Animation Previews
 

One thing that has really bothered me about animation in FIRST is that the animators don't really group up across team lines. As far as the robot competition, people share ideas and plans all the time on this forum. I know no one really wants to tip their hand as to what they will be doing for their animation will be about, but I thought it would be nice if people actually shared some WIP shots and gave pointers to each other.

So, on that thread of working together, here's what we've worked out so far over here on Team 253


I've been working on a Bugatti Veyron, and my assistant has been doing a Ferrari Modena 360

The Bugatti:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v2...onBodyWIP1.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v2...onBodyWIP2.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v2...onBodyWIP3.jpg


The Ferrari

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v2...ri/modena1.jpg

I think it would be great if other animators started showing what work they had done, and discussing techniques with each other. For my part, if anyone wants to learn about modeling from schematics, or car modeling in general, feel free to drop me a line on AIM at ElFrijole12. Good luck to all of the other animation teams! If we can all produce really spectacular animations this year, maybe people will stand up and notice how much talent there is in the AVA competition.

Re: Animation Previews
 

It's kinda early to be asking people to put their work up.
True FIRST is a very sharing community but asking to people to share their ideas this early is not likely. People don't want thier ideas stolen (and it does happen, even in FIRST). Wait about a week or two.

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Oh wow! Nince car! Im in deep trouble. :ahh:

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I like the idea of sharing WIPs.

This year, my team will be taking on the challenge of character animation. So I thought I'd start with the hand

The car models are looking good.

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In response to the stolen ideas: I don't plan on explaining anything along the lines of a script for quite awhile. I figure cars are generic enough of a theme that people using a similar theme will still result in a very different animation.



Nice mat on that hand, KCY. Is that sub-surface scattering?

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we will post some wip shots 2nite :) cu

nice car btw what method are you using can i see some wireframes ?

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Yeah, so this is what i have so far, just my stuff, 2 weeks of work, bout 2 hours a day.


BTW, wow i like those cars. I agree w/ fraggs, let's see some wireframes.
And the hand looks Sweet. Props, yo.

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Well I guess it wouldn't hurt to post our character designs.
Here is Xavier and Xerita.
our character designer Gnoc has a thing for Hello Kitty.

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it is of course a very preliminary rendering :o

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For the cars, we have been using a polymodeling technique. I found some blueprints on onnovanbraam, and put them into max. I then started with a single plane and extruded that bad boy around into a rough model of the car and then put a meshsmooth mod on it. Making the general shape isn't that bad, but the seams are a real pain.

Wires:

Veyron

This
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v2...ti/wirelow.jpg
Looks like This
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v2...i/wirehigh.jpg
with meshsmooth 2
and it looks like this
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v2...ighgoodies.jpg
when I unhide everything


Modena 360

no smooth
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v2...ri/wirelow.jpg
smooth
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v2...i/wirehigh.jpg
smooth, with stuff
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v2...ighgoodies.jpg

I don't know how to make those snazzy wireframe materials where it's shaded in between the wires. This is a blend between a plain gray mat and a black wireframe mat. Any suggestions on getting opacity in between my lines?


Salik, are you using reactor for those curtains?

Re: Animation Previews
 

nice wireframes.

yeah, it looks like salik is using reactor. Looks good, but i would suggest using a wider plane to reactor so that your final product has more wrinkles in it. It looks a little stiff or stretched, if you know what i mean. also try increasing the tiling on the texture, which will give you the appearance of having a finer fabric. and add a shell modifier, to give them a thickness. kinda 2-d looking, a bit.
But really nice looking models and all, good job.

PS: what is with the window reflection in the ligtbulb? is that a reflection map or HDRI, or is that just from the scene?

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I cant get pictures on here. some one help me.

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Salik, it looks pretty good. Watch out for clipping on the hands, and while you're at it add some more "joints" to the fingers: right now they are just curves. The mat. on the table looks really boring and a little stretched, so you might want to address that. The only other thing is the chest and elbows, which are both really simple. Otherwise, nice render. And Capt.Ard, I think the light bulb mat. is just a picture of a window IRL.

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Here is an animation test of one of my characters I wanted to see how his body moves. This test took me at least 10 mins of my time to animate.

