Walkthrough Animation

[Anonymous]

Hi All!

I've been looking for a way to create simple flat-shaded polyline based
path animation with AutoCAD release 14 for quite some time now. In the
past I've used a routine called '3dwalk.lsp' which will place x number
of views along a polyline and create the views and even hide or shade
and save slides. That worked fine, but
unfortunately, my slides are much too big to pull that off. Originally,
they were 1024x768 and over 5mb each. (yikes!) I lowered the resolution
a few times and wasn't happy with any resolution below 800x600 which
still made the slides 1.5mb each. Obviously, the recycle time using
'vslide' was just not quick enough to make that into a believable movie.

I sure wish AutoDESK would address this issue for those of us (many, I
think) who would just like to create a simple flat shaded
polyline-based path animation.

The final step way back (ions ago) in AutoDESK Animator worked fine, but
only created a .fli at 320x200, the Walkthru product was hard to
control, 3dstudio is too complex and autovision too quirky.
Unfortunately for me, I purchased all of them looking for the simple
features I've noted above. I'm not likely to buy another $500 product
only to find that it won't do what I need.

Hello, lisp programmers out there! Is the final step from 'view/shade'
or 'slide' to .mov or .mpg or even .fli at more than 800x600 is the
'holy grail' or an unworkable task?

Have any of you found shareware to do this? Help!

Thanks for your time and assistance.

Phil Wilson

[Anonymous]

The lisp routine you are talking about could probably be modified to plot
files to another standard raster format then you'd have to find a program to
turn that directory full of files into a movie. If you have photoshop, there
are some utilities for this but I think not appropriate for huge movies,
more geared for little web animations. Sorry not much help, just
brainstorming... I'd like to be able to do such a thing also.

[Anonymous]

That would be 10 times smaller in most raster formats.

Phil Wilson wrote:

> ...my slides are much too big... 1024x768 and over 5mb each. (yikes!)

[Anonymous]

I agree they don't make it easy to do such a simple thing. I can't
figure out a way to plot the shaded views without using the render
program which (EDITED).

What I really don't understand is why they can't find a way to create
Unreals' UNR files so that I can walk around my model in real time using
a nice 3DFX video card. I mean why are we even messing with creating
AVI's or MPG's? When there is so much real-time realism with the gaming
industry. I created a model using the Unreal editor but it took too long
to do and it's not easy for us cad people to use. It's different. Why is
the Architectural Visualization intudstry taking a back seat to the
Gaming industry? C'mon get with it you guys. let's get rid of all this
rendering overnight and put a joy stick in the clients hand and let them
at it.

Kevin

Phil Wilson wrote:
>
> Hi All!
>
> I've been looking for a way to create simple flat-shaded polyline based
> path animation with AutoCAD release 14 for quite some time now. In the
> past I've used a routine called '3dwalk.lsp' which will place x number
> of views along a polyline and create the views and even hide or shade
> and save slides. That worked fine, but
> unfortunately, my slides are much too big to pull that off. Originally,
> they were 1024x768 and over 5mb each. (yikes!) I lowered the resolution
> a few times and wasn't happy with any resolution below 800x600 which
> still made the slides 1.5mb each. Obviously, the recycle time using
> 'vslide' was just not quick enough to make that into a believable movie.
>
> I sure wish AutoDESK would address this issue for those of us (many, I
> think) who would just like to create a simple flat shaded
> polyline-based path animation.
>
> The final step way back (ions ago) in AutoDESK Animator worked fine, but
> only created a .fli at 320x200, the Walkthru product was hard to
> control, 3dstudio is too complex and autovision too quirky.
> Unfortunately for me, I purchased all of them looking for the simple
> features I've noted above. I'm not likely to buy another $500 product
> only to find that it won't do what I need.
>
> Hello, lisp programmers out there! Is the final step from 'view/shade'
> or 'slide' to .mov or .mpg or even .fli at more than 800x600 is the
> 'holy grail' or an unworkable task?
>
> Have any of you found shareware to do this? Help!
>
> Thanks for your time and assistance.
>
> Phil Wilson

[Anonymous]

Thanks for responding, Kevin!

I agree that clients would love a real-time movement option on 3dmodels,
but if we can't get a simple animation module, how can we expect
something much more complex. Oh, maybe someday...

