Author Topic: [FF7PC] No Chibis in FMVs (1.16b) (Read 72094 times)

DrLilo · « **on:** 2014-05-09 11:12:58 »

DOWNLOAD: https://www.mediafire.com/?ygkx8e02ka9127j

This is a quick n' dirty way to remove the original SD models from those FMVs in which they're hard-baked. FMVs like "dumcrush", "ontrain", "fallpl" etc. feature pre-rendered versions of the blocky, chibi models, which can't easily be swapped out. So I took those files into some video editing software and had a shot at superimposing some images of the realistically proportioned character models on top.

The results are far from perfect, this is NOT the mod for you, if your idea of modding FF7's cut-scenes is to improve their visual quality, lol. But, if like me, you're more annoyed by inconsistency than by bad animation, then maybe you'll appreciate this as a way to avoid ever seeing those chibi models at any point during the game...

dumcrush (The Mideel collapse sequence)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j8TIRw8ap2s&feature=youtu.be

Painted over the original models frame-by-frame
Cut some shots short to minimise work-load
Lazily rotated some backdrops to minimise work-load
Superimposed partially animated models

fallpl (Sector 7 is destroyed)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9o6bE5ZsrUk&feature=youtu.be

Warning, the timing with the real-time models goes slightly out, but it's not too bad.
Painted over the original models frame-by-frame
Cut some shots short to minimise work-load
Removed minor NPCs for convenience
Superimposed still-frame models

gold3 (Gondola scene, where the Chocobo racers pass the window)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z2x3Q0DsWwg&feature=youtu.be

Blurred the Chocobo riders, obscuring their proportions
Cut to adjust timings, to match up with real-time models

hiwind0 (Cloud climbs up to see the Highwind)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EKd1j9sRyjY&feature=youtu.be

Simplified camera movement for convenience
Cut some shots short to minimise work-load
Painted over the original model
Superimposed partially animated model

hwindfly (The Highwind arrives to rescue Tifa)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nwG3nkjRgFU&feature=youtu.be

Simplified camera movement for convenience
Cut some shots short to minimise work-load
Painted over the original models frame-by-frame
Superimposed partially animated models
This one is a particularly complicated sequence, so expect crappiness

jairofal (Tiny Bronco crash lands)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5FNHHSnBuo0&feature=youtu.be

Blurred Cloud and Cid, obscuring their proportions
Added overall motion blur to further obscure changes

monitor (Shin-Ra employee asleep in the monitor room)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3cciD1AKSOE&feature=youtu.be

Painted over the original model
Superimposed still-frame model

ontrain (Cloud escapes by jumping onto the train)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NvhJWyDSnIw

Cut some shots short to minimise work-load
Painted over the original model frame-by-frame
Superimposed partially animated model

parashot (Parashooting sequence)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6MAucM02RKA&feature=youtu.be

Reduced frame-rate for a couple of seconds to minimise work-load
Painted over the original models frame-by-frame
Superimposed still-frame models
Red XIII and Cid do not appear for convenience
Cut the sequence in places to match the timing of the real-time models

southmk (Cloud falls after the Airbuster fight)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gkQtHaFcIWc&feature=youtu.be

Painted over the original models frame-by-frame
Used some masking so a little of the original explosion is still visible
Superimposed partially animated models

weapon2 (Sapphire Weapon attacks Junon)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yQlUhOFXhTk&feature=youtu.be

Cut out the shots where Shin-Ra troops are visible

weapon3 (Sapphire Weapon attacks Junon)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tSeO58mxhlE&feature=youtu.be

Cut out the shots where Shin-Ra troops are visible

Also included in the download is a zip file called CannonSequenceFix.zip. This is an flevel patch which corrects an issue with the hwindfly sequence wherein Tifa's field model would remain visible on top of the entire FMV. To install this fix (which restores the sequence effectively) unzip the file and place the unzipped folder in your root Final Fantasy VII directory (where FF7.exe or FF7_en.exe are located) then double click "RUN ME.bat".

Credits:

I used the FMV Restoration project's files as a base.
I used character models from Kaldarasha's Redone Models and from Reunion.

Ulgp Credits:

luksy
Aali

All credit where it's due.

cmh175 · « **Reply #1 on:** 2014-05-09 13:29:00 »

This is really impressive. I agree they're pretty rough and have a lot of room for improvement, but this has some serious potential if you think the process can be perfected. I'd definitely be interested in updated videos with the unshaded models.

