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Hash, Inc. - Animation:Master

markw

*A:M User*
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Posts posted by markw

    Topology Help

    in New Users

    Posted

    The modelling tutes in 'The Art of Animation Master' are a good starting off point. (Though personally I'm not sure the one on modelling a face is the most optimal approach... ).
    But, also have a watch of Barry Zundels modelling tutorials.
    I learnt a tone from those some years back when you had to buy them. Happily they are all free now but I've never regretted having bought them!
    You can find them all here: http://barryzundel.blogspot.com/p/animationmaster-2005-tutorials.html
    They were made as I say some years back so he's using an older version of A:M which lacks some of the tools/abilities of more recent versions.
    But 100% of the basics of Patch modelling covered in the videos is still relevant.

    And your biggest resource for learning A:M is right here on the forums!
    Ask questions, lots of questions and remember there are no such things as stupid questions! Even the most knowledgeable users here knew nothing about A:M once!

    Please Help v17 v18 will not open mac

    in Open Forum

    Posted

    Hi jimd
    You can open the master0.lic file at any time with a text editing app, such as Mac's own TextEdit, and read the exact expiry date of the licence.

    As I recall when Mavericks was first released A:M was on v17g and would not launch due to unexpected changes in OSX introduced by Apple with Mavericks.
    Steffen was able to alter A:M and soon had it working again with v17g+.
    If your v16 is working on Mavericks/Yosemite then that is maybe something of bonus! However those phantom renders you mention may be a sign of a deeper incompatibility of v16 with the latest Mac OS.

    When you say "the usual disk management" did you use Disk Utility to first check your HD's formatting with Verify/Repair Disk as well as using Verify/Repair Permissions?

    Render Anomoly.

    in Animation:Master

    Posted

    Mark

    Thank you for your reply. Good to see you too.

    I think I may well end up doing that as it is getting very annoying. The main worry, as mentioned above, is the sudden slowing down of the processes. It only seems to affect AM, doesn't seem to affect other programs, although I'll watch out for that now. The "beachball of destiny" is a frustrating sight ! Have you had any trouble with your Macs in a similar way ?

    regards

    simon

    Yes, sometimes it can slow but it's never been a major issue.

    Nancy's suggestion of lowering the subdivision in the realtime view can help. Likewise working in Wireframe.

    Having Particles/Hair "On" will bog it down always in realtime if you are using it. And sometimes having "Decals" turned On can slow it down if they are large image files. But if this slowing has only just started then the above may not be the cause as they would all have been evident for some time before now.

    You could try a "Reset" of A:M, that often clears out cobwebs. See if that helps.

     

    More generally I would also suggest checking your HD formatting with Disk Utility, in your Macs' Utilities folder, once in a while when you have time.

    Use the 'Verify Disk' button in the 'Fist Aid' tab.

    Minor anomalies on the HD can sometimes show up as a slowing of the OS, excessive memory or CPU use, etc…

    Render Anomoly.

    in Animation:Master

    Posted

    Hi Simon
    Good to see you still working away at this project. Nearly there!
    Now dare I say this?
    Perhaps don't spend too many hours trying to fix this glitch.
    As the problem is at least consistent in where it happens, if not when exactly, you could just check the frames where the bears face is visible after rendering and then re-touch any affected frames in a paint program, before turning the image sequence into a video file.
    It would take but a few seconds to re-touch each frame and would certainly be less frustrating than spending more hours trying to nail down what may be causing this strange glitch in the renders.
    Just a thought.

    A:M fix for Mac OS "Mavericks"

    in Open Forum

    Posted

    Hey Rodney - seriously you need to work out time / development cost to rewrite the app - then you will have a figure and tell us the community about it, I am surprised no ones put up a " petition " to " market research " how many Mac users are on here and how many of them would donate for a re written Mac App - then you would get an idea of feasibility of it actually happening instead of playing table tennis, then tell US - meaning the community as all users of AM are a real community - we use it coz we love it plain and simple. In the rebuild there could be so much more input from users to really make it shine. So please work it out and put up a petition post or something like that , " hey we are thinking about making a new mac version from the ground up and we need your help, who amongst you would like us to that, this is what its going to cost and it is going to take this long, if you donate this much, you can be in the beat testing and if you put this much, you can have a lifetime subscription etc. etc. etc. " $15k I don't have as spare change, but I am making a control pad case for iPhone which if it is successful will allow me to indulge in donating that much and more for a native version, I'll do it coz I'm crazy, but in the meantime ask the community after all we use your software, go on do it, I dare you ;-)

    Please somebody at Hash take this post by a.quaihoi seriously and look into this.