Animation test

Re: Animation Previews
 

@White nice wires looks clean. we noticed some weird lines on the back bumper so check that out unless u have it already fixed.

@Salik See if you can fix that weird reflection in the lightblub and add some more polys to the reactored plane. but its looking good like the character design

@Buddy love it haha its a mix between matrix and stupidity. use photobucket.com to upload pix or imageshack.com is the other one i think

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How about uploading preview JPGs to the gallery area here on ChiefDelphi? There's already a folder labeled "Animation Competition".

It arranges thumbnails nicely - no clutter.

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lo, i like the vid. not bad animation, yo.
10 minutes, eh? I always have trouble when i go to animate things, motions end up choppy, but you did a pretty good job. Esp. for a test.

Keep 'em coming guys.

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After looking at many of these animation previews, I was wondering how many ppl are actually using 3ds max because they don't look like they could be done in 3ds max. Don't get me wrong or anything, they could be, just doesn't look like it. And i know it has to be

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All ours are done in max8 nothing else (team 116). Thers alot you can do in max if you search in those many buttons and option which i find very annoying haha.

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Let me assure, you, these are all quite possible in 3DSM. Not only are they possible, the work we have been posting looks like fingerpainting compared to the stuff put out by pros. Check out these pages for some ridiculously good art done in 3D Max:

http://www.ballisticpublishing.com/b...lery/index.php
http://www.ballisticpublishing.com/b...lery/index.php

With a little bit of practice, you can do quite a lot in 3DSM

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ya, ya ok. I guess it is just because of the rigging, materials, and beginning of the animation. I didn't intend to offend anyone by asking this question, i was just wondering. I can show you my animation, but not right yet. later days.

Re: Animation Previews
 

thanks for the comments...

it's a really rough render ... i kinda threw it together ...

The curtains are actually just regular patches.

the light bulb btw is going to have a lume (?) shader on it so it actually glows like a real light bulb... however it takes about 30 min to render so i didn't bother. I'm gonna add some more things to the table ... like pencils etc..

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This is my second year using 3DS Max and I wasn't very good with lighting stuff in my animation and I have created a ceiling fan for my animation this year and I was wondering how I would make the light bulbs look real and light a room. I would give a pic of it in the room, but don't want to show to much.

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Well, finished up the Bugatti today. Just need to do some work on the interior. There are some errors in the model, but I really need to get rolling on some other elements of the animation if i want to meet deadline. :ahh:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v2...ti/veyron1.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v2...ti/veyron2.jpg
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v2...ti/veyron3.jpg

I was a little worried about copyright stuff when I was doing the detail work. Do you think I'm allowed to put the Bugatti logo on?

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@white looks good the only cons i have ... CHEAP CHROME im sure u can do better on those rims. Also i think something is messed up with the hood it looks kinda "bumpy" on the edges not very smooth. Bout the logo, i dont think thers a problem with it unless u make fun of the car or anything just make it look good and i dont think bugatti would care.

@Damelvin bout the lighting contact Capt.ArD he knos alot bout lighting stuff (i think ...)

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lol, thanks for the props fraggs.

Yeah, it really depends on how you are rendering the scene. If you are rendering the scene w/ the scanline renderer, use a raytracer material w/ a high luminosity. in the render menu, turn on Radiosity. That should make the lightbulb emit it's own light. Kills render time tho.

I prefer to render in mental ray, as it has better shadows. But you can't use radiosity in Mental ray. I just turn on the self-illumination of the material really high, and put a MR omni right next to the bulb. good enough i say.

Hope it helps.

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I tried to put an omni light in there lightbulbs, but really quickly it looked like the light bleached the colors of other things in my animation. Mabye I will drop the intesity. I am going to mess around with different lightings. Thx for the tip.
Also, how would I made curtains or cloth looking material like teh ones in salik syeds picture.

