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PatMarrNC - all messages by user

2016/6/23 17:32:26
Patient lying in bed ikes wrote:

I have extracted the default actors and uploaded them here as OBJ and blender:
www.ikes.nl/downloads/muvizu_default_meshes.zip

Ikes,
what ZIP program and version did you use to create this archive? I downloaded it but my version of 7ZIP doesn't know how to extract it
2016/6/23 17:24:32
Patient lying in bed the upshot of all this is that, with models, UV maps and keyframing, we can now create all those moves that were never before possible with standard actions.

Ikes, PM me an address and I'll send you some money. You just saved me a month or more of my life that I won't have to spend making models manually!
2016/6/23 17:21:20
Patient lying in bed ziggy72 wrote:
I can control them at last! Well, not really - it's just a static mesh, but it's a great base to work from (and very accurate, of course).

I have a feeling this is the beginning of some cool new stuff!

Hats off to Ikes for pointing us in the right direction

Absolutely! I feel like we should be singing "for he's a jolly good fellow" and carrying him around on our shoulders as we squirt champagne at him, or something like that!

And apologies to Primaveranz, I seem to have hijacked your thread! but hey, it's lead to something positive - whatever position you want the patient to lie in, it can be done much more convincingly now


when something this big gets revealed, its appropriate to hijack a thread! And Primaveranz got his question answered before all this came up, so it's all good!
2016/6/23 17:16:07
ROBOT VOICE SOFTWARE MrDrWho13 wrote:

As for recording sound from your computer in audacity, you should be able to do this without using a patch cable. (I don't know if it's common to say 1/8'' in the US but in the UK we usually say 3.5mm jack. Interesting to hear you call it something different )

it is equally common in the USA to refer to just about everything in inches or millimeters. I'm old and set in my ways, so I still use the imperial scale most of the time.

I'll double check when I get back to my PC but I think you may need to enable it in your windows sound settings.

That would be awesome (and greatly appreciated!)

In windows XP there was a WHAT YOU HEAR setting, but that seems to have vanished with the newer versions of Windows.. at least I haven't discovered how to duplicate that feature in Windows 10 yet.
2016/6/23 16:50:51
ROBOT VOICE SOFTWARE Since Muvizu has a couple of robot characters, a recurring need for all of us is a way to create robotic voices for the characters. Here is a link to one such product. It has a free version and 3 levels of paid versions.

The free version has one male and one female voice. It will take a text file and convert it to synthesized speech (English). The free version won't save the audio to MP3. I use a 1/8" patch cord between my sound card's speaker jack and mic jack, which lets me record in Audacity whatever is playing thru the speakers

For about $70USD, you can get more voices and the ability to save directly to MP3. The program (even the free version) has a way to speed up the reading and change the pitch. For creating a robot character's dialog, it's pretty useful!

http://www.naturalreaders.com/index.html

If you know of other such resources, especially ones that are completely free, please post links below!
2016/6/23 14:42:29
Patient lying in bed awesome Ikes!

Since you already know how to do it, any chance you'd be willing to extract the basic mesh for each of the Muvizu characters and post the collection somewhere in OBJ format?

For the purpose intended, details don't matter.. just the basic shape and size.

====update=====

Wow, I just DL both files and briefly read thru the information... this is great! The implications are that not only can we get basic models of the current Muvizu characters, but same goes for any future characters, since they'll always be made for the Unreal engine!

We need to get this info in a WIKI because it will come up again...

Ikes, you da MAN!! Thanks for being smart enough to know about both of these products, and double thanks for sharing your knowledge instead of hoarding it!
edited by PatMarrNC on 23/06/2016
2016/6/23 14:37:54
HIT FILM SALE June 30 - July 4 $100 off I just got an email from HitFilm announcing an exclusive sale for people using the free version. June 30 to July 4

If you've ever thought you might buy the PRO version, but you haven't even installed the free one yet... now's the time to DL the freebie so you qualify for the sale price. It's my understanding that they don't have sales very often.
2016/6/23 5:14:32
Finger Pistols Are dangerous Casting clayster2012 wrote:
Hey Patt, that translator lets you download the wav file, i'm adding this to my favorites, if the robot voices don't work I may just use this, thanks


wow.. I didn't notice the download button.. that kinda makes it easy if you decide to go that route!

