Hi all,
I need help
finding an animated graphic of a racehorse (with jockey), to potentially use for animating
the races i[/i]. The graphic must be realistic (i.e.
no cartoons), include a full stride of a gallop, and include a jockey. Ideally, I either
need several versions for each color (bay, black, grey, chestnut), or it needs to be
customizable so that I can create versions for each color.
Finally, it must either be
free, or available for non-commercial use.
Any ideas?
Wowza that would be sooooo
awesome!!! I’ll let you know if I find anything for sure!
There’s a site called
Mike’s Free Gifs that has a bunch of animations, and he takes requests as long as they meet
his guidelines. I went through his site and found some that might be useful.
<a
href=‘http://www.mikesfreegifs.com/main4/horse/horse6.gif’
target=’_blank’>mikesfreegifs.com/main4/horse/horse6.gif (Or go to <a
href=‘http://www.mikesfreegifs.com/main4/horse3.htm’
target=’_blank’>mikesfreegifs.com/main4/horse3.htm It is the second gif on
the page)
<a href=‘http://www.mikesfreegifs.com/main4/horse/renn.gif’
target=’_blank’>mikesfreegifs.com/main4/horse/renn.gif (Or go to <a
href=‘http://www.mikesfreegifs.com/main4/horse24.htm’
target=’_blank’>mikesfreegifs.com/main4/horse24.htm Also the second on the
page. This one you would have to ask him to add a jockey to. Or get anyone with an animation
editor to do so.)
I’ve seen horse6.gif
several places before, and that’s approximately what I’d like, but a whole lot more
customized. At the very least, I would need the background removed, and the other color
versions.
Ok, this is kinda off topic,
but for some reason I can’t see the animations actually move. I can see them, but they’re
not moving. Any reason why or what I can do to fix it? Anybody? I want to see the cool ponies
running! 
Thanks
I might could give a shot at
customizing that graphic Shanti, i’ve done it before but not as intricate as what this
needs.
I’d be willing to give it a shot, if you’d like.
Feel free, Fatimah. 
Eventually it’d be awesome to get a horse of every color (so to speak…every color in FF,
anyway ), but for now I’d be happy with bay, black, grey, and chestnut.
The big question is are the
horses going to just run straight from left to right or are the going to run in an oval with
different views like Coker’s 3-D viewer. It kind of makes a dfference in the graffics
you’ll need.
For now, I’m aiming for
2-D. Eventually I’d like to branch into 3-D if I can.
hmm… theres this one: <a
href=‘http://dq.com/java/gallop.html’ target=’_blank’>dq.com/java/gallop.html
(you could probably colour it different colours)
<a
href=‘http://www.animatedgif.net/animals/horses/Horse-2_e0.gif’
target=’_blank’>animatedgif.net/animals/hors … e-2_e0.gif - This one
isn’t as nice… And not as realistic
<a
href=‘http://www.mikesfreegifs.com/main4/horse/gallop.gif’
target=’_blank’>mikesfreegifs.com/main4/horse/gallop.gif - Similiar to the
first one
<a href=‘http://www.mikesfreegifs.com/main4/horse/Horse-02.gif’
target=’_blank’>mikesfreegifs.com/main4/horse/Horse-02.gif - This ones kinda
cool
<a href=‘http://www.mikesfreegifs.com/main4/horse/bluerider.gif’
target=’_blank’>mikesfreegifs.com/main4/horse/bluerider.gif - Similiar to
the one above
<a href=‘http://stablemade.com/animations/race_horse_running_md_clr.gif’
target=’_blank’>stablemade.com/animations/race_h … md_clr.gif - This guy
is so cool! hehe (sorry, not realistic, I just thought it was neat)
<a
href=‘http://www.lostpencil.com/images/horse_gallop.avi’
target=’_blank’>lostpencil.com/images/horse_gallop.avi (this ones for
windows) - This guys really realistic… I very very short clip though
<a
href=‘http://www.lostpencil.com/images/horse_gallop_sorenson.mov’
target=’_blank’>lostpencil.com/images/horse_ … renson.mov (This ones
for mac) - Same as above
Heres the site the 2 above animations were from, the program
looks really neat! <a href=‘http://www.lostpencil.com/apprentice_sub_max.html’
target=’_blank’>lostpencil.com/apprentice_sub_max.html
Thanks for the links Kim,
but dont’ forget we need ones with jockeys… and ones that look like they’re racing
This sounds sooo cool. 2010
maybe?