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i wish i had something to post! i am the only person on my team who does the anomation and also video stuff. so ive been pretty busy with promos and such i havent got to animate yet :( .

ohh well i dont think i will have one this year but hopefully next year i will. :rolleyes:

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@dame its called reactor. its a built in physics engine into max ( used by halflife2 aka havok or something like that)

hers a tut on how to get all this working right. i may remind u reactor crashes sometimes for no real reason so dont get frustrated and save before you reactor !

http://www.tutorialized.com/tutorial/Reactor-Cloth/6539

if you need further help tell me where your stuck and i will try to help out

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p.s. i have not been animating very long(less than a year) so any tips would be helpfull. don't be surprised if i ask oat of ?S. :D thanks

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I here you bro. I am the only one on my team who does pro mos videos. And everyone on the team thinks I'm wasting my time doing the 3ds max. gggrrrrr....it just makes me angry. :mad:

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yeah it kinda stinks animation parts kinda getting pushed under. even do we do alot of work :ahh: but what ever life is life

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Damelvin,
how big is the scene you are putting the light in? if it is too small then the light will bleach out the colors, as it is brighter in the center than it is at the edges. Also make sure you are using a MR area omni, so you can adjust the near/far attenuation and cast more realistic shadows.

As per cloth, do you mean texture or models? for a texture, just get a nice, high-res image online and set it as your diffuse map. For a model, use a plane first and then yu have 2 ways to go. 1. do it by hand. easy to do, but it takes forever and is boring and won't look as realstic. 2. Reactor as Fraggs said. the tutorials in max are sufficient to learn this, but set aside a few hours to tinker and mess around (you will also probably have to reboot max, if not your computer a few times, due to crashes) until you get the hang of it. If you get any problems there, shout out. I'vbe done a fair bit of work w/ reactor too.

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If it's information you seek this is in excellent site to seek it out.

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how many hours does everyone spend on their animation? Do you always think about the animation you are creating?

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yeah and to add to it my school doesn't even have 3Ds max or anything PERIOD for animation :ahh:. i mean we have final cut pro and similar programs. but i am the first person on my team to deal with 3d animation as a mater a fact i think no one in our school knows how to. its sad. I am currently talking with the administration to buy 3Ds max. Ive been using my laptop.

Re: Animation Previews
 

By the time we completed our 2004 animation, I think that I alone had put in about 45 hours in Photoshop. Our head animator had at least 300 hours.

I hope that this doesn't send this thread veering off-topic, but could someone please tell me what an electronic storyboard is? I know that there are two methods of submitting the storyboard, but I really would prefer not to send ours in (it is a lengthy story, but the back side of the poster may not be considered appropriate by FIRST standards - and it would be nice to have a storyboard example for future reference). I was told that I could simply take pictures of each "frame" of the storyboard and then put them into a powerpoint file. If this is true, it would be great, since I am not 3DSmax-inclined in any way and I would have the added benefit of being able to edit out the occasional greasy fingerprint (they are awfully difficult to erase...)

Any thoughts?

Re: Animation Previews
 

We did ours in 3 days last year (it was really last minute)...we had too many lights in it tho, and we found out that it would take 12 days to render, and was due in 8 hours...oops. We exported a preview and sent that in. It WAS our first time using the software tho, and we're still impressed we managed to model and animate everything.

This year we started brainstorming as soon as we got the package and haven't let up since.

Re: Animation Previews
 

Just wondering how big is anyone;s animation team? I am the only one on teh team wanting to do this so 1 here. I guess if we had more than just 6 kids on the team that might also help on more people wanted to join in animation.

Re: Animation Previews
 

we've got 4 this year, and had 2 last year

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@koko ed yeah that site is great if u wana look at stuff and think wow how much of my life do i have to give up to make this stuff :D its just crazy on cgtalk how extreme realistic 3d modeling can get

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its just me on my team and i do promos videos and all that as well as animation. :ahh:

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u gota be very busy

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we have about 8-10 kids on the team, some aren't very consistent. Last year we peaked at about 20. But really, only about 4-6 or so get to do much with the animation, because most of the kids are freshmen, and havn't learned anything yet. next year they will get to do what Fraggs and i are doing, and train the next batch of animators.

but man, only one person on the team? that's crucial. hope you do well, and don't stress yourself to death. (i have a friend that has chronic stress-related stomachsches, not too fun)

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just me doing the animation, and i spend a lot of time on it. Hopefully it turns out ok.

