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A:M Forum Rules
GENERAL FORUM GUIDELINES
The A:M Forum is for technical support and the sharing of tips and ideas between users/prospective users of Hash software. It is moderated constantly by technical support representatives.
DO'S!
-Ask questions about the software.
-Assist other users... everyone was new at this once.
-Inform people of your version/platform when asking for help.
-Share resources; tutorials, models, textures, tips and techniques (link to useful websites).
-Post links to your work, or where your art is being used online (on websites, in games, toons', etc.)
-Search the A:M Forum and FAQ. The question you are about to ask may have already been answered.
-Organize and inform others about user groups, IRC chats, image and animation contests, job opportunities, etc.
-Discuss what you are working on and let everyone know about magazine reviews and articles that relate to your projects.
DON'TS!
-Do Not be rude or disrespectful or mean to other forum members in any way. Personal attacks will be removed.
-Do Not post bug/crash reports to the list (send bug/crash reports to http://www.hash.com/reports.
-Do Not complain about forum content. Complaints or suggestions can be sent directly to hash@hash.com
-Do Not reprimand other forum members for violating forum rules, that's the moderators job, which (unless you are a moderator) you are not.
-No complaining or whining on the forum or distribution of misinformation.
-No flames of any kind.
-No Off Topic posts. (Posts in the Off Topics section should be related to A:M in some form or fashion or benefit the A:M community as a whole).
-No soliciting of any kind without prior approval.
-No threads or comparisons related to other 3D Applications.
-No "Wish list" or feature requests, they should be sent to www.hash.com/reports for categorizing and prioritization (User requests define the future development of the software).
-No "me too!" posts
-No discussion of Hash Internal Affairs (finances, advertising, PR.)
-No posting of private email to the forum unless permission of the author is granted. (Private correspondence should remain private)
-No very general questions like: "how do I make a good 3D model" make your questions as complete and concise as possible.
If you have questions as to whether it's appropriate, send it to: support@hash.com, We'll be happy to let you know whether it is, or is not appropriate.
User Led Forum Considerations
Firstly and foremostly, please remember this is Martin Hash's forum and that it is every A:M User's primary resource for information about A:M. In order to remain relevant we need everyone's continuing support and interest.
Secondly, understand there is a distinction between A:M (the program) and the A:M forum. There are some topics and issues that are outside the scope of this forum and most can be deduced by reading through the forum guidelines. These include such things as Hash Inc internal policies, business practices, trade secrets, and specific plans for the future not yet publicly released. Each of these would be fascinating topics of their own but are better reserved for private communications with a representative of Hash Inc.
Related to the second, is purchasing, customer service and other areas outside the purview of the common user who may have no interest in such things; subjects relating to money exchanging hands are beyond the scope of the A:M Forum and often can lead to conflicts of interest between users and/or Hash Inc. (If Hash Inc cuts you a deal on volume purchasing it's really no one else's business). Likewise, individual complaints about a product or service are best remedied by going direct with Hash Inc representatives empowered to make decisions. Please allow them them the time necessary to resolve your specific issue and consider the cost of customized solutions.
This last area is likely the source of much confusion because many see the A:M Forum as the official outlet for Hash Inc... and it is. But the forum is not designed for conducting business and private matters best resolved by going to Hash Inc directly. Similarly, bug reports are best resolved by entering them directly into the A:M Reporting system.
Many problems can be easily addressed at the user level just by asking fellow users in the forum. If someone at Hash Inc suggests the forum as a source, it is very likely a problem can be easily resolved. For tougher issues there is even more reason to take the issue directly to the source... you don't want the issue discussed... you want it resolved quickly.
Finally, remember that we want to pass this forum on to future moderators and generations of A:M Users in the absolute best condition possible. A:M is just that good a program and is worthy of our consideration.
Thanks for making the A:M Forum a great community.
4,160 topics in this forum
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- 1 follower
- 10 replies
- 2.3k views
Hi, Looking again for the Forum Expertise It seems simple - so it probably is - just not for me. Frustratingly so. I'm trying to make up a mosaic and then colour it dynamically through poses. Everything is fine EXCEPT I'm not able to set up the groups. Here area couple of examples of the types of groups that I've been trying to set up without any success. I can't seem to be able to set them up when there is a common CP between what I want in the group and what I want outside the group. 1. A group with only Orange Tiles 2. A Group with only Black Tiles 3. A Group with only Green Tiles Oliver
Last reply by johnl3d, -
- 7 replies
- 746 views
Hello AM world. I've been working my way through the exercises and the forums for two weeks now and having a good time so far. When I drag a selection box in the workspace window, the box is opaque black inside until I release the mouse button, then it is clear. This makes it hard to see the CP's I'm selecting. In the videos I've watched the box is clear while dragging to size. How do I fix this?
