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Parallel Reload! Created in A:M v6


robcat2075

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  • Hash Fellow

What is Parallel Reload?

 

I didn't know when I made this opening title and I don't know today but it is something important you need to know if you have the giant enterprise switch by Northern Telecom AKA the Meridian 1.

I did this while working at Nortel in 1997 or '98. This was my first attempt at rigorously accurate mechanical modeling.

I found the original project elements while looking through my debris and have re-rendered it in HD for modern eyes.

For the most part, the original PRJ done in v6 loaded right up in v18. I just had to revisit a few of the animation curves and refind a few image files.

The many long, thin horizontal lines on the Meridian 1 were very challenging to anti-alias. A standard render couldn't do it and multi-pass wasn't available so i set the pixel aspect ratio to 4 and quadrupled the intended vertical resolution. Scrunching that back down in After Effects made them super-smooth.

 

ParallelReload.mov

 

 

update: If you know how to view cross-eye 3D you can watch it in stereoscopic on Youtube. I recommend setting it to 720p and full screening it.

 

Parallel Reload in 3D

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  • Hash Fellow

Here is a short bit of a standard "Final" render to show the anti-aliasing situation.

 

Note that lines largely by themselves, like the floor lines or the outer edges of the case, are not a serious problem. It's the lines that are densely packed together that the normal anti-aliasing scheme doesn't work well on.

 

It's a bit like the problem of shooitng venetian blinds or plaid sport coats on TV.

 

AAExample1200.mov

 

 

Fortunately in A:M we can do supersampling by rendering at a higher res until there are enough pixels between the lines to cleanly resolve them.

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  • 11 months later...
  • Hash Fellow

At the December 9 2023 Live Answer Time we talked about the Light "Bias" setting and I now recall the project where that had been a big problem... it was this "Parallel Reload" project!

Here is a frame from a render with the bias setting not correctly set. The proper result is at the top of this thread.

image.png

@Pizza Time

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