DrLilo · « **Reply #2 on:** 2014-05-09 14:02:28 »

Thanks. Yeah, I will keep improving them over time, though this was really more of a quick and dirty experiment. Hopefully a better animator than I, will take the challenge of improving on these.

EQ2Alyza · « **Reply #3 on:** 2014-05-09 15:13:22 »

I'm definitely on boat with the consistency you mentioned. I hope some animators can come along and work together with you together to get this finished

Mayo Master · « **Reply #4 on:** 2014-05-09 15:35:04 »

I like this

I may have another interesting bit for you: in the very long future, in TA we could very possible remake the FMV (since we recreate environments in 3d, and we'll just have to add in the 3d models such as Kaldarasha's). Obviously, it's in the very very far future because of how immense and complex the 3d environments are on most of these FMVs (example: oh, you want to recreate the intro FMV? Then you have to make a whole recreation of Midgar). I believe SpooX has been working on this for years, because most of his modelling efforts have been aiming at remaking the whole Sector 8, making the whole exterior of Junon, the Highwind, making train animation, etc... and most importantly he has a proof of concept right here. That being said, we'll eventually need all the animation work on the characters, which is what you'll be looking into. Hopefully in 10-20 years we'll be able to merge both projects

DrLilo · « **Reply #5 on:** 2014-05-09 15:58:45 »

Quote from: Mayo Master on 2014-05-09 15:35:04

I like this
I may have another interesting bit for you: in the very long future, in TA we could very possible remake the FMV (since we recreate environments in 3d, and we'll just have to add in the 3d models such as Kaldarasha's). Obviously, it's in the very very far future because of how immense and complex the 3d environments are on most of these FMVs (example: oh, you want to recreate the intro FMV? Then you have to make a whole recreation of Midgar). I believe SpooX has been working on this for years, because most of his modelling efforts have been aiming at remaking the whole Sector 8, making the whole exterior of Junon, the Highwind, making train animation, etc... and most importantly he has a proof of concept right here. That being said, we'll eventually need all the animation work on the characters, which is what you'll be looking into. Hopefully in 10-20 years we'll be able to merge both projects

That'll be awesome, when it's done

Consider the above a kind of stop-gap measure until that project is complete.

genesis063 · « **Reply #6 on:** 2014-05-09 21:43:00 »

Great work even if it is very rough. I just got one question. Would you possible consider adding in a version for the Sephiroth Story mod?

LeonhartGR · « **Reply #7 on:** 2014-05-10 01:38:59 »

Keep it up mate! Amazing work!

DrLilo · « **Reply #8 on:** 2014-05-11 12:59:34 »

UPDATE: (Ver 1.3)

jairofal:
Added jairofal... Of course there had to be one that I missed...

DrLilo · « **Reply #9 on:** 2014-05-12 18:24:10 »

UPDATE (Ver 1.5)

dumcrush:
Made the foregrounds and backgrounds rotate independently.
Gave Tifa more frames of animation, added the wheelchair to the ending.

gold3:
Cut the video so the timings line up better with the real-time models. (this change was in ver 1.4)

hiwind0:
Adjusted the timing on Cloud's climb animation slightly.

hwindfly:
The railing in front of Barret no longer disappears where he's throwing the rope.
The rope and the sea rotate independently.

monitor:
Made the Shin-Ra employee less shiny.

ontrain:
Neatened up the mask on Cloud so he doesn't clip through the bridge as much.
Redid the jump animation so it looks better.

southmk:
Neatened up the opening animation on Tifa slightly.
Cut a superfluous still-frame clip so it goes straight to the animated part.

Hellbringer616 · « **Reply #10 on:** 2014-05-12 18:52:27 »

Downloaded 3 separate times to try and give a review, But every time the archive is corrupt (using windows default zip program)

DrLilo · « **Reply #11 on:** 2014-05-12 19:01:18 »

Quote from: Hellbringer616 on 2014-05-12 18:52:27

Downloaded 3 separate times to try and give a review, But every time the archive is corrupt (using windows default zip program)

Uh oh... Re-uploading now.

EDIT:

Done, sorry about that. Hope this one works.

Hellbringer616 · « **Reply #12 on:** 2014-05-12 20:06:43 »

Worked great.