Last reply by bossofme, -
- 1 follower
- 3 replies
- 645 views
I wanted to know if there's a way to remove all the lights in the room and have the model self luminated. I know this must sound like a strange request, but I'm making a game with my animations and the engine already has lighting for the models so it would look strage with shadows and lights reflecting off the character. I'm using a pre-render method for the game, I'm not using the model itself which is why this is important. Thanx guys.
Last reply by Fuchur, -
- 1 follower
- 1 reply
- 419 views
Hello! There is any way to recover registration info of AM serial number in the hash site? I bought AM several years ago and would like to upgrade to the latest version. I have boxes of storage cd's and still haven't found the old master cd. thank you! Benjamin Pastrana
Last reply by Bruce Del Porte, -
- 2 followers
- 5 replies
- 885 views
Does anyone know of a good set and background tutorial? Some help would be great. Keith
Last reply by BUDDHABUCK, -
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- 292 views
ok usualy this does not bug me much but on a really complex model its starting to , for some reasion both lines and CPs are being put behind the Grid is there a way i dont know of o fix this
Last reply by Master chief, -
- 5 replies
- 1.3k views
Not sure if this is possible or makes sense, but I'm working on a beveled cube example from "A:M A Complete Guide", and I made a beveled cube with straight splines by setting peaking. Now I want to slightly round the bevel, so I want to selectively set some gammas on the bevel splines. But first, I want to set all the alphas to zero and all the magnitudes to 100% just for uniformity. If I "select all" with ctrl-A and then set the bias properties for all, some of the biases on the model do not change, and are still odd-ball values. Is this supposed to work, setting all at once? -SB
Last reply by robcat2075, -
- 4 replies
- 918 views
I seem to have gotten that almost perfect angle with a window in perspective view. I would love to make that view into the camera view. Is there a way to turn the persective view into camera view? Thanks, William
Last reply by robcat2075, -
- 2 replies
- 319 views
This is a visual tutorial Red ball with simple black and white decal Key color not set both colors show. Key color set to black, black portion does not show Key Color set to white, white color does not show This was done in v14a keycolor.mov
Last reply by phatso, -
- 1 reply
- 346 views
need help in setting the piviot point at x=0
Last reply by Rodney, -
- 2 replies
- 407 views
The bone I'm trying to aim is is right there, but I can't get this other bone to select it with the eyedropper. I try to select the target from the list and the bone does not appear on the list. I can see the bone on screen, but clicking on it gets me "None." The bone I am trying to aim at is a child of the bone that I am aiming with. Don't know if that matters*. * It must matter. I just made it a sibling bone and, bam, it worked! Thanks for your help, um...me! I solved it myself within minutes of asking, lol. Is that one of the laws of rigging? that you can't aim at child bones?
Last reply by Paul Forwood, -
- 4 replies
- 403 views
I have been trying to render an AVI in A:M that I can use in a Pinnacle movie I'm creating. According to Pinnacle, I need to have the following settings on the AVI: Quality: DV TV Cropping: Yes NTSC: 720x480 Audio: 44 kHz 16-bit Stereo So far I've made several attempts to render AVIs but once I insert them into the Pinnacle movie and burn it to DVD they only appear as a green screen on playback. I've adjusted the frame size on my animation to 720x480, but this still hasn't corrected the issue.
Last reply by rusty, -
- 2 replies
- 351 views
Hello - I created an animation awhile back and used several cameras for different angels and I pressed a key which I thought was "tab" to switch from camera to camera - can someone tell me what key to press? Thanks - Eric
Last reply by flashawd, -
- 1 reply
- 574 views
sometimes i would like to render amovie in the shaded mode, because it doen't need to be that detailed, i am just trying to get an idea across and don't need hair or fire, but it has the pink camera frame in it, is there a why to do it to get rid of the frame
Last reply by Noel, -
- 2 replies
- 349 views
ok is there any way to have a model go from shaded to wireframe in a percentage ? IE in some space games they have a weapons selection and the textured model would turn into a wireframe where they explained some of the inside parts
Last reply by johnl3d, -
- 2 replies
- 360 views
On occasions, the Shaded, and Shaded Wireframe, image in the Modeling Window appears to have a high intensity light illuminating it, and it's difficult to see what's going on. Other times, not. What causes this? [attachmentid=16750]
Last reply by Kelley, -
- 1 reply
- 520 views
I'm not a new user but this seems the most appropriate place to ask(?) I have a character and I made some shades for her. It would be fine if I just assigned them to the head bone of the rig but If I want to have the flexibility to have them moveable in an action how should I constrain them ? Would it be best to have them as an action object. If so how should they be constrained to the head ? or I've tried to assign the shades to bones in the original mode but don't know how to constrain them to the head in the action. Is it a parenting question ? Thank you for your help simon
Last reply by Simon Edmondson, -
- 6 replies
- 336 views
I have seen a model from sample as character on the face has some shading artifact ? Why? Can we eliminate this artifact by a better modeling ? What is your experience from this ? Thanks !
