GMU:3DIY/analoge 3d animation: Difference between revisions

We live in a time where everything is digitally acessable. Photography, cartography, music, films, books and drawings. One by one all major analoge medias are replaced by their digital pendant - and the transformation into "ones" and "zeros" has never been easier.

But the technological evolution also offers the possibility to take the opposite direction. With the help of the 3d printer we want to take the step and transform one of the few mere digital medias into an analog counterpart of itself: The analogisation of the digital. The analogisation of mere 3d animation.

The 3d printer as a distinct media can realize digital operation into analog object. Therefore it is the perfect tool for our aim. Considering this, we are also interested in the abstraction of the printed result, that automatically appears while printing. (Due to the small resolution of the model and the visible plastic layers, created by the printhead)

To transform digital animation into analog animation there are several ways.

The classical way is to expose film material frame by frame with the single shots of the animation until you have a complete copy of the movie. (e.g. for cinema movies) This form of analogisation is not suitable for our aims, cause only the carrier media is analog and real. The animation itself is a virtual image. Besides it is impossible to catch the full range of the 3rd dimension with this method, cause the film image itself is only a two dimensional copy.

Therefore we have decided to use a very old optical technique, which was invented in 1834 by William George Horner: the zoetrope.

A zoetrope basically a film sequence, arranged as a 360° panorama, that rotates infront of the viewers eyes. By the use of rotation the animation phases are arranged like a film. But the human eye can see the animation only with the help of a so called shutter. (otherwise the eye is too slow) The shutter in fact, is a kind of image interupter. The enables the slow human eye to perceive the animation through a quick change between image and darkness. (it lowers the framerate of the film by blocking the sight on the rotation with black phases)

* [[wikipedia:Zoetrop|Overview on zoetropes]]

* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-3yarT_h2ws video showing the functionality of the zoetrope]

* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NAhCy7U2gMU video showing the functionality of a praxinoscope]

Based on the principle of the zoetrope we want to realize our 3d animation and enhance the zoetrope technique. In contrast to the original principle, where the shutter slots are on a different level than the animation, we want to imply our shutter in a way that enables viewing the animation not only from above, but also from the front. This also allows us to construct the zoetrope more compact, which will be necessary concerning the size limit of the 3d printer.

Additionally the construction shall be self contained, so that the principle of our zoetrope isn't visible at the first sight.

To enable animation and shutter on the same level we have several approaches for realisation. On the one hand we want to try positioning the different animation phases like figures on a carrousel. The shutters shall be constructed like poles between the figures, so that they darken the viewing windows for a short time. This approach probably will not give a good contrast on the animation, because the period of darkness will have to be pretty long to achieve the desired effect.

This effect could also be achieved with a strobe light, but this will probably bring problems with the rotation speed. A mechanical shutter drum has the advance, that the speed of the strobe effect is exactly silmutaneous to the rotation of the carrousel (because the drum and the carrousel are driven by the same crank handle)

Additionally we want to experiment with a special 3d technique called chromadepth. Chromadepth is a special 3d visualisation that can display colours of a two-dimensional image on different 3d layers. Red colours appear in the front of the image, while blue colours appear in the back. This technique is designed for 2d images. But due to having only a small distance between the viewers eye and our animation this technique could improve the three-dimensionality of our animation.

For the realisation of our projects we will have to face several issues. Problems that we will have to solve are:

* How does the shutter affect sharpness and contrast of the image?

----

The first step on our way to realise our analog 3d animation was to build our "display device", the zoetrope. Like the animation we also wanted to create this part of our project in a way, that would allow us to produce it with the 3d printer, so we didn't make any drawings or sketches of the zoetrope. Instead, we decided to "build" the prototype as a 3d model. As we planned to print the zoetrope later on, we had to build it "waterproof" (every printable part had to contain no open planes) and we had to work very accurate to avoid troubles with the printed parts. We also decided to realise an optical shutter automatic (described in 1.3.1. The Shutter), because were hoping for a better animation quality and less use of material.

A major advantage of creating a 3d model instead of sketches was the fact, that we could simulate our zoetrope virtually to see, if the technique would actually work. Besides, this approach of creating a zoetrope, was fully virtual. This was a good concession to our aim of analogizing digital work.

The first simulations produced some questions that were only solveable with a real prototype, so we decided to build a functioning zoetrope, mainly made of cardboard.

After the cardboard prototype was functioning, we started to print parts of it in 3d. Unfortunately we underestimated the time we needed for troubleshooting and the printing procedure itself. After several approaches of printing large parts with ABS material, we switched to PLA and were able to create the first parts of the zoetrope. Due to the huge amount of the time that the printing of large objects needs, we haven't finished the zoetrope yet. (E.g. the cap of the zoetrope needs approx. 8-12hours of printing, depending on the material and settings - and it isn't the biggest part) The parts of the zoetrope that are already printed are: the cap and the LED-Lamp Holder.

