John Bigboote

I use the ai wizard all the time, extremely useful. You can also make paths in Photoshop for use with the ai wizard, but to a degree. Other programs include Flash and Inkscape. Always remember to save to the legacy illustrator 8 file format for importing to A:M.

STELLAR! Is that Myron?

LOVE IT! That is one of Steve Millington's models, right? I plan to put her thru my hair process soon, too. My only recommendation would be to smooth-out the camera zooms... and put something in the back area behind her- even if you put some lights back there with lens-flares... would make it seem more 'glitzy'. A trick I do for easy lens flares (not saying its hard in A:M tho... A:M is an incredible lens-flare generator... better than Knolls) Is to make a new image in Photoshop filled with pure black, and use the lens-flare filter on that... save it as a jpeg/tga and import it to A:M... put it in your chor as a layer with flat shading.) I hope Mike Branch likes this!

Yes, Nancy's test is very illuminating... note the moire in the texture on her thigh(and noise in general on the upper legs) that disappears at 16+ passes... and is not there at all on the 'no pass' image... but there IS a lot of texture noise... Fucher is right about the lower passes for animation... I do supervised animation sessions where the client looks over my shoulder while I work. I explain that the initial sequences from A:M(quick renders) are 'low-res' and will be replaced with a higher pass count later on for better anti-aliasing... most of the time, the clients say- it looks fine just the way it is. Good discussion! I need to try that post-effect trick from the reference manual... set to zero, interesting! (below) 4. Soft Antialiasing - The multi-pass render can be set up to have a different averaging mechanism used for combining each pass. This averaging technique slightly softens the image but gives the appearance of smoother antialiasing especially at lower passes. To invoke this softening effect use the Blur post effect on the camera with a softness value of 0. Note any softness value larger than 0 will invoke a true blur on the rendered image. Blur Post Effect See Post Effects for information on how to use them. Blur Softness Use a softness of 0 to only invoke the Multi-Pass softening pass averaging technique.

OH--- and another feature that only works with multipass is the hair feature called 'jitter'...

I have an alley? I think I know what you mean...MJ. Watch for mine too...

It is a different renderer... with different strengths, and weaknesses. For instance, if you need a nice fast test render... use 1 pass. The more passes you add will 'comb' thru the antialiasing better and better...you can see it getting better. Compare the standard A:M renderer to a 16 pass MP. The standard renderer does not render your displacement maps- and I don't think it can make use of the FakeAO plug-in, but it can be a fast renderer too and in certain situations be faster than MP. They both do motion-blur completely different too...and DOF.

It just seems like this would be be a fine automatic 'jaw-dropper' for lip-synching... of course further embellishments would be necessary to further the realism, but it may be a good start. John I will email you some dialogue for testing purposes...?

Put that in an app on a smart/iphone... be a great time-killer for people. PRETTY COOL!

That's very cool... that may be a record for the longest movie post ever from JohnL3D! SO- to make that happen you are using a 3rd party plug-in called Amplitude made by Gary Newby?

If you change the choreography's Y force value from -100 to zero will that do it?

AWESOME! Way to go, Rodney!

You should throw Sony Vegas in that bag too.

Setting Initial velocity to zero should do ya... great style!

You have discovered one of A:M's hidden gems... it is a natural animation stand! (anyone who has ever made cutout animation on a rostrum or oxberry or a 'title camera' knows what I mean...) Great work!

I was very entertained ! I enjoyed watching it go... and laughing... and wondering, could it work?

Maybe you should not enter a value at all into the reflection falloff.

Great advices... maybe give us a little more info on what you are trying to do.

I was chatting with another animator the other day who said, 'I was going to beat myself in the head for 12 hours a day to kill myself- but then I discovered being an animator is much faster...' With the proliferation of animation being EVERYWHERE in our lives, many people tend to think it is an easy gig. Wrong-ola. Some people take to it better than others, but most great animators are old people. Stick with it.

The last few times I tried dynamic constraints with CD... I was quickly shown the desktop...

Great earthquake... hey! I Like your new skin on your forum!

VERY COOL!

I agree with the ears being too closed in on the head... and SSS would help too. My eyes are drawn to the inside of the nostrils... perhaps a 'dark' decal there would help. Are you using Muhair shader on the hair? Also, maybe the shirtline could use a little more detail, maybe apply a cloth texture instead of the roughness setting it has. And the lips look too close to the skin color... WELCOME BACK, RUSTEEEE! New to SSS? Try these settings... 3, 3.25, 3.5... 140%

Yes, our community needs more 'pillars'...

Okay--- took a quick look. NICE MODEL Mr. Beauvais... wish he was still spline-ing. Anywhoo- look in your relationships folder...user properties...rig relationships...setup relationships...IK legs relationships setup...relationship1... left thigh/right thigh... you will see a relationship called 'hidden'... delete that, and it will show-up. Hope that helps, MJ!