Looks good so far, some criticism (constructive of course)

dumcrush
Tifa's fall looks so unfluid, even for a 15FPS (which i think was the frame rate of all the videos in FF7) video. clouds colors also seem a bit.. off, I know he has Mako sickness, but his face looks so, Off.

gold3:
Looks great to me!

hiwind0
He seems to rise and fall while the video just raises. Anyway to fix that? Otherwise looks great

hiwindfly
Seems there are bubbles around Barret and Tifa unlike in others, Understand if thats not correctable

monitor:
His hair is very very shiny, Anyway to correct just his hair?

ontrain:
His face is still too dark :/

southmk:
Minor white lines around the charaters, Otherwise it looks amazing!

DrLilo · « **Reply #13 on:** 2014-05-12 20:20:39 »

Quote from: Hellbringer616 on 2014-05-12 20:06:43

Worked great.

Looks good so far, some criticism (constructive of course)

dumcrush
Tifa's fall looks so unfluid, even for a 15FPS (which i think was the frame rate of all the videos in FF7) video. clouds colors also seem a bit.. off, I know he has Mako sickness, but his face looks so, Off.

gold3:
Looks great to me!

hiwind0
He seems to rise and fall while the video just raises. Anyway to fix that? Otherwise looks great

hiwindfly
Seems there are bubbles around Barret and Tifa unlike in others, Understand if thats not correctable

monitor:
His hair is very very shiny, Anyway to correct just his hair?

ontrain:
His face is still too dark :/

southmk:
Minor white lines around the charaters, Otherwise it looks amazing!

Thanks for the feedback

Starting tomorrow I will go through these and see what I can do... Some will be easier than others to fix. The bubble effect on hiwindfly will be extremely hard to get rid of, it's really due to having to cover up the existing chibi models. It's not a problem whenever the camera is stationary because I can take one still image of the scene and carefully Photoshop it... Whenever the camera is moving but only for a short time, I've gone in and painted them out frame by frame (which creates a kind of flickery, blobby effect) while for longer, more complex shots I've used that bubble method... Either way it doesn't look too brilliant. :/

cmh175 · « **Reply #14 on:** 2014-05-12 21:17:23 »

LeonhartGR · « **Reply #15 on:** 2014-05-13 00:36:02 »

Quote from: DrLilo on 2014-05-12 20:20:39

....frame by frame...

Oh gosh! Such a painful process! That's why I never learned "after effects". A million thank you!

dkma841 · « **Reply #16 on:** 2014-05-13 17:10:47 »

DrLilo · « **Reply #17 on:** 2014-05-13 19:11:03 »

Quote from: sunz on 2014-05-13 17:10:47

Yes! Always wanted something like this, just annoys me when it shows those old Lego blocks in fmv's before lol thank you for this awesome mod!

Hey thanks

UPDATE (Ver 1.6c)

dumcrush:
Brightened up Cloud's face, added more fully animated clips to Tifa's falling.

hiwind0:
Tightened up the syncing between the background and Cloud.

hwindfly:
Couple of subtle touches, nothing major. (still a lot of work to make this one not suck

)

monitor:
Made his hair less shiny.

ontrain:
Brightened up Cloud's face.

southmk:
Tried to blur out some of the more noticeable white outlines.

Mirrorman95 · « **Reply #18 on:** 2014-05-13 20:03:43 »

I really like this mod, because I hate those blocky models, but I have one qualm about it. Some of the video descriptions say you cut out some of the frames. As much as I hate the low-poly field models, I'd rather have them in a few problem frames then have those frames removed altogether. If you find a way to fix or replace these frames, I'd be happy to replace my current set of those videos, which are part of cmh175's HQ FMV project, with these. Shinra's navy would seem more realistically capable of taking down Sapphire Weapon when they aren't looking like a bunch of stick figures. Seriously, keep up the good work, these are fantastic.

By the way, there's a video enhancement project called SVP, that can convert videos from 24 fps to 60 fps on the fly. Does it seem like a good idea, or would such high frame-rates be unrealistic for such an old game engine?

Hellbringer616 · « **Reply #19 on:** 2014-05-13 20:05:13 »

An amazing improvement!

dumcrush:
Looks great. I feel her run is a bit unnatural, But compared to what it was originally. (chibi) yours is far far better. The fall looks great now

hiwind0:
Looks good

hiwindfly:
The cannon seems to bounce around now.

monitor:
Looks good to me

ontrain:
Perfect!

southmk:
Far less noticeable. Looks great!

DrLilo · « **Reply #20 on:** 2014-05-13 20:20:08 »

Quote from: Mirrorman95 on 2014-05-13 20:03:43

Some of the video descriptions say you cut out some of the frames. As much as I hate the low-poly field models, I'd rather have them in a few problem frames then have those frames removed altogether.

