"sshelby" <ssh### [at] rexnetnet> wrote in message
news:3a7816e1@news.povray.org...
> I'm using Moray with the Enzmann plug-in to create my animations. Can I
use
> motion blur with this, and if so, how? I have 3 different programs for
> encoding  MPEG, but cannot find any mention of motion blur in the help
> files.
> Steve

Steve
[followups to povray.animation]
As far as I know, POVRAY as it stands in 3.1g does not have any meaningful
approach toward the issue of motion blur and/or field of depth (aperture
does not cut it).  I am starting to think that the povray team do need a
committee of artists and movie makers to give some feedback on the issue.  A
bunch of programmers is not enough :O  Because they simply got no clue into
the fields of artistic animation and the field of movie making :-)
WinMegaPov does have the motion blur support.  How do you use this in an
animation in any meaningful way:  I am still asking myself this question.  I
need to play with it to see what can be done since I have been away for
quite a while.
I do not mean to discourage you, but what follows is my personal opinion -
POVRAY is not an animation package and it lacks what it takes to talk of
animation in any meaningful way.  Yes, I know, picture averaging and what
have you - forget it!  This is medieval at best.  Even a mere support for
motion blur will not cut it.
POVRAY is a tool to produce photorealistic bitmaps.  And not a tool to
produce movies.
Is this philosophising?  Not at all!
There is a difference between motion blur as a snapshot taken with a camera
and motion blur as experienced in movies.  It will take more than the key
word Motion Blur to even get close.  and simply povray was not built as is
the case now to handle this sort of things.
Think about it as the difference between Photojournalism and Movie
Cinematography.  These are completely two different fields (I am a
Cinematographer myself).  We do not think of motion blur in movie making -
we take it for granted.  A photojournalist does think about it.  If a
photojournalist takes a picture with motion blur then you can bet  it was
meant to be or simply a mistake.  With movie making and animation it IS the
heart of the thing and that is why you do not think about it.
Is this theorizing?  Not at all!  There was a raytracer that approached
animation from the point of view of taking motion blur for granted so you
did not have to do anything at all to produce it in every frame - the
raytracer is called RayStorm.  If you wanted to render one picture with
motion blur then by all means you have to use the keyword Motion Blur.  But
if you snapped shots of animation - motion blur was there as given:  forget
about averaging bitmaps and this and that.  In an animation the motion blur
depends on the velocity of the object and the shutter speed (usually 1/40 -
1/60 of a second).  It was a sad day when RayStorm development was cancelled
back in 1998.  And my copy that I used so heavily is crashing now in windows
98.  If you want the archive I'll send it to you.  But the appraoch in it is
SO elegant and graceful it still impresses me up till now.
the issue is that animation is not about cranking up so many frames per
second to produce a photorealistic result.  This is a waste of resources and
it gives an inanimate styling to the subject matter.
Meanwhile, I am going to play with the moray Plugin and povray and see what
can be done with it.
Sorry for I did not mean to discourage you.  It is just that I feel
disappointed whenever the subject turns into the issue of animation in
povray.
Maan

Post a reply to this message