Amiga Computing - Commodore Is Awesome

Steve White explains
how you can
make your object
brushes dance to
your tune
ples of picture design, backdrops and
S special effects. This month, and for the
Illl o next few issues, we will be looking at
animation f principles and specific techniques
applicable to animation,
a
Obviously, drawing single images is a lot less
painless r than creating an animation, but most
reputable w art packages include a plethora of differ
e
er en ha
hell of a lot easier, and quicker, than that on
Isoper. t o Unfortunately, understanding the techniques
con take a while and even then, opplying
fv
them correctly can prove a recurring nightmare.
So ue
for simplicity's sake, I won't be going into the
Nth ns
dimension to explain these functions but will
provide ct
simple techniques with results so that you
have ti u o head start for your own experimentation.
od
Just as with a single image, it is vitally important
that you put your animation down on paper
First
ni
in the form of storyboards_ Storyboords are
smal s e roughs of the key elements, scenes and
camera td
angles within an animation. You don't
need ht
to draw in detail, just enough so that you
personaly ah
understand what it is you're planning
and how it works.
t e
RENDERING mb
OPTIONS
The a
next thing to do is work out what animated
effects ks
ore included and the best options for rendering
e i (drawing) them, To pinpoint certain
aspects ac
I will be referring to the animation shown
here in the screenshots. The techniques explained
np
can be employed in many different ways ond
with ir
any animation, not just the one I have
supplied. mi
an
At the computer, the first thing to do is to design
all tcthe
objects that will make up your completed
onim i
(short for animation). Although lilt more
appealing to aduolly design as you go, I can guarantee
o-
you'll eventually wish you hadn't. Create all
the n objects and save them independently with
suitable o filenames, If you end up with a lot of
objects n and they're not properly labelled, you
end a up wasting precious time and freaking Out
regularly.
c
With the boring bits out of the way you
con then simply click ,
:;11
o
t h e
cmFROM i e c e s START TO FINISH
tpo g e t h
eu r o
When zooming objects in you'll quickly reah that the
, t
that make up the object turn 'blocky' as they are magnified.
dThere
- is a way around this which entails drawing the original
object at its largest size. You can then set the animation position
to the last frame in the zoom and render the brush zooming
Out, but with the animation running backwards and with
a positive value in the End z position.
Both D e luxe Pa int
and Brillia nce fe a ture
a compre he nsive lot
Of a nima tion
functions, Good
brush ma nipula tion is
fi a t forspe e d
and fle xibinty
AMIGA COMPUTING
FEBRUARY 1996
Twist and
turn it!
you'l feel happier, and more confident, spending
time getting the finished animation accurate.
Both Deluxe Point and Brilliance have powerful
Move functions They allow you to set the initial
start position of the brush, the end position, os well
as any rotations you want to occur throughout the
procedure. There are three important values for
both position and rotation and these are labelled x,
y and z The x and y are the easiest to explain and
understand. With x you con move your brush in the
horizontal (left and right) and y allows you to move
the brush in the vertical (up and down). If you are
moving clouds or a ship you would use the x position,
and to move a lift or a helicopter you would
use y.
Z is a different matter altogether. If you can
imagine a line travelling straight through the centre
of your screen, you will have discovered the z axis
When you realise that z moves brushes
closer and farther away it is easier to visualise this
imaginary line. The position of a brush hos two
uses - for moving objects or for camera pans. 11
you move a car off screen horn a standstil then it
will be clearly obvious that the abject has itself
moved. However, if you move an entire scene off
screen then it will appear that the camera has in
fact moved (panned' rather than the scene. The
Building a n
animation is
a re la tive ly
painless
procedure if
you stick to
the trie d a nd
tested
methods_
Ignore theme
methods a nd
you're in
trouble
same principle also applies to z. You con appear to
move an object closer or farther away but by moving
the entire scene you give the impression that the
camera is zooming in or out. Sorry to go on about x,
y and z, but they need to be understood if you
are maximise your potential with computer-aided
animation.
X, y and z also feature with rotation as well as
position. Using rotation you can turn your brush in
every angle while the brush is being moved through
the position axis settings. Rotation is more difficult to
grasp than position but if you can imagine the x, y
and z position lines on your screen, rotation simply
rotates the brush around the corresponding axis, like
an apple skewered on a stick. I hove supplied a
screensho indicating the position and rotation axis,
so if you still can't quite grasp the idea take a look
at it.
This picture should ittustra te to you the
m, y, a position a nd rota tion tine s using
your monitor a . a n e xa mple