Last reply by threedslider, -
- 1 follower
- 4 replies
- 633 views
When i make something, and i pess low quallity shading it looks for the most part fine and when i make it high quality it looks terible and theres all these andom lines that i didn't make. why is that and how do i prevent it from happening if you know? Pictures:
Last reply by Ganthofer, -
- 5 replies
- 535 views
Does anyone know if you can make a model cast a shadow without the model itself rendering in the scene. I have some trees that have foliage made out of hairs. Takes forever to render with the shadow option on. I was going to fake the shadow of the tree by decaling a single patch with an image of the tree as a cookie cut, then placing it correctly in the scene so that it casts an approximate shadow of the real tree. The trouble is the cookie cut patch renders in the scene as well and I can't see anyway of making it none renderable whilst still casting a shadow. If I place the cookie cut out of the view of the camera then I can't get the shadow position corr…
Last reply by cookey, -
- 10 replies
- 1.4k views
Casting shadow but not seeing the object. I need to make an object cast a shadow but it need to be invisible. I did it in the past for composite scene but I am overlooking something.
Last reply by robcat2075, -
- 4 replies
- 424 views
When I render my project, there is a shadow of my model on the ground but I want to set the shadow properly in the choreography window. I have done this before but I can't reproduce it. What are the parametersettings to do this.
Last reply by jannus850, -
- 1 follower
- 22 replies
- 2k views
I have been taking some cg spfx classes and trying to translate the info to AM. They talk about using shadow passes and composting them. I remember Yueves talking about linear work flow. I think they are related to shadow pass. Can someone point me in the direction for how to create shadow passes in AM? According to my class the pass is all black and white. Is there any info on how to do the linear workflow that the Y man describes with AM?
Last reply by jason1025, -
- 12 replies
- 1.6k views
I used Rotoscope and Front Projection, placed Transparency Map in front of Key Light for shadow on the model. Used Light List to get shadow on the model but not on the Ground. This is my Animated gif. I can't find the way to fix(mix) shadow of model to the Front Projection, please tell me how to, thank you very much.
Last reply by robcat2075, -
Hello All. Can anyone tell me why my Flower Power petals will not generate shadows? It looks like petal1 might be, but none of the other 12 petals do. The Stem and Leaves cast shadows when rendered. Thanks. Mr. Bill
Last reply by Fuchur, -
- 7 replies
- 616 views
I made a building for a friends live action short. The time has come o composit it into the footage, someone else is doing this in After Effects but, needs me to supply a suitable render to work on. I am using v13 ( although I have V14 I have yet to install it). how do I render a file for compositing were I can put the shadows on a seperate Alpha channel or is this not possible ? regards simon
Last reply by Simon Edmondson, -
- 3 replies
- 833 views
I'm doing some stills with some primitive ojects and render them as PNGs. The good thing about pngs is, that the background is saved transparent and you can use the pictures in presentations or others. But i don't want just the object but also the shadow of the object. so I switched the floor to "shadows only" and it doesn't render anymore, but also there are no shadows. I rendered it with the toon renderer - does this option not work with this renderer?
Last reply by number, -
- 4 replies
- 869 views
A couple of years ago, someone kindly pointed me to an info file which dealt with "shadows only" rendering. I used it but in the interim have been distracted by many things. I recently reorganised the house and, when I went to get it it again couldn't find it ( it was a big change around ! ). The file described the basic wok flow behind using shadows only and then compositing in AM. I think it was part of the official documentation (?). Could someone kindly point me to the files again, or a good description of the method used? Thank you very much. regards simon
Last reply by robcat2075, -
- 2 followers
- 12 replies
- 1.1k views
Having got my camera questions sorted out [Thanks again to all...] two other things I'd like to include in this first animation is [1] shafts of light coming down from above. I suspect it's a volumetric light solution, but could someone get me jump-started? In Carrara, we could install 'light cones'. [2] Does A:M support caustics for shimmers of light on the ocean floor? Thanks.[attachmentid=12862]
Last reply by Eric2575, -
- 1 reply
- 394 views
I was working on excersize 6 and I want to make shaggy appear mad, unfortunately when I click the mad eyes slider it automatically takes his eyes to around 50% mad and the slider changes from making his eyes normal at 0% and full mad at 100% to being 50% at 0 and a slight change to full mad at 100%. I closed the Choreography window and restarted, reset the computer, and tried deleting/importing new Shaggy's ( because I thought about someone saying that windows caches things) and nothing seems to fix the eye bug. I tried Keekat and Rabbit and didn't seem to happen. Also tried 14, same issue. Should I just use a different model? or am I missing something?
