All about Animating

[BadCRC]

I like to say great job Buddhi on your program.  Your animations on youtube are out of this world.  This is the coolest stuff I have seen in a long time.

I like the animation aspet of this program the most.  I have been trying to do more advance stuff with varing degrees of success.  For example sometimes when I try to do 90 to 180 pan it goes in wierd directions.

A few things I like this thread to address is:

1. I would like people to give pointers on what is the best settings and tricks to get a nice smooth long animations.

2. I hope people will conribute examples of Keyframe files.  It does not have to be a full animations although that would be nice but show how to do nice transitions or some cool moves.

3. Post your videos with some commentary or insight.

Hopefully this way we can all advance to the next level and be able to make some vids half as cool as Buddhi/Xlace.

[meegja]

Wanted to post question about animating but I think I can add point 4 to your questions:

4. How does animating work? It is addressed in the manual but only very shortly. Is there somewhere a manual that explains how animating in Mandelbulber works? I tried all kind of things but I can not even get a path or what ever.

Thanx
Menno

[Buddhi]

I like to say great job Buddhi on your program.  Your animations on youtube are out of this world.  This is the coolest stuff I have seen in a long time.
I like the animation aspet of this program the most.  I have been trying to do more advance stuff with varing degrees of success.  For example sometimes when I try to do 90 to 180 pan it goes in wierd directions.
A few things I like this thread to address is:
1. I would like people to give pointers on what is the best settings and tricks to get a nice smooth long animations.
2. I hope people will conribute examples of Keyframe files.  It does not have to be a full animations although that would be nice but show how to do nice transitions or some cool moves.
3. Post your videos with some commentary or insight.
Hopefully this way we can all advance to the next level and be able to make some vids half as cool as Buddhi/Xlace.

I will write soon some manual. There will be described step by step how to make an animation.

[BadCRC]

I will write soon some manual. There will be described step by step how to make an animation.

Great news.  Hope you put in some intermediate to advance stuff also.  If you need any help let me know. I use to do white papers.

Wanted to post question about animating but I think I can add point 4 to your questions:

4. How does animating work? It is addressed in the manual but only very shortly. Is there somewhere a manual that explains how animating in Mandelbulber works? I tried all kind of things but I can not even get a path or what ever.

Thanx
Menno

Well the easiest way is to use Keyframes.  Here is a quick tut to get you started.

0. Open the Image tab, set image width and height to 200. Gives quick render of images for navigating and testing.  For final animation increase to higher resolution.

1. Open Timeline. If it has Keyframes then delete them.
2. Pick a starting point in the Render window. Then click Record or Insert After in Timeline.
3. Move to another location in the Render window. Click Insert After in Timeline.
4. Do this for X amount of keyframes.  For this tut lets say 5 keyframes.
5. In the Animation Tab choose 50 for "Frames per key".
6. In "Frames to render" put Start frame 0 and End frame 200.
7. Click "Render from key-frames"

Thats it.  You will have 200 images in your images folder you can animate using Vdub or some such program.

Hope that helps.

[meegja]

@ Buddhi: okay, that would be cool!! Did see some of the animations and they look so so great!

@ BadCRC: thanx!!! Render of the frames is busy now. I see that it takes some time but that's no problem: I am used to use Bryce and that program has a very good but V E R Y slow render engine.

Menno

[meegja]

BadCRC thanx again!! Just made my first try with animation 
See http://www.fractalforums.com/gallery-b177/my-first-10-second-mandelbulber-animation/ for the result.

Menno

[BadCRC]

@ BadCRC: thanx!!! Render of the frames is busy now. I see that it takes some time but that's no problem: I am used to use Bryce and that program has a very good but V E R Y slow render engine.

Menno

Cool.  No problem.  You can always do a quick render by changing the image width and height to like 200 under the Image tab.  That way you can see how it will look before you do a full hi res render.

Nice first animation.

[Buddhi]

I have just finished creating tutorial for creating animations. I put it on Mandelbulber's website into "Getting started" section

http://sites.google.com/site/mandelbulber/getting-started

If you still have some questions about animations in Mandelbulber, please let me know. I will try to add more advices.

[tomot]

Well the easiest way is to use Keyframes.  Here is a quick tut to get you started.

1. Open Timeline. If it has Keyframes then delete them.
2. Pick a starting point in the Render window. Then click Record or Insert After in Timeline.
3. Move to another location in the Render window. Click Insert After in Timeline.
4. Do this for X amount of keyframes.  For this tut lets say 5 keyframes.
5. In the Animation Tab choose 50 for "Frames per key".
6. In "Frames to render" put Start frame 0 and End frame 200.
7. Click "Render from key-frames"

Thats it.  You will have 200 images in your images folder you can animate using Vdub or some such program.

Hope that helps.

thanks, @ BadCRC I'm also a fan of a concise step by step procedure method:
I would add:
1.a Open the Image tab, set image width and image height to smaller values, this renders a quick preview of your sequence of images


 

[tomot]

I have just finished creating tutorial for creating animations. I put it on Mandelbulber's website into "Getting started" section

http://sites.google.com/site/mandelbulber/getting-started

Thanks Buddhi, I have been waiting for this.