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just a little lol :eek:

Re: Animation Previews
 

since i am a rookie and am learning from no one and are last video guy only made about 1 or 2 short 5 min videos a year and probably didn't even know we had 3ds max at our school.

well what I'm trying to get at here is i need some info on registering to be in the comp. since its only me and its later in the season already i wont be able to enter but what about next year how does it work what are some of the rules? :confused:

thanks

p.s. what regals is everyone going to? i wanna see your animations :) . were going to Philly and Hartford.

p.p.s. i will plan to have some of my work at the regionals :D

Re: Animation Previews
 

same here.

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I was messing around with modeling some extra things to put in my animation and I started making a psp. The only problem is when I tried to make the L and R buttons on the top smaller I had to detach them and shrink them then retach them. Probably another way to do it but cant think of any. Anyways it left a gap in the model and when I cap the holes it doesnt work right. Any suggestions heres some pics:

the problem:

After trying to cap:

Re: Animation Previews
 

If you're working with an editable poly, go to "poly" under selection on the modify panel. Then hit "create" (i think it's under edit geometry, but i'm not sure off the top of my head). This will show all the vertices in the model. Next, check the picture I made for you. Click on the following vertices in the following order (1,2,4,3,1) then (3,4,6,5,2). That should fix up your problem.

The Picture:
http://www.dropshots.com/photos/5920...116/202033.jpg

Re: Animation Previews
 

Wow! Thanks it worked perfectly. Heres what is looks like now:

Not the finished project but close.

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The buttons could use a little work. I'd suggest first putting a shell modifier on them with a pretty big inset for the "inner" spinner. Next make them a *bit* more opaque, and spin up the index of refraction to something like 1.7 or so. Finally put the specular and gloss to something appropriately high. This will help to give them some mass, rather than just looking like ghostly parallelograms on the sides. Good luck!

Re: Animation Previews
 

Since I have never used a shell modifier since I dont know everything about all teh tools in Max, I will try it. But this is a easter egg not really important to the animation, so I will work on it later.

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for the animation, how do you make an object seethrough? what i mean is i want to make a sheet of plexiglass or a window, but i don't know how to make it see throught to look like a window. any help would be great.

Re: Animation Previews
 

okay, look at the material that you apply to the plexiglass-to-be. look near where the diffuse/ambien/specular colors are, and you should see a box that says transparency or opacity or something like that. set the number low for opacity and high for transparency, depending on which one is what you see.

another thing that you want to consider is reflections/light. Im gonna assume you know how to adjust specularity/glossiness, so just keep in mind that if the object you have is 100% see through, those things won't show up so well.

shout if you need more help.

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what material do i use? i'm not sure how to start it. I am new to 3ds max this year, i started working on it last year, but couldn't complete in time for the deadline. Yes, i should know how to do the others, just not sure where to start exactly.

Re: Animation Previews
 

okay, open up the material editor. click on one of the blank material slots. from there you need to decide how cool and fancy you want it to be. if you want lots of shiney and reflections, then click "get material" and make a raytrace material. then uncheck the transparency box and increase the number. then add whatever colors or other tweaks you want. this will give you lots of cool reflections, but slows render times a bit. or you can just set the opacity low on the default material. then make sure to up the specularity and glossiness.

I don't know if max 8 come with them, but there are a lot of premade materials in the materials library. i have mine left over from max 6, and just copy the materials over every time i update. if you don;t have raytrace libraries 1 and 2, pm me and i can email them to you. they'll help a lot.
don't worry, this stuff is legal as it is part of 3dsmax6 that went out 2 years ago.

Re: Animation Previews
 

Hey everyone

Unfortunately its just me and one other person on my team that have offered to work on the animation and we both help with designing and building the actual robot so it'll be a challenge.

Ive done character modeling before, but it was in maya, i was wondering how different 3dsmax 8 is from maya 6.0. If anyone has also used that

Re: Animation Previews
 

max is more complex more menues sometimes harder to find places where maya is more visual. In max you gota enter like numbers in random little boxes with like 1 line of text and fool around with it, where in maya well thats a little different its more visual.If you read a couple tuts online then ur ready to go i would say

http://www.tutorialized.com/tutorials/3DS-MAX/1 (very good tutorials)

comparison otherwise its pretty similar

i prefer maya 6.5 myself but max is what we gota work with so be it.

