heyvern
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Posts posted by heyvern
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If you check the history of modeling with most long time users of AM you will find the patch count got smaller as time goes by. This is not a rule of course, just a personal observation. I remember my first successful "face" model that had phonemes and poses etc... good grief it had WAY too many patches and was a torturous dog to work with (it was 10 years ago of course). It turned out great but was just too dense if I look at it now. As time goes by you learn to be more sparse and efficient with the number of patches. You would be SHOCKED at how few splines are really needed to define even modestly detailed models.
To avoid that "learning curve" try starting now to use as few patches as possible to get what you need. If you are doing "mechanical" style models study the primitives that come with AM (or, I suppose you download them now with the web subscription). Those primitives are a treasure trove of minimalistic mesh construction guidelines for anything mechanical in nature.
I still tend to go overboard with patch count sometimes. I remember spending hours upon hours on a metal hinge for a contest image... huge patch count... every edge beveled... each part a separate mesh that moved like a real hinge... and in the final image the hinge WAS NOT IN VIEW. Keep that in mind as well. If it isn't seen much it doesn't have to have a lot of detail in the mesh.
Decals, bumps, displacement maps, can all help "hide" low patch counts very effectively.
-vern
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Hey Vern
I am also working on a project that has a curtain in it. Instead of me re inventing the wheel could you create a quick video tutorial of how you did yours? Or could I get a copy of yours to study the settings and how you did the bones?
I uploaded a project and models in a zip:
http://www.hash.com/forums/index.php?s=&am...st&p=293935
-vern
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Remember that you don't have to just accept what a simulation produces. Once you have those keys you can do whatever you want with them.
I had to make cloth "settle" better after a simulation. It kept jittering at the end even though nothing was moving. The cloth was lying on dozens of cloth deflector objects and just didn't stop twitching for ages and ages. What I did was to delete a bunch of keys at gradual key frames before the "last" key I wanted to keep. I used the existing spline key motion and "softened" it by removing huge bunches of keys. I slid them along the time line till it looked "natural". Then the cloth gradually settled and stopped. Worked like a charm. I used the majority of what the simulation produced and then used it in "big chunks" to tweak it. I didn't have to actually key individual points (I did though on 20 frames. Just 20 frames and about 50 cps. Not hard).
I don't animate hair much yet so I don't know how AM puts in keys for the motion. It could mean you would have to bake the action. Cloth is very straight forward and just keys every frame. A warning though, selecting keys for cloth is very slow on my machine. Deleting keys can take some time... that's a ton of stuff. I don't know if the same applies to hair, just thought I would point that out.
-vern
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Here are a few tricks I used to deal with GIGANTIC CHORS:
I "duplicated" a BIG chor, did a save as or whatever. I then deleted anything not needed for whatever I was animating or working on. For a specific example in my case, the cloth/physics combo. There was no way in heck to simulate my cloth curtain interacting with all of those objects. Even removing deflectors wasn't giving me joy. There was just too much stuff and my computer couldn't handle it sometimes.
In the duplicated "small" chor I deleted EVERYTHING. Every single model except any model that came into contact with the curtain. After simulating cloth I then exported the curtain spline motion as an action for each curtain and imported into my FINAL chor. This was a life saver for me (I prefer cherry life saver's but beggars can't be choosers).
I did this as well for some of the physics that needed tweaking rather than a complete resimulation. If there was a portion of physics that didn't work, I could quickly simulate one or two or three objects in a duplicate chor and export the actions. This was so much easier than trying to do the whole thing at one time. I ended up with bunches of saved actions that all "matched up". I load those all into the final chor add them to the models. Then it was just a matter of rendering. For instance the very last stage crash. Some of the objects on the floor are bumped by parts of the falling stage. When I simulated that only those objects "hit" by the stage were in the chor.
Other benefits of this was having a "clean" set up for the final choreography. I didn't have to worry about turning things on and off (active) so much because I had one final chor that was "ready to go" so to speak. Faster loading. Some of my chors took a good 5 minutes to open. By having small ones with limited objects they opened really fast. I just saved opening the big ones for the final chor or action import and render.
