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From: gmk@ucsc.edu (Gottfried Mayer-Kress)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.next
Subject: Re: NeXTs for Animation?
Keywords: graphics, animation, formats
Message-ID: <17609@darkstar.ucsc.edu>
Date: 30 Jun 91 23:54:54 GMT
References: <26798@beta.gov>
Sender: usenet@darkstar.ucsc.edu
Lines: 32

In article <26798@beta.gov> mcn@acl.lanl.gov (Michael Neuman) writes:
> I'm looking at a variety of systems to purchase for a home workstation. I'll
> be needing it mainly to visualize scientific data as well as for general 
> programming. Thusfar, I've been considering NeXT, SGI, and SUN.
> 
> One of the most important features (aside from computational power and Unix
> compatibility) is the systems ability to produce animations. By this, I mean
> availability of animation & titling software, as well as if it's any good!
> 
I am currently display a sequence of .tiff frames from the Los Alamos 
Global Circulation Model simulation using the animation facility of the 
IconTool.
I record it through the ScreenScape tool. Titling I do in a combination of
WriteNow/TopDraw and ScreenScape. I think it works very well. I can only
compare it to the SGI and it seems to be much more cumbersome there.
The NeXT applications are really nicely integrated. 

One general problem seems to be memory requirements: I animate 354*298
tiff files and at 300k each these limits me in how many frames I can 
animate smoothly. For video recording I could also use the gif format
and save a factor 15-30 but ViewGif2 does not have a good 
animation option (the slideshow doesn't do it really).
So I was curious if there is a way to animate images in TV quality more 
efficiently.

--
Gottfried Mayer-Kress

gmk@goshawk.lanl.gov
gmk@sfi.santafe.edu
gmk@ucscc.ucsc.edu
gmk@pegasos.ucsc.edu (NeXT mail preferred)