ArgleBargle

Thank you very much. It was great fun to watch that again. And thanks for the FTP reference. I'll have to see if I can get some to play.

Years ago when I was working regularly with A:M, I watched a video in the A:M showcase with two swordsman on an island. The style was like flat animation built from 3D. Anyone know where that can still be found? The current showcase only has some 200 videos so I know the ones from 6 years ago or longer are not around. Any way to see the archived videos?

I desperately wish someone had let me know this when I started with A:M. I think I've lost weeks from not knowing this. These days, I use After Effects. I can't see doing sounds any other way. It's a bit of a pain, but the results are better.

Well, darn, Caroline. Finally a question comes along that I can answer and you beat me to it. Good response. I've had some fun with flashing/blinking bits of models and it's not too hard to do. It's surprisingly satisfying to see working.

What a great trip down memory lane. Your quote looks dangerously close to one of mine: "you can only be young once, but you can be immature forever."

You know, the mind boggles with potential comments about that. Frankly, I'm so overwhelmed, I don't know where to begin. Though, practically, get ahold of some porno or some anatomy books. Personally, I get embarrassed and don't make anatomically correct models.

Your Newton splash looks like it had the same problems I had with marbles. Your liquid seems to be oozing through "holes" in the plate.

Actually, I had a bit of a black-dot problem appear on both of my Windows machines when I updated to one of the later v12 releases. I had no change in video card or drivers, but if I'm in shaded wireframe mode, sometimes the dots are black and I can't tell what I've selected. It's not real consistent, but I'll have the problem typically if I've shifted to a direct view (like press a keypad number). No problems in wireframe mode. While the problem could definitely be driver issues, nonetheless, it appeared between revisions of A:M. Cool... I see that the special item stuff works on the forum now. Someone staying busy over Christmas? Or did Safari just get some brains?

Actually, I finally punted on that concept and went with the Newton engine. You can specify frame ranges to simulate with it. I had a lot of fun with that one and got some good results. Oh, and when it finished it topped 12,000 frames. I was kinda pleased, but it was definitely my longest. (Steve, that's the one I showed you when you dropped by.)

I really doubt you'll get a conclusive answer to your question. I've run A:M on numerous computers (Mac and PC, both) and never gotten random sounds. I suggest the following: The problem is really outside A:M whatever is producing the "dong" is tied to an event in windows. Go look in your sound settings and match the noise to the event(s) and maybe that'll give you some clues. Not much in life is really random... even with computers. Something consistent is happening to make the noise. Be alert for patterns. If something is really wrong, maybe look into driver problems (usually video) that a driver update might fix. Await some suggestions from others.

Yves, that's the best description I've read of that. It's tough to wrap your head around a 4th dimension (and I'm not totally sure I have it perfectly) but that clock analogy was great.

Here's a suggestion: save your project, then consolidate it (on the Project menu) to a temporary folder. You might find you have a lot of things in the consolidated folder that you don't actually have on the other computer you're trying to move your work to. Anyway, if your goal is to do a render on another machine, that might be the option you want, anyway.

It's bigger than the first and 3rd rooms I had as a kid and smaller than my 2nd and 4th. I never got a rug. I'd say it's just about right.

If you ever do give it a try, on one of the A:M Extra CD's I donated a generic freight car chassis (frame, wheels, couplers, etc.). So you'd only have to build the bodies. And somewhere there's a diesel locomotive model that Jeff Cantin donated. I found those already and have considered what you were suggesting. Also, the other day I asked who used A:M in eastern Oklahoma and I've already had a phone conversation with someone (Steve Shelton) here in Tulsa since making that post. He turns out to be a model railroader as well. This makes me wonder if there would be any fun in a collaborative effort on an A:M model railway. It makes you wonder what Model Railroader magazine would do with photo-realistic train pictures of models that don't exist in the real world.

Nothing other than the basic model bone. You don't get much choice about that one. If you load up the projects, you'll see the problem. Oddly, it's not deterministic. I got the marbles to roll around in the jar in the successful project, but later, I loaded the same project and the marbles fell through. Re-run the sim, some fall through, re-rerun again, it works, fine. Try again and get more random results. Physics isn't supposed to work that way.