Dabil's 2017 Christmas Show Community WIP Thread

[QldKing]

I added bitmapped light sabers for extra realism. (Posted below). I am also thinking of creating a full bodied light saber dual between Luke and Vader for those people who have larger Matrixes to use instead of the plain light sabers. An example of what those images might look like is attached as well as the bitmaps of the light sabers I used.

Hi dabil - Thank you for posting your work.  Its been good to watch and get ideas from.  Just want to check, the light saber fight images, is the Luke one posted still a work in progress?  I have downloaded on two computers and the image appears to break up part of the way through, yet in the preview above its a clean image the whole way through the file.  Or am I just downloading it wrong?  The Darth Vadar works as in the preview above.

Thanks

[Dabil]

It should work just as it does above. If you want to package your sequence and post it here, I will take a look at what you are doing and maybe I can give you some advice or fix whatever the problem is.

Maybe that will even motivate me to create more of those images.

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[QldKing]

It should work just as it does above. If you want to package your sequence and post it here, I will take a look at what you are doing and maybe I can give you some advice or fix whatever the problem is.

Maybe that will even motivate me to create more of those images.

I don't think it is the way the file is added to the sequence.  When I view the Luke gif as an image outside of xlights it does it as well on two different computers (see attached screen shot). You can also see it in this https://youtu.be/vfN0Ysy7rvo?t=5s where it is used in the sequence.  Darth works OK.  Are you able to send me the files or upload to Drop Box and send me the link please, just in case its the way it is downloading from the site?  Thank you once again.

[keithsw1111]

Could the problem be one of you is or isnt allowing blending between models?

[QldKing]

Keith - thats only if I am in Xlights?  I am getting a broken image even if I view the gif file in windows file explorer, outside of xlights.

[keithsw1111]

Sure but assuming he has the same gif with the same issues then he has to be doing something different.

[Dabil]

So I played with this animated gif in xlights and I was getting the same clipping problems you are. Where parts were missing from some frames. I remembered that I had that problem with another animated gif where I had used color #000000 while drawing the image, and xlights seems to recognize #000000 as an off state. And years ago in game development color #000000 was frequently used to mark pixels in an image as being transparent, and Xlights seems to follow that convention. So I found anything I layered behind that image would show through just like it would on a 1980's early 1990's graphic engine (showing my age here? lol). I changed the color to #0a0a0a and the problem went away, even though it is a very similar color. I bring this up only as a reference in case the issue has something to do with it, although I could not fix the issues with the Luke animation by changing the color #000000 to #0a0a0a in this case.

I use Photoshop CC 2015.1.2 to make all my animated gifs. I switched these images to Piskel and recreated the animated gif and that fixed the issue on my machine. So the issue seems to be with Photoshop CC and Xlights. Xlights is the only program I checked that animation on that seems to have a problem with it. Firefox, Internet Explorer, and the windows 10 photos app run the animated gif just fine.

I will attach the piskel version of the gif here for comparison if someone on the Xlights team wants to compare it to the previous photoshop version earlier in this thread. I will also check my version of Photoshop to see if there are any updates for it in case it is a known issue. Although that wouldn't explain why the animation works in all the above named programs correctly and not Xlights. It could just very well be a bug or incompatibility with Xlights.

In the meantime while we wait to see if the xlights team can sort this out, if anyone finds any issues with any of my animted gifs I have already posted, please let me know and I will rebuild them in piskel.

[Dabil]

Sorry Mackdave for not answering your question. You asked:

"How do you make the eyes blink the 16x 50 face matrix? I put them in the sequence as a picture under the model. I think i'm missing something."

You simply place the images of the eyes moving over top of the still eyes in the mouth positions. To do this you create an additional layer above the faces effect on your megatree (or matrix, or whatever other model you are using), and place the image of the eye you want on the new layer. If you are using a 16x50 Matrix or MegaTree, the eyes should line up perfect when you have scaling off and the X,Y position of the image set to 0,0.

Let me know if you have any other issues. The sequences I have above have examples of this in action that you can view to verify your understanding.

[QldKing]

So I played with this animated gif in xlights and I was getting the same clipping problems you are.

Thanks Dabil - just downloaded the new image and its working beautifully.  May the force be with you

[Dabil]

QldKing, what are the dimensions on that Matrix you are using to display those images?

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[QldKing]

QldKing, what are the dimensions on that Matrix you are using to display those images?

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P10 panels 5w x 4h


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[mackdave]

Sorry Mackdave for not answering your question. You asked:

"How do you make the eyes blink the 16x 50 face matrix? I put them in the sequence as a picture under the model. I think i'm missing something."

You simply place the images of the eyes moving over top of the still eyes in the mouth positions. To do this you create an additional layer above the faces effect on your megatree (or matrix, or whatever other model you are using), and place the image of the eye you want on the new layer. If you are using a 16x50 Matrix or MegaTree, the eyes should line up perfect when you have scaling off and the X,Y position of the image set to 0,0.

Let me know if you have any other issues. The sequences I have above have examples of this in action that you can view to verify your understanding.

Thanks I will try that. I put a layer below the model and it wasn't working.

[dthompson]

Dabil, thank you for sharing your sequences. They are great !!

I'm going to purchase the Light of Christmas sequence so that i can put it together based on your sequence. This will be my 1st year doing an actual animation sequence to music. Last year was my 1st year doing any Christmas lights on my house. I only did a simple animation without music just to show off the pixel lights. I'm really excited to put together my 1st show!

It is because of you and all the others on here that have inspired me to get into this really fun hobby.

Thanks again for helping out a newbie!!
Darryl

[Dabil]

You are welcome. I am but one person in a sea of very talented and creative people. I have been inspired by too many people to list.  I recently received all my physical lights so I have been busy building the elements but hope to get back to this and do more sequencing soon.

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[QldKing]

I am currently in the beginning of doing a sequence I am calling Santa Impossible. My current idea is to use the Mission Impossible theme song with this Arthur Christmas Easter Egg in the middle.

Hi Dabil - I watched Arthur Christmas on the weekend with the kids and wondered how your sequence was going using it as an easter egg?

Cheers

Brad