    I'm job less and nearly homeless right now but I would still try and find money from somewhere to put into a crowd funded development of the Mac A:M.

    Also let me say that Steffen has done great things keeping the Mac version going all by himself this long and I salute him for that but he is just one man.

    Need help with Mac stability

    in Animation:Master

    Posted

    So installing 18L-SS4e
    System:
    I'm still running OSX 10.8.5
    Macbook Pro
    2 Core 2.6GHz i7 Intel
    Nvidia Graphics card plus Intel built in chip.
    Ran a Terminal command first to make sure my Mac can handle SS4e. Which it said it could. So…
    First try:
    A clean instal. Not overwriting of a previous A:M installation:
    The A:M folder installed but no actual A:M application was contained in the resulting folder, which was a surprise!
    Second try:
    Overwrite of a non SS4e v18i insulation with the v18L SS4e version:
    Installation completed but A:M consistently crashes trying to start.
    I suspect this is because as in the first try no new app was actually installed so any new components that may have been installed aren't working with the old non ss4e version of A:M which was not overwritten as perhaps it should have been.
    Third try:
    Standard v18L instals and works both as a clean instal and as an overwrite of a previous version.

    I don't have any Tar assets to try so no idea what will happen trying to load those.
    Where do we find them?
    It's also been a while since I last used A:M and I don't really have much time now so I've no idea what else may be broken in the latest Mac version.

    v17g was about as good as it got I recall and I only used an early v18 for rendering with SSAO.

    Niki and Snail

    in Characters

    Posted · Edited by markw

    Just tried your idea there Rob and yes things started crashing again. So it looks like it is being caused by a bad JPG.iio package in v18h.

    Will let Steffen know.

     

    Well looks like some else has already reported the jpeg problem and Steffen has fixed it for v18i when it's ready!

    (I suppose before then if people are desperate they can try my workaround)

    Niki and Snail

    in Characters

    Posted

    Thank you all for taking time to try the models.
    After more prodding and poking I think my loading/crash problem is being caused by some of the decals.

    Looks like the Mac version of 18h dose not like .jpegs! If I change them to, say .png or .tga the models can be loaded.
    So any other v18h Mac users having this problem with .jpeg?

    Niki and Snail

    in Characters

    Posted

    I recently found that two of my models will not open in v18h, indeed attempting to do so will always crash v18h!
    However all other versions of A:M are quite happy to load them which seems strange to me.
    So I thought I would post them here (in the attached .zip file) and maybe others would like to see if they can load them in v18h and maybe determine if there is something about v18h that needs reporting to Steffen.
    Also as this is the time for giving do feel free to keep and use the models in your own work as you wish. The bass models I re-splined and developed them from are both on the Extras DVD. A model just called "Woman" I think for Niki and "Meta Bean" for the snail.
    They're perhaps not brilliantly rigged (it's really not my thing!) but they did what I needed them to do at the time.

    Niki&Snail.zip

    Buying a coffee shop

    in Design Dynamics presents

    Posted

    Right Click anywhere in the modelling window and choose 'Refind Normals'.
    That should get everything facing the right way again. But in truth, not always I've found! Still it should do the majority of the work for you.
    In the attached example it scored 100%.

    Also, I have 'Show Back Facing Polys' "OFF" in the render sittings in the example which leave "holes" where the offending patches are which makes spotting them easier.

    If you have areas of incorrect patches you can group select them. Then right click inside the bounding box of the selection and choose 'Flip Normals'.

    And then lastly there is the 'Patch Group Mode' tool in the 'Modelling' toolbar (or shift+P to activate it) you can use if only needing to do a few scattered patches.

    Screen Shot 2014-12-14 at 10.18.43.pngScreen Shot 2014-12-14 at 10.19.24.png

    Creases

    in Animation:Master

    Posted

    My two pence worth regarding modelling and patch normals:
    Open A:M's Options and go to the Rendering Tab.
    Set:
    Show Back Facing Polys = OFF

    If you can't see that option in list of settings, set Quality = Realtime and it should then be available to you.
    Click OK to close.
    Now any patch with a normal not facing the right way will be invisible and the resulting apparent "hole" in the mesh quickly spotted as you work.
    I'm not sure why this setting appears in the "Render" settings? I always thought it would be easier to find in the settings under the "Modelling" tab.

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