New MSAgent

Baerdric · December 14, 2009, 12:17:40 AM

I'm starting work on a 3D comedy "mechwarrior" agent using PovRay scripting to render the animations. I'm hoping to include a good number of animations, since most of the parts can be reused anyway. I'll be posting small screen shots occasionally and hope to get some comments about skits I can have the little guy do. Probably a lot of "Transformer" kinds of things where he turns into whatever the end result should be. There will probably be lots of shooting of lasers and unfortunate explosions.

Admittedly there is very little work done so far, I have just one small segment of the "Show" routine worked out and rendered where he builds himself out of an impossibly small box.

I would love to hear any suggestions at all.

snowman · December 14, 2009, 01:26:37 AM

That sounds awesome... am a big fan of those kind of animation.

I can't wait to see what you come up with. [;)]

Baerdric · December 14, 2009, 10:44:42 AM

Well, I'm having problems getting MSAgent to use my rendered images. Apparently it needs every frame to have the same palette. I've found some really old (1998) tools for regularizing palettes but they are shareware and the companies both seem to be out of business.

The example of this type of software would be "Palette Express", but I can't even register it because the company is gone.

Anyone know of any newer tools that can do batch reprocessing and extract a common palette from a selection of images?

spydaz · December 14, 2009, 03:07:00 PM

when i was creating character i found that PAINTSHOP Came with an additional program ANIMATION SHOP! Paintshop5 preety old. but it does the job!

Baerdric · December 16, 2009, 08:24:22 AM

I got this and it does create a unified palette for animated gifs, but how did you then export those images for MsAgent?

spydaz · December 16, 2009, 09:45:13 AM

quote:
Originally posted by Baerdric

I got this and it does create a unified palette for animated gifs, but how did you then export those images for MsAgent?

I exported the animations AS HQ GIFS....
for Each Emotion / ACTION and new GIF....
Then assign it in the Microsoft ACE... here you can also Chose aCUSTOM VOICE but you also need the "SID" or CLass ID for your newley created voice

http://www.guile3d.com.br/home.asp
here they used JPEGS to construct the GIFS....

Baerdric · December 16, 2009, 10:33:28 AM

I'll look again, but I didn't find a way to use animated gifs as a MsAgent animation, it seemed to want individual BMP frames.

spydaz · December 16, 2009, 08:37:16 PM

quote:
Originally posted by Baerdric

I'll look again, but I didn't find a way to use animated gifs as a MsAgent animation, it seemed to want individual BMP frames.

In the Animation shop add on to paint shop, LOL. I REMMEBER NOW!
Export GIF/animation IT will give you every frame as a BMP!

I will have to Search and download paintshop pro and take a quikie look

spydaz · December 16, 2009, 08:55:58 PM

OK I Downloaded the EVAL version of PSP5 I only installed the animation shop component!.. Its free!

I installed the MsACE Free TOO.

I Opened a Quality GIF on my PC and opened in the animation shop
On Each Frame I exported a Numbered BMP (for ordering)

I opened MSACE.
created a new character.
New Animation linked to STATE.
Insert Frame From Images, Selected all of the Exported BMPS
Then i saved Character and Invoked the State with a script

Completed!

snowman · December 17, 2009, 12:53:18 AM

ok, I know what I'm about to say has no importance...

I have no idea what any of you are talking about.... although I do undersand the occational word...

[:D]

Keep it up... sounds good. [;)]

spydaz · December 17, 2009, 05:08:24 AM

We Are just speaking about HOW to create a MSAGENT CHARACTER,

REQ: Microsoft Agent Editor (ACE.exe)
REQ: PaintShop7(ANIMATION SHOP)

each character has a set of animations - assigned to a STATE
theses animations are made up of BMP's OR GIFS, The MS AGENT EDITOR
Requires EACH animation in FRAMES of BMP.

AS long as you can create your animation into frames you will be ok.
SO ANIMATION SHOP is a usefull TOOL, as it can export frames, as BMP. From A GIF.

Transparency is the USUAL PINK!

Baerdric · December 17, 2009, 09:34:23 AM

No, I know how to make agents, I've made several insignificant ones. The problems is (and because of my reformat I have to start over) that PovRay outputs a 16m color image with it's own palette. But Character Editor wants 256 color images with a single unified palette. As frames progress, with different parts of the Robot coming into view, the frames I have develop different colors. So I need to be able to point something at a directory of many images and have it deduce a single 256 indexed pallet.

I'm still working on Animator Shop, but I had to reinstall everything this morning and I'm still not quite there.

snowman · December 17, 2009, 12:52:54 PM

cooooolll!

Thanks SpyDaz for the leason. I got to try this out!

[:)]

Baerdric · December 17, 2009, 05:05:04 PM

Urrrr..... can't find PSP version 5

I'll have to install the shareware version pretty soon.

spydaz · December 17, 2009, 05:24:49 PM

quote:
Originally posted by Baerdric

Urrrr..... can't find PSP version 5

I'll have to install the shareware version pretty soon.

http://www.oldversion.com/Paint-Shop-Pro.html
Here is where i quickly found it All of the previous versions