Subject: Re: LW Frame limits?
From: Ernie Wright <[email-masked]>
To: Multiple recipients of list <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 18 Dec 1995 13:28:21 -0500

David Warner wrote:

> I seem to have discovered another limitation of LightWave...in addition 
> the 1,000 object limit and the 65,000 polygon (per object) limit, there 
> appears to be a frame limit of 24,464 frames.
> 
> had a total of 90,000 frames...when I loaded it into LW, it only showed 
> 24,464 in the scene panel ...

That's pretty funny, and I think I know what's happening.  24,464 is
what you get when you only look at the lower two bytes of 90,000.  Or:

   90000 = 01 5F 90h
   24464 = 00 5F 90h

The loss of the bits above the 15th could have been an effect of using
certain Windows functions to handle the frame number fields on the
Scene panel, but a quick check on the Amiga also shows this behavior,
which implies that LW itself is using a 16-bit integer to store frame
numbers.

The actual limit, in effect, is 32,767.  And if David had needed, say, 
100,000 frames instead of 90,000, the Last Frame value displayed on the
Scene panel would have been *negative*.

- Ernie