#color cycling flick
7 messages in this thread
I have been having some difficulty acheiving what I was hoping was a
simple thing to do. What I desire as an end product is an animated
bump map. In order to create it, I used fractint to make a plasma
fractal, converted it to greyscale in picture publisher, then brought
it into animator pro. I attempted to create a 30 frame flick having
all the colors cycle through like it does in fractint, but so far no
success. I want the bumps to sort of 'bubble' and alter when I use it
in 3ds, but I haven't figured it out as of yet. Any suggestions to do
this quickly and easily?
We're all waiting for Ed Kellerman to jump in here!
But it would depend a lot on the greyscale image. Without seeing it, how do
these steps work:
In AAPro, load the image.
Bring up the Palette panel, select ALL (vs. CLUSTER).
Select "Value/Squeeze" and OK the number of colors. (Note the number)
Cluster/Unused colors and OK
Cluster/Invert
Create additional frames (total frame count to equal the number of
colors in the cluster, remember from Squeezing the palette). The
color RGB 0,0,0 (black) will probably be a problem for you, so you
might end up changing it to RGB 1,0,0.
Time on, Fit off, Arrange/Cycle.
Nik
Thanks, I will try this when I get home. My animator pro is a little rusty. I
managed to try most of those commands, but not in that order. The image is just
a plasma fractal, standard nothing special. I was (am) attempting to see what
kind of look I can get applying an animated bump map to a
rippling-semi-tranparent box.
It's been awhile, so I hesitate to jump in here, but…
First off, you could have used AniPro to convert the image to grayscale. Next,
you need to arrange your palette in luminance order so that the "colors" will
cycle logically. I suspect you can do this with Luma Sort. What I'd probably do
is a Luma Sort with Fit turned on, and then I'd ramp the entire palette to
create a smooth grayscale. Finally, I'd use Squeeze to get the palette down to
the number of frames you want for your animation (30?).
Now that your palette is ready, create 30 identical frames and RIGHT-click on
the [C] button to proceed with the color cycling. (See page 4-25 of the AniPro
Ref. Manual for stuff about color cycling. Don't miss the small paragraph
following the numbered steps.)
Caveat: I haven't tried out any of the above, so you might have to punt.
– Jack
>>3DS calling Fractint…
Tim,
Last night, I tried the basics of Nik's technique for color-cycling a GIF with
AniPro. I started by bringing an existing color Fracting GIF, squeezing the
palette and selecting the cluster as Nik suggested, then converted to
grey-scale by building a grey ramp to replace the color cluster. The rest of
Nik's technique (adding frames, T, no FIT, Arrange/Cycle) did the trick.
I didn't like the hard-edge effect of a black-white palette when the flic
repeated, so I then modified the cluster to add little reversed greyscale ramp
at the end of the cluster (ramping back down to black) and rebuilt the flic –
looked much better. However, for the "bubbling" effect I think you want (which
I want too, now that you thought of it!), I may try creating a series of
shorter cycles, forwards and backwards, and try to make them look somewhat
random.
J K J
PS: I just saw Jack's message on the same subject – more things to try!
I gave it a try as well and it looked more like a piece of paper being burned
up (which may have it's uses as well, I have to file that one away), so i will
continue to experiment, try some of yours and Jack's suggestions as well. I was
hoping it wasn't going to be a complicated affair because it is only one small
part of a much bigger project I am working on. But, one thing at a time…
I use color cycle in many of my Ham radio and Aviation related graphics
for my company. Call me.. I will be glad to try to help.
David R. Long
619-541-2200 — Computer Graphics and animation Dept.
King Schools
San Diego, Ca.