Rodney

The 2D animaiton software used by Studio Ghibli (of japanese anime fame) is going open source according to a recent press release. Other than that I don't know much about it. From their site: So... six days away. Here's the press release: http://www.toonzpremium.com/#!news/aawrs Here's a video of Toonz Harlequin 7.1 in action. I'm not sure what is different from that release and the one going open source. xhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-jjeh1USIlY

Yet another alternative... one I don't really recommend but a method that keeps all the tiles in one group... Using 5 point patches allows tiles to be selected without including the adjacent tiles, because the 5th Control Point keeps them from being selected. There are issues with 5 point patches that will likely make this a less than optimal solution.

The multi-group method might be what I'd use if I needed to preserve spline continuity from tile to tile. If the tiles were to be flat I might make them all single patches where each could be selected separately. I might use this latter method if for some reason I absolutely had to include all targeted tiles in the same group. Here's an example of a checkerboard where the black tiles are the result of two groups (the white tiles don't have any group and are the models surface color): On my system there is a glitch of sorts that changes the Models surface color to the color of the second group but that can easily be changed to another color. Not sure what is going on there.

While this probably would not be my first approach I thought I'd investigate because I can't recall ever using this approach before. Here's an example of a 5 group solution to the checkerboard... with a patch image assigned to each of the 5 groups. Why 5 groups? Well, because I didn't want to spend time looking for the optimal/minimal group solution when any number of groups (equal to or greater than 2) should work.

I can think of a couple approaches but much will depend on your targeted goal. As far as I know a straightforward selection of continuous spline derived four point patches without selecting adjacent patches isn't possible. There are some caviets and other considerations though... For instance, for some purposes you can approximate the first example by coloring all tiles orange and then targeting the center tile, as you've done and color it white. Each time you need the orange tiles you color everything and the white would obscure, or remove the center tile. One way some folks might approach all of the above would be to split the patches into additional patches (four patches per tile) and then press on. If using decals instead of patch images or basic patch surface color this would work. The easy way to do this would be to Right Click and Use the Splitpatch wizard. If spline continuity throughout the entire field of patches isn't required each patch could be it's own separate four sided tile. This might be the way I'd approach it if using patch images. Yet another approach would be to select appropriate spline locations, Hit the Y key to insert a Control Point and leave holes in the checkerboard pattern. Then either color the background the appropriate color or place another patch or set of patches behind the checkerboard of tiles to account for the secondary color. I'm sure that doesn't exhaust the possibilities but those are some alternatives. For instance... several sets of bones attached to specific CPs might in turn be controlled by yet another (master) bone that collects the tiles that are needed. I'd have to research this one a bit. Another approach would be multiple groups. Grab tiles that are not adjacent to each other and assign them to a group. Then grab other tiles and add them to another group. Keep adding groups until all tiles are accounted for. If any of these are unclear I can post a few demos of these approaches.

When searching for your own posts the best way is generally to use 'My Content' located in your forum settings/profile area. I believe this should list every post you've ever made. The forum is set to search for three letter words but doesn't always seem to do that... especially if searching for members. Instead of searching on 'members' search on 'forums' instead. Also, if on the odd chance you'd like to change your forum name to something else (something longer for instance) just say, "Hey, can I change my forum name to ?" and the forum gremlins will see it and make the change. Here's a search for all the topics you've posted in: LINK P.S. You have a great last name.

I neglected to mention... Those little critters are really cute. I don't recall ever seeing them before. I love how they suggest there is more of their story to tell, just outside the realm of this illustration. And here I don't use the word 'illustration' lightly (pun intended!). I'm captivated by how you have illuminated the characters and their activity with fun shapes and detail. My primary suggestion (not that you are looking to change anything) would be to make the letters of 'show and tell' on the board a bit larger as they are hard to read. I suppose an alternative to that would be to make the color of the letter contrast that of the blocks they are cut into (as if paint had been applied to them). Of course the small size does suggest that 'Haven' is using found items and use what was available... tiny scrabble-sized blocks with letters.

And good news... you CAN use that. As a subscriber you can install and use any release from v13 v15 to the most current release. This negates the worries about features disappearing from current versions that we've relied on in the past... because they still exist in the earlier versions that we can install and use. (Just copy your current license file over to the installation folder) (teensy weensy itsy bitsy version number edit by moderator)

