Thx for those tips, I will definitely try it - especially because I don't trust any program in terms of resolution without testing. What if I change the project dimesions mid-way?
OK, those questions are a bit academic right now. The stuff you saw is made for a showreel only, on DVD, so the dimensions are fixed. I've already noticed a strong moiré in certain combination of size and codec. Woodcuts (or any material with such high contrast patterns) is definitely a difficult subject for digital filmmaking. I'd like to see this as 35mm film on a big screen ...
Walk test with woodcuts
Moderators: Víctor Paredes, Belgarath, slowtiger
I think I'll better go with smoothening them in Photoshop, if necessary. Since I already prepare all stuff in there, it's no additional work.
If I appear to be highly organized, be warned that it just looks so. Nearly all stuff I'm posting here is completely improvized without planning and made by the whim of a minute.
If I appear to be highly organized, be warned that it just looks so. Nearly all stuff I'm posting here is completely improvized without planning and made by the whim of a minute.
David Lebrun was using Dover Publications woodcuts for "Proteus" on 35mm film and got atrocious moire effects, prior to the advent of digital production.slowtiger wrote:Woodcuts (or any material with such high contrast patterns) is definitely a difficult subject for digital filmmaking. I'd like to see this as 35mm film on a big screen ...
He said some moire appeared even on complete lockdown, although one can imagine it would be far worse for his terrific moving seascapes.
He looked around for optical advice everywhere and consulted, if memory serves me, Technicolor. They were baffled with this novel problem, but kept hunting around, and ultimately said they had one lens which would help.
LeBrun used that lens and got results good enough to make his film. Sometimes you can still see some moire in the final shots. I don't know how many experimental shots he had to throw away because they were unusable.
I'll make the following prediction, however: if you get some good footage at high resolution by using the right smoothing, you're in for trouble when the video is played back at any other resolution.
Vern: Re-opening the file works like a charm. Thx again!
I did some more corrections. Found that I had connected the knees wrong, or better, placed the joints incorrectly. This time I set the default interpolation to "linear" which is the best idea for any rotating object. Much easier.
Added some colour (just as a tint, it's two vector shapes with a gradient, layer set to "multiply") and some wizardry. Have a look at the fast replacement of elements there, it's a technique PEZ uses as well as Jan Švankmajer.
http://www.slowtiger.de/examples/biker2.html (2,2 MB)
I did some more corrections. Found that I had connected the knees wrong, or better, placed the joints incorrectly. This time I set the default interpolation to "linear" which is the best idea for any rotating object. Much easier.
Added some colour (just as a tint, it's two vector shapes with a gradient, layer set to "multiply") and some wizardry. Have a look at the fast replacement of elements there, it's a technique PEZ uses as well as Jan Švankmajer.
http://www.slowtiger.de/examples/biker2.html (2,2 MB)
Fantastic! The color really helps and I love the animation. I'll have to look up some books with woodcut art to use in some animations when I visit the states. Did you do the "presto chango" with switch layers?
Do you feel the colors helped reduce the moire effect(I didn't notice it so much myself anyway)?
udd.
Do you feel the colors helped reduce the moire effect(I didn't notice it so much myself anyway)?
udd.
uddhava: The colour reduces the contrast and thus the Moirè. You'll notice that the sky is OK but the animal heads still flicker. This is because the lines of the sky are several pixels wide whereas the lines in the animal heads are thinner than 1 pixel. This could be overcome if I find smaller artwork to use. If this were a real film project, I'd experiment with some overall noise on top of the final animation, and maybe a bit of blur in some of the assets.
Magic is done with switch layers, of course ...
Overall I'm quite happy with the sharp, high-contrast look.
Magic is done with switch layers, of course ...
Overall I'm quite happy with the sharp, high-contrast look.
http://www.slowtiger.de/examples/biker3.html (2,5 MB)
And another. This was done with layer movement instead of 3D camera. There's some mistakes in there, but it's only a test for the overall effect. I think I will add some shadow to the layers to separate the different bridges from each other. I think it's time now to create a general colour scheme for all these scenes.
The workflow could be improved if I render the bikers as a movie and use this on the tracks - much faster rendering.
What you don't see in this small size: the measurements in the bridge drawings are still there. Oh, and where to get these: gutenberg.org carries lots of old issues of "Scientific American" and the like. Use google image search.
And another. This was done with layer movement instead of 3D camera. There's some mistakes in there, but it's only a test for the overall effect. I think I will add some shadow to the layers to separate the different bridges from each other. I think it's time now to create a general colour scheme for all these scenes.
The workflow could be improved if I render the bikers as a movie and use this on the tracks - much faster rendering.
What you don't see in this small size: the measurements in the bridge drawings are still there. Oh, and where to get these: gutenberg.org carries lots of old issues of "Scientific American" and the like. Use google image search.
Karel Zeman
Looks great. I like the films of Karel Zeman. He was a genius. Just for interest...I taught at film school in Zlin where's the film studio of Karel Zeman. Inspirational place:-)