Aladdin4D is not totally useless

[Ral-Clan]

I just posted a message and some images on this forum about how I am making a video project using Aladdin4d.  I posted it in the Aladdin 4d section, but it appears that messages posted to that section don't show up on the main page of A.org.  So rather than have no one see that posting, I'm just redirecting from here. For those who are interested, see this thread:

http://www.amiga.org/forums/showthread.php?t=64434

Is there any way for the owner of A.org to fix that, so messages posted to that section DO show up where all A.org members can actually see them?

[Ral-Clan]

I'm almost finished one of the interior "sets" of my moonbase rendered in Aladdin4d.  The only thing missing from this render is shadows (which will take a bit of time as I haven't used shadows very much yet).

The original image was rendered in 1920 x 1080 but I've downscaled this to 1280 x 720 for this posting:



(click to enlarge)

[Ral-Clan]

This was all done in Aladdin4d, no other software (well, ImageFX to make some textures for use on Aladdin4d objects).

I just rendered a version with shadows. No other differences in this picture other than the shadows, but it does give it a higher degree of realism.



Also, yes, I do use it in WinUAE.  But I see no reason why you couldn't do it in a hardware Amiga with a good amount of RAM.  It would be slower, or you'd have to work in lower resolutions than 1920 x 1080, that's all.  When I first started I used Aladdin4d on my real A2000.

Texturing the exterior of the moonbase is going to take some time.  I've "only" done the non-textured exteriors at the moment.

[Ral-Clan]

Very cool!

I'm exploring my future options with Aladdin4D. The current programmer is just too hard to reach and does not communicate enough. I've invested a bunch to have this product further developed and am sad by the delay caused by him.

That's too bad.  I really hope that the ball gets rolling again on Aladdin4d development.  It's very stable, but I've been pushing it REALLY hard and have dug up a few things which might be bugs - most people wouldn't encounter these in normal use but it would be nice to have them squashed.

Also, there are a few things that I would really like to see added to Aladdin4d in order to tempt me to stay with it in the long run.

- Boolean operations on objects
- a real multi-step undo function
- The ability to name groups and list all the groups in a selectable menu.
- a fix for the slightly squashed vertical dimension in the editor when using RTG (square pixel) screenmodes.

If these things were added (plus the bug-fixes) I would not constantly be tempted to move over to Lightwave.  Aladdin is really capable, very good and worth the price.  The addition of the above things would make it no-brainer for me to stay with Aladdin4d.

[Ral-Clan]

That's good stuff, Aegis.  I have only recently (in the past three years) taught myself 3D modelling, so the moonbase project is the most complex thing I have attempted.  Aladdin4d is what I learned on, so that's what I am continuing to use for the moment.

I have also been learning Lightwave 5 on the Amiga (reading books and watching tutorial videos), but have not yet attempted a complete project on it.  I do like the workflow though.  The use of keyframes, cameras and lights in the layout view is very intuitive.

I know Lightwave 5 is old by today's standards, but am I wrong in thinking that someone could still turn out some respectable work in it?  Your renders look pretty good (I especially like the middle one of the buildings), and with what you know now, you could probably improve on them.

[Ral-Clan]

I've got a copy of Lightwave 5 for the Amiga, and as I said, have been learning it.  My main focus has been on Aladdin 4d as at the time I purchasd it (three or four years ago) it was the only 3d modelling package I could still buy brand-new for the Amiga.  Having a real manual was a big deal to me, as I had been banging my head against 3d software packages otherwise.  Also, Aladdin4d was really cheap (I think I got it on sale new for $69).  So for that price I got a capable 3d rendering package with fully printed manual - so it was good value.  Aladdin4d may not have all the features of Lightwave on the Amiga (missing Boolean and real ray-tracing) and it also doesn't have quite as intuitive an interface, but it is still capable of some very good looking renders.  It's also got a good reputation for fast renders.

I've also heard that Aladdin4d handles gases and flares well (better that LW 5)?

Of course, you can take advantage of both software as objects can be transferred between (sometimes requiring intermediate translating software).

The one thing that I don't think is possible in any Amiga 3d modelling package, but I WISH was possible, is a way to display a series of frames from an animation (or film clip) behind the layout/stage screen. For example, lets say I had a series of 60 frames, or 2 seconds, dumped from a real video sequence.  I want to model a ball travelling from one actor's hand in the frame sequence to another's hand.  It would be a lot easier if I could load the sequence of frames into the background of the layout screen in the 3d modelling software and actually see where the actor's hands are at a particular keyframe, in order to create the path of the ball.

I think in Lightwave you can load a single frame in the background, but on the Amiga it will only be in 1-bit colour (i.e. pure black or pure white pixels, dithered).

I'd be pleased to hear if there was a way to do this.

[Ral-Clan]

One thing I really like about Aladdin4d is that you can edit an object from any perspective, rather than just "flat" X, Y, Z and only view the perspective (as with Lightwave).

But I agree, if you've already mastered Lightwave, there's probably nothing to entice you to Aladdin, but if you haven't already invested a lot into Lightwave then it's worth a look.

The other advantage Aladdin4d had going for it is that it's still supported (well, er, sort of....more like "on life support", but it might come back!).

[Ral-Clan]

UPDATE JAN-18-2014

Okay folks.  I've done some more work on this project.  I've switched over to Lightwave 5.0 (Amiga version).  I've made a lot of progress texturing and colouring the models.  Here are some VERY ROUGH composites of one of the models.  These aren't finished yet and these composites are literally 10 minute throw-togethers just to put something up.

