MetaCreations Corporation offers a range of additional resources to help you if you have any questions concerning LogoMotion. MetaCreations maintains on-line user forums on America Online which can be excellent venues to ask questions from and exchange ideas with other LogoMotion users and MetaCreations staff.
Ñ On the Internet send mail to logomotion@metacreations.com
Ñ For access to MetaCreations' World Wide Web site, use http://www.metacreations.com
Ñ Telephone technical support is also available to registered users of LogoMotion Monday through Friday from 8 AM to 5 PM Pacific Standard Time at (408) 430-4080. Be sure to have your name, product name, platform, telephone number, serial number and a complete description of your problem available when you call MetaCreations.
To be eligible to receive technical support, you must send in your registration card.
To help out, below is a list of some of the most common questions that MetaCreations Technical Support hears.
Question: Where are the hundreds of StageHands that come with LogoMotion?
Answer: A few 'Starter' StageHands are installed on your hard drive when LogoMotion is installed. The rest of the StageHands are found on the LogoMotion CD-ROM. To gain access to the hundreds of Cameras, Lights, Props, and Backdrops on the LogoMotion CD, replace the StageHands folder found in the LogoMotion folder of the hard drive with the StageHands folder found on the LogoMotion CD. This will require about 100 MB of hard disk space. If there is little free hard disk space, here's what you can do: the StageHands folder on the CD contains folders of Cameras, Lights, Props, and Backdrops. Within those folders are more folders containing different categories of StageHands. Simply copy the desired category folders into the corresponding folder on the hard disk and the new StageHands will appear in the StageHands panel within LogoMotion. For Example: if you want to use some Hollywood props found on the LogoMotion CD, copy that 'Hollywood' folder from the CD into the Props folder of the StageHands folder on the Hard Drive. The next time LogoMotion is run, the Hollywood props will appear in the StageHands panel.
Question: How can I use my own images as background images?
Answer: Place them in the "Put Your Own Backdrops Here" folder, which is located in the StageHands folder. The next time LogoMotion is run, your image or animation will appear in the StageHands panel and can be dragged into your scene. On the Mac, PICT and QuickTime files can be used as backdrops. On Windows, BMP, JPG and other image files can be used.
Question: How do I import an EPS file from PhotoShop and Illustrator?
Answer: If you get a message in LogoMotion saying that there are "no recognizable EPS operators" then this question is for you. If you are attempting to save a picture as an EPS file and bring it into LogoMotion, it needs to be done a special way. Here's why: saving a picture as an EPS file is the equivalent of putting a picture into an EPS "envelope", then giving this envelope to LogoMotion and expecting the program to pull the picture out of the envelope to make a 3D object out of it. What you need to do instead is to use your picture as a template and create outlines around the edges of your picture. In PhotoShop, you would use the selection tools and path tools to come up with your outline. After you've done that, you would do a "File->Export->Paths to Illustrator" (you are not going to Illustrator, but that's the kind of file LogoMotion wants to see). In Illustrator, you would use the path tools or "create outlines" command for text to create the paths that LogoMotion wants to use to make a 3D object.
Question: Why don't the texture maps on the objects show up in my scene?
Answer: To see objects that have PICT images and QuickTime movies texture mapped on to them, you must be in Shade Best mode. Go to the Rendering Control Panel Mode (command-6 on Mac, control-6 on Windows) and set the Quality to "Best." Texture Maps will not be rendered in any of the other rendering modes.
Question: Why don't my objects cast shadows?
Answer: To have a scene with shadows, you should make sure of five items. 1) Your scene must be set to render in Shade Best in the Rendering Control Panel mode (command-6 on Mac, control-6 on Windows). 2) The Shadows button in the Rendering Panel must be turned on. 3) Every object that you want to cast a shadow should have its own Cast Shadows button turned to "On" in the Object Information Control Panel (command-1 on Mac, control-1 on Windows). 4) The QuickDraw 3D button in the Rendering Control Panel is set to "Off" 5) A light in your scene must also be made to cast shadows. With the light selected choose Edit Light under the Options menu and check the Cast Shadows box. After all this, you should see shadows in your scene. When rendering the final movie of your animation, make sure the Shadows box is checked in the Options menu of the Make Movie dialog.
Question: How can I create an animation that can be pasted onto a background in another application?
Answer: You will mostly likely want to use an alpha channel (see next question) to mask out the background (note: your background color must be set to black to work properly). To create an alpha channel for an existing scene, go to the File menu and choose "Render Movie." In the Make Movie dialog box, select millions of colors and check the Create Alpha Channel box. Once you've done this, click on the Render button. If you are going to render to a QuickTime movie, click the Options button in the save animation dialog, choose the animation compressor with Millions of Colors+, and set the quality to High or Most.
