A different way to make shows: Improvements in 3D rendering

[Dr Laser]

[carmangary]

Ohhhhhhhhh, snap. This thread is outta control!

[buffo]

Adam, you are truly a hypocrite.

You know - I had *just* decided to take you off my ignore list, James - after someone kindly suggested to me in a PM that you might yet have something meaningful to contribute. And what is the first thing I read from you? Your post above.

Why is it that people who have nothing to say take so many words to say nothing?

And you're calling *me* a hypocrite? The irony is astounding...

I stand by my original statement to Josh. He's been here, what - 3 months? Yet he's telling Jem to stop talking about his new scanners? ("Stay on track" was his exact quote.) And Jeremy has been here nearly 2 years? That's bogus.

Adam

[James Lehman]

Adam.

If you have something relevant to add to the discussion about the ILDA file format, specifically about format 3, and why it's section header is different than all the rest, and / or formats 4 & 5 being completely non related and non retro-engineered to the original formats 0, 1, & 2. I'd love to hear it.

Get as technical as you want. I'll try to keep up.

James.

PS. I joined the PL exactly one week before you and I'm older than you. So shut the F$%K Up.

[buffo]

I have no desire to get into another discussion about ILDA format 3, with you or anyone else.

First, there is already a thread devoted to the topic where the facts have been laid out quite to my satisfaction by the key players involved. (In fact, to *everyone's* satisfaction except yours.)

Second, I strongly suspect that the real reason behind your invitation to discuss the matter is not to further the state of the art of laser file formats, but rather to beat the drum of "James Lehman deserves more respect", and "Pay attention to James Lehman to the exclusion of everything else", and finally "Down with commercial software - open source is the only answer." I have no time for that.

And third, the entire discussion is irrelevent. The format has already been abandoned by the rest of the world. If that's not good enough for you to drop it, then nothing I say will change your mind.

Adam

[James Lehman]

Yep. That's what I thought.

Nothing to say.

James.

[buffo]

shut the F$%K Up.

Yep. That's what I thought.
Nothing to say.

POT.KETTLE.BLACK

Adam (Signing off)

[DZ]

LOL!!!


You know, this really was a good thread at the start. The 3D rendering program that drlava created really looks awesome and I'm sure will be amazingly cheaper than the Pangolin plugin. Is that something that is going to be made available for everyone?

[Pitts]

Hey guys..

You both obviously have something to offer for all to benefit from (otherwise you would both not be here debating[bumping] so hard..)

BUT... there comes a time..

Ding Ding !! the bell has rung back to your corners for a good towelling down..and a cool off..

The Referees here have made up their minds many posts ago..

No point in wasting all that energy that could be going into something positive..

Cheers

Ray

[James Lehman]

Just in case anyone might be wondering.... I have no intention of reveres engineering any proprietary laser vector art formats and I have no desire to create any software that would allow anyone to convert licensed, copyrighted shows into the public domain in any way. I couldn't care less about how many different ways the pros come up with to rearrange and store the same data.

Ultimately, the public, open standard needs to be replaced with a well designed interpretation of the already open wave file format.

All I want to do is help to make the playing field a bit more level for everyone involved. If you think about it, the ILDA file format is "The Written Word" of the laserist. It is the only well established means of exchanging vector art from one system to another. As such it is FUNDAMENTALLY important.

There are countless thousands of frames out there in the ILDA format, so, even if a better format is developed, it will be quite some time before the ILDA format is completely phased out or forgotten.

Since January of 2005, when I posted my objections to the changes that were proposed to the format, I still have not seen one single word dedicated to explaining why the section header for format 3 needed to be changed to something different than all the others. I've gotten TONS of crap about who, when, where and some unimportant dancing around the issue of why, but NEVER A WORD explaining the technical benefits of doing it that way.

Then, when the busted format 3 was found to be ridiculous, it was trashed and replaced with something that has nothing to do with the original purpose and functionality of the pre-existing formats 0, 1 & 2.

I have written extensively about the specific technical details of the ILDA format and the ramifications of doing it one way or the other. It is all there for anyone who understands such things. I would be happy to enhance or explain any part of it.

Everyone just seems to except the fact that ILDA is ILDA and they get to set their own standards for whatever reasons they see fit. That attitude just doesn't hold up to any reasonable scrutiny for the development of what is supposed to be a world-wide industry standard, generic, open file specification.

And for God's sake! WHY should it take more than six years, since 2002, to still have no published standard for 24 bit color? Doesn't THAT tell you something?

I find it very annoying when people who don't know the first thing about this issue simply take the side of "the establishment". These people might as well save themselves a lot of meaningless typing and anxiety and simply say they blindly support the establishment for no reason other than the fact that they know them and they like them.

Good, solid technology is not supposed to be decided by a popularity contest.

The ILDA file format with properly implemented formats 0, 1, 2 & 3 is technically superior to the use of formats 4 & 5. I have already proven this. It is implemented in LaserBoy and has been for almost 4 years. As of late, LaserBoy now also reads and writes in formats 4 & 5 so a reasonable analysis and comparison can be made using the same open source code project.

Keep in mind that LaserBoy has only been running in Windows since the beginning of May of this year. So the rest of the world has only been able to see it in action since then.

If I can't get this blatantly obvious point across to anyone that matters, then what hope do any of us individuals have in influencing the direction of the art of laser display in general?

Buffo is right about one thing. I DO let budding young laserists know how wrong this is.

James.