supernovavfx

I do so much depth of field effects in post where I "fake" it for the most part. Now I have a project its PERFECT for and I'm embarrassed I can't get any results. Yes.. i read the manuals directions multiple times. I thought it would be as easy as the fog setting… where you could indicate it starting at 3000 and ending at say… 5000 Does anyone have a semi straight forward set of steps to actually get results. I know it involves motion blur in some way… my camera moves and comes to rest on a broadcast logo and i simply want what goes on behind that logo to slowly defocus…. essentially... I could "fake" it again but I really want to do it "authentically" in EI

pro animator also imports and exports Facts and C4d but I'm not sure its 'robust' enough to handle larger scenes

thank you all… GREAT advice… the more i can 'work' with them seamlessly the better… so much mograph is being done in c4d the more I can work and share with places that use it the more projects I can bid on. I wonder why c4d 'format' is not 'out there' as much as obj etc….

my new client has in house Cinema 4d artist. IF they were to create or want to create models for ME to import into EI, what is the best of the available formats for me to have them save things 'as' Also…. if I were to export my scene for them what is my best format. Thank You Scott

Tomas… is there any hope to use some of the GPU's power to speed things along?

I referenced that In the past that I have both the 2008 8 core 3.2ghz, 32 ram Mac pro with internal pcie 1tb system card (the owc accelsior 2) and upgraded video card the gtx 680 powerhouse card AND the 2012 iMac i7 3.4ghz with 32 gigs of ram and 680mx card I was literally blown away at how much faster the iMac rendered things vs my 2008 machine. Test renders and iterations were so fast that it made more sense for me too concept and build on the iMac because i got to see my progress renders so much faster. thats 3.2ghz vs 3.4ghz and roughly a 50% speed increase…. when a 4 minute render times in at under 2 that adds up FAST. Because of that fact sitting next to me tested daily… my 2 cents on this is to go with a 6 core higher ghz machine with mid or high level cards and 1 terabyte internal ssd. remember one thing not mentioned that i enjoy… ssd speed is nice 4 - 500 gbps INTERNAL pciessd is BLAZING fast at close to 8 - 900gbps external ssd's will only be half that. I partitioned mine by 3 my apps on one… one is a cache ONLY for AE…. and the third is my current projects folder. AE with its new cacheing features really does work and with the internal pciessd its hard to describe fast. So my old mac pro has proven better suited for hard core AE work given the cache AND that my Sapphire plug ins FLY using Cuda from the gtx 680 card. EI had some issues with the SSD that Tomas helped me work around related to renderama and frame dispersion. The drive was TOO fast… lol…. i had to split up folders amongst different drives… Lastly, the reason id go with a fast iMac or the 6 core for EI \ 3d is that most 3d developers… and I sense Tomas as well…. see a lot of possibilities in leveraging that power in future updates of there software… so your machine may not get faster in the years to come BUT things will GO faster as software is updated to address those dual monster cards. cpu clock speeds have bogged down some… the gpu is the next best vehicle too trust…. not to mention apple will and has totally tweaked out Final Cut to use those cards as an example. The machine I'm describing is around 5k…. I'm really not interested in a 12 core machine with lowered ghz… not at close to 9k.

when ONYX no longer supported EI I saved out a chunk of all the tree styles and have them in my source folder for future use in stills or animations. I have no idea about the selling of trees or trading... i "THINK" you can... who is to say i did not pay you $1 for 15 trees or plants made by my version of the software... sounds legal to me. I am looking into a LOT of options for selling content that can make an animators life much easier and tools to help people achieve certain looks much faster as well.... its a weird market.... some seem to be doing well and others seem to be almost junky freeware type sites for models and more. Im researching whats out there and if I may be able to repurpose some of my resources for sale. PF allows you to make totally original hybrids directly from a source so selling it should be allowed and easy, but it also seems that there are a number of "free" models out there that make the effort of doing it yourself interesting.

99% of what i do is animation... plant factory is what im testing out now... they dont seem to use clip maps. What im struggling with is exporting and understanding what to look for upon IMPORTING the textures.... Ive rarely had to use UV mapped things in my career but from what I understand thats just ONE map that simply places things properly on your tree if you check the uv box. But I appear to be getting multiple textures in my export tests.... I emailed some of the tree people but get no response... its hard.. i have 23 yrs experience in animation yet STILL have beginner like questions that seem to get pushed aside with some of this more advanced software... but im still trying... the manuals just assume you get how to do this stuff... thanks Thomo

that is a GREAT answer Thomo... really what I was looking for was some OTHER use of that setting to help elsewhere... honestly, what I "thought" recursion was... was when using transparency and refraction the number of "bounces" so to speak that camera would use in its analysis... the higher the setting, the more accurate the detail realized in complex reflections and refractions... I dont know if i worded that very well... but render times increase and Im pretty sure ive seen this work on some glass scenes ive rendered in the past... I also know that lowering it to say, 5, speeds raytracing along and many times without a visible quality difference... Ironically im starting to get more into plants and trees so your input is very welcome. thanks...

