to what you create in Animation:Master and protects your intellectual property. Martin Hash is an intellectual property rights lawyer so he knows the score there. Its nice to have someone who understands the law as creator and maintainer of the software you use. If you enter into a work-for-hire contract or otherwise release your rights you may have to pay for use of your own creations so consider releasing your rights carefully. To answer the question though... No, Hash Inc does not require any royalties from what you create with Animation:Master.

Paul, It would be interesting to see what areas are defined as your deflector groups under the cloth. In areas such as under arm pits, groin vault etc. you most likely will not need any. There are some examples here in the forum where the underlying geometry is entirely removed. This then dampens the cloth automatically as there is nothing to deflect in the areas of built up geometry. Was it Xtas that did those? The principle goes back to not modeling what won't be seen. If there is no geometry there there can be no pass throughs and nothing to drive strange deflection. Just make sure there is adequate deflection in those areas that need it. Note: I'm not sure if just hiding geometry will help but that would be easy to test.

That was very smooth. You may consider it simplistic and not particularly creative but it look quite successful to me. Color me impressed.

I had seen you character in the other thread but didn't comment. I'm glad to see you've moved him into his own WIP. This is the type of character my eyes really like. (I really like the design/style) He's an impressive character as is without posing, texturing or animation. As such I'm confident he'll be even more impressive as your work progresses. Looking forward to your updates.

I could swear I already commented but don't see a post from me here. Just want to add in my words of praise. You certainly haven't lost your modeling ability! Your work is as impressive as always. The texturing and lighting is a treat too.

David Simmons has reported gettting good results from Inkscape into AI format. I seem to recall getting it through once but it wasn't a straightforward method to get it done. As I have other ways to get it done (through CorelDraw/PowerTrace) I backed off of investigating further. Check the Help file and it may walk you through the process.

Matt, I've been following this with great interest. I think people will really be talking about your project for a long time... and experiencing it too! I can only imagine that people will want to do more of the same and even add to it. If I was on scene I'd want to have everyone pick a spot and jump up into the air. Of course then I'd be sued for all the broken legs. Thinking about the possible photos that could be taken and the various illusions of standing, sitting, jumping... My mind leaps to Escher. One of the things we all struggle with as artists is moving our 3D work into the real world. This is a very successful example of doing just that. Outstanding!

Bravo! I'd say that is a very successful test. Really amazing what you've got going there. Two questions/suggestions: Might I suggest a little more of a 3/4 view or is there a reason you prefer this angle? Do you have anything planned to account for blinks or will they be added after the fact. I'm guessing blinks might have to be handled differently (maybe a push button control) but don't know how you plan to tackle that. Apologies if you've answered already in your other thread.

I can post the project but wouldn't it be better if the logo was yours. Everything used you have available to you in Animation:Master. Here is an animation of what I think an emerald storm might look like. Note that in my take I've decided to stay away from lightning and emphasize the storm. To my way of thinking YOU are the lighting. Those that do business with you just may not know it yet! Besides its not 'EmeraldLightning' its 'EmeraldStorm'! If I have the time I'd love to work with you on your logo. Making it your own is so much more rewarding though. The attached animation uses a couple cloud images from the Libary, a black image, a white image and the logo I posted. No models in this last project... just images. For the first project (the one with models) I created the text in the logo using the Font Wizard. I used Arial Bold font if I recall correctly. Thats a nice readable font. The Shape outlining the lighting bolt is just a torus. It was lathed with 5 crossections. You can't see it in this animation but it actually changes shape from a circle to that pentagon looking thing. Not to confuse you here but I animated it just by changing the Magnitude of the splines over time. The lightning bolt itself is just an outline drawn with splines... extruded forward and then extruded backward to create the sense of depth. I did animate the depth to change the lighting a bit and there are some flaws left from that attempt. The clouds appear to move because one of the cloud images is scaled up over time. The second cloud image you really can't see because I made things so dark. Another error! Lighting flash (not lightning!) is where the white image is made un-transparent and then made transparent again. Darkness throughout the whole thing is controlled by an on image on top that is entirely black adjusted with transparency up... and down over time. The editing of all of these elements together does require v14 as the absolute control of frames in images (in this case camera rotoscopes) didn't exist until a recent v14Beta release. I will send you the project but... do you REALLY want it? It'd be so much more fun to create your own. You could even add that lightning bolt to it. EmeraldStorm1.mov

Have you seen the Lightning tutorial here by Stephen Bruce? http://www.members.optusnet.com.au/~s_bruc...htningBolt.html I'm still convinced that animation should be a secondary consideration. But... not my logo. Here is me playing with no particular theme in mind except maybe lighting, lightning and green. I have a lousy animation of it too but not sure its worth posting.

Mike (assuming that's you and not a close lookalike/impersonator with supreme toon talent). It's great to see you posting Ebon updates again. Too cool! Nice blog too.

As an American I can certainly say, "Yea! Awesome! You rock dude!" too. Your work is indeed 'awesome'. What does it feel like to be creating our very own... 'Star Wars'. Rhetorical question of course. I know its a lot of work but you've got to love seeing your work come together.

