#Common graphic/anim
21 messages in this thread
Guess I asked a question in the wrong place. I'll try again here.
The goal is to produce an application for multiple OS's and platforms which
includes animation of images 128*128 pixels in 64 gray shades. We are
trying to use a common CDROM for the "data disk" and put the hardware
specific programs on their own floppies.
If we settle on ISO-9660 as a CDROM format standard, what is the most
common graphic standard for the images? As stated above, the image is
fairly small, but we could not tolerate ANY data loss to
compression/decompression routines. The only possible compromise might be a
reduction in gray shades.
Target platforms include the usual suspects plus UNIX(Motif).
Any opinions including "it can't be done" are welcome. Thanks, Rob.
Rob, it's hard to say that any animation format is common to all platforms,
but I can say that .GL (Grasp) libraries are supported to some degree on
PC, Mac, ST, Amiga and Unix/Motif in shareware or public domain offerings.
I've also seen players or converters for the Amiga's ANIM format on many
platforms, but it doesn't seem to carry the same popularity…probably
because there aren't as many "nudie" anims around in ANIM format as there
are in .GL format.
Kermit Woodall Nova Design, Inc.
Thanks, we're willing to use different anim engines which are platform
specific if only we can share the underlying graphic stills. If we can't
get a common data set, we probably can't port to various machines.
In this app, 95% of the effort and development cost is the data; the
platform specific operating code is easy.
Rob,
The "Interchange Plus" program from Syndesis might be something of
interest to you in your project.
It can read, write, and modify 3D objects in the following formats:
LightWave
Imagine
Turbo Silver 2.0 and 3.0
Videoscape 1.0 and 2.0
Sculpt 3D/4D scene (and write Sculpt 3D/4D script)
PAGErender
ImageMaster ISHAPEs
It also several tools that might be of interest to you.
David
Thanks for the plug, but we don't convert between bitmap image formats, we
convert between 3D formats. If we start translating bitmap formats, then
Perry and Ben will sit on me, and they're some of the biggest Amiga
developers around. 🙂
Thanks, but our images are 2D, and development will be on another machine.
I believe the iso-9660 (high sierra) spec already uses a variant of the EA
IFF85 format which is native to our beloved Amigas. It features lossless
compression, multiple heirarchically embedded data types, and some other
good stuff I'm sure.. ;}
Are you sure? I didn't think ISO-9660 had anything to do with IFF or
IFF-like file formats. Are you thinking of some other kind of data file
format? ISO-9660 is a file system.
I'm not sure, I think I read it in an Amiga mag, and you especially can
know what that means… I might have said it was yourown article..
but that seems increasingly unlikely ;-] How does High Sierra diffre from
ISO-9660, I thought they were synonomous. Might they have a file format
spec?
Rob,
I read on the CDROM forum that the High Sierra format is about 98%
compatible with the ISO-9660 and that most software that could read one
could read the other – and the High Sierra format is not proprietary. In
fact, I think it can be found here on CIS. I don't know the price for
ISO-9660, but you might want to check this out.
From what I read over there, they seem to think Kodak PHOTOCD is going to
sweep the market on graphic format, but it is not compatible with most of
the CDROM drives currently in use. The new ones just coming out can use
it.
—Betty
Thanks, Betty. What we're trying to do (share objects among platforms) will
probably be trivial in a few years. It sure isn't easy now, though.
Will all the computers have video modes that are similar in aspect ratio?
That's another wrench in the works.
I'd suggest using Multpile copies of the SAME image in a few different
Standards.For instance the Texture City CD-ROM I have has 100 752*480
Resolution Images in Targa,TIFF,PCX and IFF24 picture types.That covers
most bases their and is on a ISO-9660 CD Rom disk.Quite nice IMHO.
Thanks, great idea.
You're Quite Welcome Rob.Lemme know when yer CD makes its way across the
Pond,I'd purchase this Disk if it was liscenced for Video use.
Well… If the application is custom written (which you pretty much would
need to do anyway to get an animation playable on multiple platforms using
the same data…), then as long as you write it to use the same format, it
really doesn't matter *what* format you use. Amiga's IFF ANIM, Grasp's
GL, Autodesk's FLI formats are all effective. Or you could store all the
images in a non animation format (like GIF) and assemble frames from that.
In fact, that might be your best bet, since the various animation formats
all have hidden assumptions about the hardware. (Amiga ANIMs assume a
Planar format, nearly all Mac animation stuff assumes a chunky format, I'm
not certain how IBM animation formats work…
No matter what you do, you are going to be faced with conversion time
problem when loading on some or all machines, to get the image in a format
in memory which is playable in real time. (I don't know what sort of
frame rate you want, for that matter… On some machines a high frame
rate would be nearly impossible.) You may even want to design your own
format which allows for fast decompression and conversion, if load speed
is important.
Finally, you may want to ask this over in the Graphics Support Forum as
well. That's a sort of central clearing house for people doing graphics
on all platforms, and it's possible that someone there knows of something
which better fits your needs…
–>Steve Bennett
Thanks for the suggestions. As maybe you can guess, we will optimize it for
the Intel/MS world and if it runs easily anywhere else, that's all the
better. We are trying not to close the door to other systems by accident
early in the development process.
That makes perfect sense. In fact, you're to be applauded for thinking
about this now, before you start. So often companies start such an
undertaking and then when the data is all done, suddenly wonder if they
can do a version for another system, and discover then it's a lot more
work…
–>Steve Bennett
>> So often companies…
It's myself and two other guys, although we have a significant backer. 🙂
Nobody's quitting any day jobs yet. Rob.