Chase 1 Pixel on Wireframe Christmas Tree

[gsmith37064]

I have a wireframe Christmas tree (48 pixels) that I want to use a MOTION ROW to chase a SINGLE pixel from starting point 1 to ending point 48.

I have been playing with the straight line effect and I have the tree broken into two halves. A left side model (24 pixels) and a right side model (24 pixels).

Only thing is the speed maxes out at 50 and the pixel does get it all the way up before the right model kicks in. The left side model moves the pixel upwards and the right side model moves the pixel downwards.

I have spent that last hour trying to turn the channel level into a motion row.

Any thoughts on how to accomplish this?

Edited March 16 by gsmith37064

[Box on Rails]

Try the Single Block Motion effect? Set your direction and then set the head length to 1, body length to 0,  tail length to 0 and the rest of the input variables are set to default.  I just tried it on my leaping arches and it did a single pixel chase just fine. 

Kenny

Edited March 17 by Box on Rails

[gsmith37064]

2 hours ago, Box on Rails said:

Try the Single Block Motion effect? Set your direction and then set the head length to 1, body length to 0,  tail length to 0 and the rest of the input variables are set to default.  I just tried it on my leaping arches and it did a single pixel chase just fine. 

Kenny

I have tried that. Nothing displays which I thought was odd. Some effects I expected to see something, if even just a blip, but nodda.

[Steven]

Try "Scanner" with a tail length of 1.

Most of the other motion effects don't work with a very small number of pixels.

[gsmith37064]

27 minutes ago, Steven said:

Try "Scanner" with a tail length of 1.

Most of the other motion effects don't work with a very small number of pixels.

I have decided to leave it channel level. I have spent half a day now trying to get it to look the same and decided I have spent way to much time on it. This seems to be the norm with motion rows.

[Box on Rails]

On 3/17/2024 at 5:57 AM, gsmith37064 said:

I have tried that. Nothing displays which I thought was odd. Some effects I expected to see something, if even just a blip, but nodda.

If It doesn't display anything using the Single Block the way I described, then the prop Set up is the issue. Post a picture of the prop definition page if you could. That will give me an Idea of what changes need to be made. 

Kenny

[gsmith37064]

3 minutes ago, Box on Rails said:

If It doesn't display anything using the Single Block the way I described, then the prop Set up is the issue. Post a picture of the prop definition page if you could. That will give me an Idea of what changes need to be made. 

Kenny

I sent you a couple screenshots of the prop to your email. It's a custom built prop with 48 pixels. Nothing really fancy.

[gsmith37064]

3 minutes ago, gsmith37064 said:

I sent you a couple screenshots of the prop to your email. It's a custom built prop with 48 pixels. Nothing really fancy.

I can also send you the prop model if needed.

[gsmith37064]

Kenny recreated the prop using the line-connected built in prop with 48 bends to get a tree shape. After that, he applied a spiral effect to it and a single pixel was able to travel around the prop. I enabled the color blend and it was pretty much spot on with what I wanted to accomplish.

Both of us came to the same conclusion, motion rows seem to work as intended on the LOR built-in props, but importing a 3rd party vendor prop or a custom created prop gives you a different outcome. This explains why some props look really good and others I will spend days on trying to get a simple effect to look right.

Any chances of getting a button called "convert channel level effects to a motion row effect"? Or at least get it to where custom built props work the same as LOR built-in props. Or maybe... add both? 😃

 

[Jeremiah Ackermann]

3 hours ago, gsmith37064 said:

Or at least get it to where custom built props work the same

I would like this feature too, as I have wanted to do marquee or other "line-based effects" to areas of my custom props.

The reason custom props never work is due to how motion effects are rendered to your custom prop or motion effect rows. The underlying "pixel buffer" always gets created as a rectangle, so a motion effect row like your tree shape outline is a rectangle and not a line. Applying marquee to that motion effect row very likely does nothing because the effect will get rendered on the 4 edges of that rectangular pixel buffer but none of your tree's pixels are on the edges (unless if a few do fall on an edge, you can get some pixels showing up). The LOR props partially avoid some of this by using the Advanced prop shape that lets you layout the pixels in lines and then move them freeform. I have utilized this approach for some of my own custom props that have low pixel counts. I have a few props with 500-900 pixels that would make this a very tedious process.

Ideally you could specify a motion effect row's "pixel buffer" to be laid out as a straight line instead and dictate the order of the pixels in that line. This would enable effects that are more "line-based" like marquee or straight lines" to work better in custom props. This is why using the line-connected prop works because it is laid out like a line in the "pixel buffer" even though its tedious to lay out with all the bends, etc.