c-wheeler

Going good so far, Dhar. Resetting compensates is, I think, 6c. 6a is the bit where you've just finished and are eager to try out you new rig. 6b is the one where you find you've just made the elephant man or Mr Inside-out Face Rusty has done a great list on resetting the compensates. Here Once you have done the compensates, I also found it useful to look at Davids older videos - Face rigging 1.mov and Face rigging 2.mov as well as all those on This Thread Although the link for mirror splines(Is that still available?)doesn't work Hope this helps, Chris

Thats a very impressive start to the model, Stan. Perhaps we should have a ship-building thread. ummmm How long do you get for these lunchbreaks?

Still too smiley though- try for bored as default Chris

I should have said somewhere in my epic e-mail - Its only one cho per shot. Since the cho loads each scene, I just start a new prj file each time.

This looks so promising, Dhar Chris

Just a thought - Does the little hand icon on the right of each object in the cho have a red cross through it? That means unclickable.

Hi All! And thanks in advance to anyone taking the trouble to read this. I've been applying the squetch rig to a head. The process went simply enough. I decided to go with bones for poses rather than muscle and the job is nearly complete, everything works OK apart from some minor glitches that I can fix, but I seem to have acquired a hair lip(see picture) when the model is used in an action. The normal mesh is distorted in an action to produce a slight up curling on the left lip. I have reset all(I think) compensates, but I think I may have done one two many. Can anyone suggest where to look? Chris

It sounds like you might have muscle mode(f7) selected. The light should animate able in an action file provided you are in skeletal mode(f8) In a cho file it should be click able in both cho mode and skeletal mode, but not muscle mode. Chris

I noticed that on Squetchy Sam as well. I seems to be just the upper arms though. I would be interested in whats going on behind the scenes. Chris

I recently did a short film set in an office. Mini movie contest All files needed where kept in a folder specifically for that project, since it was to be rendered on a number of machines without using net render. The folder structure was similar to that used by Rusty Williamson(Thanks Rusty if your reading this-also thanks for the work you shared on resetting compensates). I wont post that, but basically if you keep everything together on a flash drive, you can easily switch between one machine and another. In the project file I first set up the office with all the props etc, including all the buildings outside, but no lighting since the time of day was to change symbolically from morning to midnight and back to morning again.There were also props like a clock and calender that had to be set to different settings for each scene. This was then saved outside the project as a _base cho file, and imported it back into the project as each scene was set up. Once this was done for each scene the camera movement was set up, things like the clock and calender where adjusted to take into account changing days and times, the character was positioned (NOT ANIMATED) and lighting was then added. Then everything not in shot was removed to cut down render times and conserve memory.This was then saved and renamed as scene_1,_2 etc. I had already worked out a production schedule from the storyboard, so I knew that some scenes had similar lighting and setup, so once I had lit one scene, say scene_1, I was able to delete everything other than the lights and save this as scene_1_lighting.cho, then work on setting up the next scene. When I was subsequently working on a scene with similar lighting or setup, I would then import the lighting .cho file into the scene and adjust accordingly or just import the whole scene. Once I had setup and lit each scene, I generated a screen shot, and added this to the production sheet. This gave an indication of progress. The animation was then completed in a number of passes. I include the production schedule for general interest. Hope this helps a little Chris

Works for me! Thanks for going to the trouble of posting a tute sheet. Chris

I like the look, but I feel the hands and neck seem out of scale for me. Chris

I think you may have missed the point there, Phatso. If, on frame 00, you force a keyframe, then from THEN on you get every single bone channel in the action. If the model only has a few bones, no problem, but if youre using, for example, the posable squetch rig and face setup, well, it adds a lot of clutter and uses much more processing power just to manipulate. For me, its far simpler just to key a few bones at the start to setup the action file.After that I always key on every 4th frame just to keep it neat. Chris

But what about worn patches? Chris

What Dhar Said, also Whenever I start an animation, on frame 00 I always key in all the bones I am going to animate - also the pose sliders as well. Chris

To get an animation on a tv screen or similar:- Convert your file to tga's(AM is easy as anything) This will give you a series of numbered stills. When you import the images, click on "Animation or image Sequence". This will import the whole sequence. Then just apply the image as a decal. When this is rendered in a timeline, it should give you the animation Hope this helps Chris

You can import images in many different formats - jpg,jpeg,.png, tga, bmp,pcx,mov plus others I forget which. So its very easy to import directly from a digital camera, the web, or another package. What hasn't been said is you can import a series of images, and use that as a rotoscope sequence to aid your animating - so for example you can use a series of still captures, or frames from a live action shot, as reference for acting or body position. Chris

Yes too small! Try rendering out as a sorenson 3 .mov file to at low resolution Chris

A good start. I'me looking forward to seeing the rest of it. Make sure you get the superhero proportions right or he'll turn into a sidekick! Chris

Awesome work! With just "auto assign bones" the ease of installing that rig was amazing. I made a few mistakes along the way, but they were all easiy to correct. One or two thing puzzled me- Are the values of the pose sliders set? When I was changing the values in a pose slider in the action file - eg from 100 to -992, I had to first set the value on the pose slider to -1000 max, when I later came back to correct a value, the pose sliders reset there max values to min 0, max 100. I thought some of the show/hide poses were not working properly eg the unhide face install only showed me the cheek install bones, not the jowel or nostril target, and I was unable to see any of the nullds in the mouth install poses, or the geometry bones, wich were in the pictures. But apart from these minor points - beautifull work Chris

Kalibur- Some quick methods:- You could try finding a picture of the sky on the internet and using it as a rotoscope in the choreography window. Providing the camera doesnt move wildly off plane, it looks ok. There are plenty of images here, or just search using google. The cd comes with asky pictures as well You could apply a suitable sky image to a flat plane and put this behind the action in your cho. window, there are models on the cd like this You could apply a suitable sky image to a 4 sided cube, top,front, left and right, then use this as a backdrop in your choreography. Or you could make a skydome - lathe a half sphere and drop a gradient material on it, or slightly more sophisticated - nest two or three domes inside each other, then the clouds would appear to move as the camera did.Check out the example "skytrace"on the cd. Hope this helps, Chris

Goody goody goody

I dont think there is a more convenient way. There shouldnt be much need to copy/paste/flip every frame unless you have keyed on every single frame(mistake). When I do a walk, I will usually key on the contact first(that's shown as 00:00 in the exercise) and then on the passing position(shown as 00:15).Then copy/paste/mirror frame 00:00 at 01:00. as the last frame in a half step. I then muck about with the spacing of these to give the desired time for the step, and then add the other inbetweens, the "down"(shown as 00:05 and "up" (00.10) shots. Following the example in the book gives you keys on 00:00,00:05,00:10,00:15,and 00:20. The key on 00:25 is a mirror of 00:00. If you view from the side in wireframe mode as you cycle the action at this point, it can give you a good idea of how its going to pan out. Once I'me happy I then copy/paste/mirror the rest of the keys in sequence. Chris

Have you tried the "loop" button on the base bar? Chris

Yay, welcome to AM Steve! I think you can learn something new every time you do an exercise.And it is good practice. It is easy to learn, but you'll find the more you learn, the more you find to learn, so it never stops being interesting. Chris