Video of showing all parts of the zoetrope's 3d prototype.

After testing the prototype of the zoetrope and the 3d printer we were able to set the basic technical conditions for our animation. So we started to think about the content of our little animation cycle.

We came to the agreement that we wanted to animate relatively simple models, because the settings of the zoetrope limited the size of each figure to 1,8 x 1,8 x 1,8cm. With this resolution it would have been very tricky to print detailed models in high quality. And quality would be needed to perceive the fluid animation. Due to a low image sharpness of our zoetrope (low distance between eye and animation, high rotation speed of the carrousel and therefore a slight motion blur) we wanted to focus on 2 forms of movement in our animation, that are well visible despite all technical problems. On the one hand we wanted to focus on the animation of the objects' silhouettes. On the other hand we wanted to experiment with colour morphs.

(3d testanimation)

The animation will be an infinite loop of the 3 Bauhaus basic geometric shapes triangle, circle and square (respectively their three-dimensional pendants pyramid, sphere and cube) with the title "Symbiosis and Synergie". The 3 symbols morph smoothly into each other all within the 16 frames that we have at our disposal. The result is a hypnotic, almost fluid wafting of the forms. In the same it is a quote of the used printing material in its heated form.

Therefore it seems to us, that 3d printing and Bauhaus fit together perfectly.

We printed the 16 animation frames with white ABS. We split the figures with too much overhang into halfs and glued them together afterwards. Afterwards we went over the models with rasp and sand paper and then used spray paint to dye them black.

[[File:atmo.jpg|thumb|150px|printing at night is even more fun]]

Now that (almost) all parts were done, it was time to combine them to realize our analogized digital 3d animation:(please don't mind the low video quality. Unfortunately we had no better camera.)  

----

* creation and testing of 2 simple zoetrope models

* the classical zoetrop works, but with a bad contrast

* furthermore it appears that strong overhangs arent possible without backings

* Creation of a 3d model of the planned zoetrope. The 3d model is alread waterproof and therefore (hopefully) printable.  

* Simulation of an animation with the 3d zoetrope. The unusual design of the shutter creates some issues. Due to these troubles a cardboard model of the 3d model is planned to test the shutter in real life:

* Construction of a crank handle for the zoetrope (Prototype build with LEGO)

* Building of a working cardboard model with optical shutter, based on the 3d model:  

<videoflash>TPzxaY0aD0M</videoflash>

* To improve contrast and image sharpness, further experiments with variations of the shutter size and different light settings are planned

Efforts for optimizing the prototype:

* Decreasing the shutter size for shorter exposure time  --> no effect on the animation quality

* Improved isolation of the zoetrope against light from the outside and dyeing the inner parts of the zoetrope to increase contrast --> small improvement of the animation quality

Adjustment of the 3d model due to experiences with the prototype:

* the height of the inner drum is decreased. therefore the drum has more space for rotation

* reduction of the wall sizes (=reduction of material needed for printing)

* Brainstorming ideas for animation content

* creation of the final animation for the zoetrope

* experimenting with animated colourmorphs

<videoflash>n1ImjejuEa0</videoflash>

* setting up skeinforge and bfb axon on 2 laptops and testing the program settings

* installing additional printing profiles

* adjusting 3d file and bugfixing

* printing of the complete animation cycle, results are viewable at [http://web.uni-weimar.de/medien/wiki/GMU:3DIY/Printer_queue#The_printer_queue Printer queue]

* 1st printing test of the cap of the zoetrope. Results [http://web.uni-weimar.de/medien/wiki/GMU:3DIY/Printer_queue#The_printer_queue here]

* 2nd printing test of the zoetrope cap. Results [http://web.uni-weimar.de/medien/wiki/GMU:3DIY/Printer_queue#The_printer_queue here]

* installing the crank handle on the cardboard prototype of the zoetrope

* minor repairs on our models with glue, rasp and sandpaper

* dyeing the animation cycle with black spray paint for better contrast in the zoetrope and softer surface

* further optimization of the cardboard prototype of the zoetrope

* further optimization of the cardboard prototype of the zoetrope  

* installing the animation cycle into the prototype

* applying the LED-Lamp Holder

* finishing the installation of the zoetrope prototype

* failed attempt of printing a part of the crank handle gear

* new version of the zoetrope's 3d model (viewing windows is bigger and in a higher position for better 3d perspective on the animation, shutters on the shutter automatic are bigger to let in more light, for a better contrast)

* several hours of printer troubleshooting, failed attempt of printing 2 more gear parts

----