[BadCRC]

I have just finished creating tutorial for creating animations. I put it on Mandelbulber's website into "Getting started" section

http://sites.google.com/site/mandelbulber/getting-started

If you still have some questions about animations in Mandelbulber, please let me know. I will try to add more advices.

Looks awesome.  Can't wait to get home to read it fully tonight.

thanks, @ BadCRC I'm also a fan of a concise step by step procedure method:
I would add:
1.a Open the Image tab, set image width and image height to smaller values, this renders a quick preview of your sequence of images
 

Thanks.  Added point 0. to Reply #3.

[BadCRC]

Great Tutorial.  Great insight on Catmull-Rom interpolation.

It is better to decrease distance in smaller steps. In first step reduce distance 5 times and in second step also about 5 times. Camera will not collide with the wall. Changing relative value maximum 7 times in one step guarantees interpolated path without overshooting.

So is 5 like the safe number?  I see that is what you use in Mouse click close-up ratio in the View tab.

If after rendering some keyframe has to be corrected it is not necessary to render whole animation from the beginning. Example: keyframe no. 10 was corrected, frames per keyframe = 100. You should delete 200 frames before the keyframe (from 800) and 200 frames after the keyframe (to 1200). Next press Render from key-frames button. The program will automatically analyse which frames are exists in destination folder and will render only missed frames.

Why delete 200 frames in each direction?  If Frames per key = 100 then shouldn't you just delete 100 each way (from 900 to 1100) to the adjacent keyframes?

Thanks

[Buddhi]

I get what you are saying but I am not getting the same numbers you are. From the pic the first distance is about 9 to the wall and the second is 2, 9 / 2 = 4.5 like you said "first step reduce distance 5 times".  But the second one is 2 / .5 = 4.  How are you getting about 5?

"about 5 times" means "approximately 5 times". So 4 is something about 5 

Why delete 200 frames in each direction?  If Frames per key = 100 then shouldn't you just delete 100 each way (from 900 to 1100) to the adjacent keyframes?

You have to delete 200 frames in each direction because change of something on 10th keyframe has influence on frames between 8th and 12th keyframe. It is because Catmull-Rom splines are 3-rd degree polynomials. Value change of one control point makes change of the spline shape between all control points.

[BadCRC]

To get the kind of fluid keyframe animations. What are some of the common default settings?  For example a 60 second clip.  

Animation tab
What is a good Frames per key?  Default is 100.  I sometimes use 30.
How many Keyframes for a 60 second clip?

----------
Frames per key: 100?
Start frame: 0
End frame: 1800
----------

View tab
Usually I use all default values.  Now the big question is, how does one know where to put the keyframes for fluid motion?
Is it 1, 2 or 3 mouse clicks before setting a keyframe?  
Or how does one use:

During preparation of camera movement watch on View tab Estimated viewpoint distance to the surface and Distance form last keyframe values. Those values will help avoiding to high changes of distance or keeping constant camera speed.

What is a good Distance to the surface or Distance form last keyframe change before setting a keyframe?
Why does Distance form last keyframe only work with camera movment keys?

----------
Step for camera moving multiplied by DE: .5
Absolute distance mode: unchecked
Absolute movement distance: 0.1
Rotation step in degrees: 10
Mouse click close-up ratio: 5?
Enable zoom by mouse click: checked
Go close to indicated surface: unchecked
Rotation without using gamma angle: checked
----------

When you assemble the rendered images into a movie file do you use Frame Rate of 10, 24 or 30 FPS?

Thanks

[Buddhi]

To get the kind of fluid keyframe animations. What are some of the common default settings?  For example a 60 second clip. 

Animation tab
I usually use 50 or 100 frames fer keyframe. But it depends of character of animation which you want to get. For smooth flying or transformation it is good to use 100 keys/frame. But for some music video with fast electronic music it will be better to use 20 or 50.

View tab
There is no universal rule. It depends of technique which you want to use for camera moving.
If you use mouse clicking on image, and the "Mouse click close-up ratio" is set to 5, you should create one keyframe for each "click".
If you use arrows and Forward/Backward buttons, you have to observe "Estimated viewpoint distance to the surface" and "Distance form last keyframe" values. If you want to create smooth flight you should try to keep for each keyframe similar values for  "Distance form last keyframe" - you will get almost constant flight speed.
But if you want to make "zoom in" animation, you should observe distance to fractal surface. You shouldn't decrease distance more than 5 times per keyframe.

You asked why Distance form last keyframe only work with camera movment keys. I don't know . It will be corrected in next release.

----------
Step for camera moving multiplied by DE: from 0.5 to 3.0
Absolute distance mode: checked for flight animation, unchecked for closing up
Absolute movement distance: depends on required flight speed and how close to fractal surface the camera is
Rotation step in degrees: from 5 to 30
Mouse click close-up ratio: from 3 to 5
Enable zoom by mouse click: checked
Go close to indicated surface: usually unchecked, but it is useful for flight-around animations
Rotation without using gamma angle: checked
----------

Frames per second
I use 25 or 30fps

On Linux there is mplayer program, which can play animation directly from JPG image sequence.
Just use folowing command:

Code:

mplayer "mf://*jpg" -mf fps=25

I often use this for preview of animation.