Four months in the making! With a cast of thousands! (of objects)

Here's a representative image from an animation which I've posted over at
p.b.animations. I set this scene up with animation and motion-blur in mind, so a
still image doesn't really show it to its best advantage, IMO. Everything was
done in POV-Ray v3.6.1, including the post-processed motion-blur (none here,
though.) OK, I used Photoshop for some image_maps, and sPatch for a few mesh
objects in the B-29--the wings and tail. The airplane isn't perfect; the CSG
engines still need some work, as does the nose/cockpit. When I started this
project, I wasn't all that interested in getting the B-29 to be technically
accurate; I just wanted a 'flying scene.' But one thing led to another...

My apologies for not posting any WIPs during the process--I kept changing/adding
things daily, even hourly. Which meant running yet more test animations. (At
last count, 153 of 'em!) Helped along with LOTS of on/off #if switches for
testing various things, plus simple 'proxy' objects.

There are quite a few *cheats* going on here--the clouds, the many reflections
in the airplane, the cloud shadows on it, the flames. Some to get a particular
visual effect, but mainly to speed up rendering during the *long* animation
run--4000 frames over 90 hours, to get 400 final motion-blurred images. No AA
either (except for this image); but blurring together each 10-image batch helped
hide the jaggies. The only media in the scene is the black smoke behind the
flaming engine (and only because I couldn't come up with a good cheat for that!)

About mid-way through rendering the raw animation, I hit on the rather bizarre
idea of doing 'alternate-field' renders, again to save time.  That is, using
Field_Render in the INI file.  That cut the remaining render time in half--with
a decrease in image quality, of course. For a typical still frame, the results
are quite ugly (especially with no AA!) But 10 such frames blurred together
didn't look half-bad, in the context of the quickly-moving animation. (After
doing a final motion-blurred animation test, I picked out the frames that still
didn't look very good, then went back and re-rendered the raw frames without
Field_Render.)

I'll add more notes as the comments come rolling in. ;-)

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Attachments:
Download 'b29_bomber_1.jpg' (407 KB)

Preview of image 'b29_bomber_1.jpg'

"Kenneth" <kdw### [at] earthlinknet> wrote in message 
news:web.4baae0a4649f667b65f302820@news.povray.org...
> Four months in the making! With a cast of thousands! (of objects)
>
> Here's a representative image from an animation which I've posted over at
> p.b.animations. I set this scene up with animation and motion-blur in 
> mind, so a
> still image doesn't really show it to its best advantage, IMO. Everything 
> was
> done in POV-Ray v3.6.1, including the post-processed motion-blur (none 
> here,
> though.) OK, I used Photoshop for some image_maps, and sPatch for a few 
> mesh
> objects in the B-29--the wings and tail. The airplane isn't perfect; the 
> CSG
> engines still need some work, as does the nose/cockpit. When I started 
> this
> project, I wasn't all that interested in getting the B-29 to be 
> technically
> accurate; I just wanted a 'flying scene.' But one thing led to another...
>
> My apologies for not posting any WIPs during the process--I kept 
> changing/adding
> things daily, even hourly. Which meant running yet more test animations. 
> (At
> last count, 153 of 'em!) Helped along with LOTS of on/off #if switches for
> testing various things, plus simple 'proxy' objects.
>
> There are quite a few *cheats* going on here--the clouds, the many 
> reflections
> in the airplane, the cloud shadows on it, the flames. Some to get a 
> particular
> visual effect, but mainly to speed up rendering during the *long* 
> animation
> run--4000 frames over 90 hours, to get 400 final motion-blurred images. No 
> AA
> either (except for this image); but blurring together each 10-image batch 
> helped
> hide the jaggies. The only media in the scene is the black smoke behind 
> the
> flaming engine (and only because I couldn't come up with a good cheat for 
> that!)
>
> About mid-way through rendering the raw animation, I hit on the rather 
> bizarre
> idea of doing 'alternate-field' renders, again to save time.  That is, 
> using
> Field_Render in the INI file.  That cut the remaining render time in 
> half--with
> a decrease in image quality, of course. For a typical still frame, the 
> results
> are quite ugly (especially with no AA!) But 10 such frames blurred 
> together
> didn't look half-bad, in the context of the quickly-moving animation. 
> (After
> doing a final motion-blurred animation test, I picked out the frames that 
> still
> didn't look very good, then went back and re-rendered the raw frames 
> without
> Field_Render.)
>
> I'll add more notes as the comments come rolling in. ;-)
>

Holy crap!  Consider me impressed!  Very impressed!!!

Cheers Dre

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"Kenneth" <kdw### [at] earthlinknet> wrote:
> Four months in the making! With a cast of thousands! (of objects)
>
> Here's a representative image from an animation which I've posted over at
> p.b.animations.

The still looks great, but the animation isn't showing up in
"povray.binaries.animations" for me. I NEED to see it, darn it!!!

Regards,
Dave Blandston

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"Dave Blandston" <nomail@nomail> wrote:

> The still looks great, but the animation isn't showing up in
> "povray.binaries.animations" for me. I NEED to see it, darn it!!!
>

Thanks!  And sorry--I ran into a file-size-limit problem; my first try was with
a file size of 4.9MB, which wouldn't fit into the 5MB limit(!)  Ditto trying a
4.5MB file.  But it's there now (a 3.8MB file was a success!) I remember, back
when the animation size limit was increased, that there was some 'overhead' of
some kind that needed to be taken into account. *Seems* that 4MB is about the
practical limit.

Ken

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"Dre" <and### [at] gmailcom> wrote:


> Holy crap!  Consider me impressed!  Very impressed!!!
>

Thanks! It was a labor of love--well, sort of, after solving umpteen problems.
But big scenes are always 'instructive'--I always learn some new things (and
they really give POV-Ray a workout, clarifying its strengths and weaknesses.)

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Hey, machine guns! Cool! OK, I can't really take time to leave much of a comment
now, I'm too busy pushing the "Play" button over and over...

Wow! Everything is so well done it's amazing. The detailed objects and textures
make the scene very interesting.

There's a brief moment, I think around the two - three second mark, where the
smoke from the burning engine doesn't appear to be blowing backward as fast as
would be expected based on the speed of the passing clouds. Maybe it's my
imagination.

The reflections on the body of the disabled plane are great. I also like how the
other planes' contrails follow their motion from previous frames. Great
attention to detail.

Regards,
Dave Blandston

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Wow, high marks indeed!  Great modeling.  There are many things I could ask but
I'd like to know what approach you took for the ground and the motion.  You did
a good job at creating an unsteady camera.

Charles

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Truly amazing work, Kenneth. I am literally speachless.

Thomas

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Stunning. The image is superb, but it simply gives no hint as to the realism and
immediacy conveyed by the animation. I almost can't believe it was done with
POV-Ray!

Gonna watch this a few times more :)

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On 25/03/2010 16:27, Kenneth wrote:
> Thanks!  And sorry--I ran into a file-size-limit problem; my first try was with
> a file size of 4.9MB, which wouldn't fit into the 5MB limit(!)  Ditto trying a
> 4.5MB file.  But it's there now (a 3.8MB file was a success!) I remember, back
> when the animation size limit was increased, that there was some 'overhead' of
> some kind that needed to be taken into account. *Seems* that 4MB is about the
> practical limit.

I can host it on povray.org in a temp dir if you like. pop me an email if so.

-- Chris

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