These features would have made making my film easier

[marc]

Hello everyone,

having finished work on my first short film (www.kickerfilm.de) with Lightwave 7/7.5, I can say that the following features would have saved me a lot of time:

* Relative references in expressions, i.e. thisObject.y=parent.x, that can easily be copied to multiple objects without having to make adjustments.

* Camera selector working during rendering, too.

* Soft shadows for all lights that work well on concave objects (self-shadowing).

* Instancing of objects (I think): Model once, ad many times to scene, but each time with different textures.

* Rigid body dynamics for letting a ball roll and be kicked around (not at all as simple, as you might think).

For my next film I'd also like to have:

* A better GUI (although I like this one it could use a little more consistency).

* Rendering to multiple frame-rates, i.e. in the timeline I work with 25 frames/sec, but I can render for 24, 25 or 29,97 f/sec with all the interpolations happening during render time.

* All the other suggestions already made.

Cheers,
Marc

[DaveW]

If you animate at 24fps but want to render at 30, then change the framerate in the options and LW will automagically scale the frames. I like the other suggestions.

[Red_Oddity]

Yeah, i had a big request/gripe about the expressions aswell (i think it was on the old LW Forum)
Someone told me that a plugin named Relativity does just that and a lot more (was used on 'Dune' i believe)
http://www.premdesign.com/relativ.html

[marc]

Dave, you're right. So the fps-feature request is off the list. But I just remembered - THIS would have saved me lots of time:

* Really great bevelling tools! (Edge, adjacent polys). Much like this other plugin that I also didn't want too buy, VertiBevel, I think.

Marc

[Elmar Moelzer]

Hey Marc, dont use shadowmaps for softshadows, they suck. Use linear or arealights, or spinning- lights instead. Raytraced shadows dont have those limitations regarding selfshadowing.
CU
Elmar

[Matt]

hey marc!

some very good suggestions there, this one:

"Instancing of objects (I think): Model once, add many times to scene, but each time with different textures"

is something that I would find very handy!

never saw the point of 'clone object' when it doesn't allow you to change it's instance properties, and if you do want to you have to save it out as a different object - cheers, well that's useful isn't it!!!

:)

[faulknermano]

Originally posted by Matt
hey marc!

some very good suggestions there, this one:

"Instancing of objects (I think): Model once, add many times to scene, but each time with different textures"

is something that I would find very handy!

never saw the point of 'clone object' when it doesn't allow you to change it's instance properties, and if you do want to you have to save it out as a different object - cheers, well that's useful isn't it!!!

:)

this _may_ require a node-like implementation of objects. this enables dependency heirarchies to work instances and their properties. what i'd like, however, is a good interface to those properties. it makes ALL the difference.

[marc]

I just remembered another little improvement I wished for: Being able to keep on working while doing a test render. (And I don't want to start another Lightwave for this.)

Marc