Last reply by Dhar, -
- 2 replies
- 553 views
On the 1st wk of next month, i am organising a workshop and it is going to be focused on modelling shapes, pliz can any body tell me types of shapes that will be good for beginers to learn with. thz
Last reply by Rodney, -
- 4 replies
- 436 views
im trying to make a mech of sorts and as you know they usualy are not very curvy. how do i make a sharp edge on a model with out it turning into a black brick this is the best i can get but there are still distortions in the back , alos the have been black blob things as well any help would be most apreceated ow the only way i managed to do this is to set inmagnitude and outmagnitude to 2%
Last reply by Master chief, -
- 2 replies
- 564 views
Can A:M use shatter maps (or some other technique) to simulate exploding/breaking materials such as a dropped glass or window being shot out? Seems like it can do about everything else so this may also be a pleasant surprise! Thanks. raf
Last reply by raf1, -
- 1 follower
- 12 replies
- 1.8k views
Hey Gang, Has anyone tinkered with shattering glass? I'm guessing Newton would have to be used? Can it be directional shards such as this video clip? Here is a video clip of what I mean. glasss_shatters.mp4
Last reply by robcat2075, -
- 4 replies
- 636 views
Hi all! I have made some spaceships that I have made shields for. And I need an effect when something hits the shield. Any ideas on how it should look? I have thought on a "rings on water" effect. But more ideas would be great! Thanks!
Last reply by johnl3d, -
shiny hair
by hybrid- 2 replies
- 549 views
I have a little hair trouble. I made a werewolf (It's one of my first good models), but I want the hair to cover the whole body. When I put the hair on my character though it doesn't completely cover the body. It just looks like little hair tothpicks poking out everywhere. Also since my model is a werewolf I want to make his hair/fur look shiny and dog like. How would I be able to do this?
Last reply by C-grid, -
- 4 replies
- 470 views
Hello, In bone mode, the Ctrl key help to move the bone with his CPs. But this short keys don't work with weight. So when a CP is 50% assigned to "bone1" 50% with "bone2", it do as there are 100% with "bone1" and 0% with "bone2" It is there a short keys that takes into account the weights in bone mode? In the same idea. When I move a CP, it is there a short keys that CP does not change the distribution of weights? When I add a CP on a segment of a spline, it is there a short keys that it takes the value of places where it is located between the other two CP?
Last reply by Malo, -
- 0 replies
- 454 views
First test And second test that i've done whiles half asleep (not a good idea as you will see the thing that went wrong) Holding test: found the timeline to make it all work this time. lighting test and camera control test, again half asleep. Camera control, edit, one sound, pause and movement test.(before i went to bed) The one second front n rear punch in the dark.
