#24 bit animation player?
15 messages in this thread
GreG,
You seem to be the guy in the know, so I thought I'd ask your opinion here. I'm
buying a new system for home which I intend to use for rendering and animation
etc. I use Imagine PC 3.0. Where I have a problem is viewing and getting my
animations to tape. I don't want to buy a single frame recorder, and don't
really require that kind of quality anyway (I won't be selling my work).
Here is the system I looking at:
Pentium 90 PCI
Fast & Wide SCSI III controller & 1080mb drive
ATI 64 bit display card
512k cache
32 mb RAM
The vendor claims I can move 20mb/sec continuous data off the hard disk with
the SCSI III setup which should be adequate. However, I have no easy way of
compressing or playing 24 bit animations as I do with FLC files. Is there a
software package out there that lets me compress a string of 24 bit TGA files?
I know Visual Circuits sells the Bit Blitzer that does this, but it's $1,500
and VL-Bus only (with a 32bit accellerator).
Also, do I need an "AV ready" hard disk such as the Seagate Barricuda? I would
prefer to go with the above setup, and use a (relatively) inexpensive scan
converter to output to tape.
Thanks in advance for any input, it's really appreciated.
Trevor Low,
Vancouver, BC
>>
I have no easy way of compressing or playing 24 bit animations as I do with FLC
files. Is there a software package out there that lets me compress a string of
24 bit TGA files?
<<
Try DTA.ZIP in the Graphics Developer's forum (GO GRAPHDEV), section
13-Animation Sources. It can create numerous anim formats including FLH (Hi
Color) and FLT (True Color) anims. It's shareware, Dos based, and can so a
wide variety of other things such as convert to GIF, color reduction, cropping,
re-sizing, compositing, etc.
As for hardware setup in getting anims from your PC to tape…you asked the
wrong person. I usually produce the stills and the company I do work for
compiles them. DTA.ZIP as I mentioned above, will create FLH & FLT anims for
you.
One thing to note, make sure your Hard Drive does not do "Thermal Self
Adjusting". A few drives above 700+ MEG perform this self adjusting
periodically. When they do it while you are compiling an animation the anim
can get corrupted. This is relayed to me by one of my contractors.
-GreG
GreG,
>> Try DTA.ZIP in the Graphics Developer's forum <<
Thanks for the tip about DTA. Works great!
Trevor.
Hi ,
I saw your reply to Trevor and thought maybe you could help me.
Is there a way of outputing a 24-bit animation , compressed with a
non-lossy codec , to video ?
Maybe playing through memory (DFV) to a quality encoder.
Any thoughts on a quality board that captures Betacam (single-frame or
compressed movie) ?
TIA ,
Joao
>>
Is there a way of outputing a 24-bit animation , compressed with a
non-lossy codec , to video ?
Joao,
I can't help with hardware, since I'm not current on it. As for software,
Dave's Targa Animator (DTA) allows you to create FLT files (similar to FLC but
supports 24bit animations), which if I am correct, is not a lossy codec. DTA
is shareware, and is available here (older version 2.04), or in the Graphics
Developers (GO GRAPHDEV) forum (version 2.1).
Hopefully someone else can jump in with hardware suggestions.
-GreG
Joan,
the best thing to get animations on tape is either single frame recording or a
HS recorder. The best HD recorders are from Abekas (D1 quality), but the
prices are also "full quality". <g>
A very good and not too expensive solution is the PAR from DPS. It's a card
for the PC or the Amiga with it's own HD. It is very very popular because it
offers very high quality at a very low price. The PAL PC version is $2500
without HD. And it has YUV (=Betacam, M2) output!
-David
David ,
Thanks , but the doesn't the PAR require a dedicated HD ?
I also think it's an IDE drive which is nuisance because Fast Wide
SCSI-2 has a better transfer rate and higher capacity.
There is also the compression problem – in terms of video quality
it's not broadcast. For short animations wouldn't it be better to
be able to get a few seconds of images to memory and then dump the
whole thing into something like a Matrox Illuminator Pro ?
One second of non compressed video would take aproximately 26 Mb
so 64 Mb should handle more than 2 seconds.
For large animations or feature films you do have to resort to some kind of
compression. For that I would like non-lossy compression with the ability to
edit the individual frames .
