Sun rasterfile animation to video on the cheap (summ

[FILLMORE%EMRCAN.bitnet at ugw.utcs.utoronto.ca]

A while aso I asked for suggestions on how to do an animation on the Sun
and record it on videotape - cheaply.  Thanks very much to everyone who
replied, especially Ole H. Nielsen the author of Movietool.

A lot of people suggested that I get a copy of Movietool to do the
animation.  As for the hardware to get the images to videotape, it appears
that you have to spend at least $15,000 for a reasonable genlock which is
currently a little out of our league.  I also got a few suggestions to
transfer the images to an Amiga or a PC which would allow lower-cost
genlocks to be used.  In this case the user did not want to get involved
in using two machines with associated file transfers, etc.

We finally decided to get a copy of Movietool from titan.rice.edu and we
are now experimenting with it.  One of the applications is modelling the
heat created in a bar of steel as it is compressed.  Patran creates a
sequence of Sun color rasterfiles with color used to show the temperature.
We have found that if we keep the image to about 1/8 of the raster size
then Movietool will create a very smooth animation on our system (Sun 3/60
with 8 meg).  We have tried videotaping directly from the screen with a
camcorder with some success (there is a little flicker).  We are going to
get a video professional to try this with better equipment.

Thanks again for all the suggestions!

Bob Fillmore, Systems Software & Communications     BITNET:  FILLMORE at EMRCAN
  Computer Services Centre,                         BIX:     bfillmore
  Energy, Mines, & Resources Canada                 Voice:   (613) 992-2832
  588 Booth St., Ottawa, Ontario, Canada  K1A 0E4   FAX:     (613) 996-2953