The model was entirely made from scratch by me.  It's my own design. Modelled at first in Aladdin4d then finished and textured in Lightwave. Some touch-up was done in ImageFX.

This is the first serious 3d modelling project I've ever done.

(click on the thumbnails below to see larger versions).





PS: just in case you were wondering, the backgrounds are real.  NASA pictures.

[Ral-Clan]

Looks good!

So Aladdin 4D IS useless ??

Well - (I knew I was going to get this comment! haha!) - yes and no.  Aladdin4d is VERY capable.  But I find the interface of Lightwave & its modeller more intuitive.  Lightwave Modeller also has visible layers, multiple undo levels and boolean operations which are SO useful.  The whole way Lightwave Layout sets things up as if you're on a studio soundstage is very intuitive.  Plus, Lightwave also does true raytracing (which I'm not really using a lot for this project).

Lightwave 5 does fall short on a few features that Aladdin4d has - Alladin 4d allows you to set multiple surfaces of different sizes (that define different polygon areas) on top of each other (hard to explain).  Harder to do in Lightwave.

Aladdin4d also allows you to rotate bitmap textures.  So if you're laying a bitmap image on a shape that is not quite flat in the X/Y/Z planes, you can angle it so it doesn't get distorted.  This is missing in Lightwave 5 and I really missed it (I had to do some inconvenient work-arounds).

Aladdin4d has much better particle animation and gas rendering functions. It also has faster rendering, and its renders have a different look which can be quite beautiful.  Aladdin4d has better RTG support.  Lightwave doesn't really support RTG for displaying renders unless you use a third party plug-in.

So both pieces of software are quite good.  I think I'll probably end up using both interchangeably - i.e. modelling objects in Lightwave and using rendering them in Alladin4d on occasion.

Lightwave is a bit harder to set up on a modern Amiga, whereas Aladdin4d is totally compliant with Workbench/intuition. Back in the 1990s Aladdin4d was also quite a bit cheaper than Lightwave, which obviously doesn't make a difference today - but would have been a major consideration then.

Both are great pieces of software - and both can produce stunning renders.

Aladdin4d is also (marginally) still alive and has a small chance of being developed further.  If they added Boolean operations, more than one undo level and visible layers I would be sorely tempted to use Aladdin4d full time.

[Ral-Clan]

@ ral-clan

they look great! how long did they take to render on your miggy ??

also, can you list your screen modes for LW5 as I'm having issues with a fresh install of OS3.9 on my 1200.

I'm running it under WinUAE, actually, emulating an A4000 (AGA) under OS3.9.  So I'm sure the render times are equivalent to an 060, maybe faster?  It takes about a minute to render a frame at medium resolution with medium anti-aliasing turned on.  I haven't turned on shadow ray tracing yet, so maybe it will take longer then.

As for the screen modes.  Lightwave Layout starts up in a native PAL Hi-Res Laced screenmode by default (it even seems to do this on NTSC systems) - so there shouldn't be any trouble there. Did you delete your PAL video driver from Workbench?  Maybe that is causing your problem.

I then switch Layout over to 800x600 screenmode 8-colours most of the time, although it can also do 1024x768 (or whatever that screenmode is).  These higher resolution screenmodes are promoted to RTG with NewMode screen promoter (I really had to play around with NewMode to get it to work).

The key when promoting Lightwave Layout RTG screenmodes is that you must tell your mode promoting software to remember the screen NOT BY ITS NAME, but my the resolution and other identifying features (NewMode has this ability).  This is because Lightwave Layout generates all sorts of different screens when you change Layout's resolution, render in different resolutions, to HAM-8 or HAM-6 or RTG, etc. AND it calls all these screens "Lightwave" which confuses your mode promoter.  Again, I've only ever tried NewMode and can report it works.  You've also got to tell your mode promoter software remember to NOT promote HAM-8 or HAM-6 or other native screenmodes Lightwave occasionally uses.

Lightwave of course can display rendered screens in Native HAM-8, which looks good enough most of the time.  But I also have a piece of software called CyberGraphics Renderer installed (are you an English Amiga Board user? Zone?).  This plugin allows Lightwave rendered images to an RTG screenmode (full 24-bits, etc.).  I think probably what this plugin does is save a 24-bit IFF to a temporary buffer then call up an small RTG image viewer. Anyway, it works well.  If you are an AREXX programmer you might be able to write something which would fulfill a similar function using your favourite image viewing software (i.e. the viewer software is running in the background and once it detects a new image Lighwave generated IFF in the temporary buffer location it loads it, displays it, and makes itself the foremost display screen).

Lightwave Modeller in version 5 is sort of RTG friendly.  It will natively allow you to use a couple of different RTG resolutions without too much complaint - although I've found that you must stick to 4:3 ratio screenmodes or else things get stretched horizontally - which messes up your ability to do accurate modelling.

I can't see why any of the above cannot be done on a real hardware Amiga (indeed, I had Lightwave running on my real A2000/040 up until 2008).  Render times will of course be slower.

[Ral-Clan]

Hi Folks,

I've almost got my moonbase scene finished.  Not quite done, but looking good.  There are a few tweaks I'm still going to do to add realism, but here's some shots for now:

(click on them to enlarge images- and then click on the larger image AGAIN to get a full screen image)





All models, textures etc. etc. were built from scratch by me and rendered 100% in Lightwave 5.0 running on AmigaOS3.9.  Textures were made in ImageFX.  As I mentioned before, this is my first serious 3D modelling project.

Hope you enjoy.  I'd welcome comments.