Question: What exactly is an alpha channel?
In a 32-bit image (millions of colors), 8 bits are used for storing the red color information, 8 for the green information, and 8 for the blue color information. The remaining 8 bits can be used by some applications (such as Adobe Premiere and Avid Videoshop) to store masking information for compositing images together. A common use is to layer graphics over a background or an animation over live video. The alpha channel is used to store the anti-aliasing information so that the composite is seamless.
Question: Why is my extrude object hollow when I expect it to be solid?
Answer: The outline for this object may not be closed. In the extrude workshop, you can connect the points using by first choosing Snap To Grid from the Points Menu. Now drag one of the points to any location on the grid, and then drag the second point to this same location. Your points are effectively joined, but to turn the two overlapping points in to one point, choose "Join Points" from the Object menu. Once the object no longer appears hollow in the Object window, leave the workshop and your object should be solid.
Question: How can I make an object appear or disappear during an animation?
Answer: Since objects exist throughout the entire animation, making an object suddenly appear can be done in one of three ways. The first way is to position the object outside the camera view at the beginning of your animation and then later moving the object into the camera view. The second way is to shrink the object down to a Uniform Scale of 0.001 in the Object Information Panel Mode at the beginning of the animation and then later enlarging the object to a visible size. Since the object's position/size will change over time from one eventmark to the next, the time for this change to occur depends on the time between eventmarks. For example, if there are two seconds between eventmarks, then the object will take two seconds to move into view or to grow from nothing to full size. If the eventmarks are only one frame apart, this transition will be instantaneous. To make an object disappear, simply make the object visible at the beginning of the animation and later move the object out of view or scale it to 0.001. The third way to make an object disappear, and perhaps the easiest method, is to double-click on one of the object's eventmarks in the Sequencer window. When the Eventmark Info dialog appears, check the 'End Animation' checkbox, then click the OK button. The object will disappear at the time of the eventmark in the Sequencer's timeline.
Question: Why do the QuickTime movies I produce with LogoMotion have choppy playback?
Answer: How smoothly your movies play will depend on such factors as the type of machine you are running on, if you have any additional hardware support, the screen size and file size of your movie, the frame rate, the movie compression type, and the amount of RAM allocated to the movie-playing application. QuickTime, by nature, will have jerky playback on most machines without some sort of hardware support to help it. In the absence of extra hardware, your best bet is to keep your movies to 320x240 or smaller in size (keeping the image size to a division of four will help too), playing at 20 to 15 frames per second with medium animation compression.
Question: I am using a Power3D accellerator card and objects look and move strangely. Why?
Answer: There are conflicts with LogoMotion and Power3D accellerator cards. While the two products may work more nicely together in the future, currently we recommend disabling or removing the Power3D drivers (3dfx RAVE and 3dfxGlideLib2.x ) when using LogoMotion.
Question: Text is missing in LogoMotion's panels, and the text that is visible is very large. What causes this?
Answer: You are most likely have the "Large Fonts" setting enabled on your Windows 95 or NT machine. We recommend choosing the "Small Fonts" option found in the Settings panel of the Display Control panel.
Question: How can I make my own StageHands show animated previews on another computer?
Answer: On a Macintosh, StageHand previews should always play. On windows, we recommend using "Microsoft Video 1" compression when saving custom StageHand files. This is a movie compressor that is included with every Windows 95 and NT 4 operating system. If you use other compressors, other computers must have the compressor you used in order to show the StageHand preview. Don't worry if a StageHand's preview doesn't animate - it will still work fine.
Customer Support
Technical Support is provided free of charge to registered users of LogoMotion* There are three easy options to contact technical support for questions about installation, configuration or functionality. These options are Web, e-mail and phone support. For questions about creative technique, please see the Creative Support section below.
Web Support
Many of the answers to your questions are available 24 hours a day on our website:
www.metacreations.com/support
In addition to frequently asked questions, our website provides troubleshooting techniques, late breaking product news, and other resources to get the most out of LogoMotion.
E-mail Support
To answer your technical support question most effectively and quickly, please use the e-mail form provided to you on our website: www.metacreations.com/support. If you do not have World Wide Web access, please send e-mail to: logomotion@metacreations.com
Phone Support
Phone support hours are Monday-Friday, 8:00 AM-5:00 PM Pacific Standard Time, excluding holidays. Call (408) 430-4080 When calling, please have your serial number handy and be at the computer that you need assistance.
Creative Support
If you have questions regarding creative technique, please refer to our message boards on our website: www.metacreations.com
This area is available to you to meet and talk with other users of LogoMotion to share knowledge, technique, and inspiration.
* MetaCreations does not currently charge for technical support for LogoMotion. The only expense to the user is the telephone toll charges.