I notice there's another option farther down the page to change the frequency of the beeps.. lower number makes a lower pitched sound... so if your story ever introduces the robot's "dad" or "mom", "dad" could have a "deeper" voice and "Mom" could have a higher voice.

You can also speed it up so it takes less time for the robot to deliver his lines

Or, you could speed it up when the robot is supposed to be excited, and slow it down when the robot is tired.
edited by PatMarrNC on 23/06/2016
2016/6/23 4:16:07
Finger Pistols Are dangerous Casting
but just to let you know Robo James is a Clock Work Robot, they didn't have electronics back in them thar days..lol, but if you can manage to get it sound good then I'm game with it, I have a couple of Lines already for him in the saloon scene, so if you want to give it a try let me know and I'll send you the lines.


tell you what... send the lines, and I'll send you the robo-speak and you can decide if it works for your purposes.

What might be cool would be to do his dialog with dots & dashes like a telegraph (the closest thing to electronics in those days) then to translate you could either use sub titles, or do what they did in the old Lassie series, where Lassie would bark and somebody would tell us what Lassie said.

"What's that Lassie?? You say Timmy fell in the well again? Good girl Lassie!"

The telegraph-speak might turn into a signature theme. There are so many movie cliches, but I've never seen anybody else use that one.

Here's a morse code translator.. you can type his dialog, then play back the dots and dashes as sound. If you can capture the sound in audacity then you can save it as an MP3 and use it as dialog.
http://morsecode.scphillips.com/translator.html

That way, if some nerd who actually knows morse code ever watches your cartoon, he'll be impressed that your robot speaks in true morse code. ;-)
2016/6/23 3:56:46
Patient lying in bed ziggy72 wrote:
@ PatMarrNC Good Beefy shape, thanks again Pat!


And thanks for the Fat Man Pat


You're both quite welcome! I was tickled to see how Ziggy used the female model, and I look forward to seeing how others might use these and the other models in the pipeline!
2016/6/23 2:40:50
Finger Pistols Are dangerous Casting re: saloon set

holy cow, Clayster, you are amazing! Are you rich and don't have to work or something?? How do you find time to do all this??? and so FAST!! And so WELL!! I'm totally impressed

Regarding Robo James:
If he's a robot, I have a program that generates robotic dialog from a text file. The program doesn't have a SAVE feature, but I figured out how to save it anyway. If you don't already have a way to create robotic voices I could do his voice maybe. But if you already have a way, I'm fine with not taking on anything else. Your call.
2016/6/23 0:22:20
Patient lying in bed primaveranz wrote:
Thanks for the link and thanks Pat! I will use it as a guide for the proportions for my Male patient.


there's also a model for the Fat Man character: https://www.dropbox.com/s/6iwgk5z64hjrdo8/fat%20man.zip?dl=0

more to come (but probably not until fall when the live music scene slows down )


update:
here's one for Beefy (sized for FBX) : https://www.dropbox.com/s/exq857jm5pk8m32/beefy.obj?dl=0

these are only reference models to get you in the ballpark. Certainly NOT finished models suitable for anything other than sizing other items to the same scale.
edited by PatMarrNC on 23/06/2016
2016/6/23 0:19:06
Patient lying in bed Rocque wrote:
Thanks, Pat. I learn more than one new thing every time I use Muvizu or something related to it. If I wanted your new female character, then would I have to have a 3D modeling program to use it? Or, will it just open in Muvizu?


It won't open in Muvizu. The only 3d formats that open in Muvizu are ASE and FBX.

The OBJ files are useful only in a 3D modelling program where you need to make something like a helmet that fits one of the characters... (You can fit it to the OBJ model)... or in the case of Ziggy's project, he used the model to help form the shape in the sheet.

Without having something the right size for fitting, you end up blindly making an item, importing it to Muvizu, seeing that it isn't the right size and/or orientation, going back and resizing blindly until after a bunch of tries you end up with something that works. Having a reference model saves a few steps.

Then, whatever gets created in the 3D program can be saved in the FBX or ASE format for use in Muvizu. Make sense?
2016/6/23 0:10:17
Patient lying in bed primaveranz wrote:

Is there a way to extract the 3D mesh for one of the Muvizu dummies into a modelling tool, or do you have to create it from scratch?


The quick answer is "no, we can't export a character mesh from Muvizu"

But having a model of each character that can be brought into a modelling app at the correct size makes it a lot easier to create accessories for the characters. A set of models has been wished for by many of us in the past. I set out to create a full set of OBJ models, but I got distracted by life after finishing only a few.

