[Cadhorn]

The title is a joke, the client is super-sensitive about the word "billboards". They are "outdoor signs". Uh... okay.

http://anonarch.com/video

Embedded flash video, no sound. Hosted via flickr, which apparently restricts the video size to 500xsomething, but is no great loss as the original was 640x376.

Modeled/animated in Rhino.

I think this will always be a work-in-progress since the client wants (and is getting) a couple of stills. But, it seemed like a plausible excuse to try animating something from Rhino.

In case it's not obvious: the subject of the animation is the "outdoor signs". To show their visual impact on the users of the freeway.

Gotta give credit to JDHill for nursing the Rhino plugin along to the point where it can handle animation. I vaguely remember trying to animate something rhino->maxwell a year ago or so and giving up in tears. But now it's

[JCAddy]

Pretty nice but a bit flat. I understand that the focal point is the billboards or 'signs' but I think that adding a few more detailed materials like asphalt and concrete here and there would make it that much better.

Smooth animation and good to see it done with Maxwell.

What firm do you work for in LA ?

[martgreg]

Pretty nice but a bit flat. I understand that the focal point is the billboards or 'signs' but I think that adding a few more detailed materials like asphalt and concrete here and there would make it that much better.

Smooth animation and good to see it done with Maxwell.

What firm do you work for in LA ?

let me guess anonarch.com ???

[Cadhorn]

It is very flat. What's funny is that this project was originally supposed to be a couple of "birds eye" renderings, showing the signs in an industrial yard. I spent a week modelling all kinds of cars, buses, buildings, trash cans, etc in the yard which now (after the client changed it to "drivers eye" renderings) are invisible! The freeway that was 300' away from camera is now 3' away... sigh.

Textures would help... and maybe some of those reflector dots they put between the stripes... and something to hold up the railing...

I work for as many firms as possible (i'm self-employed/freelance/underemployed).

anonarch is my forever-under-construction web site.

[JCAddy]

I was just thinking anonarch was a large firms upload site or something

[NicoR44]

That's a pretty cool Rhino animation Cadhorn did you use bongo?

[Cadhorn]

nico: no bongo. just a plain rhino path animation, with a point in the sky as the target. the only real mental challenge was figuring out how many frames of animation to specify to simulate 70 miles per hour car travel.

the physical challenge was clicking to render every single frame. there's some disconnect between rhino and external renderers (maybe just maxwell?) that makes this non-trivial. (might be scriptable though...)

[ivox3]

nico: no bongo. just a plain rhino path animation, with a point in the sky as the target. the only real mental challenge was figuring out how many frames of animation to specify to simulate 70 miles per hour car travel.

the physical challenge was clicking to render every single frame. there's some disconnect between rhino and external renderers (maybe just maxwell?) that makes this non-trivial. (might be scriptable though...)

What? ...are you telling me you had to click 'render' on every frame? You shouldn't of had to do that ....

[oz42]

Cadhorn,

the animation is nice and smooth. What render-time & sl are you getting per frame?

[Cadhorn]

ivox3: i am telling you that i had to click "render" for every single frame. have i missed something obvious? (which i do frequently)

oz42: i set the s.l. to 6 (edit: was really sl 7), most frames rendered in around 50 seconds. there's only one light source (sun), no metal or glass materials anywhere in the scene, all whites under 225rgb... and i turned off caustics.

[JCAddy]

You are out of your mind clicking render for every frame!!!!!!!

Network rendering doesn't work for you?

[Bubbaloo]

If it's like Max's plugin, there's not a way (that I know of) to render an animation on a farm from the plugin.
Now, if it is just going to be rendered on one computer, you can render the whole thing hitting "render" once. Otherwise, you have to export each frame and then set up your network rendering.

[ivox3]

Yeah ... you missed something. lol...

It's hard to tell what though .. The plug-in writes out each mxs and then renders each mxs automatically.

I think Jeremy could put some sense to it ... Let me go get him...

[Cadhorn]

oh my god...

i didn't have maxwell selected as my renderer... (was set to rhino render)

so when i clicked 'record', rhino render did it's usual thing and i figured "oh, i guess rhino doesn't work with maxwell for animations."

much more accurate to say that i need to look a little more carefully before i waste two hours clicking "render".

damn, now i will have to improve the animation since i don't have the excuse that it's too much work to render it.

edit: no! please don't tell jeremy! i'll feel a total fool if he reads this thread! (not really, but yeah really)

[ivox3]

On the bright side ....... a very good thing you mentioned it ---or you might of just wore out that index finger.

ps. Can't stop him reading it now .... Message was sent. lol...