Sometimes I would just save out a chor with no lights or cameras. Just a few models that I was tweaking. I would delete these models in the "final" chor, and import the new chor directly. This allowed me to keep choreography actions intact rather than saving actions, if I needed to make tweaks. It's often easier to tweak stuff when you have the keys right there in the chor rather than a linked action.
Anyway, I did lots of crazy stuff at the end to save time and avoid... well.... avoid that thing that happens sometimes we like to avoid.
p.s. I only have 1gb of ram.
-vern
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First hand experience of this behavior on my project. This is most likely... user error.
It was in my case. I too had HUGE GIGANTIC MONSTROUS chors with so many objects it took several seconds to turn them on and off after selecting all children in a folder. In my case what was happening was selecting and moving "groups" in a chor. Sometimes I was not careful enough about where I was in the time line. This would occasionally cause a group of selected objects to "jump" to the same coordinates and appear to "vanish". For instance I would select a bunch of randomly positioned models in a chor, and move them... they would all jump to the first items position and create a key frame.
Other times I would be copying and pasting key frames with out realizing I was copying keys from frame 0 and pasting them later in the time line causing them to "vanish" because they had jumped to their original position. Other times I forgot to click the "A" button off and would use the "active" property and end up with silly models turning on and off all over the time line. This all seemed odd to me until I started paying closer attention to what I was doing. Also I would do a "save as" for like 5 or 6 versions before even NOTICING these problems... then I would be really confused.
What really helped were chor folders. I put all models part of one "section", like the stage, in one folder. All falling objects in a folder. I then could easily turn things on and off to see where funny things might happen and to also streamline hiding models in the chor for easier animation. In your sample image I see the "street" sections. You could put all of those in a chor folder. You close that folder and you don't have to scroll as much.
Drag selecting multiple objects in a chor creates a "group". This is NOT the same as shift selecting models in the PWS. That "group" doesn't behave the same way. I've found this "group" can have both good and odd results when used to move or rotate things in the chor. Most times it worked great but sometimes it would place keys I didn't want or expect. This is a "new" feature for me so I may not be using it properly.
-vern
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Watch out for really really fast movements or movements over even short distances in one frame. Hard for AM to determine where the hair should be. The hair is penetrating something "between" frames when no collision detection has had time to take place.
The same thing happened when I used cloth and physics. The action was happening so fast that collision detection didn't have time to do a check. It was like the speed of light.
In an extreme case you could slow it down when simulating, stretch the time of the action and maybe make the hair "heavier" or slower to react. and then compress the the key frames afterwards, I did that and it worked great. Or turn off the hair "movement" for a few frames of fast motion then turn it back on or actually delete keys for the hair. I also did that with cloth and physics. The action happens so fast you don't notice a thing.
-vern
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well heyvern youve given me a lot to think about , on thing i would like to know you said you used a distortion map to alter the text to look good on the round part of the pillar...
Not distortiion "map" distortion grid... actually the tool is called "distortion mode". It's a wireframe cube thingy button at the top between mesh mode and bones mode buttons. You set the grid resolution in the modeling tab under tools/options.
For example in my model the letters "Change Your Pants!" should be "round" to match a cylinder. With the results from the font wizard the distortion grid makes this a piece of cake.
1. The first thing to do before distorting the shape is to decide how thick the letters or glyphs should be. It's easier to do this now before distorting by grabbing the fronts of the them and just moving them forward or back on the z axis. If you want to do this later it is possible but not straight forward.
2. Go to tools/options/modeling. Set the grid to 2, 2, 2. Now select all your letters, click the distortion mode button and view from the top.
3. From the top view select all the points of the distortion grid on the right and left. Leave the center points of the distortion grid alone. Now using the cursor keys or the "N" key move those points back on the z axis so the mesh "bends" or curves. The distortion grid will "bend" all the points into a sort of round shape. (make sure you curve the letters in the right direction so they "read" properly).
4. Notice the ends aren't right? The right and left side of the distortion grid are still straight on the z axis which isn't creating a good circle shape of the meshes. Select only ONE side group of points of the distortion grid box (still viewing from the top) and rotate those points on the Y axis so they sort of "aim" into the center of the circle shape you are trying to create. Follow me?. Do the this on the other side but rotating in the opposite direction so it points in the center of your imaginary circle.
