martin

Very cool. I want to see this guy finished and throwing punches! (Top of Crusher's head is shaped more like the top of an egg. Nose to mouth also shorter... But if you're not doing the exact Crusher, that's okay.)

Good, Katt. Comments: There seems to be two shots of Mac Flin falling down at the end - need just one. Mac Flin has a run cycle that's used 3 times. That would be a good reusable motion to refine because it is used multiple times. (It needs refining - he runs too slow.) Story notes: What caused the gold to stop pouring - the book?

Mark, we got a bunch of Courtiers for SO coming down the pipe - I hope we can use the 2008 rig in those.

Awesome! Thank you, Dusan, for using Animation:Master to create that work of art.

Those all look really good, Caleb.

Hey, those pictures aren't from the video clip?! I recommend: Lena is turned away from the banshee when she says "come to me." If she said "follow me," that would allow you to turn her back but if "come to me" is the correct dialog then keep her pointed at the banshee while she's talking. At the end, there are 3 cuts while Lena talks to the banshee (looking through the spider's web). Ditch #1 & #3 and stay on #2 throughout the dialog.

Lookin' mighty fine. (Hey, I want him to SAY something...)

Rupert Murdoch talks like a pirate every day. (At least the Keith Olbermann version does.)

Very interesting... When I watched those pocket gymnastics, it got me thinking about complex rigs that need to be transitory, (turn on only when needed so that they offer no clutter and take no processing time).

Oh, yeah, that's good. Music is perfect... Voices too. (You might have the music too loud or the voices too quiet on this one but I still heard every word and sound effect.) Put some pictures up too, Ernest. (Put them in the first post - I added the link and changed the title.)

You're really coming along!

Congrats! (Mark should be proud.)

IK Switching is easy to add to any rig.

Try it. You'll beat that dang TSM if it's as easy as the 2001, (drag-n-drop).

This is your movie, Katt, and for heaven's sake, I've got my own movie directing to do, but as directors-in-arms, I've got to make a few suggestions: 1) Separate the lines of dialog - they run into each other. 2) Do some establishing shots, (your other clips usually showed where the action was taking place but not this one.) 3) These are all medium shots - try some closeups and wide shots. 4) When the dialog changes pitch, it is misleading if the same person is talking - perhaps you shouldn't do that except when the effect is truly needed. I watch every one of these clips, and I'm enjoying your progress.

If this is right (and I follow you so it could be right), all images that are imported into A:M need gamma correction (.45 usually). Is that "Current gamma" value on the Render dialog the same one I write in the Targa header? (I can't find the one I used to maintain for the Targa files.) Additionally, this brings up an interesting quandry... If A:M applies a 2.2 gamma every time it saves (under your scenario), and gamma correction does not occur when the image is reimported again, it will get progressively more gamma applied if the cycle is repeated.

That is correct. Images imported into A:M are gamma corrected so they look right on a gamma 2.2 display. Their image data is not linear anymore and they must be linearized. This I do not agree. If the image data had a 2.2 gamma already on the pixels, the 2nd time the image was displayed in an A:M window would get an additional 2.2 gamma (from the monitor) and would not appear the same image as it originally was in the Photoshop window. No. I'm talking about any RGB color that are entered in the color properties. Those colors were selected in a gamma 2.2 display device so they must be considered as having been intrinsically gamma corrected and must be uncorrected. One very obvious case is picking a color from a photo. But picking a color from a color dialog is also the case. Think that the color dialog lives in a display color space that is made so gamma corrected photos look good. Thus any color that looks good on this device must be considered as gamma corrected when the user sees them and selects them. This I follow and agree.

My understanding of your understanding is that images imported into A:M are NOT gamma of 1.0. (When you mention "materials," you must be talking about image-based materials). Hmmm... I need to research that assertion some before I comment further.