I'd say to think in terms of black and white. - First create a Model. Your lightning bolt (It could be in 3D but test out the possibilities in 2D. Keep it simple.) - Then create an Action of your lighting bolt changing (things that could change... color (black to white through gray remember!) size... location). - Add the text of your Logo as necessary Once you get something successful add the colors. Think about how you can de-emphasize first.. then emphasize the color green. I'd say that perhaps the logo should change to green once struct by lightning but its generally better not to use the first idea that comes to mind. If you can think of it that easily... everyone else can too. Go for something original. Think in terms of no words at all. If you had to convey the theme without the words 'EmeraldStorm' how would you do it? Once you get that down adding simple text to further sell the theme will be easy. Again... keep it simple. This will let you test out a lot more possibilities. Sketch it out on paper. Narrow those down to ones you can make work. Ask someone you know for their opinion. Finally, select the one that works best for you. As far as modeling it... just draw it out in splines. Or if you are unsure just start with a simple grid. Or maybe import a drawing or picture of a lightning storm. Simplify from there. Avoid animation until you get the basic forms right. For the animation you might experiment with path animation and a traveling bolt of light. You remember path animation from TaoA:M right? Post your progress here in the forum and get some feedback. Post your project file if you can and that'll generate even more support. There are sure to be lots of Logo experts around here to offer advice.

I have definitely not been keeping up and probably will fall even farther behind but took a few minutes to explore. Squetchy Sam is just incredible. What an outstanding character and rig to learn to animate with. Outstanding work guys!

If I understand you correctly... yes you can. The objects can be exchanged via the drop down menu. Got you. I'll stop straying off track now. Hopefully we haven't just confused you LightBeing... keep it simple.

I hesitate to add this as the old method really works well. I'm not sure if this is something new in v13/14 but I've now become a fan of adding lights via Actions. This doesn't keep you from adding them to the model of course. The reason I've been moving toward Lights added via actions is that they are instantly movable, reusable and can be easily targeted and constrained. Of course as Actions they can then be simply animated and/or replaced. You can then create separate setups that allow for change in lighting as you have the need. This allows so much more flexibility than if you just add the lights directly to the model. I've long been a fan of adding lights to models. Love using them that way! As someone said they then go everywhere with the model. I think I need to break that habit though and work with lights in actions. Still exploring the possibilities... There are no doubt reasons to use them in either way. The situation will dicate but... consider reusability.

John, Thanks for the insight into your rendering process. One thing animators should realize early on is that 'realism' can be quite costly in terms of design, animation and rendering time. Its certainly a lot harder to create than your average toon film. I applaud your efforts to tackle it.

Tell me about it! I've been using A:M since 1998 and some days I feel I've barely scratched the surface of what Animation:Master makes available to us. The first few years I had little time to devote but learned a lot anyway. The middle years I was just trying to find my way... lurking. The last three years I've spent many enjoyable hours helping others get through the rough spots and learn to find their own solutions. Now there is Tin Woodman of Oz to get everyone up to speed quickly and gain experience creating a feature film. As I near retirement from the military its nice to know that A:M provides all the tools I need. In some ways Animation:Master has changed a whole lot. In other ways Animation:Master is still the same. There is such an extensive feature set available in A:M we can design our own solutions tailored to our own needs. The workflow is still incredibly intuitive as is A:M's ease of use. Hash Inc continues to be a leader in the industry despite limited resources and the saturation of cheap (and even free) products in distribution channels. Other software has worked hard to catch up. Some have gobbled up the competition and added new flexibility and features to their products. They've had to lower their prices dramatically and pay closer attention to 'little' companies like Hash Inc. The A:M Community is indeed growing and A:M users both new and old are joining in the fun. Some users have retired and gone fishing. Its sad to see them go. There is a place even for retired guys that prefer fishing in the A:M Community. Keep in touch will you? These A:M Users from the past have important stories to tell and their experience tells the tale. Their insight, interest in the process of computer animation and their knowledge is important. As is yours. Just as there once was a large group of people that thought they could never master that new fangled contraption called the personal computer there is a growing number of aspiring animators with an keen intrest in mastering the animation that can be produced on that computer. With Animation:Master they will learn it and many will learn it well. Projects like Tin Woodman of Oz are designed to accelerate the learning process through daily practice in the art of animation. TWO won't be in production forever so I encourage everyone to take advantage and get involved. Regardless of the path we choose to follow, be it fishing, animating, teaching others how to do it or simply appreciating the art of animation, take the time to enjoy the interaction with other aspiring animators. You'll get frustrated from time to time but you'll be really glad you got involved.

The basic shapes can usually be found in the folder: data/models/primatives on the A:M CD. If you are just wanting to go grab them.

We haven't heard much out of the Chicago group in quite a while. I'm from Illinois myself (but only get back for the family visits these days). I know there are several A:M users in Milwaukee too. Great to see you are getting back into A:M Bob. If you haven't dove into the new version yet you really should. It won't surprise you as you probably already know what to expect. It's amazing.

Thats pretty eye catching Rich. Its hard work to make Skulls fly I'll bet. The primary change I would suggest (and I read that you probably won't change anything) would be to extend the wings out to fully formed 'Y' shape at some point (about 2/3 of the way through by my guesstimation). This would give the sense that the wings are helping the skull decend to its final position. As such you wouldn't need to worry as much about it flying. The final resting position makes me think 'spider' a bit more than winged skull. This might not be a bad thing of course but you might consider that interpretation for when you use the image in stills. To counter that effect you could add a little light or coloring to the wings. Regardless... your logo definitely says "Dark Skull Productions" to me! More please!

Congratulations! You've taken a bold new step toward defining a 'studio' personality. What I would suggest is that you work to develop a theme. It doesn't have to be anything too crazy. I doesn't necessarily need to be permanent (although consider that aspect). When someone sees your logo what do you want them to immediately think. In this aspect the theme is more important than the animation. While it might seem obvious to you by its name alone... what is the theme of 'Emerald Storm'? Find that and your logo will be successful in both still and animated form.

Thanks for the wireframe Robert! It does look a little spline heavy in places but we haven't seen everything close up. As Ken suggests you may be able to cut down on splines considerably in some places. I'm not entirely sure which areas he means by 'circular features' but any cylinders and such can often be created with 4 cross sections. Its your model though and its looking mighty sweet as is.