i just did a transition context movie and i forgot to expand the keyframes. if you choose the virtual sub expand keys does that expand them also because it worked.
i am wondering what the generative set transition size/generative procedural keyframes settings have to do with the process in transition contexts? i am interested in the history sequence to keyframed paint settings too and have a vague memory of you perhaps saying one of those settings could be used to do the hand painting of keyframed movies that were in the movie layers.
in what sort of scenarios would you use history sequence to paseq settings?
does the load a style image or folder setting meant to be used with gallery show? same question with art strategy setting.
i'm having a blast with all this new stuff.
Replies
I will cover all of the Transition Context controls and menu commands over the course of a few posts. So i think i can answer all of yoru questions as we work through that material.
So the controls to edit Transition Contexts are available in the Editor as a sub menu option when in Paint Action Sequence operation mode.
Remember, you can always use the main Operation menu to get to any control panel inside of Studio Artist in one menu command.
Most Studio Artist control panels hide editable parameters if they are not currently relevant ( because they are used in some feature currently turned off in another parameter). The Transition Context control panel does not do this (yet as of V5.5.5), so be aware to avoid confusion.
Let's quickly run through the different controls available.
Trans Algorithm
A series of different time based interpolation (or transition) algorithms. Some of them (like Flow or Fade) will be your bread and butter. Others (like Alg1, Al2 or Fracture) can be thought of as colorful and gritty visual equivalents of guitar effect pedals. May one of them be your visual Sovtek Pi muff.
Others (like Face) are trying to do facial detection and then transition between the 2 detected faces (so if you have non facial imagery being transitioned then all bets are off, and the face detection may or may not work based on the imagery being analyzed).
Trans Source Option
Trans SubNest Size
Typically you want to keep Trans Source Option on Default (so things just work as normal transitions between actual red keyframes). The other options are special cases.
One of them (Canvas) is a way to feed back the current canvas image into the transition (we are entering science fair project territory here, but i know some of your like that kind of stuff). This option is a way to turn a Transition Context into a generative time-based visual oscillator if that suits your fancy.
The other 2 virtual keyframe options let you time compress or time expand using virtual keyframes (as opposed to you having to go and manually enter all of the keyframes, virtual does it for you automatically).
So say you have a movie file key-framed in a Transition Context at frame time 1. Then if you turn on 'Virtual SubNest Keys' you will create a series of virtual keyframes that index into the movie file reference every 'Trans SubNest Size' # of frames. Let's us say you have it set to 10 like is shown above for Trans SubNest Size. Then every 10 frames (after the initial red start key) you will see a yellow virtual sub nest keyframe.
Note, there is currently a cosmetic bug when you first turn it on, so mouse down in the Transition Context action step and jiggle it a little bit, then release the mouse, and those yellow virtual keyframes will come into view.
Now the Transition Context will work exactly the way you have it configured, effectively sub-sampling the reference movie file (skipping frames) every 10 frames, and then running the Trans Algorithm you have setup to compute all of the frames between the 2 yellow virtual keyframes.
If you now change the Trans Source Option to the other virtual keyframe option (Virtual SubExpand Keys) you will now time expand your movie file reference by 10X. So each frame reference in the referenced movie file is pushed out 10 frames apart to land on those yellow virtual expansion keys. The interpolation algorithm used for the movie frame time expansion will be your currently specified Trans Algorithm.
Trans Alg Extent
Trans Alg SubDivision
Trans Alg SoftMid SubDiv
There 3 are adjustable parameters associated with individual Trans Algorithms. They do not all work with every algorithm.
Trans Alg Extent specified the spatial extent of the algorithms effect (for Alg1,Alg2,Fracture,Alg3,Alg4).
Trans Alg SubDivision lets you lower the spatial frequency octave of the transition algorithm. reducing it will let you dial down high frequency components(and noise) associated with a particular algorithms interaction with your source material.
Trans Alg SoftMid SubDiv let's you dial in a second sub-octave filter that auto-mixes in and out as you approach the center and then leave the center of the transition's range.
Trans Destination
Determines where the output of the Transition Context is routed in the interface. You can currently route it to the Canvas, the Source, or the Style.
Trans BusOut
The mythical back door connect from the Transition Context to elsewhere in the interface. First prize to anyone who can tell me where it currently routes to (ha,ha).
As you might expect from my description of this one, it is early on in the overall development strategy. You will see it's full power unveiled in V6.
Can you have more than one Transition Context in a PASeq?
Why yes you can. And they can be keyframe referencing totally different file references.
But they will all use the Transition Context parameters you have specified (so those parameters are global, not local to a particular action step).
We might improve that situation in V6, TBD.
Can one specify a compositing option for the Transition Context output?
Not in V5.5.5. Again, something to look forward to in V6.
How does one make a Transition Context?
Will be explained in the next post reply.
thank you for all of this. i'm obesessed with it. i'm using the face setting and it's doing crazy things.
Let's dive into how to generate Transition Contexts.
