Page 1 of 1

using Moho for non-cartoon animation

Posted: Tue Oct 17, 2017 12:31 am
by starfish30
Wow, this app is really impressive. So far I haven't done cartoon animation but I'm animating images for GIFs using smart mesh and bones and experimenting with the physics engine.

Stuff like this:
https://i.imgur.com/wBj5tBa.gifv
https://i.imgur.com/ERIG2QQ.gifv

Anyway, I noticed that even if I do nothing to an imported image, using the exact same dimensions as the original in Photohop, it renders slightly distorted. Is this normal for Moho or could there be something I'm doing wrong?

Thanks!

Re: using Moho for non-cartoon animation

Posted: Tue Oct 17, 2017 12:50 am
by Greenlaw
starfish30 wrote:if I do nothing to an imported image, using the exact same dimensions as the original in Photohop, it renders slightly distorted. Is this normal...?
It shouldn't be...could you post a comparison?

TBH, if it does, I've never noticed. Okay, now I'm curious.

Re: using Moho for non-cartoon animation

Posted: Tue Oct 17, 2017 1:00 am
by starfish30
Greenlaw wrote:It shouldn't be...could you post a comparison?

TBH, if it does, I've never noticed. Okay, now I'm curious.
here's the image I placed:
https://i.imgur.com/XRZoQhI.png

and the rendered result (nothing was done to the image):
https://i.imgur.com/OSKYfKD.png

Compared to the original the images is slightly softer and the pixels seem to have shifted up half a pixel. But it's not a rendering issue because the display looks the same.

Re: using Moho for non-cartoon animation

Posted: Tue Oct 17, 2017 1:08 am
by synthsin75
Try disabling nearest neighbor sampling in the image layer, image tab settings.

EDIT: And enable higher quality rendering.

Re: using Moho for non-cartoon animation

Posted: Tue Oct 17, 2017 1:14 am
by starfish30
synthsin75 wrote:Try disabling nearest neighbor sampling in the image layer, image tab settings.

EDIT: And enable higher quality rendering.
Didn't help. The problem doesn't seem to be rendering because the image also looks different (slightly softer) after importing.

Re: using Moho for non-cartoon animation

Posted: Tue Oct 17, 2017 1:30 am
by Greenlaw
Yeah, the aspect shouldn't change but with default settings there may be some render differences due to anti-aliasing and other quality processes (as Wes mentions.)

BTW, Higher Quality scales up the render internally and then applies AA. This gives you higher quality at the expense of much higher render times. (It's worth it, IMO.) It should make the render sharper but the process does alter the image slightly.

Just curious: what happens if you disable Nearest Neighbor Sampling and Higher Quality Rendering? Also, make sure Nearest Neighbor Sampling for New Images Layers is off. To me, these settings sound like they should disable the 'quality' post processes for the image layer and, assuming everything is rendered a the same pixel size, you should have the exact same image. But I've never actually tried that myself, and I could be wrong about it.

If there is a difference, I probably never noticed because I tend to use source images and textures that are higher resolution than the final target resolution.

Re: using Moho for non-cartoon animation

Posted: Tue Oct 17, 2017 2:07 am
by starfish30
Greenlaw wrote:Yeah, the aspect shouldn't change but with default settings there may be some render differences due to anti-aliasing and other quality processes (as Wes mentions.)

BTW, Higher Quality scales up the render internally and then applies AA. This gives you higher quality at the expense of much higher render times. (It's worth it, IMO.) It should make the render sharper but the process does alter the image slightly.

Just curious: what happens if you disable Nearest Neighbor Sampling and Higher Quality Rendering? Also, make sure Nearest Neighbor Sampling for New Images Layers is off. To me, these settings sound like they should disable the 'quality' post processes for the image layer and, assuming everything is rendered a the same pixel size, you should have the exact same image. But I've never actually tried that myself, and I could be wrong about it.

If there is a difference, I probably never noticed because I tend to use source images and textures that are higher resolution than the final target resolution.
Thanks for the info. Changing Nearest Neighbor Sampling and/or Higher Quality Rendering doesn't seem to have an effect. The image looks soft on screen and renders out soft, plus when I paste the Moho render on top of the original in Photoshop there's a very slight shift. Less than a pixel, because if I move the image one pixel it look shifted in the other direction. But regardless of how it renders, shouldn't Moho display the image with the same detail it has in Photoshop?

Re: using Moho for non-cartoon animation

Posted: Tue Oct 17, 2017 3:10 am
by neeters_guy
starfish30 wrote:...But regardless of how it renders, shouldn't Moho display the image with the same detail it has in Photoshop?
This old thread may not explain the specific issue, but it does shed light on why you shouldn't expect pixel perfect rendering: Serious render quality problem

Re: using Moho for non-cartoon animation

Posted: Tue Oct 17, 2017 5:23 am
by starfish30
neeters_guy wrote:
starfish30 wrote:...But regardless of how it renders, shouldn't Moho display the image with the same detail it has in Photoshop?
This old thread may not explain the specific issue, but it does shed light on why you shouldn't expect pixel perfect rendering: Serious render quality problem
Thanks for the link. That's exactly the problem I'm having.