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Thanks

and do you know why they arent allowing maya and also how they are going to enforce it?
arent there converters?

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So which one is better maya or 3ds max, never used maya here so can't compare. Also, I heard most video games and 3D movie makers like pixar and disney use 3DS MAX.

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Autodesk supplies FIRST with the program 3DS MAX. The awards and competition for animations is done through autodesk. Thats why its called Autodesk Vizualiztion competition, or whatever. They want teams to use their product.

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they aren't allowing it because until recently maya was a competing program. It's the Autodesk award, not the Alias award. I gues they just want to push their own product. But, maybe next year, cuz alias was just bought by Autodesk.
I said a while ago, they can't enforce it, but that doesn't mean you should do it.

EDIT: DAGGIT! you beat me to it while i was typing!

Re: Animation Previews
 

I like better maya cause its easier to use for me(i like visual boxy and im a visual learner)thers some cool texturing things and hair is awsome in maya. like you can paint directly onto an object in maya rather then texturing it :) if you want more info IM me

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ok, first off, my version of 8 doesn't work, and i only have version 7. so if it is possible i'd like to restrict it to just 7. i will try what you have said so far and see how far i will get. thanks.

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Are you having problems with the network licensing of 3DS Max 8? Heres a link on how to get it to work:
http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...hlight=3ds+max

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ok, thanks for the tip with the glass/transparency effect. Now i was wondering how to get proper lighting. When i do it, it looks like it is over lit, too white, and not realistic. How do i start?

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Admittedly, I'm terrible at lighting, but typically skylighting will do the trick for a simple scene. It's very possible to come up with better looking solutions, but nothing is as easy as the skylight. Just place one of those babies in the scene, and click on "final gather" under indirect illumination in the render panel. The downside is that the render time is pretty long, and you *need* to be using the mental ray renderer.

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um..ok, that would be for an outdoor scene though wouldn't it? what if i wanted to have a light for an indoor scene such as an overhead ceiling light for a room?

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i like maya better, but it might be just because im used to it.
i feel like the hotkeys in 3dmax are all over the place and hard to get to.

and ive been looking for about an hour now and cant figure out how to make my 3dmax have just the perspective mode and not the 4 screen system

Re: Animation Previews
 

the most likely reason for getting you scene washed out is because your lights' intensities are too high ot too close to your object. try lowering the intensity of the lights, or use less of them.
Another good concept for lighting is "three point lighting". this is exactly what it sounds like. just put three omni lights in an equilateral triangle, slightly skewed, centered on your object. then, pick which light is the one you want to be your main light, or the one that represents the lightbulb/sun/lightsource. set the intensities to .8, .6 and .4 or some numbers like that, depending on what looks best. Make sure the one you decided is your primary light has the highest intensity. Lastly, turn off all shadows for every light that is not your primary light.

if you have a small room, you can get away with only 1 or 2 lights. If you use mental ray, there are a few tricks you can use, like the emmitter object options etc, but that gets complicated quickly.

Down in the lower right corner of the screen are 8 buttons, one is a hand, one is a rotate thingy, etc. i can't remember which one, but one of those 8 buttons maximizes the viewport you have selected. to set it back, just click the same button again.

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All of our team has no previous experience 3ds Max that I know of, but things are coming along smoothly. Maybe I or one of them will post some pictures of our work.

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easier way is select the prospective view and hit "alt+w" this should maximise the prospective view, then if u ever want to change to front hit-F...... the hotkeys are on that little brouseure that was included in the package or use google

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Hey, could we try to keep this thread on topic? I don't mean to be rude, but this is the thread for animation previews, so let's see some more. I'd show some of ours, but we don't have much solid material right now.

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yes, sorry about that, i would show something soon. possibly a weeks time.

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Very nice job on the cars, i really hope u get that ferrari done. I'm pretty sure that it will turn out pretty well.

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*bump*
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v2...gatti/zoom.jpg

I wasn't sure if I was allowed to put the Bugatti logo on the tach, so i threw on the FIRST logo.

I love any car that has a speedometer that goes up to 450 kph :D

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*Bump!*



I know the trees look kinda crappy, but you try rendering 2 cars, a racetrack, 8 light poles, and a couple dozen trees in 5 days :p

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looks awesome...!