CompuServe Messages

>>…JPEG..seems you always want to keep the image in RGB or >>…uncompressed domain… I may misunderstand how the PAR stores frames, but I was under the impression that they were JPG compressed. If so, then it seems that a PAR->TGA output would result in a TGA already containing any initial PAR-induced JPG artifacts. Then a DOS TGA->JPG conversion could introduce additional artifacts (as you mentioned). This was the whole point of my previous comment stemming from DonL's request for PAR->JPG. I wonder: if PAR is true JPG, can you possibly write a PAR->JPG output (and perhaps the reverse) that would not introduce any additional compression artifacts, but simply mirror the .ANI frame bit for bit? If so, then a JPG output from the PAR would be extremely useful to 3DS'ers like Don and company. The reasoning: 3DS can accept JPG as input for texture maps, etc. If a PAR->TGA _does_ retain JPG artifacts, then using an equivalent JPG may be far better than the TGA, since the JPG would occupy much less disk space. (Remember, when using bitmaps in materials in 3DS, the image quality is not nearly the issue it is in other applications, since the bitmap is stretched, skewed, scaled, distorted, blurred, etc.) In Don's rotoscoping example, copying hundreds of frames from PAR to disk might be much less painful if the files were simply much smaller. Again, is a lossierless <g> PAR->JPG possible? I admit to knowing zilch about JPG algorithms so this may be the equivalent of asking for antigravity or something. BTW, I've been putting v1.30b thru the mill here with numerous small test files and have found no problems yet. I've purposely tried some things that crashed me before, like deleting a bunch of ANI and STL files and projects. Thanks again for the play/pause control. The Down-arrow key on my keyboard is now all I need to play/pause/play all night. JKJ PS. PAR wishlist item for the day: An option to autoswitch into single field mode whenever the animation is paused/stopped, and back into frame mode when restarted. This would a) make interactive viewing more pleasant for fields-ON animations, and b) make it easier/quicker to dump an animation to tape with long manual head & tails (since the ANI would not have to be sandwiched between separate specially rendered non-interlaced frames). OK, now I'll shut up for a while (since I'm leaving in the morning for a week of work in Colorado <g>)