Ehh.. It was really just a case of cutting the work load, by trimming the sequences down a bit. I removed or shortened some parts, but kept everything that's necessary to tell the story, including all the various camera angles. I don't currently have any plan to put these missing bits back in, but you won't notice them missing, the game doesn't wait on black for the full lengthed video to end or anything like that... Yeah the Shin-Ra troops are missing from the Junon attack, but as they're such minor NPCs, it just seemed like a lot of extra work. Heideggar says "ATTACK!" then you see a bunch of ammunition fly from Junon to the Weapon, so the story still makes sense.

Quote from: Mirrorman95 on 2014-05-13 20:03:43

By the way, there's a video enhancement project called SVP, that can convert videos from 24 fps to 60 fps on the fly. Does it seem like a good idea, or would such high frame-rates be unrealistic for such an old game engine?

I haven't done much research into it, for now I'm converting the videos to the same resolution and framerate as the vanilla game, as others settings and codecs that I've tried wouldn't run.

DrLilo · « **Reply #21 on:** 2014-05-13 21:30:42 »

UPDATE (Ver 1.7)

dumcrush:
Minor improvement to Tifa's running animation (her upper-half is no longer rock solid)

hwindfly:
Made the cannon's wobble less extreme, more of a gentle movement.

Thanks for the feedback Hellbringer.

EQ2Alyza · « **Reply #22 on:** 2014-05-13 22:11:42 »

Good work so far

dumcrush: Between the 8 and 9 seconds, the scene cuts to another but it shows Tifa still running (arm motion obvious) for a split second before she starts her falling animation.
Suggestion: When it cuts to the next scene, have the falling animation start right away. This would make the transition between scenes as fluid as possible.

fallpl: I can notice the transparent cloaking you gave to the running citizen. Is there anyway to eliminate it completely?

highwind0: Between the 8 and 9 seconds, the screen turns gray and flashes until the end.

highwindfly: Someone commented about the bubble blurs around Barret and Tifa. I can still notice them, but perhaps this is the best that can be done. I didn't read through the entire thread, so sorry if you've already addressed it.

ontrain: Give Cloud more time to prepare his setup before he jumps. You can hear a *thud* right around the start of the 3 second mark. In the original, this thud noise was exactly when Cloud landed on the train. Is there any way to have him crouched on one knee and leaning his arms forward onto the train? Standing straight up would seem difficult with the wind resistance.

DrLilo · « **Reply #23 on:** 2014-05-13 22:38:00 »

Quote from: EQ2Alyza on 2014-05-13 22:11:42

Good work so far

dumcrush: Between the 8 and 9 seconds, the scene cuts to another but it shows Tifa still running (arm motion obvious) for a split second before she starts her falling animation.
Suggestion: When it cuts to the next scene, have the falling animation start right away. This would make the transition between scenes as fluid as possible.

fallpl: I can notice the transparent cloaking you gave to the running citizen. Is there anyway to eliminate it completely?

highwind0: Between the 8 and 9 seconds, the screen turns gray and flashes until the end.

highwindfly: Someone commented about the bubble blurs around Barret and Tifa. I can still notice them, but perhaps this is the best that can be done. I didn't read through the entire thread, so sorry if you've already addressed it.

ontrain: Give Cloud more time to prepare his setup before he jumps. You can hear a *thud* right around the start of the 3 second mark. In the original, this thud noise was exactly when Cloud landed on the train. Is there any way to have him crouched on one knee and leaning his arms forward onto the train? Standing straight up would seem difficult with the wind resistance.

Thanks for the feedback... The hiwind0 problem was a rendering glitch, thanks for pointing it out. Re-uploading now.

The dumcrush one actually isn't a mistake, she was supposed to be still running, but I guess it doesn't look that great, so I'll have another go at that bit, when I get five mins. The transparent citizen is one example of many where it's actually super obvious where the old chibi models used to be... I dunno if I'll ever get rid of them completely, but I'll keep trying to improve the result. The ontrain sound effect is a good catch, hadn't occured to me, I'll have another look at that one.. (maybe I'll just move the sound effect itself, lol).

EDIT: Re-uploaded with fixed hiwind0. (Ver 1.7b)

Hellbringer616 · « **Reply #24 on:** 2014-05-14 00:33:46 »

So while watching this i realize...
The videos seem smaller than the ones DLPB uses with his restoration project and i had assumed you used that as a base. Did you?

If not you may want to try those as they may end up with less pixaled that you are injecting.

All in all.
dumcrush looks amazing now, And you are my hero haha