Flic palette
4 messages in this thread
Hello, here goes another one.
3DS3 file documentation says that 3DS could play flics with more than 256
colors, if you have the drivers, but can produce unpredictable results…
Can 3DS3 with Vibrant drivers do that? May be there's a third party's flic
player and/or drivers that supports more than 256 colors, I don't know, but as
far as I know, rendering to a .flc file means _always_ 256 colors. Or not? In
one line: How can I play 3DS hi-color realtime animations?
This little monster can play 320x200x256 so fast I'm sure it would give an
acceptable frame rate with 16 bit flics.
A help on this?
Cheers!
<< 3DS3 file documentation says that 3DS could play flics with more than 256
colors, if you have the drivers, but can produce unpredictable results…>>
Ignacio, I'm not familiar with the section we say this. Could you tell me where
in the documentation we state this?
The problems is, the FLC file format is 256 colors. That's it, aint no more.
There are some companies (like tempra) that developed an FLX format for 16 bit
color animations, but they are out of business (I heard) and it never really
caught on anyway. Bottom line, to get 16 bit color, it would not be an Autodesk
file format.
-brian
Yes, flic=8bit. That was the idea in my mind until I read this:
From 3DS3.DOC, that comes with 3DS r3.
V.9. RUNNING A FLIC WITH DRIVERS SUPPORTING OVER 256 COLORS
Only use flic drivers intended for running 8-bit flic files with
8-bit (256 color) flics. Attempting to run a standard 3D Studio
(8-bit) flic with a flic driver designed for more than 256 colors
will most likely cause serious, unpredictable results. In some cases, it's
possible to configure VIBCFG to run a flic with many
than 256 colors, depending on the display board you are
and the driver you select. There is no way for the program
know what type of file you will be running under your
so it is not possible to warn a user that unwanted
will occur.
This is the paragraph that made me dream with superflics… The idea of
16bit flics (or any format for realtime anims) was pretty attractive, but hard
to fit with Autodesk software. That's why I asked. But, don't you think they
worth a try?
Thanks Brian.
PS: PC's are running so fast now (and faster every month) that 16bit flics are
a posible dream. I have a 48Mb pentium60 that runs a full-screen motion flc of
300×400 at 45 frames/second with aniplay, so a 16Flic player is a reasonable
wish in 1994. May Autodesk do it first!
Ignacio,
I think you are interpreting that paragraph wrong.
<< Only use flic drivers intended for running 8-bit flic files with
8-bit (256 color) flics.>>
Here we say that Autodesk recommends only using the Vibrant selections that are
256 colors for FLIC playback.
<<In some cases, it's possible to configure VIBCFG to run a flic with many
than 256 colors, depending on the display board you are and the driver you
select.>>
This is poor wording. What is being said is that with some video drivers you
can play a Flic file (still only 256 colors) when your Vibrant driver is
configured so that you are using a video _driver_ that supports more than 256
colors.
I can see how you would get confused. However, the intent here is to warn about
selecting a wrong driver, NOT to tell people there are FLIC files with more
than 256 colors. Sorry for the confusion.
-Brian