A new release is available here: RenderFlam3

I’ve been back to the script during the last days and found that before adding more new features I’ll better use the 1.3.8.x releases to add some more maintenance stuff.
There was some more coding left outside during the last releases due to the lack of spare time.

1. User defined JPEG quality and 16bit PNG support let users to fully customize the generated files both in terms of Format and Quality.
2. Flames checking is now selectable: this feature is very important cos the preliminary Flames checking could require various minutes on big Flames files. Users can use this feature to skip it. It’s should be used on Flames you’ve already checked for Flam3 compatibility.
3. Progress display for preliminary Flames checking and Better progress display for Flames saving let users in having a better and more complete feedback of the operations done by the working script.
4. BAT file header reports Flam3 and RenderFlam3 used version and BAT file header reports Generation parameters give users some information about the environment used to generate the Flame-sequence and the BAT file generated parameters.
5. BAT file is better commented give users more explanatory comments into the generated BAT file; it’d be more easy to optimize the whole rendering process now.

The interesting thing about this script is that, taking a look to the Site’s statistics, I’ve found there’s still some quite good interest in it; it’s actually often browsed and downloaded but I rarely have back some comments or usage tracks: I’m quite mature to know that the general Internet rule is “grab what you can“.

Well, I’ve spent some time tracing the users old requests and working to better code them, as far as possible,  instead of adding a new bunch of stuff.
Most of the things are now implemented and some more will be added during the next maintenance releases.

Download here (right click / Save As): RenderFlam3.zip

Released under GPL License – http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.html
Credits or donations are not mandatory but very appreciated especially when using “RenderFlam3″ in commercial production.

Complete Render Flam3 posts archive: Search about Render Flam3

Low-quality preview of the Global Camera Rotation feature

RenderFlam3 main purpose is rendering a sequence of Flames using Flam3 to create animations.
It’s an Apophysis script which cycles through the flames in the Title Window,
sets their time field,
sets their advanced animation tags,
saves them all off to a single flame file,
and then creates a bat file (to the same output path).
Executing the bat file will launch flam3-animate and render the animation’s frames; Flam3 will interpolate all the flames.
RenderFlam3 can create Morph, Sheep or Edge animations.

Flam3 supported Variations:
linear, sinusoidal, spherical, swirl, horseshoe, polar, handkerchief, heart, disc, spiral, hyperbolic, diamond, ex, julia, bent, waves, fisheye, popcorn, exponential, power, cosine, rings, fan, blob, pdj, fan2, rings2, eyefish, bubble, cylinder, perspective, noise, julian, juliascope, blur, gaussian_blur, radial_blur, pie, ngon, curl, rectangles, arch, tangent, square, rays, blade, secant2, twintrian, cross, disc2, super_shape, flower, conic, parabola, split and move.

Preliminary Docs are included in the new archive.
Read the Docs or below for new features.

Changelog
v 1.3.8.5 – 18 June 2009
User defined JPEG quality added
16bit PNG support added
Flames checking is now selectable
Progress display for preliminary Flames checking
Better progress display for Flames saving
BAT file header reports Flam3 and RenderFlam3 used version
BAT file header reports Generation parameters
BAT file is better commented

v 1.3.8.3 – 5 June 2009
Added Global Camera Rotation

v 1.3.8.2 – 2 June 2009
Added support for disc2, conic and parabola Variations
Updated/Better Flam3 version checking scheme: Flam3 versions are now properly checked forward!

v 1.3.8 – 08 November 2008
Corrected a couple of bug regarding selectable Padding XForms writing
Implemented writing of No, FinalXForm + PostXForm, PostXForm or FinalXForm only
Default value changed to 0 = No Padding XForms
The archive’s name is RenderFlam3.zip only

v 1.3.7 – 04 November 2008
More compact/optimized code
Added support for
Flam3 2.7.15 interpolation types: old and older (linear and log already supported)
Flam3 2.7.14 new motion blur features: temporal_filter_type, temporal_filter_width and temporal_filter_exp
Added support for selectable Padding XForms writing implemented in “Flam3 Advanced Parameters” section
Fixed a minor/rare bug regarding FinalXForm handling
Updated/Better Flam3 version checking scheme
it’s now 2.7.xx version-independent both on “plain” and “sub” folder installations

v 1.3.6 – 24 April 2008
Updated Flam3 version checking scheme
corrected one minor Flam3 README file browsing fault
Added support for Flam3 Interpolation Space tag
needs Flam3 2.7.7 or newer
default value is Log
Added support for Flam3 “enable_jpeg_comments” and “enable_png_comments” vars
the proper var is written into the bat file
enable_jpeg_comments set to 1 by default
enable_png_comments set to 1 by default
Little changes to the bat file writing routine
Some minor code clean-up

v 1.3.5 – 19 April 2008
Implemented new Flam3 version checking scheme
Needs Flam3 “README.txt” file
Plain-folder install: automatic version check browsing Flam3 README file
Sub-folder install: supported for 2.7.6 up to 2.7.11 checking folder name
Forcing Flam3 path via “flam3path” variable
see below at the end of the main comment
Secant to Secant2 variation conversion for Flam3 2.7.10 and 2.7.11
Dropped Flam3 2.7.5 support
Supporting only Flam3 2.7.6 and newer
Raw-support for Flam3 2.7.7 and newer

v 1.3.4 – 18 April 2008
Some small code clean-up

v 1.3.3 – 17 April 2008
Apophysis version-independent
SaveFile Dialog fully supported
Added raw support for Flam3 up to version 2.7.11

v 1.3.2 – 7 Nov. 2007
Added Apophysis 2.07

v 1.3.1 – 25 Oct. 2007
Added support for Apophysis 2.06c 3D hack
Added support for Flam3 2.7.6
Camera Zoom minor bugs fixed
Minor updates:
Some code optimizations
Better supersample/oversample check
Bat file: end comment modified
“LoopKF” named added back

v 1.3 – 19 Oct. 2007
Sheep and Edge animations types added.
Support for Camera Angle/Rotation property added (needs Apophysis 2.06c beta or newer).
Supporting only Flam3 2.7.5
Flam3 install check added.
Apo version-independent Variations check against Flam3 supported ones.
Bat files: more advanced options and more comments added.
Two different Script versions
One for Apophysis 2.06c beta , Apophysis 2.06 beta and Apophysis 2.06 beta Z+
and one for Apophysis 2.05 beta 2, Apophysis 2.05 Z+ beta 2 and Apophysis 2.05 Z+ beta 2 C++
Supporting Variation Variables for:
radial_blur, rings2, fan, blob, pdj, perspective,
julian, juliascope, curl, move, ngon, disc2,
rectangles, super_shape, flower, conic, parabola,
pie and split variations.

v. 1.2 beta1 to beta12
RAW saving routine added.
Main/big updates on the whole script (too much to list).

v. 1.1
Saving scheme updated
It’s now completely resolution independent.
Use “Maintain Aspect Ratio” for perfect matching
or Apo’s free scale: may have no perfect matching (depending on flames) but let you scale in no-proportional way.
“Maintain Aspect Ratio” added
“Animation Loop” added
“Copy first flame’s MasterScale/Zoom to each others” added
This is an hard-coded testing option (no user-request displayed)
Change the “szcopy” variable value.
Verbose messages in Script window.

v. 1.0
Initial release.