Admin Rodney Posted July 31, 2011 Admin Share Posted July 31, 2011 I haven't been keeping up with all the various programs out there but this one caught my attention. http://vectorian.com/ It is a free Flash-type program that can even use Action Script (v2 scripts if I read correctly) It may be worth looking into if you have need of .SWF animation. In a pinch it might be useful for using images created in A:M to create .SWF movies. It did import PNG images and kept their transparency which is something a some programs fail at. I'm not familiar with Action Script but that might be a means to further exploit usage of A:M with Giotto. Ideally you'd be able to import a sequence of images but I didn't see that capability. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hash Fellow robcat2075 Posted July 31, 2011 Hash Fellow Share Posted July 31, 2011 Can it export an .AI like Flash can? (I'm still looking for a free AI creation program for A:M's AI importer.) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Admin Rodney Posted July 31, 2011 Author Admin Share Posted July 31, 2011 Can it export an .AI like Flash can? Negative. I didn't think Flash could do that either. But .AI is an Illustrator format so perhaps most Adobe products can export to that. I think the more straightforward solution is going to be to update the AI Wizard to a SVG wizard or some other appropriate open source vector format. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
largento Posted July 31, 2011 Share Posted July 31, 2011 Shame that it's Windows only. I don't think there are any free ways to do that, Robert. The likelihood would be that even if something did exist it wouldn't be able to create Illustrator 8 files. The current version is 15. I live in fear of the day that Illustrator drops support for saving that far back. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Admin Rodney Posted July 31, 2011 Author Admin Share Posted July 31, 2011 David Simmons uses Inkscape to create .AI files but I've never had much success with that. I use Coreldraw to create .AI files as it's a simple export to make the conversion. You may have more luck with the Font wizard. There are several shareware programs that can be used to create fonts and then those can be imported into A:M. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hash Fellow robcat2075 Posted July 31, 2011 Hash Fellow Share Posted July 31, 2011 I looked at Inkscape and never was any workflow that would get an AI file out of it. Adding SVG import to the AI wizard would help, but I think the best solution would be to allow the wizard to work with any flat outline created in A:M. The AI wizard is something I'd like to cover in New TAoA:M because it sure simplifies a lot of modeling tasks, but getting an AI file is a pricey thing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
johnl3d Posted July 31, 2011 Share Posted July 31, 2011 check this out http://www.pstoedit.net/pstoedit/ converts svg files to ai svg can come from inkscape Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Admin Rodney Posted July 31, 2011 Author Admin Share Posted July 31, 2011 The AI wizard is something I'd like to cover in New TAoA:M because it sure simplifies a lot of modeling tasks, but getting an AI file is a pricey thing. Perhaps we could find a way to reverse the current process of converting AI to splines... export a spline out to AI... then bring it back into A:M through the AI wizard. Of course we wouldn't be satisfied with that we'd want that process automated. Or perhaps the same could be done with the Font wizard where A:M pretends to export a spline out but then brings that data back in as if it were converting/closing the surface of a font. I have it on my list of things to do to dissect the AI Wizard and see if I can add a few minor features to it. If I can wrap my head around that I might be able to program something useful. Does anyone know where the CAP plugin went to? That wasn't as versatile as the AI wizard but it was useful in closing off a spline or two. Similarly, many a year ago there was A:M Loft. That little program had some innovate spline tools although it should be noted that most of those can be found in the current Sweeper plugin. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
itsjustme Posted July 31, 2011 Share Posted July 31, 2011 It's a little strange to do, but it works with Inkscape and other free software. First, you have to have Ghostscript and ps2edit installed, then make a ".PS" in Inkscape and run the ps2ai.bat (be sure to set the correct path for Ghostscript in the ".Bat") file at the command line...that's what works for me. Here's a quick example that I threw together...it would need some work to get a good model, but this is what I got without much effort. Hope that helps. scripttest.zip Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Admin Rodney Posted July 31, 2011 Author Admin Share Posted July 31, 2011 This won't be of any use to Mac Users and little to no use to PC users either but... I located A:M Loft and discovered it still works fine on my PC. Note: There was a Mac version of A:M Loft but is there any chance a twenty year old program would work on the latest release? If the answer is yes then we should be able to find the file via the Wayback machine. For those silly enough to want to try, download the attached. As a hint as to how to use A:M Loft look at the bottom of the screen after you've loaded a model. It'll tell you what to do step by step. The only capability that I see that is missing in A:M now is the skinning tool where you select several spline loops and when you click okay it skins and inbetweens those according to a number you set. AMloft.zip Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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