Regarding your plotting of the shaded images without 'render'. I use
Corel Draw which has a screen capture component called Capture. It
writes to .jpg .bmp etc... and works great for me. Of course, to do
that to hundreds of images would be a little too labor intensive.
Hopefully, someone will write some .lsp code to save a shaded
.sld out as a .jpg so I can batch it in with the view, shade, vslide
routine... but I'm still looking.

Thanks again!

Phil Wilson

[Anonymous]

Thanks for your ideas, Paul!

Maybe if enough people ask, someone will write some .lsp to save a
shaded .sld out as a .jpg so I can batch it in with the view, shade,
vslide routine...(or do the whole task in one step) but I'm still
looking.

Phil Wilson

[Anonymous]

I do not know if you are aware or not but there is a real nice simple
program called Walk-Thru by Autodesk that was for R14.

It is very simple to use and if it is still available the cost is relatively
inexpensive. It was about $100 a few years ago.

Also, if you upgrade to ADT 2.0 you can make walk-thru's in a few minutes.

Of course these are three D but I imagine you could stick raster images in
space in a correct plane for viewing and move the camera along stopping at
each raster image.

This was also very easy to do in AutoCAD R14 AEC Professional Suite 2.0.
This package came with a camera similar to what is now available in ADT.

I think your idea about the coming together of gaming and architecture is
very interesting. I do not know enough about either one to know if it is
reasonable or if there is some good reason it is not happening.

Anyway, Autodesk has made rendering much better and also 3dStudio Viz is
pretty good too.

Jack Talsky

"Phil Wilson" wrote in message
news:3A632DEA.FEB6C5C7@netzero.net...
> Hi All!
>
> I've been looking for a way to create simple flat-shaded polyline based
> path animation with AutoCAD release 14 for quite some time now. In the
> past I've used a routine called '3dwalk.lsp' which will place x number
> of views along a polyline and create the views and even hide or shade
> and save slides. That worked fine, but
> unfortunately, my slides are much too big to pull that off. Originally,
> they were 1024x768 and over 5mb each. (yikes!) I lowered the resolution
> a few times and wasn't happy with any resolution below 800x600 which
> still made the slides 1.5mb each. Obviously, the recycle time using
> 'vslide' was just not quick enough to make that into a believable movie.
>
> I sure wish AutoDESK would address this issue for those of us (many, I
> think) who would just like to create a simple flat shaded
> polyline-based path animation.
>
> The final step way back (ions ago) in AutoDESK Animator worked fine, but
> only created a .fli at 320x200, the Walkthru product was hard to
> control, 3dstudio is too complex and autovision too quirky.
> Unfortunately for me, I purchased all of them looking for the simple
> features I've noted above. I'm not likely to buy another $500 product
> only to find that it won't do what I need.
>
> Hello, lisp programmers out there! Is the final step from 'view/shade'
> or 'slide' to .mov or .mpg or even .fli at more than 800x600 is the
> 'holy grail' or an unworkable task?
>
> Have any of you found shareware to do this? Help!
>
> Thanks for your time and assistance.
>
> Phil Wilson
>

[Anonymous]

Thanks for responding, Jack!

I have the walkthrough product, and have used it, but it is more an
interactive approach (that can be saved) than a batching approach.
Maybe I'm off base, but I'd like to string a 3dpolyline thru my model,
tell it how many steps or stops (like the 'divide' or 'measure'
commands) and have a smooth animation .mpg, .mov or .fli come out the
back end of the process. The '3dwalk' .lsp shareware from way back does
all of these steps wonderfully except the last step of turning the .sld
or shaded view into a movie. It interacted with AutoDESK Animator and
FLIMAKER which I think were forever left at 320x200 resolution.


I'm not familiar with the ADT 2.0 product you referenced, but you
certainly got my attention with the '...make walk-thrus in a few
minutes..' comment. What, where and how much is this product?

Thanks again for your time and effort on my problem!

Phil Wilson

[Anonymous]

You might want to check out TurboCAD Pro-low cost, basically ACAD
compatible, built-in radiosity rendering, and works with AnimationLab (also,
good for converting to other formats).
http://www.softdevspb.com/plugins/AniLabPage/AniLab_v2.htm

[Anonymous]

Thanks for responding, David.

I'm hesitant to buy into another product after my experiences with the
other products I listed, but will check out their website and see what
it can do.

Thanks again,

Phil Wilson