Simon Edmondson

Rodney and Robert Thank you once again for your help I think the problem starts with confusion on my part. I was expecting it to look like it did going through ( as previous experience suggested ). I misunderstood what was going on, I'll get there slowly. regards simon Ps I'll try layers this evening. In my own defence I was a bit confused when I tried to open the TGA and some PNG files in Photoshop and couldn't access the alpha channel but again, I think thats inexperience!

Robert Heres the unconverted TGA. Thank you and Rodney for your help. regards simon Stormy_C1__073.tga

Rodney Pardon me, I was typing the reply while you were typing this one. I was going to try some compositing with the EXR's mentioned, using the light buffers, I was getting a bit exasperated with the png's rendered and, after last weeks intro to compositing, thought I'd try that. I will try the method above later. I must confess I'm getting into a bit dizzy with it all at the moment. regards simon

Rodney That was very quick, I'd only just eaten lunch... Thank you for your reply. The files were rendered in AM to a TGA format. One with the Alpha on, one with it off. Those files were then 'saved as' with preview under OSX ( the reason for that was because of previous mistakes on my part were I uploaded TGA files). It may be my misunderstanding, as there is nothing the other side of the window except the rim light acting as the lightening. When the render is going through the information I expected to be there, was, as each of three passes completed. Then, when the final part of the render completed, the previous info seemed to vanish and I got the transparency of the alpha channel with no reflections of the room. When the chor was rendered as a QT file this was the result S1_000.mov And it was that room reflection that I was expecting with the still files but didn't get? Thank you for your help regards simon

Using V15J on an Imac with OSX 10.68 I am having trouble with the alpha channel on renders. This is a Jpg conversion of the TGA file rendered with the Alpha on This is the same frame ( again converted to jpg ) rendered with the alpha off. I rendered some exr sequences at the weekend with light buffers turned on but they are now turned off and the setting are 'normal' I have rendered out sequences with alpha included before and not had this problem, can anyone kindly suggest what the problem might be and how to correct it ? regards simon

Rodney As you know, I am the most technically competent person on the forum ( joke ) but, I was thinking about this earlier. Gerald's suggestion is more likely to work than mine but, here goes If you have full body selected in the keyframes section, Select the root bone, then step through the animation forcing the keyframe on that, It will only put the ones in on the bones you have selected before but, if you then bake that action in the chor it seems to but a key on every bone, even if you've not selected it before ? You could then export it and work from there . (less than) two pennies worth simon

Marcos That is terrific. Excellent job. How on earth did you do the trees ? regards simon

Just installed Chrome and it seems to access the file Rodney mentioned. Just have to learn from it now. Thank you all. simon ps I've just watched it and, ( to use an english expression ) GORDON BENNET !!! Thats one extremely powerful feature. The case for a comprehensive and functional wiki grows even bigger. ps2 I just tried the address at the end of the talk for the composite Tutorial and got a 404 file not found. Has it been moved ? http://www.hash.com/am2005/Composite/tutorial.htm

Chris I'll try it again later but I can't get it to work at the moment. If I was a superstitious chap I'd begin to wonder about mal spirits. My car keys went missing last night in the 15 foot from car door to front door, and other things keep popping up and going too !!! Regards simon

Mark Thank you very much for that. I checked the Library as you suggested , and got this, I may have misunderstood but, that would suggest it was OK ? I've been using computers for a long time but have very, very, little knowledge about the OS's. My brother on the other hand dreams in machine code ! regards simon

Rodney WOW ! That was comprehensive. I shall be writing that down later. I want to improve my model making but, am more focused on the animating and story side at the moment. I did say the other day that the learning curve was almost vertical. regards simon

Rodney I got the ensharpen but it seems to be the same. Robert Mark W suggested Firefox so I might try that later. I was trying to avoid Chrome because I get enough google cookies as it is ( grrrr ) Thank you both for your help. simon

Mark and Mark Thank you both for your replies. I did check to see if it was the Adobe site and it did link to the licence agreement and a few other adobe bits so seemed safe (?). I followed Mark W's suggestion and checked the version number in system preferences and it tallied with what you mentioned about the latest version, 11.4.402.265 Is there a way I can check to see if I have the trojan ? The last time I picked up malware was a virus on the Amiga ( !!!) and used to steer clear of the net for just that reason. regards simon

http://www.3dworldmag.com/2012/10/02/compe...ake-a-3d-human/ It wouldn't be for me but some of the better modellers out there might be interested in this competition run by the magazine 3D World ? simon apologies, I just read it properly and its for other software, My mistake. I don't know how to delete the post. Sorry.