When you get it the way you like it is done. It might be easier to have an actual circle shape as a guide line when distorting the mesh. And maybe depending on the shapes you might find increasing the resolution of the grid in Tools/Options/Modeling will give you more control over the final shape.
Keep in mind this is only a GENERALIZED curvature based on the splines and points of the individual shapes in the mesh. It does not curve something that has no points to curve. It won't ADD POINTS to make the curve smoother. For example if you tried to use the distortion grid on a single 4 point patch... not much would happen, it might scale up and down but you won't make it curve because it only has 4 points. However it does a good enough job in most cases that doesn't look too shabby.
-vern
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Here's a sample using displacement.
I created the displacement map using AM. I used the font wizard to create the text. Made it white with a single neutral gray patch behind the text. Put it in a chor with an orthogonal camera (no perspective) I added a blur post effect to the camera to soften the edges slightly for the displacement (probably too much in this case).
After rendering that I imported it as a decal for the cylinder object. Set the decal image to displacement 100%. Worked quite nice for a few minutes work.
(if you make the text black it will cut into the surface. The text must have neutral gray around it. Gray will not displace.)
project file
-vern
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I did these two samples using the same text mesh from the Font wizard. It would work with the AI wizard as well.
After extruding the text I just "curved" it using the distortion grid in the modeling window. Just move and rotate the points of the distortion grid to make the extruded letters or "glyphs" line up with the shape.
One set was assigned to a boolean cutter bone on one side of the cylinder object. The other just stuck on the other side.
In:
Out:
Project file:
-vern
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Depending on how "deep" they need to be "cut" or how far out or "3D" they need to be a bump map could work. If you need more distortion, try using a "displacement map" decal. Displacement is sort of like a bump map but it distorts the actual mesh.... uh... not really but it does show as 3D in preview at higher preview settings (hit page up key) and it shows in render. Displacement I believe is a "polygon" modifier so it looks pretty good even on low density meshes. The "older" displacement method required a higher density mesh.
Here's another trick for using booleans if you want to experiment:
In the Obelisk model, use the AI wizard to create your "text" or "glyphs". Bring in the art work for those shapes and extrude them. Now assign those glyphs to a bone that is a boolean cutter. Lay them over the shape to cut into. If the object is "roundish" or an odd shape you can adjust those glyphs to fit the shape better. This of course is cut "in" to the shape. If you want to cut them out around the glyphs, having the glyphs "stick out" you would need to use the AI import to create a "reverse mold" of the glyphs. Not as hard as it sounds. Of course you would need access to Adobe Illustrator or a similar application that can create the AI files needed.
-vern
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I have a cousin who did the same thing. He went from construction to nursing and is now an RN. He is at least 10 years younger than me though but still he made us all proud. He tells the most disgusting stories at family reunions. I have to cover my ears and go "Blah blah blah! Can't hear you!".
-vern
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Holy Cow! I'm 45! Are we allowed to do that? Go back to school? Good grief.
Thanks for the inspiration dude! It makes me feel young again!
-vern
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I would suggest starting smaller. Start with the tutorials or a very simple project. If you use a complex prebuilt project or model that you aren't familiar with there is no way to figure out what might be causing the trouble. That project you are using is pretty complex as I remember. It was on the first AM Extras CD as I recall. A project included from the image contests. I don't think it was intended for animating if that is the case.
If you are set on using this scene then you should delete each object (models, lights, etc) in the chor one at a time and render each time until you figure out which model or object might be causing the trouble. Sometimes it could be a "funky" image decal, or a really "slow" material. It could be some issue with constraints in a model rig. I had that recently with a circularity constraint "user error" that wouldn't allow me to render. It could be due to a whole bunch of raytraced shadows choking the computers resources. It might be due to rendering a MOVIE instead of an image sequence. "Movie" or AVI format rendering may require more computer resources. It might even be a codec or compression issue in your optional settings for the movie format.
-vern
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I had a severe case of "creative block" a while back. I am pretty sure I know what caused it. I wasn't doing anything "creative"... not just creative but deadline motivated creative. It's that kind of thing that can really get you going. I had a really boring uncreative job that sucked all the energy out of me. It was icky yucky and not creative at all and I was doing it for weeks non stop. It involved a lot of coding and technical stuff (which I like too). I find when my brain is working on the left side the right side goes to sleep and I have to hit it with a big stick to wake it up.