Introductory pricing for 48 hours... $39 vs $60. Aaron continues to put together some of the most direct, accessible and... reasonably priced material on drawing and animation available. This time he tackles human anatomy. https://creatureartteacher.com/product/drawing-human-anatomy/ Here's the promo video: xhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uOcrsSbYteA The primary reason I think Aaron's approach is superior to many available is his experience with a variety of art mediums but specifically his foundation in animation which brings it all together. Description of content from his site: In this comprehensive 9.5 Hour video course, animator, director and concept artist Aaron Blaise (“The Lion King”, “Aladdin”, “Mulan”, “Brother Bear”) takes you through the fundamentals of drawing, illustrating and capturing the essence of the human form. Watch as Aaron creates new original images right in front of you and explains his process for rendering believable human anatomy. You’ll get 16 HD Tutorial Videos covering: How to Draw the human skeleton Understanding Head Proportions Muscles & Anatomy Body Proportions & Scale Gesture Drawing How to Draw Eyes Drawing Noses & Ears How to draw legs and arms Drawing Hands How to draw feet Drawing Tips & Techniques Human Locomotion and movement. Original Animation and Video breaking down the body in motion as only an expert animator can offer. PLUS you’ll also get bonus material including: Original animated videos High-Res Copies of the images that Aaron creates in the videos. (Plus, more detailed renderings) Layered Photoshop files of his animation so you can break down each pose Here's another (related) anatomy video Aaron recently released on drawing noses as part of his Aaron's Art Tips: xhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2bDlUN_8h0M Disclaimer: I have not yet purchased this product but plan to do so soon. I wanted to get the word out before the intro prices goes away. (now purchased)

I think we need to know more about your end goal here... I'm rendering out a test of frames where the focus point drifts from far to near... mostly to refresh my memory on DOF. I tried to emulate the scene in your image as near as possible. Thus far, A:M is performing quite well. In your example image I'm not sure exactly what you are specifically targeting however.

I don't really know the answer to the DOF question. Sorry. I think we'd have to look at the Post Effects option (on a camera) combined with DOF to get at the full effect you want. Render time is then mostly a matter of finding the optimal settings. Tore. You should look into Blackmagic Fusion. It's free and can digitally composite your shots (with DOF) in very short order. This can be accomplished in 2D or 3D. There is a learning curve to get you up and running but once that initial step is taken there'd be no stopping you. Fusion is a lot like A:M in that it has great depth in its feature set. The difference being that A:M isn't a dedicated compositor with scripting capability. What I like to do is explore a workflow in Fusion but then find a similar equivalent in A:M thereafter. The setup in Fusion is often easier (because experimentation can often be very complicated) then it's just a matter of figuring out how to do the same thing natively and optimally in A:M. I have used DOF in A:M before and it works great... for my part we'd just need to dig deep to optimize the workflow. This is especially true given that some features (such as GPU blurring) weren't in A:M when DOF was originally put in place. Translation: No one has yet published an optimal workflow. My gut feel (which often proves wrong!) is that A:M's Blur post effect is a bit too subtle BUT multiple blurs can be added to increase the effect. And... I have yet to use A:M with both the GPU blur effect and the standard blur post effect. And... to my knowledge DOF doesn't require either to deliver it's effect (although I understand that DOF works best with Multipass). So how to proceed? I"d say that we (i.e. anyone) just needs to publish their basic DOF workflow online and then we (everyone else) can suggest changes to tailor the effect optimally. A key to use of Depth Buffer might also be to use the EXR format. As far as I know it's the only format up to the challenge... with the possible exception of TGA in some circumstances. I'll add: Rendering with blur/DOF/Depth Buffers should be pretty quick. The key being to have Multipass on (and for faster rendering... limit the number of passes) A simple setup should take only seconds per frame.

Love the beautiful painterly style Nancy!

I should have said also... A reason you won't see most Shag Hair references include the SHIFT key requirement is that when the documentation was written that wasn't a requirement. When the new particle hair was created it took the default method and rather than remove the old (Shag Hair), it was given the Shift key method as a means to activate.

Here's the no-frills video walkthrough of initiating Shag Hair. My apologies there is no narration. I do run through some troubleshooting that might be a bit hard to follow without voice or text accompanying the imagery. I don't think anything will be too difficult to follow though. ShagHair.mp4

I'm sure there must be something online but... I'm not sure if I can track it down faster than I can just run through the process... especially since I just used it two days ago. I will say that there is good reason A:M's new hair is preferred. If... if only... some of the features from shag hair could be blended with the newer hair! Newer hair is more versatile/customizable. I'll see if I can't put together a quick video but that might not be until tomorrow. posted. The important stuff: 1. How to initiate Shag Hair 2. How to apply and modify Shag Hair 3. Primary differences between the two And of course, Shag Hair can be used in conjunction with the current hair. Let me hit #3 first. Both types of hair are materials. The primary difference between the two regarding application is that one type is based on patches while the other on splines. In the case of current hair the material is applied to either a model or a group. If the group doesn't contain patches... no hair will emit. #1 How to initiate Shag Hair After creating the intitial (empty) material proceed like you are going to create regular particle hair. This is done by Right Clicking on the Material Attribute and selecting Change Type To/Particle System/Hair The KEY DIFFERENCE is that in order to create Shag Hair the SHIFT KEY must be held down while changing the Type to /Particle System/Hair #2 How to apply Once the Shag Hair material is created it must be drag/dropped onto a SPLINE in the Project Workspace listing (PWS). To find a spline to drag/drop the material onto open the Model and look for the Spline listing. Each spline will have a number. If you can't see the Spline listing make sure you have Show Advanced Properties option checked in Tools/Options and the Global tab Once the material has been drag/dropped onto a spline the Shag Hair can be adjusted as required. I'll post a quick down and dirty example soon.

