Alan Lorence
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COW Coin
Forum Replies Created
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Download the official emitter catalog here
We’ll also be releasing particleView (the new name for ShowIEL) probably in the first week of October. It includes a much-needed emitter search function.
Alan.
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They don’t show up automatically — only the current library is shown. To load another one, r-click (ctrl-click on a 1-button Mac) in the library window and “load library”, then browse to the folder where you put them, and select the one you want.
particleIllusion 3.0 is a little better in that you can use a “quickload” menu, or use the library manager.
Alan.
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You can edit posts. It’s a new feature. View the post then click the “edit your post” link under it.
About the effect — have you looked at the Pro Emitters “Abstract” library? A lot of similar effects. If not acceptable, they’re probably the best starting point for customizing to get what you want.
Also take a look at some of the emitters in the “emitters_05_02” library.
Alan.
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Excellent work, and not “cheesy” at all. Next time, on the big kicks, add some sparkle “spray” that shoots off. =)
I’d like to hear how you did all of the camera tracking, and controlled the “zoom” of the particles.
(The only sport more entertaining than peewee soccer is peewee ice hockey.)
Alan.
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Email wondertouch support and we’ll get you on the 3.0.2 beta, which has enhanced movie file support.
Alan.
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Some quick math (640 x 480 x 4 x 874) shows me that frame 874 is just about at 1 GB. I don’t know any intrinsic reason that pI can’t use files larger than that, but I also don’t know why uncompressed is a problem for some people with pI.
So, I have only 2 suggestions right now.
1) Break the clip up into 2 uncompressed clips and load them on different layers in pI3, with the second starting at the end of the first.
2) Don’t use uncompressed. I’ll say this again, because I feel pretty strongly about it: don’t use uncompressed. It’s a complete waste of HD space and requires a lot of bandwidth to move around. Instead, use a lossless codec like Lagarith or Huffy UV. In many cases, these LOSSLESS codecs (meaning you get perfect, unchanged video) produce file sizes that are 10 times smaller (or more), and use less bandwith (but a bit more cpu power to uncompress).
File size example:
Using a pI3 project with 4 emitters so the empty area of the frame is minimized and there is a lot of “stuff” going on in the frames, 640×480, 120 frames:
Uncompressed: 108.2 MB
Huffy UV: 43.8 MB
Lagarith: 27.9 MBEach of these produces identical output.
(A lossless codec uses compression that does not remove any information — like a ZIP file.)
Alan.
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[Soniclight] “I had also forgotten (whud??) to get the July ones”
Once 3.0.2 is released (and 3.0.6 on Mac) this will be a thing of the past, since you’ll be able to check for, download, and install new libraries from within pI3.
Alan.
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The main reason they are so good (if you agree that they are) is that Tony Hudson contributed some great animated particle shapes. Thanks Tony!
Also, I noticed that there may be a problem with the first emitter (the “volume dust cloud” I think it’s called). When put on the stage, it may not show up! Or, it may show once, then won’t show again after playback repeats.
The solution seems to be to increase the particle type “number” value from 3 to 6 or so.
Alan.
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I would say that since you’re just masking out a small object (looks like a clump of grass?)… don’t even use a blocker. Instead, copy that portion of video (a single frame even) with the grass, then paint a nice mask around it. Then you can load that image into pI3, create a “single” particle from it (like the “cartoon mouse” emitter) and place it on top of the other emitter.
Alan.
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Will be released this month.
The other option is to install a DV codec (like the Panasonic DV codec). This will allow pIllusion to read DV AVIs right now.