Preserved Topic: Get your lava lamp PSD's here.

Anyway. I didn't want to clutter up the big sig competition of this month, so here goes.

90Kb, PS 6.0 or higher

I've made some explaining pictures to tell how I've done it, but it's much more fun to see it in action.

The basic idea is that the 'balls' or lumps you see aren't solid, but just gradients.

Over the gradients, there's a 'levels' adjustment layer. It separates the pixels between darker than 50% gray and lighter than 50% gray, so you get spheres.

Now, if the two spheres overlap, the part in the middle of the two lumps gets much brighter.

Which results in this:


Have fun!



[This message has been edited by mahjqa (edited 10-15-2002).]

Damn mahjqa you rock, really nice to see you revealling your techniques again, clever way of doing it, as usual you take the time not only to amaze us but then to show us how to do it.

Someone give the guy a bag of black pill topped cookies and fire this into the FAQ


only one suggestion, and i know yaq said this was still a WIP, you should turn down the speed of the movement on the wax in the lava lamp you have room in the size to give a more natural feel to the movemnt without really banging up the filesize with frame content



[This message has been edited by tomeaglescz (edited 10-15-2002).]

this is excellent
thx for the explanation
this helps a lot

my hobby is eating izz pears....hehe*hides* -THE SPACE-

Big fun there mahjqa!

Only comment goes with tome... slow it down if you can... the real thing doesn't move that fast.

Pretty cool stuff. I made this while playing around the psd.

Pretty cool stuff. I made this while playing around the psd.

For those who use POV-Ray, you may be interested to know that this is the same concept used for Blobs.

By the way, mahjqa, are you applying any sort of curves to the gradients? Your final result looks pretty smooth, so I assume you are, or are at least doing something similar, but if not, then applying a curve to the gradients before the levels may create a smoother result. (Apply a curve that's flat from 0, then steep upwards, then flat to 1, sort of like part of a sine wave.)

woahh...thats just amazing. very nice that
you share that with us... :top:

an effect like this can also easily be achieved using a blob object in povray.
maybe ill render a lava lamp.

hehehe metaballs in max

Hey Mahjqa!

Look what happens when you use the lava lamp technique with your animated fire!

Yowza

I have no clue what it's supposed to look like, but it sure looks nifty

Moth: It almost looks like a burning pear. But no one would hurt a PEAR would they!!! <lol> I think you're in trouble!

Nah. Not a burning pear, although, that would be funny.

It was meant to be one of those balls of fire you see chinese dragons playing with in chinese art prints. I got the idea from Mahjqa's pyrefly.

If I find a decent picture of a silk moth I will replace the oxidized copper moth.

Here's another sig that is the result of combining Mahjqa's ideas about animated fire and his observations about the effects of a levels layer above gradients.

... and on the other background.



[This message has been edited by Moth (edited 10-21-2002).]

Yes maybe if you could tell us what it is and then lower the file size we can discuss it .

Well... It's clouds going over the moon. I would love to make the file size smaller but I am starting to see some artifacting due to the 128 colors.

Here is a non-transparent version. Smaller and with more frame to slow the clouds down.

This technique has hit me like a ton of bricks. I keep thinking of all the possibilities.



[This message has been edited by Moth (edited 10-21-2002).]

Well, try B&W...only 2 colors...it's only clouds and moon, anyway...in B/W it would still look good...and you could then really cut the size down...

Good suggestion. I will give it a try.