That looks like a great lead... no option for Win10 though. The service/dll is turned off in Win7 and 8 but appears to be fully missing with Win10. If you type CD Windows\system32 at the command prompt that will (CD - Change Directory) to put you in that directory and change the prompt Depending on where you are you might type: CD C:\Windows\system32 and that'll achieve the same thing (just accounting for the harddrive/partition you are on) On Win10 I get an error and message that the driver in question has been blocked from loading. That might be related to Admin rights though so... investigating. Probably not.

Very nice!

Yes, Win 7 or even Win 10 shouldn't be an issue as I've run the older versions of A:M on those before on 7, 8, 8.1 and 10. Something has indeed changed. The solution is out there somewhere... somewhere... somewhere...

Great interview.. but... but.... Gah! Good grief. To be continued??? It's like watching those TV shows like Star Trek in the 70's where they all ended in cliffhangers! Noooooo!!!! I don't wanna wait until next week! Like I said, great interview.

Not sure what the solution is but... a google search on the missing DLL problem suggests the first thing you should do to fix the DLL error is restart your computer as that may correct the problem. That may not in fact correct the problem but restarting a computer is fairly easy to do so is well worth a try.

*Some corrections updates have been applied to this topic since first posting* This is kind of a 'yikes' for me... I've reported on the project management solution known as 'Tactic' by Southpaw Technologies and even explored it a little as I thought it was well worth looking into. In recent times Southpaw had been pushing a tailor made VFX setup of Tactic designed with filmmaking in mind. The 'yikes' of this post is that I just saw the news that Toonboom Animation Inc. has purchased Southpaw** and is rolling out their own version of Project Management named Toon Boom Manager. https://www.toonboom.com/products/manager news release: https://www.toonboom.com/news/toon-boom-animation-acquires-tactic-studio-southpaw-technology The pros and cons? Not sure. I assume that the basic Tactic software will still be open and free but am not sure about that because no information on the open program was released short of saying Southpaw would still sell it's tailored version of Tactic for B2B purposes. Why is this news? Primarily because everyone who can is getting into the content management and collaboration biz. Adobe is pushing integration and collaboration with its CC products Autodesk recently acquired Shotgun Animation Mentor is fielding Artella Sony has their online collab in the cloud Avid has recently launched their own cloud collab solution (primarily for musicians) And on and on and on... In the long run this should help to bring project management software to the masses but in the short term I have some concerns. **Correction: There's a bit of a disconnect here for me in that it appears Toonboom has purchased only the Tactic VFX Studio portion of Southpaws technology/API. Not sure what all that suggests but that would be much different than Toonboom purchasing all of Southpaw, which is not what appears to have happened. The good news in this is that the underlying software Tactic would still be separate and freely available to all.

I just want to say... That was an excellent description of your problem Oliver. It's great when screen captures like that are shared as it gives us insight into what is really going on. It sounds like Robert's got your solution in sight. Another option might be to use Action Objects. With Action Objects you can put as many of the same model into another model as you want and each pose slider works separately with that instance of the model. I suppose this is simliar to combining the models in a Chor so... likely not an ideal solution. I'll press on with this option for completeness sake even though it may not be a viable option. The primary downside might be that you'd have to select the specific instance of the model in order to activate that pose slider as each will only appear when the model is selected. An additional downside is that if you export the Action Objects from Action into a new Model you have the same single pose dilemma. As such I think Robert's approach to renaming just before importing is optimal. Steps to set up the combined Action Object: Create Empty Model - this will contain all instances of models Create Models with Poses Create an Action using the Empty Model Drag/Drop Models into the Action - This will add these instance to any Model you apply this Action to in a Choreography Select Models as desired and adjust their Pose Sliders.

Very interesting. I see the program has a plugin for programs that support the Adobe 8BF plugin filter format (for use with photoshop, irfanview, etc.).

Here's a bit more of a rabbit-like hair...

Something worth noting with regard to the research Disney did for hair simulation was how they appear to focus on hair at the edges of a shape (i.e. those hairs that alter the profile). My sense is that hair not affecting the profile can generally be simulated without costly calculations to include allowing a hair map/decal to appear in those locations rather than simulated strands of hair. I'm currently running into an odd behavior with hair in A:M where only about 1/2 of a patch is rendering the hair. More than likely some setting I adjusted that is effecting the final render but... a mystery I'm looking into. Update: Starting from scratch again the rendering problem went away. A:M still has one of the most versatile hair systems available and it comes with the program... no plugin required.