With a program supporting layers and dynamic filters, special effects should
be easy to do (non real-time). For almost real-time there is the promise of
the Pinnacle Alladin machine. Both Matrox and TrueVision have announced support
, but cost is on the 30K + league.
I've read about D/Vision CineWorks which works basically like the PAR ,
but using Intel SuperRTV for compression instead of M-JPEG or JPEG.
It is a non-liner editor and it's cost is about 2,300 USD. It also handles
4 audio channels which the PAR doesn't at present. It only lacks Betacam
input and output . Quality is S-VHS from what I've read.
Do you happen to know any board that features Betacam INPUT ?
If you feed S-VHS or Hi-8 you are losing about 100 + lines of video
resolution . Betacam input with quality framegrabbers/compressors
should get the PAR/Matrox/Cineworks/T2000 closer to broadcast quality
and ease their acceptance in the TV production world.
TIA,
Joao
Joao,
correct, the PAR is not high end quality, but for that price it's absolutely
stunning. As I suggested, you can have non compressed video with an Abekas.
They store in uncompressed, but you will have to pay for that. I have had the
Matrox system here for a review in a magazine. I also went to a studio who
makes comuter animations. They have a compression ratio of 1:8 and we couldn't
see any difference to Betacam single frame recording. Matrox can also record
a YUV input. The PAR can do the same with an additional card.
I only suggested the PAR because I think it's the best thing you can get for
the money right now. (The whole Matrox thing is a lot more). You can have
uncompressed video but it'll cost you a lot more.
If you know a service bureau that works with Abekas you can get a software
that brings your TGA (or whatever) files to Abekas format. Then you put in on
a data cartrige and give it to them. They put it on their machine and you can
recoder it to whatever format they can offer (Betacam, M2, D1,2,3,5).
-David
Elastic Reality offers drivers which allow Windows systems to directly
read and write Abekas backup tapes. Two advantages of this method over
using Tar tapes is 1) Abekas backup takes can be random accessed – Tar
tapes can't and 2) Elastic Reality's RGB to YUV encoding is much better
than the encoding performed by the Abekas hardware.
These drivers are also available for Macintosh, SGI and Amiga systems.
Jason
ERI Technical Support
But I would need to have one of these Abekas drives. Or can I put in DAT, too?
-David
To exchange data directly with an Abekas or Accom type digital disk recorder
you would need an EXABYTE 8500 or 8505.
Consider also that you'd get to use this drive as a 5 or 10 (8500 vs 8505)
gigabyte back up device when you weren't writing digital video.
Jason
ERI Technical Support
Hi Trevor,
Just a few months ago I bought a card from miro called DC1tv that does what
you need. It is a hardware M-JPEG compression/decompression board. It is a
frame grabber and it can also play animations and output them as video.
The resolution is 384×288 so it's as good as VHS. I use it to view my
animations at full speed (25/30 fps) and without the 256 color limit of
FLI/FLC files. I also use it to make tapes for the customer. So I don't have
to do a single frame record each time.
It is possible to adjust the compression and data rate so you can adjust the
quality of the output. It is not broadcast quality, but very good VHS.
I have done all stuff on a regular IDE hard disk with a normal ISA controller.
It's a ISA BUS card, so it will work in any ISA, EISA and VLB slot.
just ask if you have more questions.
-David
Trevor,
How much did your compression/decompression board cost? Hate to be nosey, but
have wondered what the cost of hardware mpeg is these days.
Thanks!
John Parker
Hi John,
it's not a MPEG board it's a M-JPEG board. That's a difference. There are real
MPEG decompressions boards available for a reasonably price, but compressions
boards for MPEG are still very expensive.
Ok my card was 1600 DM ($1000) including Adobe Premiere for Windows and some
other software. I can really recomment it for everyone how is looking for a
way to recoder animations to video and don't need professional quality.
But I also recomment it for professionals who only have a single frame recoder
and want to show the customers first results quick without waering down the
expensive recorder.
Those who want to go into the buisness right now and don't have any hardware
so far should better get a PAR or another HD recorder.
-David
David,
Thanks for your comments regarding the M-JPEG board, I'm in the dark a little
about the different compression techniques, so that's something I plan to start
looking into.
I decided to go with the Zenon computer. Good value for the buck.
Thanks again for you comments,
Trevor.