#Humanoid Start
18 messages in this thread
I have the Humanoid set and and it's a killer with dem bones!
Thanks for the info. I'll probably go ahead and pick up a copy.
I was reading as to how you can seamlessly morph between the child, woman,
& man targets?!?
Erik Flom – ELF Works 3D Construction Co.
Do you think Michael actually has a 'bones' version of the Humanoids ? Maybe
I'm getting confused between the Toaster version and the Imagine version. Hmmm.
I don't think it comes with bones, but an article/review of 'Humanoid' by
Crestline Software Puibl. in LWPro provides some hints at using bones for
flexing muscles & breathing.
Still, it would be a nice building block for my demon. (Though I'm
thinking the CycleMuscle guys might be better in a way…more
caricaturized.)
Erik Flom – ELF Works 3D Construction Co.
I don't know if you get this nerdy publication, but if you are a member of IEEE
you might get the IEEE member publication, "Comptuer Graphics and
Applications". My artwork made the back inside cover but there is also an
interesting feature article by Bradley Schenck. Looks like he is going to the
bank on Labyrinth. The CycleMuscle guys are real charactuers, so making the
muscles move weirdly would be a plus – especially if they flexed in 'non-human'
ways. I'm attempting the Imagine Bone's tut. and I need to do it a few times to
get the concept down. Very different with the cycle motion that came with my
set of Humanoids.
I've seen the publication "Computer Graphics and Applications", but that
was back at the engineering library in college. :^)
Congrats on getting on the inside back cover! (A fairly prestigious place
for 'lowly' Amigans!)
What's this you mention about Bradley Schenck & Labyrinth. I purchased
Bradley's Diner Objects for Imagine, but have never heard of 'Labyrinth'
(short of the muppet flick w/ Bowie a few years back. :^)
Thanks,
Erik Flom – ELF Works 3D Construction Co.
"Labyrinth of Time" is a CD-Rom based game for MS-DOS and the Mac. I think I've
seen ads for it in MacWorld etc. The article says it is also on the Amiga but
having no CD rom or gaming interest, I never thought to investigate. Don't ask
me how the IEEE people got my name, but they did. I've always like Mr.Schenck's
DPaint artwork and he has ported a great deal of his style to Imagine. Lots of
columns, rings, complex textures, fractal patterns in the marble etc. etc.
Hmmm, the name rings a bell. I'll have to try and get my girlfriend to
pick up a copy of 'Labyrinth.' (She's the big game player.)
I've still got some of his old HAM anims from long ago. Pretty cool for
the time. Can't seem to find a new player that'll view them though….:^(
Did you UL a version of your printed image here to CIS?
Erik Flom – ELF Works 3D Construction Co.
I UL'd a very poor version of it up here. It has a lot of horizontal lines
which moire when I rescale the image from the 7 Meg size. Now to think of it –
nay – I have the almost one meg Jpeg around here. The node I call from is stuck
at 2400 baud. I don't think they'll ever upgrade the Medford, Oregon line
speed. Most of my artwork here has scrolled away since I haven't sent much up
in a while.
What's the name of your picture? I'll pick it up next time I'm browsing.
Erik Flom – ELF Works 3D Construction Co.
I looked in the library and it isn't there – the one in the magazine was called
"Fandancer".
}} Do you think Michael actually has a 'bones' version of the Humanoids ?
No, I am using the LW version and it doesn't employee bones
manipulation for expression changes but I have used LW bones capability to
're-expression' head morph targets and have gotten some good stuff out of
that.
Erik,
I have MotionMan and you can very easily morph between the various objects. All
you have to do is set up the morph like any other in the objects directory,
since all of the objects – man, manstron, woman, and child have the exact same
number of points.
They are very articulated and highly detailed and I am sure that with some
patience you can move points around and make a mean looking demon. But no
bones are used in creating motion or anything. You move the objects or use the
morph targets (for hands, facial expressions, and speach) to simulate motion.
I set up an 8 second speech/morph sequence with MotionMan in about 4 hours.
