Wishlist for Marine Aquarium 3 and Future

[JohnWho]

Good point and question, xitrum.

Perhaps Jim could respond since he determined the 30fps limit.

[Jim Sachs]

I don't really understand the question. 3D systems do their thing in hardware and drivers - I don't see why they would care (or even know about) what rate the scene is being updated. 120 times per second, they simply show the left eye whatever is in the left buffer, then do the same for the right eye (60 hz per eye). My program just delivers the coordinates for the objects, the hardware takes it from there and splits it into left eye / right eye views. You can even pause my program (frame rate of 0), and the view will be a static scene, but still 3D.

My nVidia 3D Vision system with a 120 hz Samsung monitor does a terrific job at 1920x1200, no matter what rate I update the coordinates. Anything less than 30 fps makes the animation too jerky.

[johnblommers]

This is MA3 we're talking about right? You want to reduce the application frame rate to 24fps? There's a setting for that

[feldon34]

It's probably possible within the Registry to set the frame rate limiter to 24.

[Jim Sachs]

That screen is from the Mac version. It looks like Jim O'Connor lets you take it down to 24.

[johnblommers]

Absolutely that's a Mac screen shot, I knew that when I posted to this "Marine Aquarium for Windows" forum. The lower limit for the Mac version is 20fps. Jim O'Connor gives the user more flexibility and choice in the matter. I appreciate that very much.

[Jim Sachs]

When Napoleon took over the monastery of Santa Maria delle Grazie, he cut a large doorway right through the bottom part of Da Vinci's "The Last Supper", so that the kitchen and dining room would have a more direct connection. The kitchen staff probably appreciated it very much, but I'll bet that old Leonardo would have voted against it, had he still been alive.

If you guys insist on running the Aquarium at less than 30 fps, please wait 'til I'm dead.

[johnblommers]

Jim, that was very eloquently put. I was pretty sure that your artistic senses would be set on edge at the very thought of guys like xitrum and me making MA3 look bad by running it at low fps. I can imagine you thundering:

"I am surrounded by Philistines!"

and I would not blame you if you did. This sort of thing reflects negatively on MA3. As I have said in the past, the Marine Aquarium screen savers are the only screen savers for which I have every laid down coin. Why? Because they look so darned good.

At ease, good artiste .....

[Jim Sachs]

OK, I'm at ease. (But not dead, yet.)

[Wizwad]

Oooh - that's so nearly a Monty Python reference. I'm sitting here biting my tongue!

[JohnWho]

Originally posted by Jim Sachs:

If you guys insist on running the Aquarium at less than 30 fps, please wait 'til I'm dead.  

But, the guy with the Mac can run it at less than 30 fps, Jim.

Perhaps you should check your pulse?

[Jim Sachs]

I've never seen the Mac version, but just because they CAN do it doesn't mean they SHOULD do it. I'm putting everyone on the honor system.

[xitrum]

Thanks for all the replies. Yes, I'd like to able to set the frame rate to 24 fps, like shown in that Mac screen shot.

The reason is simple: I have my PC connected to a 3DTV, not a 120Hz monitor. The 3DTV supports the 3D blu-ray spec. Included in the spec is supported for 3D gaming. That is, the 3DTV can display 3D content with 1280x720p @ 60Hz or 1920x1080p @24Hz.

I'm using nVidia 3DTV Play. So, if I set my PC resolution to 1280x720 @60Hz. I'd see Marine Aquarium in its glorious 3D. I'd like to up the resolution to 1920x1080p. In order for nVidia 3DTV Play to push the 3D content to the 3DTV, the refresh rate for 1920x1080p must be set to 24Hz.

Hope that explains it. :-)

Again, THANKS a bunch!

[xitrum]

Originally posted by Jim Sachs:

When Napoleon took over the monastery of Santa Maria delle Grazie, he cut a large doorway right through the bottom part of Da Vinci's "The Last Supper", so that the kitchen and dining room would have a more direct connection. The kitchen staff probably appreciated it very much, but I'll bet that old Leonardo would have voted against it, had he still been alive.

If you guys insist on running the Aquarium at less than 30 fps, please wait 'til I'm dead.  

Now now... not wanting that to happen...

But 24 fps isn't too much to ask, it it? Look at it this way, film is 24 fps. By running at 24 fps, it would just look "cinematic".

[johnblommers]

Hi xitrum

My sense is that you can set your video card on your PC to 24fps and still allow MA to run at 30fps. The MA3 code can throw more frames per second at the video card than the card can throw at the TV. You're just seeing 24 of the 30 frames per second.

In the days of MA2 we would test our systems by seeing how high we could get the frame rate. As I write this I'm running MA2.6 for the Mac at 1920x1200 fullscreen and it's showing over 300fps. This on a 60Hz LCD monitor.