In my opinion the "collective cleverness" on this forum is pretty high, and I suspect that if we put our heads together we could probably think up a better way to do it than the way I'm doing it (manually).

Autodesk offers a free online service which generates a 3D model from a series of about 60 images taken all around a subject. The utility is named 123DCatch.

I tried to pan a camera around a character and save the output as PNG, but that generated more than the max number of images. So I wrote a batch file to delete the extra images so I ended up with a symmetrical sample and the right number of images.

But it failed to generate a 3D model because
1) the images were too low-res and
2) I didn't have "identifiers" built into the character's skin. Identifiers are a series of randomly placed dots or characters on the surface of an object that provide a reference so the algorithm can join the photos together at the right place

I think if somebody tries this experiment again and uses higher res output for the images and creates a skin for the character with dots, numbers, letters or other identifiers that help to sew the images together, it should be possible to GENERATE nearly perfect 3D models from these characters.

more info here: http://www.123dapp.com/catch

whoever finally figures this out will have my respect forevermore
2016/6/22 23:05:08
Patient lying in bed Rocque wrote:
What is OB format? I apologize for being uneducated in all of this for now.


Hey Rocque... no need to apologize for asking questions! That's what forums are all about! And although it's true that many forums are full of people who berate others for asking what they consider to be "stupid questions" this is definitely NOT one of THOSE forums!

OBJ (Oh Bee Jay) format is an old and well-established file format for 3D models which has been around long enough that it's become one of the widely supported formats that can be used to move models from one program to another. If a 3D program supports only a handful of formats, chances are good that one of them is the OBJ format.

For that reason, when people want to make models available in a format that lots of people can open in their own favorite modelling program, OBJ is a good choice.
2016/6/22 19:39:53
Patient lying in bed ziggy72 wrote:
Erm, a couple of minutes... Big Grin See, in 3d Coat, you can just 'drop' a sheet of 'cloth' over something (in this case PatMarr's body template) and it conforms to the shape for you. Simples!


this is why I like to collect all kinds of animation and modelling tools, because you never know when your workaround might need some obscure feature that only one bit of software can do. Cool trick that 3D coat can do with the conforming sheet. I've never seen that feature in any other software.

Regarding Ziggy's ability to create this in minutes: That's why he's a Mogul. ;-)
2016/6/22 16:17:56
Transparency in Body Texture? ukBerty wrote:
In the past I have coloured the rest of the character green and then greenscreened it out in post.


not that you have time for another project or anything... but I'd love to read your book on tips & tricks if you ever write it.
2016/6/22 16:14:42
Help with Audio. I'm just guessing crazy stuff here... but really not THAT crazy...

I'm assuming you spoke the dialog into a mic and recorded it in audacity. Is it possible there was a real cricket in the room when you were recording? Our brains tend to ignore background noises to the point that we don't notice them anymore.. but the mic misses nothing. The reason why recording studios have isolation rooms for the singer is to make sure no ambient sound can creep into the track. It's a common occurrence, especially in the realm of home recording.

Another common thing in home studios is noise that's introduced when a motor of some kind turns on... like maybe the air conditioner, furnace, dishwasher etc. Depending on how the house is wired and which circuit your recording gear is using, you can pick up a high pitched electronic whine due to interference from other circuit activity.

Another thing that has happened to me is that I forgot to remove an audio file from a set when I reused it for a new scene. It happened to be in the same section as my new audio, so part way through my new audio I heard unexpected background noise.

And of course, when I can't find any assignable cause, I blame it on gremlins. The gremlin population must be pretty high where I live, because unexplainable crazy-a$$ stuff happens to me all the time. ;-)
2016/6/22 15:56:16
Patient lying in bed primaveranz wrote:
Is there any way to get the actor to just lie on his back in bed and put a sheet over him as if he is a very sick patient? Or will I have to make a dummy myself and import it?


funny you should mention that... Ziggy just solved that problem. Maybe he will elaborate. ;-)
2016/6/22 2:31:53
Make Me Laugh ( Comedy Competition) Looks interesting so far, Ziggy!
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Muvizu is easy to use 3D animation software that allows anyone to create high quality animations quickly and easily. Muvizu’s animation engine is ideal for storytellers, animators, teachers and businesses looking to engage, enchant and delight audiences with animated content.