#Animated Text
Jerry,
I am trying to do an opening title in Lightwave. I brought in a still image as
a background. I then brought in some text. However, I am having problems with
the surfaces and the colors.
I brought the text in through modeler and used the macro to extrude it. When I
go into surfaces, the menu shows that the text has two sides. FRONT & SIDE. I
made the SIDE black and the front I tried to make red, but the color is not
strong enough to hold up against the background.
The background is an outdoor shot of a school yard. There is almost white sky
above, then trees, then grass. Red may not be the best color to use, but it is
the schools color.
I have tried using the different types of surfaces, brushmetal, marble and
tried apply a color to that. Maybe that is not the way to do it. When you
select a color after you load a surface from the LOAD SURFACE button, does one
cancel out the other?
I finally tried to use a solid blue color. I turned red and green down to 0 and
blue up all the way. None of the other attributes are selected. I turned the
ambient light down to 10%. Changed the light to a spot and brought it up to
100%. I then moved the light so that it is coming from above at about 45%
angle.
I have five lines of text. The top line comes out as a rich blue. The next line
is a dark blue. The following three lines are again different shades of blue.
I know that I am doing something wrong, but I'm not sure what. I would really
like to have the letters red. But red against green is not working. I even
tried copper and gold, but again the background is brighter than the letters.
I took the ambient light down because I thought that the ambient light was
lighting up the background. It didn't make a difference.
Whatever color I end up with, I would like them to have a 3D look. Kind of like
a drop shadow. Right now they end up being straight on to the camera. Maybe I
should tilt them.
What do you suggest?
Fred
P.S. I am going to send you a copy of the video you did the animation for. I'll
try and ship it out monday. The client and me were very happy.