In another thread about compositing, Rodney kindly supplied a link to a talk about the subject. I followed up the link provided and it asked me to update the Flash player. I did that and installed it but, when I went back to try the link again it still wanted me to install the latest version... This has happened before with other things, notably on Youtube, so I suspect it may be part of the Apple - Adobe battle I've heard about? Is anyone else using a Mac having this problem and, if so, does anyone know a solution ? I'm using OSX 10:68 with Safari regards simon

Rodney Thank you once again, but I've found a hiccup, nothing to do with AM but it has been irritating for some while. I followed up the link you provided and it asked me to update the Flash player. I did that and installed it but, when I went back to try the link again it still wanted me to install the latest version... This has happened before with other things, notably on Youtube, so I suspect it may be part of the Apple - Adobe battle I've heard about? Is there another format I could try ? regards simon

Rodney Thank you for the link. I shall follow it up straight away. Regards Simon

I was a member of cg char about 96 and was even more naive than now. I got into an exchange about Mo cap with somebody who, after revealing my ignorance, turned out to be senior mo cap man on Titanic. I still blush at the thought. It was also the first place I ever heard about , and met, people using AM. In relation to your post Rodney, the O's have perhaps been touched on before as , character, conflict and resolution ? You can cover establish either of the c's first as long as the resolution moves both further on and thats the journey for the audience. I bought a Wallace and Gromit collection the other day and watched them with the commentaries. It was interesting to hear Nick Park talking about the changes and developments in the characters and how they tried to do something new with each short. There was a gallery section which I tried to get some shots from because the poses were terrific but, sadly, it didn't work, perhaps next time. simon

http://www.hash.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=15282 I was trying to read up about using Compositer within AM and found some mention and links to a tutorial by Homeslice. He mentioned a tutorial by Davis Rodgers which I followed up with the link above, only to find that there were a number of missing images. Has the info been moved elsewhere ? regards simon

I just got my copy of the December issue of 3Dworld today and there is a whole article on making Horror characters. I think you have them beat ! simon

Steve ( keep the salt ready ) If you look at frame three The grounded foot changes orientation from the proceeding and following frame - toe down, to toe up, to toe down, Also on F3 perhaps the height of the hips relative to the grounded foot might be higher, likewise on F10 ? Frames 7& 8 perhaps need the foreleg extended further, before the touchdown on frame 9. The rear foot on F9 might best be pointing back rather than forwards ? simon

Pardon me but, were you the person building the model of the cathedral near his home ? If so, did you apply the textures and materials to the model yet, or was it to stay in the original state? If not, my apologies. regards simon

Steve Take this with the proverbial salt mine, An observation I would make is, depending on the speed she is running at, the arms should move through a wider range,If she was an athlete or an action movie star ( at one extreme) then the forearms would be parallel at least to the thighs and possibly higher if sprinting flat out. She is in contact with the ground for 8 frames, which seems a lot to me but I defer to someone with more expertise. The other point to make is that she lands as if walking, heel first, and I think most of the action in running is in the first part of the foot, from the toes back to the in step ? Pass the salt... simon

Rodney Thank you for your help. I did render to TGA in the past and possibly will again in future. I get bad trouble with banding when I output to Mov format and wondered if you have a preferred codec and compressor? I bought Final Cut Pro a couple of years ago and have been using that to edit the shorts but, the compressor option within it doesn't work ( which says a lot for Apple's coding, but thats another matter ! ). I'm outputting to HD1080 resolution. regards simon Ps Just found out that, with the same settings, only the file type changed, TGA's render out about 33% faster than png files.. 4:08 as opposed to 6:30. Ps2 I just reread Nancy's observations earlier. Drat ! Apologies for not taking it in, My mistake.. Have to learn how to use composite now...

Following an earlier suggestion about using png files rather than tga. I rendered out the sequences that way. I've now got to editing the frames into the final piece. However, the png results seem to be far different from what I was expecting. When I open the frames in CS2 the alpha channel shows up but I can't seem to access it or the other information in the frame. Can anyone kindly give me a quick overview as to how to go about it, or point me in the direction of a resource that deals with it ? regards simon