GLOSSARY

IFL Files

The Image File List (extension .ifl) is an ASCII file that lists other single-frame bitmap files to be used for each rendered frame.

There are four ways to animate bitmaps in 3D Studio. You can use FLC files, AVI files, IFL files, or you can use incrementally numbered static image files.

When you assign an animated bitmap for any purpose and render it, the bitmap steps through each frame of its animation as each frame of the scene is rendered, resulting in an animated map.

For example, if you assign a 10-frame flic of a blinking red "Danger" sign as a texture map, apply the material to a cube, and then render a 30-frame animation, the cube displays the blinking red Danger animation three times.

The .ifl file is an ASCII file containing a list of the bitmap files to be used with each frame. You can append an optional numeric argument to each filename to specify the number of frames of rendered animation on which it is used. For example:

; Anything after a semicolon is a comment, and is ignored.
sand.tga 20
pebble.tga 40
stone.tif 20
boulder.tif 20

The IFL file listed above specifies sand.tga to be used for the first 20 frames, pebble.tga to be used for the next 40 frames, stone.tif to be used for 20 frames, and boulder.tif to be used for 20 frames.

Specify only the filenames in your IFL files. The file paths are derived from the map paths established in your preferences.

When you’re in a bitmap-file-selector dialog, for example, when you are selecting a bitmap in the Material Editor or in Video Post, you can type in the unique prefix of a list of files and a wildcard to find its incrementally-numbered set.

You can use both asterisk and ? characters in the wildcard to find exactly the set you’re looking for. The file selector then becomes an IFL-file generator. It makes an IFL with the unique prefix and an .ifl extension and assigns it to that bitmap's slot. You can then open the IFL file with a text editor.

Additional notes:

If the IFL generator has a name conflict with an existing IFL file, it will increment its name to avoid overwriting the existing file.

If the IFL generator has any problems with write access while trying to create the IFL file, the process will fail and the IFL file won't be created. So it won’t work when reading bitmaps off of a CD-ROM. You’ll have to copy them to a directory on your hard disk first. Likewise, it won’t work on network drives to which you don’t have write access.