Okay, I’m working on using Blender and Icarus to create CG backgrounds for video. Here’s the WIP thread. Right now, I’m still doing basic tests.
I have two questions. First, is there a way to reduce the amount of motion I get with the IPO curves? Right now the motion is scaled wrong and I have to make the scene hundreds of times larger than normal. I tried using Scale in the IPO editor but that also reduces the length of the animation, which screws everything up.
Secondly, right now I am working on a test which includes variable focal length (the camera zooms in and out). For the static focal length tests, I’d been parenting a plane with the footage on it to the camera. This works fine with the new test, until the camera zooms out, and then the footage doesn’t fill the whole view anymore. Is there any way I can fix this?
You could parent your camera to an empty, and scale the empty down. Or, you can scale only along the Y axis in the IPO editor by pressing S and then pressing the middle mouse button as you move the mouse vertically.
As for your other problem, I dunno, make the plane bigger?
I ended up figuring it out. I don’t think any of you understood. I had the plane sized so that in the camera view it filled exactly the render area. The video texture was set to orco, so it ended up being exactly the size of the render area. But when the camera zoomed out, the plane no longer filled the whole view. I fixed this by scaling the plane up a lot and setting the texture to Win so it doesn’t matter how big the plane is as long as it’s as least as big as the render area.
edit: The camera wasn’t the problem, by the way, I forgot to mention… I have Clipend set very high. It’s in the 3D view outside of the camera where large stuff just disappears.
I tried scaling the IPO curves using the S key and pressing the middle mouse button. They only scale vertically, but it changes the rotation of the camera so it’s slanted and pointed downward, which means I can’t use it.
Glad you figured out the problem with the video texture.
Is your camera supposed to move in x,y,z space and rotate as well?
If so, you can scale just its location IPOs without effecting the rotation.
Select the camera in object mode then, in the IPO curve editor,
click Loc X, Loc Y, or Loc Z to select only those curves. Or shift + click to select two or more.
Please, does anyone have any other suggestions? I’ve been (quite against my will) assigned a project due on the 22nd, where I and another student have to provide a reasonably convincing tech demo, and unless we can get the model down to a managable size there’s no way we can do it.
Is there any way to manually set the distance to an object in Icarus? Is there anything I can do in Icarus to fix the motion paths? I’m very stuck right now and it’s very frustrating. I’ve been checking tutorials but I can’t find anything useful.
You, or someone you’re going to have to convince, will have to refigure the variables and their values in the script. Since all the Python is there it’s really just the math.