So all of the menu commands for generating different PASeq Contexts are available under Action : PASeq Timeline.
My, that is a long series of sub-menus. All kinds of different new features are hiding inside of that PASeq Timeline menu.
Unlike everything else recorded inside of a Paint Action Sequence (PASeq), Contexts are recorded by running an associated 'Record Context' menu command.
PASeq Contexts have been around since the dawn of Studio Artist V4. For an overview of what they used to be (and all of that old functionality still works in V5.5.5), check out this PASeq Context tip.
Transition Contexts are like the old Content Context, except they visually interpolate between keyframe content over time. So if your Trans Algorithm was set to Fade, then they would implement a fade between the image int he first keyframe and the image in the second keyframe.
I say image, but you can also keyframe movie files in Transition Contexts (and Content and Source Contexts as well). If your keyframes reference movie files, then the referenced movie contents will frame advance as the transition occurs.
If the second keyframe for the transition references frame 1 of the movie file, then it isn't going to play until the timeline hits it's key time. So you want to setup the frame index for the key to be at least the same number of frames into the movie as the number of frames in the transition. So if your transition is 10 frames long (distance from one keyframe cell to the next one), then the movie file associated with that second next keyframe should be references to start 10 (or more) frames into the movie file (if you want it to play across the entire transition).
Lets discuss the relevant Record Context menu commands to make new Transition Contexts.
You might want to erase before running any of these Record Context menu commands, if not it gets added at the bottom of the list.
The Empty Transition menu command will record an empty Transition Context action step into the PASeq list.
The Single Key -use Source : Transiton menu command will make a new Transition Context that references whatever file is in the Source Area. If it is a movie file, then the current frame time is recorded into the new red key as the movie references offset associated with that red keyframe.
The Multiple Keys from Disk : Transition menu command brings up a standard file dialog that you can use to input multiple file reference keyframes. You can select multiple files in the list of files. And after you hit Ok, the file dialog will come back again so you can select more files. Hit Cancel when you have selected enough files.
All of your selected files will be referenced in a series of different red keyframes in the new Transition Context.
In order to space those new red keyframes apart so you can see the effect of the transition algorithm (as the timeline progresses across the non-red frames between spaced apart red keyframes), you need to time expand the timeline.
You can do this using the Action : PASeq Timeline : Time Compress/Expand menu command. Time expanding by 10 would space the individual red keyframes 10 frames apart.
If you press the Animate button above the PASeq list and timeline you can watch the PASeq playback into the canvas (or where ever you specified as the Trans Destination) and see the effect of the different Transition Context parameters on the visual appearance of the transition effect. You can adjust them while it is running
So the whole Generative submenu in Action : PASeq Timeline is still under active development.
Because of that, there is not a whole lot you can really do with it in V5.5.5. But we'll cover what is currently available below.
'Generate Procedural Transition Keyframes' and 'Convert History Sequence PaintStroke to TimePaint PASeq Action Step' are turned off in release V5.5.5. So think of them as placeholders for future functionality.
'Set Transition Size' lets you set a generative transition size in frames. That is the transition time used in any generative timeline command.
So if you run 'Convert History Sequence to Keyframe PASeq Action Step', and you have a series of action steps of the same operation type with different parameter values recorded in your History Sequence, then those individual action steps are automatically turned into a series of individual keyframes spaced the Transition Size apart in a single new generated PASeq action step.
So it's a way to quickly record in a History Sequence a series of parameter change action steps for the same effect and then turn them into a rhythmic sequence of auto-generated keyframes (that will parameter interpolate between the generated red keyframes) in a single new action step in your PASeq list.
If the 'Generate Procedural Transition Keyframes' and 'Convert History Sequence PaintStroke to TimePaint PASeq Action Step' menus were turned on in V5.5.5, then the Transition Size would also apply to them. They will be available in V6.
The generative transition size also works with some experimental interactive generative keyframe functionality that is also un-accessible in V5.5.5. So more stuff to look forward to in V6.
The Style can certainly be used in Gallery Show. But it is also available throughout the program as a second source of visual attribute modulation.
At the most basic level, it is just another image buffer (like the Source is). And both the Source and the Style are analyzed by the internal human visual modeling ai algorithms available in Studio Artist. Studio Artist always worked from day one by allowing visual effects to be modulated by different visual attributes derived off of a human visual model analysis of the Source.
With the new Style functionality, you can generate a second set of visual attributes based off of the Style. So you can mix and match visual attribute modulation between 2 different images, and then utilize that to build all kinds of different style transfer effects.
But you aren't limited to just that kind of thing. Since the Style is an image buffer, you can use it as a temporary swap buffer in a PASeq. This can be used for all kinds of different effect scenerios. Look at the factory PASeq presets to see how it is used that way.
I will put together a more expansive explanation of the Style and what you can do with it in another post.
Same goes for the Art Strategy menus, i'll cover them in another post. They are direct extensions of functionality available in Gallery Show that you can work with at the top level interface.