[xitrum]

Originally posted by Jim Sachs:

My nVidia 3D Vision system with a 120 hz Samsung monitor does a terrific job at 1920x1200, no matter what rate I update the coordinates. Anything less than 30 fps makes the animation too jerky.  

The 3D blu-ray spec allows a device to pack 2 frames (one for each eye) for each refresh. So, let's say the program sends a frame every 1/24 second. The nVidia driver takes that frame, creates a perspective pair (second frame), and sends both (as a single packed frame) to the 3DTV (in that 1/24th second) for display. The 3DTv unpacks it and displays a frame for each eye.

I've played some video games at 1920x1080p @ 24fps setting and did not have issues. So I thought it would work for this software as well.

[xitrum]

Originally posted by johnblommers:

Hi xitrum

My sense is that you can set your video card on your PC to 24fps and still allow MA to run at 30fps. The MA3 code can throw more frames per second at the video card than the card can throw at the TV. You're just seeing 24 of the 30 frames per second.  

Thanks for the suggestion. That works.

But that requires that my PC resolution to be set at 1920x1080p @ 24 fps. I'm sitting 12 feet away from my TV display so I set my PC resolution at 1020x720p. Thus, I like the feature to set the resolution and frame rate inside the program (similar to video games). When the program runs, as long as it sends 1920x1080p @ 24fps, the nVidia will do its magic.

[Jim Sachs]

I'll try my best to clear up this confusion. Let's say your 3D system really does require a refresh rate of 24 fps to sync with shutter glasses (to say I'm skeptical about this would be an understatement). If true, it would need EXACTLY 24 fps. The timing for left/right eye is extremely critical. We're talking hardware precision here, not software.

When my program sets a frame rate, it simply records the time as it exits the loop. The next time through the loop, it checks the elapsed time. If it's less than that required for the desired frame, it waits a moment, then checks the time again. JUST CHECKING THE CLOCK burns up several thousand cycles, and that alone would insure that the timing can never be exact. But things get far worse. At a certain point in the loop, the program reliquishes all control back to Windows (hoping to get it back soon). All the other programs in the multitasking system then have their chance at clock cycles, and may or may not EVER give control back to my program.

So, even if you were allowed to set a frame rate of 24, that's just a high-end request. The frame rates for 5 consecutive frames might be something like 23.2, 21.9, 23.9, 8.1, 23.9.

For this reason 3D cards set their own refresh rate in hardware. There's absolutely no reason the system should care whether the 3D coordinates in the frame buffers have changed in the last 1/24 of a second. There's no traffic cop that says, "Hey, I suspect that these numbers have changed twice since the last time I was here. I'm citing you for excessive speed, and shutting down your operation!"

Also, the reason film doesn't look too bad at 24 fps can be summed up in two words: motion blur. Moving objects are blurred between where they are now and where they were in the last frame. With a 3D program, moving objects get very ugly and jittery below about 30 fps.

[xitrum]

Originally posted by Jim Sachs:

I'll try my best to clear up this confusion. Let's say your 3D system really does require a refresh rate of 24 fps to sync with shutter glasses (to say I'm skeptical about this would be an understatement).  

Sorry for the miscommunication. Let's try again.

The HDMI 1.4a spec requires 3D game content to be 720p/60. It happens to require 3D movie content to be 1080p/24Hz. This has nothing to do with syncing with the shutter glasses.

nVidia 3DTV Play takes resolution and frame rate into account when it tries to detect whether the content it is displaying is 3D compatible. If I set the resolution to 1920x1080 and the frame rate at 30. nVidia 3DTV Play says that the format is not 3D compatible and will not output 3D content to the 3DTV. But if I set the resolution to 1920x1080 and the frame rate at 24 or the resolution to 1280x720 and the frame rate at 60, then nVidia 3DTV Play will recognize the content as 3D compatible and will output 3D content to the 3DTV. As of now, I can only use the 720p resolution.

I don't know how you deal with the latency when trying to push data at a certain frame rate. But I guess it's the same as if you allow the user to set the frame rate at 30, 60, etc. There are certain video games that allow me to set fixed frame rate. I've used that feature to play the games in 3D at 1920x1080. So I know this is possible.

[JohnWho]

xitrum -

Jim has created the algorithm that allows the various frame rates and he has arbitrarily set the limits at 30 through 124 fps. I suspect, but do not know for sure, that changing those limits either higher or lower is possible. (Actually, we know it can be done because during the beta testing those limits hadn't been set yet.)

His program, his decision.

The situation you describe may become one that affects more and more folks that choose to purchase 3D capable HDTV's.

While Jim may be correct regarding the "motion blur" possibility on 24 fps, it should be noted that most HDTV's have the 24 fps setting in order to more properly display 24 fps film images. I believe some models that can display at 240 Hz will show each frame 10 times per second and may even "interpolate" the frames to even out the motion blur.

Modern technology working to display and improve the 24 fps motion picture film technology.

Cool, eh?

Sounds like you are enjoying yours.