Last reply by crimsure, -
- 1 follower
- 6 replies
- 811 views
Now that I am starting back with AM I have forgotten some hot keys. Here is one I need. At a cp you can have different bias on either side of the cp. What is the hot key that breaks it into? Steve
Last reply by Fuchur, -
- 5 replies
- 493 views
Deciding to take a break from the Bird/Flock problem, I set out to build a dino-type beast. But of late, my smooth splines are coming out with kinks. How to stop this from happening? Thinking that it was a Bias problem, and that setting the In Magnitude & Out Magnitude would smooth out the splines, I selected all CP's and set the value from 100% to 0%. Big mistake. So...[1] How to stop splines from kinking? and [2] can this model be saved? I tried Selecting All CP's and re-entering 100% in both boxes. No go. [attachmentid=16243]
Last reply by Rodney, -
- 1 follower
- 38 replies
- 3.9k views
I want to have a butterfly flit across the screen while the credits appear. I modeled the Butterfly and made a path in the chor. I made a flitting action but I'm having trouble successfully getting what I'm after. Using the info I have from a walk cycle tute from days of old, I tried to make it work, but I'm having trouble. How do I get the "flitting" action to work. Get the Butterfly down the path to the end at the end of the chor. I realize that I need to make the chor longer. I'm attaching an embedded version of the project. I appreciate all the help I can get. Thanks. Forum Butterfly.prj
Last reply by MJL, -
- 3 replies
- 562 views
Do the graphical glitches (glitchy update during bone manipulation) happen in XP? I picked up AM and read the forums before hand. Knew there were some small issues, but it's quite persistent and gets you out of the flow. Work around (for me) is to minimize the window and then bring it back. But it's happening often enough I don't think I can stand it. Comp: Q6600, 8GB RAM, Vista Home Premium x64, EVGA 8800GTS 320MB, AM 15b. Driver at 169.44, Vista up to date. I have a render node with an E6600, 2GB RAM and XP SP2. Is XP that much more stable and reliable running AM than Vista? Interested in hearing someone with Vista that has encountered this issue and li…
Last reply by Rodney, -
- 6 replies
- 681 views
I had purchased AM twice in the past, and the last time was Animation Master 2000, v8.5 I had taken up animation as a hobby, and completed all the examples in the book. Fast-forward to 2009: I would like to get back into animation and character modeling, and was looking at the following free products: * Blender: best free product, but difficult to use * Alice: fun, but more for kids * POV-Ray: nice, but not as intuitive as AM * 3D Studio Max: too expensive... * Maya: ... likewise But I still love AM, am would consider getting an upgrade: * the Hash website has an unversioned product (posted 2007?) for $299 * SafeHarbor (sharbor.com) has…
Last reply by mouseman, -
- 1 follower
- 12 replies
- 1.1k views
Hello, I was in Fry's the other night and just happened to find a copy of the A:M software while looking at video editing applications (I do quite a bit of audio engineering and mixing and just got into video). Anyway, animation and modeling strikes me as fun. I have no goal for using the software other than something fun to do during spare time and if I were to get good enough, perhaps have some fun composing music for short animated videos. Anyway, to the question: I have no animation or modeling background, so how realistic is it that I would be able to learn how to use this software? More specifically, I guess I'm looking to figure out whether the time i…
Last reply by Bob Savage, -
- 3 replies
- 476 views
I'm seeing the "Show Manipulator Properties" being selected in quite a few tutorial video's, the seem to be different looking than the one I'm seeing when I've multiple CP's selected. I've Animation:Master 2002:A Complete Guide, and it has tutorial video's that show the Manipulator Properties to show X,Y,Z Scale and X,Y,Z Pivot when having multiple CP selected. Mine only shows X,Y,Z Offset when having multiple CP's selected. Now I know I can find Scale and Pivot also in the Properties Tab, but I'm human and in nature very lazy, so if I can do some thing with less moving of my mouse I like to take the easy way All joking aside, is there an option to chan…
Last reply by MJL, -
- 3 replies
- 728 views
I am trying to repeat an image sequence imported as a layer in a choreography. As the attached jpeg shows, a "show more than drivers" icon is unavailable in the choreography. Where can I access "show more than drivers" for this image sequence & what the best way to repeat this 9 frame sequence? Mac OS 10.4.11 using A:M 15.0j+
Last reply by cribbidaj, -
- 2 replies
- 555 views
I've noticed that for many things... The suggestion is made to click "show more than drivers". I can't find info on it anywhere. How do I "show more than drivers"? What does it do? Point me to a part of the tech ref, or a tutorial.. I can't find it.. I prolly don't need it (yet), but my inquiring mind wants to know... and I see Drivers with a green check mark in it in my models, so I'm wondering. Thanks,
Last reply by oakchas, -
I have a scene in the shower. This will be composite shot. The character is hand drawn but I need to have an effect of water droplets coming down and off the body. for shower effect I will be using robcat2075 shower spray. But I need to make the water droplets on the body. I have made a model of the image for the effect. Any idea’s?? Also dose any one have a shower head with a coord?
Last reply by johnl3d, -
- 0 replies
- 379 views
Hi all, I want to show all my controls for my character on the dopesheet (keyframe sheet) because I need to key them all for each pose. So I am using the 'tack' function but everytime I go to another control, the others disappear on the dopesheet. How can I prevent this from happening? Also, other than moving (jiggling) the other bones that are not being moved, is there a way to set them automatically when you set one of the other controllers? Thanks
Last reply by Pesto, -
- 2 replies
- 785 views
I thought that in order to show all curves, you hit the button with the red, blue and green curves - how do you show the pose curves as well? I've gone back through my notes and am having problems finding that.
Last reply by Fuchur,
