Hi all,
I have created a custom PASeq using a couple of action steps from the Vectorizer and Paint Synthesizer Classic. The rest of the steps are taken mostly from factory PASeq for movies however I have been having an issue with one of those steps.
That step is coming from the "Color & Bamboo" PASeq which I added to my custom PASeq (the step where it actually paints colour, the rest of the steps are black ink style painting).
At first the problem was that every frame was different so it was flickering; an issue I've seen covered in the online documentation speaking about paint strategies. What I did to solve this was; rather than put down the frame rate of the entire movie, I simply made mute keyframes after that action step every few frames.
So as to say I would put in an active keyframe followed by a muted keyframe, skip a few frames then put another active keyframe followed by a muted keyframe. I did the same for the Canvas to white step right before it. Those two steps are on their own layer so they don't affect the rest of the overall effect.
This solution worked except for one problem I did not expect which seems to be a glitch unless I'm missing something and that is why I'm making this post.
Before I had used the muted keyframes, the amount that the autodraw action step would paint was a certain amount. It still paints the same amount on the first frame and if I hit the action button to see how the PASeq works on one frame. However when I process the movie, the following frames where that action step is activated don't paint as much and therefore are not giving me the desired affect (even though the flickering issue was fixed by my solution). It now paints less on the other frames and thus the paint is less filled in and lighter than I want.
Is this some kind of setting with that autodraw action step? Does it have to do with the muted keyframes? Is there a way to control how long each action step paints before it gets to the next action step?
For some reason all the frames after the first frame that I have a keyframe in, paint for a shorter time than the first one which is at a correct length and I want to fix that.
Sorry for making my post so long but I hope someone can help.
Replies
can you post your PASeq so that we can take a direct look at the steps. There may be several different places to make adjustments.
If it is a bug.. John will attend to it.
cheers
If you want to post the PASeq preset, that's the best way to really analyze what is going on and comment specifically on what to do to change it.
The number of paint strokes painted in each action step associated with auto-painting is controlled by the Max Stroke setting in the Path Start control panel. So you could try boosting that. Maybe it got cut down in one of your subsequent keyframes you are dropping in after a mute keyframe?
The paint synthesizer also contains a lot of different specific controls that can affect where paint ends up. Many of the parameters in the path start, path end, and path application control panels do this. Maybe there is an interaction associated with one of those that is changing the amount of paint after you modified the original PASeq. Again, by looking at the specifics of the action steps recorded in the PASeq you are using i could comment on whether anything like that is going on.
I did look at the 'Color and Bamboo' PASeq. If you are referring to the 2nd action step that auto-paints color, if you look at the Path Start control panel, both Texture Range and Lum Range controls are turned on. Lum stands for luminance. So only paint stroke path start locations that meet those specified Texture and Luminance range values will actually paint, other wise they will be skipped and another random start point will be tried. Maybe for your particular source frame image content, you need to modify those settings or turn them off.
If you look at the Path End control panel, both Local Color Range and Visual Error parameters are turned on to control when paint stroke paths could potentially end before reaching their maximum specified path length. Local Color Range you would probably want to keep on i imagine. The Visual Error One, set to PaintColor LumEr might be making fewer color strokes get laid down on subsequent frames in your movie processing when you are doing the overdrawing on previous frames. So maybe turning that control to None for that action step will help.
Thanks for your quick and friendly replies. I have attached the PASeq for analysis. As you can see there are only 2 action steps assigned to layer 4; the second one is the only one I appear to be having an issue with. The painting less on subsequent frames didn't happen until I made muted keyframes as described in my original post.
I just checked all the control panels mentioned and noticed that their settings match up on the different frames. Perhaps it's the VisualErr issue you mentioned in the Path End so I can give that a shot and see if it works.
I was not getting this issue before but there are some things I did that perhaps made it happen? One thing I had tried was doing sequential keyframing by painting in the keyframes with the pen using autodraw interactive... unfortunately unlike I had hoped, each frame was still different without interpolation because I suppose that feature only works when each stroke is drawn manually as its own step rather than using the automatic painting?
In the meantime, while I try turning VisualErr to None on each keyframe and processing it again, I would like to state my ideal situation just in case it is possible and you would know how to do it.
That would be for that action step of adding painterly colour of a good amount (the default in "Color and Bamboo") on layer 4 is not only consistent in its amount but also consistent in how it's applied so as to move smoothly with the rest of the image. If that is not possible with some way of interpolating between keyframes or removing randomization of where the strokes are made; as I mentioned in the original post I would settle for simply lowering the frame rate for that layer to an acceptable level (I made a keyframe followed by a muted keyframe every 4 keyframes for an approximate FPS of 7.5) and am hoping that each of those keyframes then applies the same amount of paint.