Please expand on this statement... When would the reciprocal gamma (.45) be applied to an image unless it had a gamma (2.2) listed in its file format (Targa, PNG)? Applying "twice" would be if the "Gamma" Post Effect were applied to a final A:M image which ALSO had the regular 2.2 gamma applied by the display device. It MAY BE (only a guess - I'd need to look in the code) that when you hooked up the gamma adjustment in A:M, that you were assuming what the viewer was seeing on their monitor was a gamma of "1.0." It seems to me (once again I'm speculating until I look in the code), that your gamma type-in value should default to whatever the display device's gamma is because that's what the viewer is seeing, and if the user typed "1.0" into that gamma adjustment value, the reciprocal of the display device's gamma should be applied (1.0/2.2). Just guessing as to what's happening?

Yves, you might want to draw a "workflow" diagram that shows where the nonlinearities come in. My experience is that most raw images are stored with "0" gamma, (linear) - digital pictures included - and gamma isn't applied until display time using the display device's gamma. Years ago, I can remember importing images from digital cameras, screen capture devices, etc., that had not been de-gammaed but I have not witnessed one of those images recently? When Macs used 2.2 gamma & PCs used 1.8 gamma, that always caused consternation because people saw the same image differently. I've heard Macs don't do that anymore. In the end, it all depends on the intended final distribution method: film (different gamma needed), YouTube (yikes! we've experienced how difficult it is to get our animations to display "correctly" on YouTube), TV (my recommended method of burning a DVD is easy).

Yes. A gamma 2.2 monitor is a quite dark monitor BTW. I'm not quite sure Yves is answering the same thing Robert asked, or even if Robert asked the right thing, so I will state the obvious for clarification. A:M works in 1.0 gamma (none). The signal goes out of the videocard into the monitor - there are several possibilities where gamma (assume 2.2) is applied: 1) A:M puts on the gamma (normally this is not what people do) 2) The videocard puts on the gamma (an option) 3) The monitor puts on the gamma (quite common) You only want the gamma applied ONCE. I assume my new flatscreen TV with DVD player has correct gamma so that's why burning a DVD is a good way to check your computer monitor BUT there is still the possibility that your TV/DVD is not adjusted correctly, so that's why you would do that gamma adjustment scheme Robert doesn't trust. Yves may also be talking about the ultimate in gamma diligence - the "gamma curve." flatscreen TVs & computer monitors are made as cheaply as possible, which sometimes means that the gamma response suffers (plus, it's just difficult to match how your eye perceives gamma). Film projectors have a GREAT gamma curve because they use filtered light - so what you see on your monitor may not match how film would be projected even if you do the gamma adjustment scheme. My last statement on the issue: if the image on your monitor looks like the image on your TV, consider that good enough, (unless you work as a tech at a TV station.)

Here's my experience... I can't trust the video output on my computer because that is controlled by the videocard and that's one of the things I'm checking! If I want trust, I use a home DVD player, burn a DVD from my computer, play the image from the DVD player on a flat screen TV (or tube), put the image right next to my computer monitor. Are they the same? Yay! Calibrated! Are they different? Hmmm? Is it my videocard that needs adjustment or my monitor. Because "brightness" and "contrast" on my monitor are so easy to adjust - I try those things first. Hmmm? Not fixing it - then that whole gamma curve thing comes into play. I'm quite technical and I could figure it out if I had to but it's actually easier to buy a new monitor or videocard than it is to screw with touchy technical settings.

One more thing: A monitor's "brightness" and "contrast" are the culprit much more often than the gamma. If you light a scene on a monitor with incorrect brightness/contrast, it will look bad on a correctly calibrated monitor.

Almost all videocards ALREADY display at 2.2 (or 1.8 or whatever the default display device is) - if you put a 2.2 adjustment on A:M images too, it will be doubled! ALMOST ALWAYS when we burn a DVD right from A:M - it looks fine on the TV. What happens is that people light their scene with bad gamma on their monitor (not 2.2, not 1.8 or whatever). When someone else looks at the same image on another monitor (that has correct 2.2 or 1.8 or whatever), it looks dark or bright - so the problem starts on the original artist's monitor. If you (the artist) burn your image to DVD then look at it on your TV, and it looks like you expect, then the gamma on your monitor is probably okay.

Here's what we did for TWO... Burn a test DVD of each sequence in question and look at it on the TV - adjust up/down accordingly. (Flat screen, tube type - it doesn't seem to make any difference.)