I have read the 'definition of this' can anyone add an easier sort of real world explanation of what "benefits" raising this number gives my scene. I have done numerous tests with my complex transparent and reflective logo and cant really see the difference except longer render times... I want to max out my quality settings for my new promotional material and id like anyones input here.... thank you. Scott

whats the best way to reach you... I have emailed you multiple times regarding the software and its capabilities and don't seem to be getting through... could you leave an accurate contact method please. Your work and knowledge is very impressive. Scott

Plant Factory is a fully functional demo... it seems pretty amazing... Tomas... is it too hard or too costly too update the FBX library? Importing these models with motion makes this a must buy purchace for me... but I cant really justify the $1000 to just make plants... I can purchace libraries of them much cheaper. but if MOTION can be imported, then THAT makes all the difference. thank you.

if it still would help Greg... get me your email and ill send you some files.... otherwise... barefeats.com is a great performance website for macs... the iMac looks here to stay for ME... ill sell my macpro when the new one comes out this fall... but im sold on it with that solid video card as well... 680mx... now that new imacs just came out.... the older ones will probably be even cheaper... main issue to me is the i7 3.4 clock speed and thunderbolt usb 3 inputs... that guarantees me really fast production... where it falls short im guessing... is for me, when i have a 4 or 5 hundred frames needed... renderama has 4 cameras (optimally) the new mac pro will have a minimum 6 actual cores... rumor has it that would be the cheap one around $2500 -$3k I most likely would not invest in anything less than the 12 core model... the way EI works and i work though... is im constantly rendering individual frames guaging things... NOT using renderama... so having a fast processor speed really accellerates my projects... im sure im not alone in rendering things overnight when im sleeping.... so not having 12 processors usually does not slow me down.... I'm SLEEPING... lol... production speed and efficiency is a kind of obsession of mine... I cant operate with less than 3 macs in the middle of a big project... 2 at the minimum... rendering compositing researching etc...

Greg im sorry I can not get back to you right away im trying to work out my priveleges here in the forum...

I "Finally" got EI up and running on my 2012 27" iMac 3.4ghz i7 quad core 32megs ram.... 680 mx video card. Basic 1 terabyte drive ( to be replaced by a 2 gig internal SSD drive in the months to come) My 'production' machine is the 2008 MacPro tower 3.2 ghz intel zeon 8 core with a blazing 1tb SSD internal pcie card 32 gigs of ram and a hefty gtx 680 card with 2gigs of ram my raytraced 1920 x 1080 scene averaged 4mins and 55 seconds with a 64 bit camera on the 2008 mac pro same scene same settings rendered in 1 minute and around 10 sec's!!! I fell off my chair! WOW.... my internals on the mac pro are brand new....... but the new iMac 3.4 just whipped it.... I tried it with 32 bit camera as well... roughly same results.... I understand variables and im not equipped to get really detailed on this but the nearly 5x speed increase amazed me. My imac is now my "king" 3d machine going forward until the new mac pro comes out. Just wanted to share.... ill post a few more as i go... the first few frames came in around 14 minutes a frame on the Mac Pro and 6 mins on my iMac. Again rough... but i dont care... its so dramatic that im THRILLED and want to remind you how affordable an imac is.... especially compared to the old mac pro's. HAPPY NEWS.... render fast retire young!! Scott

wow... that looks fabulous as well.... I just wish I had more experience on the workflow between EI and speed tree.... I mostly am looking for animated capabilities of palms and what the process would be like importing into EI and rendering. Cool options is a great start though. EI's ability to import things as well as the other big players in 3d is key and great.

this looks amazing.... EI is fully capable of importing and rendering .fbx sequences correct? I dont have experience with .fbx is it kind of like importing a model, we can place it scale it etc... but does it automatically show up in our animation timeline? so if we rendered a 10 second tree blowing in the wind in the "tree app" and exported the .fbx it would bring all ten seconds into EI...? what could we THEN manipulate or control...? im reading up on this, but any simple rules or advice on importing .fbx would be helpful.... ive been looking for some replacement to Onyx tree Storm for years...

Al... if your going to composite this... I have great luck in After effects with the TWIXTOR PRO plug in for retiming.... its the best at this in graphics. If you can get your car scene simply moving at a medium pace and render it in its own pass... in AE you can accelerate and bring to a smooth stop and vary the cars pacing. I use it for all kinds of EI effects that need to be altered by a client and I dont have time to re render. Its truly amazing and hi quality. Ive used it for years and its tech was part of a tech achievement academy award \ oscar thingy.... just another possibility... :) Scott Supernova VFX

bull

As an EI animator, I wonder about the feasibility of an AUTO 'cut' geometry like Zaxwerks has... I can import HIS cut geometry INTO EI... You should have a slice and dice shredder plug in so we can use Bullet and other tools... I'd also like the ability to share C4d FILES back and forth. If you could make EI c4D compliant and you will go a LONG way to giving alternatives to c4d artists which equals money....

amazing work

I have done a run through of the tutorials. but now I want to tackle something I heard of but never really understood totally how to use them and what graphically I could do with them. Could anyone link me to any really good explanations of reactive shaders... what do they "do" where are they applied and are there certain "rules" they all follow. I Have looked. I saw that Blobmaker has it in it... but how to actually USE it and what it does I failed at. can a sphere 'melt' and be repelled by a reactive "color?" so much I dont know but im more capable NOW. Thanks in advance. Scott

It was for a website in south korea teaching english... Check it in the Gallery or on Vimeo: Scott

did you notice that gravity which can look like "wind" is now an option in blobmaker 3.0 if its MR Blobby.... then sorry...

im sorry, im not sure your first name fanomaz.... I should by now. I dont want to sound critical because NL did the plug for free... I owned real flow and can still upgrade it.... but what I remember was that you could not do all it was capable of... like importing moving geometry then exporting it... there was SOMETHING missing and im sorry I dont have exactly what it was... I vaguely recall being allowed to get some output but not the control of other apps. Also I thought NL mentioned that Real Flow needed to release certain code... its so expensive I really need a robust link between the apps.... I would need to see a variety of tests before "trusting" it again.... I WANT to believe it works fully but then the people at Next Limit should "authorize" it... not enough of us for them to make a link on their own they told me years back... im hopeful.... I really want to get into fluid simulations...