Thanks again for your help it is highly appreciated! I will also be happy to share my project on the forum when it's ready!
P.S. My project is an animated music video with animated cats in CG and then made to look cartoony/painterly with Studio Artist. I'll also attach a single frame so you know what it's looking like.
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Yes, in general sequential key framing was designed for working with sets of manually drawn individual paint strokes. As a way of speeding up that process by automatically setting up the appropriate paint presets and recording the new keyframes automatically when you started a new drawing at a different keyframe time. The idea came up with some interactions we had with one of the original Waking Life animators, who is into building up hand drawn keyframed animation.
There are ways to work with building interpolation off of complete auto-painted canvases. So that all of the individual paint strokes generated from a series of auto-painted canvases will interpolate their positions over time. This is probably one of the more technically involved things you can do in Studio Artist.
It involves the technique of encapsulating an entire set of bezier paths that represent an entire painting in a single auto-paint action step. The bezier paths are stored inside of the internal bezier path memory , which is a feature of the paint synthesizer.
This tip describes encapsulated bezier keyframe paint animation.
This tip describes how to automate the process of creating a multi-keyframe encapsulated bezier paint animation.
Of course, you could be using multiple auto-paint action steps that are working with different paint presets, each interpolating off of encapsulated bezier paths contained in their associated keyframes. So very elaborate keyframe animations could be built up using this approach.
There are some features associated with sequential keyframe recording to aid in working with this kind of approach as well.
I see. Yes that was what I was envisioning; I just didn't know how one would go about it exactly. Thanks for pointing me in the right direction! For now I think I would only need to do it with that layer, because I suppose the other autopaint steps are predictable enough to not have to do that, but if I find it necessary for those steps later too, I will.
I really like the sequential keyframing feature. I have even done frame-by-frame animation on my own before in other software, so I am no stranger to its benefits. I am also very familiar with interpolated animation since I've used it a lot in programs like Flash and After Effects. Of course I had never done it for a painterly style though I have dreamed of doing it in the past, but thought frame-by-frame painting would be impractical. After seeing it was possible in SA it amazed me so I may have do it for future projects after completing this one.
Here is an example of someone who actually did it by hand, frame-by-frame for a short animated film if you're not familiar. He did it by adjusting one frame at a time while the paint was still wet. He did it by finger painting. I've watched the lovely film before, and its making-of, it is really enthralling and worth checking out:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/My_Love_(2006_film)
It's awesome that SA can reproduce those results digitally with interpolation so that the quality can be elevated or kept high along with added efficiency allowing the possibility of feature length animations in that style to be more feasible.
Studio Artist has another feature called a movie layer. You can use that if you want to build up traditional hand painted animation frame by frame. Or do hand painting on top of an existing video. We have some customers who use this feature to generate traditional hand painted animation. Where they paint every frame hand by hand. They can insert blank frames and use before-after onion skin views to build up the interior motion between hand drawn key paintings. Sometimes they use some of the Studio Artist warp features to move selective sections of the key paintings around to help out in this process, in addition to just straight painting when building up the tween painted frames.
Richard Hoffman used this feature of hand painting paint stroke animation on top of normal video footage in his award winning digital short Invisible Mountain as a mechanism to get across the visual thinking that was occurring inside the mind of one of the characters in his film.
Yes that's awesome and worth exploring. It is really an amazing software you guys have put out. It is like a little known secret but that probably makes it easier on you I suppose than having to deal with all that comes from getting too big. In any case, I really think it is awesome. I always tell people about it, because it is really on another level. It must be avant-garde but I figure eventually more will catch on.
In any case, though there is quite a learning curve to know all that it can do; I feel happy to stick with it because the more I learn about it the more I am surprised by what it can do. In some ways I don't want too many people to know about it; but I usually can't help tell people about it; it is so great how passionate you are over there. That's what it's all about.
more direct link to a trailer of "My Love" Here
Like your Hep Cat band Idea
Haha thanks. :D
Hi John,
I've read through both of these tips several times and I think I pretty much understand the process now but before I go ahead and do it I had at least one question.
I noticed that if we wanted to do it with automatically generated bezier paths, one has to select multiple images for each keyframe. If I wanted the encapsulated action step to be included as part of the PASeq I had already made using the video (or PNG sequence) as a source, would there be a way so that those keyframes for the source context is just coming from the same video frames or PNG sequence as the source for the PASeq I already have?
The reason for this of course would be so that I don't have to composite that layer in later. Unless there is a way to use Studio Artist purely for compositing (i.e., taking multiple pre-made movies and using Studio Artist's layers and blending mode together to composite them together) which I assume is out of Studio Artist's territory.
If neither of this is possible, I guess I could split up my SA effect into three or more passes and then composite them elsewhere like in AE. Please let me know if that's the best solution. Thanks.
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