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[mysterysmith]

Hey all,

Im new here but Im using anim8or for a school project. Im trying to make a cityscape at night (but cant find any textures but thats another story) and I was wondering if it was possible to make moving billboards. Can anyone help?

Thanks in advance

[floyd86]

Ofcourse this is possible. Suggest try taking some tutorials (http://anim8or.com/tutorials/index.html) reading the manual (http://anim8or.com/manual/index.html) and get used to the programs. Then use you creativity to create something.

A good texture site is : http://cgtextures.com/

[3D Joe Wiltshire]

Moving billboards? In what sense? Anything is possible really, just takes some tinkering to get the right method

[captaindrewi]

like at a football ground, electronic advertisement board ?
or a mechanical, vertical, scrolling one ?

[johnar]

 Cool. I've made some moving billboards.
 Will post an example 2moro, after i get home and dig out the old vid and files. Could be 24-36 hours away

[selden]

Guys,

Don't forget that in 3D graphics, the word "billboard" has a special meaning, which has nothing to do with the big signs you see along highways. I'm still confused as to which johnar means.

[captaindrewi]

whats it mean in 3d graphics then?
one is eager to see johnars examples in any event.

[selden]

The Wikipedia article on sprites discusses them.
"More often sprite now refers to a partially transparent two dimensional animation that is mapped onto a special plane in a 3D scene. Unlike a texture map, the sprite plane is always perpendicular to the axis emanating from the camera. The image can be scaled to simulate perspective, rotated two dimensionally, overlapped with other objects, and be occluded, but it can only be viewed from the same angle. This rendering method is also referred to as billboarding."

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sprite_(computer_graphics) for details.

[johnar]

 Actually, i've dug mine out, and it needs some tweaking.
 If you could let me off the hook for another 24 hours  

 Mine has like 'vertical strips, which when stood together, wide-face forward and side by side, appear as 1 continuous flat plane.
 An image is applied to that '1 apparent plane'.
 Then,  each strip  rotates, ( together, but seperately), along the x axis, for a rotation of 180 degrees.
 At 180 degrees rotation, the backs of the strips are now displayed, This new 'apparent single plane', has a different image attached.

 whew.

 Does that make any sense.
 Anyway, i'll get it posted just ASAP.

 

[sbenator]

You can do that sort of thing with Terranim8or then import back into anim8or. I believe there's a tut on Terranim8or site for a TV with a moving picture which is along the same sort of lines as you want.

[mysterysmith]

Wow thanks so much for all these quick responses. I'll clarify what I mean.

I'm not talking about sprites but I meant physical billboards (like coca cola). I was trying to get animated textures to work at first, then I tried morph targets but neither seemed to work for me. Johnar yours sounds interesting I'm eager to see it.

Oh I meant electronic, not mechanical. I'll look into Terranim8or.

Thanks again

[captaindrewi]

cheers seldon.
yeah johnar[after a second read] i think i can picture it .
with a rotating bone for each strip.
i have just posted a mini article on animanon concerning the fading of an image/animation to a transparency.
possible futuristic holoscreen perhaps  

[selden]

If you make all of the vertical faces the same width, you could display four different images. This wouldn't work so well in reality because the vertical bars would have to be farther apart than with thin slats. It'd work fine in graphics if you don't mind them interpenetrating.

[captaindrewi]

sorry mysterysmith i know you dont want mechanical.
but i thought i'd make some sense of this approach and someone might
find it use full.

have made a vid and put file .an8 on animanon tutorials.

[johnar]

 Hi guys.
 sorry i'm l8. Got called away to work. So, now i've made it down to the internet cafe, with a video on my flashdrive, only to discover that i've got the large version. 177mb! 

  Thats a bit large to be uploading.
 So, i'll have to make a compressed version 2nite, and post it up 2moro. Haven't been able to organise a free file hosting yet, so will have to use youtube for now.

 Captaindrewi.  Yes, originally i tried bones, but in the end, found that morph targets worked well. But then, after thinking about it a bit more, i realised, hang on, couldn't we just as easilly import each tile into scene mode as seperate objects, and rotate them manually. ie: no bones, no morph targets. ??   
 
 I'll still post my vid. It has one using morph targets, from a couple of different views, but it also has my original 'moving billboard', which  i think will be a surprise. Its not quite how you'd expect.

 But i got a question.
 mysterysmith. I'm not exactly sure what you measn by 'electronic'. Is that sort've 'flashing lighted images' or something like that?
 Although my examples would probably best be described as mechanical, i have added a short piece at the end, wondering if it's the sort've effect you're after.

 I'm imagining that its a 'moving electronic image' on a 'stationary board'.
 Would that be right?.

 If not, and its a little difficult to explain, perhaps a link to a pic of what you mean.?