I have no reservations recommending these models, and at the price Crestline is
giving them, it is just a tremendous deal – just check out how much Viewpoint
wants for their object which is not as nice as MotionMan, and does not include
morph targerts. Oh, you also get complete Silver and Gold reflection maps
along with a nice marble texture courtesy of Texture City Inc. This is a
professional, high quality humanoid package – you have my word on it, you will
not be disappointed.
I remembered your 'talking' sequence in the AGII tape. (Which was cool,
BTW.)
I used CycleMan about 2 years ago for a simple project, and the object was
nice back then. Having morphable women & child objects is just another
plus! I'll probably get them here sometime soon. (Of course I just spent
$1100 on a WarpEngine [my 2nd 40MHz acc. in 3 months!], and am planning on
dropping $1400 [killer deal!] for 2 2GB Barracuda drives next week. All I
have to do is figure out which credit card still has some money left on
it! :^)
Erik Flom – ELF Works 3D Construction Co.
I hear you loud and clear. I have melted quite a few cards myself.
Oh, I threw in a WarpEngine 040 28Mhz in my machine last week – I needed more
ram, and it was the cheapest way to go as I have NO room in my 4000, and since
the makers are local, I got a real good deal.
Know of anyone who has an old 4000 who wants to upgrade to 25Mhz? I have the
board, all they need is the 040 chip.
So, what sort of speed improvement did you see with the WarpEngine (I
assume you moved your RAM over to the acc, since it's much faster
onboard?)
I just hooked up one of my drives to the SCSI-II on the Warp, and have
gotten DiskSpeed results of over 4MB/s on my fastest drive. (Yowza!)
As for your 3640 sans CPU, I don't know anyone who's interested. (If they
were, I'd try to sell them on my 28MHz A3000 acc. :^)
Erik Flom – ELF Works 3D Construction Co.
>>So, what sort of speed improvement did you see with the WarpEngine<< I
really can't say, since I had to finish a project and just needed to Render and
didn't have time to do any testing.
The ScreamerNet software crashed on me on Saturday after I loaded the latest
update they had sent. Tried everything – Deskstation even sent new hard drives
in case it was a hardware problem, but even after fresh drives were installed
and the ScreamerNet reloaded, Lightwave was still screwed up.
Reloaded Lightwave 3.1, took the RAM out of the Raptor and loaded all the bays
in the Warp Engine – I needed two frames at print resolution for a brochure
which went in conjunction with the other work – Each frame was still taking
7hours 11 minutes each! (it would have been minutes with the Raptor on-line)
Converted the two frames in ADpro, modemed them over to the separation house at
3:00am, gave film and matchprint to the printer today, will pickup 2000 copies
tomorrow, and fly out to New Mexico Sunday night for the presentation Tuesday.
Raptor is still down, absolutely no NewTek support – even after three phone
calls (since Monday) by me and Deskstation. I am going to fully reinstall the
new ScreamerNet software and see what happens, but I am extremely upset with
NewTek and will be posting a message about the BS service I got from them.
The dealer installed the Warp Engine and I think both my drives are IDE, so I
have not been able to take advantage of the kick butt SCSI controller on the
board. But it sure felt neat having over 75MB of Ram on the 4000 – even though
it was only for a day.
>>I don't know anyone who's interested. (If they
were, I'd try to sell them on my 28MHz A3000 acc)<< Yeah, I hear you, I would
do the same – once a businessman, always a businessman.
The earth object still rules (ala Bevis and Butthead)!
Adib
My sincere condolences about your ruptured Raptor! (That could be a major
pain.) Did you try going back to the version you used before it crashed?
(You mentioned this was right after updating the software…)
The lack of support from NewTek is also somewhat disquieting…I hope it's
because they're too busy finishing up some major new release for SIGGRAPH
next week.
So, those frames were taking 7hrs 11min on a 40MHz 040?!? Got kind of
spoiled by having the Raptor, eh? :^)
75MB RAM on your 4000?!? But why for only a day? (Must've been fun.)
As for the SCSI-II from the Warp, you're gonna have to get an adaptor fron
MacroSystems for $45 to hook up to any external devices…..I just cobbled
together a cable for $10, but I'll probably get the 'real thing' when they
become available. (2 wks is what they said on Wed.)
Keep On Toastin'!
Erik Flom – ELF Works 3D Construction Co.