This recent AM project recharged my batteries. The key I think is to try and keep that kind of thing at least "on simmer" as much as possible to keep the creative juices flowing. Like a pilot light. I think my pilot light had gone out. Then the gas built up and I lit a match and exploded.
-vern
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Okay, here's my plan. I will sign up and look over what is there and see what I can do to help out in the FX area. The "short" but really tricky spots. I can make a list of areas that might need some fancy FX. If I start now I should have time to review as much of the story line as I can and then in my spare time do "experiments" just like I did with "Change Your Pants" to come up some cool techniques that can be applied more efficiently to the "final" product. Instead of experimenting on the actual projects. I would love to have SO really really showcase some of the cool features of A:M. Obviously we don't want them to "stand out" too much but you know what I mean.
I think I'm better at short, intense, small chunks of dedicated work then long term tasks. I may change my mind of course later.
Does that sound like a good idea? I don't want to get too burned out. I can't afford to get burned out right now. I have a lot of projects going on and some new animation jobs for clients, plus a possible long term job, but I would hate to see something at the end of SO and think to myself "Holy cow that would have been easy to do this way and look really cool!"
The Yoop transformation scene, when she zaps the main characters... I would have LOVED to have gotten my hands on just that one scene. I did some very early "morphing" tests on my own with the Thom model that could have been pushed further. My thought is even if you have to create "special versions" of each model or modify them for a particular scene or even do compositing of renders it's worth it for the final result as long as everything "blends" seamlessly. But you can't expect someone to do that who has 50 bazillion other things to worry about.
p.s. There was a HUGE rendering mistake I made in my recent project. I had to cut to a different angle to hide a change in camera angle and position that was suppose to be one continuous shot. Worked like a charm and actually improved the final scene. That's another trick that could be used for FX shots as well... I'm sure you already know this... I'm new to all this I guess.
-vern
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So far, the SO files take up about 3 Gigabytes, but you should save space for another 1 or 2 Gigabytes as new work is added.
This has to be done in one shot? Or can it be done over days or even weeks? I can't tie up my internet to download 3 gigs during working hours. Could I do this in increments at night in small chunks? I also use my computer to upload big files for clients and would need to stop any other downloads or uploads to do so.
There doesn't seem to be an "FX" category for participation. What category might this type of thing fall into? Animating? What I'm suggesting is if one person, like me, whose only job was to do one single effect that was technically tricky or maybe beyond the scope of expertise for an animator whose time is better spent animating, scenes like that could be pulled up a notch or two and it might not be such a burden. Someone would step in at the point when the rest of the animation was approved and then "fill in" those few seconds of animation that are needed. Maybe an FX category already exists? Like the wonderful water/river scene in TWO. I would assume that there was someone specifically in charge of that effect.
-vern
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In regards to volunteering. I would like to help but in a very "limited" and "specific" manor if that is possible. Something that won't burn me out too much.
What I would like to offer help with is Physics and Cloth. Specifically with difficult or unusal "FX" areas that might fall within a scene or shot. For instance an example of this from TWO would be the apron stealing scene. After having worked with cloth and physics I think I could have added some technical expertise to that specific part... obviously back then I couldn't offer that but now I could.
I remember that there was one single scene in The Incredibles where Mr. Incredible puts his hand through a tear in his uniform. In the special features this was called out as a big gigantic thing to pull off and needed special attention. that's the kind of thing I would like to offer. Instead of working on an entire scene I could do one technical aspect of it after the animation has been finished.
Signing up for SVN and "downloading the project" and all that jaz in the first post here, what is involved as far as computer resources/space? Would it take up huge amounts of hard drive space? If I worked on one small aspect of a scene that could involve complex physics and/or cloth would I be required to download the entire scene project? Or could I just work on those specific objects and save out "actions" as I did with my own recent project? I don't have super high speed cable internet. I have modest dsl. It's fast enough for me but huge uploads are a killer. If I can minimize the size of the uploads, limit them to actions or specific models. For example. Physics would not need to be applied to the models for rendering. Just the actions produced by the physics. Same for cloth. It would be best if these things were done "last". Meaning after all modeling and meshes were "final".