Good luck with figuring it all out guys! 
hehe yeah… forgot about
that andrea :rolleyes:
There’s one at <a
href=‘http://mywebpages.comcast.net/freequine/anim.html’ target=’_blank’>Freequine,
it’s a little down the page, but there is a jockey, too.
Thanks, but the only 2 that
are racehorses with jockeys have already been posted.
<a
href=‘http://www.revolution3d.de/mambo/’ target=’_blank’>Revolution 3D graphics
engine
Shanthi above is the link to the graphics engine Coker used for his viewer. On
his web site he mentioned it was free, and I believe it also supports 2D. I haven’t had a
chance to check the whole site out yet.
I was mulling over games
I’ve seen in the past that depicted horse races, and was reminded of a game I used to play
way back in the day on my Commodore 64, called Omni-Play Horse Racing. The way they displayed
their races was that they provided a side view of the horses during stretch runs, and then as
the field ran round corners, it switched to an overhead view that only displayed numbers (the
post position number of each horse) that moved. That might sound cheesy, but it really
didn’t look that bad, and eliminated the need to do a bunch of tricky camera changes that
the Commodore couldn’t do, anyway. You can see screen shots of it <a
href=‘http://s64.emuunlim.com/gameinfos/omniplayhorseracing/omniplayhorseracing.htm’
target=’_blank’>here…and yes, I realize that they are way old-school graphics. I
was just thinking, though, that that format might work at least for starters; if you have
some good graphics and an idea of how you want to code the stretch runs, at least, then
you’d only have to worry about seguing the turn shots with those on the stretch. (Only, she
says! Ha ha. Easily said by a non-programmer. )
There’s also a shareware program
called CyberPony that does a better job of depicting the entire race, just showing it in one
steady shot instead of having to do a bunch of switching. I went ahead and downloaded the
free trial version of it, and it’s not bad. It has a database of 1000 horses including
famous ones like Alydar and Seattle Slew, and you can add horses to it…and best of all, it
has a little color editor when you’re creating the horses, so you can pick a pretty good
approximation of a light or dark grey or bay or chestnut horse. You can create custom races
(though it won’t let you bet on them) containing up to 14 horses, though as far as I could
tell it would only make them for one set distance. And, there’s no steeplechasing or turf,
just dirt. You do have to pay for the full version, but it’s only $4 ($4.40 if you
want to mail the payment in by snail mail to Canada. ) I don’t know how easy it would be
to get it and hack into it to make it suit Final Furlong. I also have to admit that I don’t
know how ethical that would be. I don’t know how copyrights apply to shareware. But, I
encountered it at <a href=‘http://games.soft32.com/games/download-CyberPony-102896.html’
target=’_blank’>this page if anyone’s interested in looking at it. And the
developer’s site is <a href=‘http://members.aol.com/softgun/Policy.html’
target=’_blank’>here…the cool thing about them is that if you purchase a
registration, all the future versions they release are free…it’s like buying a lifetime
registration, basically.
So…I don’t know if any of that is practical or helpful at
all…just random thoughts.
I’m planning to start slow
and work up. At first, the graphics may not be more than a horse galloping (with or without
jockey ) with the Post Parade # on its side to distinguish horse from horse.
Obviously
eventually I’d like to have custom colors (possibly even markings), potentially show
equipment on the horse, allow for steeplechasing (turf is pretty easy, just turn the track
green 
), etc.
First step, though, is to get the basic code working to run the race and
get results…then we’ll see about how to animate it.
Thanks!
Wow, that game (Omni-Play)
is one I’ve been looking for forever! I bought a copy of Sport
of Kings about 15 years ago, but I didn’t have a PC, so I gave it to my friend. Once I
finally got a PC, I wanted to try and find that game again and just mess around with it, but
could never find anything.
How cool that it finally appeared!
LOL I’m glad someone else
remembers that game! I wish my Commodore still worked…I’d love to fire it up and play
it again. That and Sid Meier’s Pirates…best PC game ever made, far as I’m concerned.
But now I digress.