For instance one trick I learned was to save out "empty" chors that only contained the models and actions needed. For instance I saved out just 4 of the falling panels and struts from one chor of my stage crash that I had to modify. I deleted those models from one chor and replaced them by importing another. The chor was HUGE but the smaller version was tiny.
I had trouble with SVN a long time ago with TWO but I could give it another shot. I am concerned about computer resources since I use my PC now for a lot more than AM. I use it for other production work and I can't risk messing up the system too much. Like I said... I'm concerned about taking on too much and not being able to complete it but would very much like to share my experiences with cloth and physics that I learned on my last project. I could even give specific steps and details of the best way to accomplish a task.
If there are scenes that could use some cool cloth or physics interaction to make them stand out or at least... not stand out in the wrong way... I would like to give it a shot.
Instead of just talking the talk I've decided to in some small way try and put my money where my mouth is.
-vern
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I just watched the whole thing on Youtube yesterday. It's in 11 parts. I assume this is the completed movie but I couldn't say for sure. Just do a search on youtube for Tin Woodman of Oz.
-vern
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Here's the final results of the dynamic/streaks combo:
http://www.hash.com/forums/index.php?act=a...st&id=41819
-vern
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Yes, there is some sort of conflict with a dynamic constraint and streaks/sprite emitters. The real time display was inaccurate which caused me to make incorrect decisions
. I got around all this by getting the dynamic constraint right first, simulating springs, removing the constraint THEN turning on particles, got the particles right and BINGO success.My next option was to try using a Newton "chain" somehow for the cable but... ick... wasn't looking forward to that. Alls well that ends well. The effect was very short but very... "effective". It reminds me of all those fx guys who spend days or weeks doing one shot that lasts a few seconds.
-vern
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Ha! Weird.
Here's the scoop. For some reason turning on "Draw particles and hair" causes the dynamic constraint to go twice as fast. Seriously. It speeds it up. If I turn off draw particles hair in the render settings suddenly the whole thing goes zippity doo. What the heck? Are the streaks actually exerting some "force" on the dynamic constraint? I don't think so because the chain goes real slow... like through molasses. When the particles are turned on it follows the same motion but in half the frames... very odd.
-vern
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I'm so confused. I created a dynamic chain for an electrical cable. I have a streak emitter attached to the end that shoots out sparks. I did this in s separate choreography and project. Exported the chor and imported that chor into another chor in a different project.
I didn't change anything after importing. Everything is the same in the dynamic settings. Now the dynamic chain swings really really slow. At least 50% slower than the original. In the original I had timed the streak sparks for certain points as the wire is swinging. Now they don't line up. I'm curious what might cause this. Does the dynamic constraint rely on the "speed" of the playback? The final project file is quite "loaded" and so real time playback is slower than the original. I did the whole thing with simulating the springs... uh... crud. I could just bake the action in the original chor and save it out. Then the key frames will be the same and won't change on import... hmm...
Still though a valid question as to why this might happen.
-vern
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To use a path from a model with the MMop pluging you need a group. Select a spline in the model and make it a group. Click the "show more properties" dohicky for the model in the chor. Right click on the path group in that models chor shortcut and select the mmop plugin.
On another topic, a path constraint from a model works with actions and action objects. If you create an action you can use a path constraint on a bone to a separate spline in the same model or another model as an action object. I too wish that model paths could be accessed as path constraints the same as in an action. I don't understand why it can't be.
-vern
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I'm such an idiot. So silly... so silly silly stupid stupid. Here I am working with the Thom character and the OLD 2001 rig and all this time there is Thom available with this rig...
. Well, I still have a small bit of animation to do with Thom so I could switch to the new version. As was indicated in the first post "old actions" are not compatible with this rig right? -vern
Rotoscopes
in A:M 2009
Posted
Worked for me! Wooooohooooooo!
Ken, I think I love you and want to have your children.*
* Since this is not possible with current scientific and medical procedures I think I'm pretty safe. If this ever becomes possible I hope I'm either dead or too old to follow up on it. It's the thought that counts right?
-vern