rusty

Isiac, I would definitely like to know what version of AM you are using and, what is up with your SS attempts. I rely on SS as the final polish. People LOOOVVVEEE weighted CPs but... both it and SS have their pros and cons (watch some prima donna put a flame on me for that perceived slight on WCPs, LOL). WCPs have a steeper learning curve then SS and they can be a lot more work then SS in complex models. Also, using only WCPs, joints will lose their volume (which is corrected by SS or, by jumping through hoops with WCPs). Furthermore WCPs provide a single force to deal with all situations (get it perfect with the joint bent this way and pray it works for the joint bending the other way because unlike SS there is only one setting you can apply). SS is relatively easy and, if the mesh doesn't look right when rotated the other way, you can simply fix it (you can apply multiple forces to deal with multiple situations). But use too much of it and it can spiral out of control on you. Don't watch what you're doing and its easy to place key frames close together causing the mesh to jump and, its fixable but you have to know how (WCPs are easier to fix). For myself, WCPs and SS combined form a excellent balance. I get it as close as I can, first with just the geometry bones, then with fan bone, then with WCPs and finally with a little SS. Remember, what version are you using and, what's the deal with how its not working for you (if there's a problem we need to know)? Cheers, Rusty

Hi David! A (nother) question... :-) If I do as you say above (except instead of using the bicep bones, substitute in the sleeve bones, yes?)... then will the sleeve mesh expand out to accommodate the muscle flex? And, will it somehow do this even when the bicep is rotated and the arm twists under the sleeve (while the sleeve does not twist)? Is that clear? In other words if, from the default model position, you rotate the lower arm forward to flex the bicep will the front of the sleeve push outward to accommodate the flex... and... if you then rotate the bicep so that the lower arm rotates upward and the flexed muscle rotates from the front to the top will the shape of the sleeve somehow morph from the front upward to the top to still cover the flexed muscle as it rotates up? The best I can do at describing it. Sorry. Thanks! Rusty

Oh.... please... say its not so! If this is a V14 bug can someone who has an example of this please report it. And can each and everyone of you say a prayer along with me that Hash fixes this in V14 and not make this another "this will be fixed in V15" sorrow. I need the current production version of AM to work on this one. Thanks! Rusty

Hey, I'm sorry for suggesting that the Squetch rig has bugs. That was stupid of me and I don't know what I was thinking of. You, David and others have worked hard to provide this really cool rig and your support (especially to me) has been exemplary. I think I was having a brain fart. :-) My only intention was to make a few suggestions that might help you. To a person with my background 'all' complex systems, whether from NASA, IBM or the US Army Corp of Engineers (or anyone) have 'bugs' -- esoterically, mathematically it is impossible for them not to. Iandependent studies done in the early 80s by all of the aforementioned institutions concluded this and probably planted this mind set in my head and sadly, experience reinforced it. For the most part, this is one of those lofty, theoretical, mathematical views that does not pertain to the real world that much. In this case the system is not constrained to normal or expected usage and is wide open to any circumstance. Rusty

You are right. I tried the file on another PC in V14b and the flex stuff works fine. It's my notebook... strange stuff. Thanks for your help pinning it down! Rusty

Mark, Thank you for getting back on this. I first tried lowing the percentage in the User Properties and then I opened a new action. When there was no change in the amount of the flex I started trying crazy things. Everything you say above I know and, what you suggest trying is 'good' and something I hadn't thought to try. However, right now I'm being bombarded with other problems; I can't select the right_forearm bone in the action -- in the PSW the bone remains highlighted even when I select other bones! Also, I keep crashing. Also my notebook is acting up and doing strange things (and my desktop is out for upgrades). I just went to V14b. Right now I don't know if its the new version, my model or project file or my notebook or a virus or malware or... some combination. I have some things I need to try. Cheers, Rusty

I did not think that it was an 'animatable' feature. I did set it in the user properties. Thanks for trying! Rusty

I lowered the percentages of the right/left_bicep_flexing... in the model and then in the action... first a little then to 5 percent, then to zero... I didn't see any difference in the bicep's flexing. I'm I doing something wrong? Thanks for your help! Rusty

You crack me up sometimes! "This is a bug-free setup" is a contridiction. I was tring to be helpful (to you and David), not poop on anyone's parade. Sorry. I'll just be quite and thankful for you and David's efforts. r

Survey says... okay. BUT... if this were software I'd say "Only if you can make it a descrete sub-system isolated from the main rig. Something that can removed or added without affecting the rest of the rig and, if possigble, make it an add-on that can be installed on models that already have the latest Squetch rig installed." My concern is that new versions with new features are coming out faster then existing versions can be fully tested -- its becoming a moving target. The latest version most likey has more bugs in it that no one has found yet (we just found several and I may have found another). I'm also concerned that the rig is getting too complex. This mainly impacts the people who support it and have to find and fix bugs... which in turn affects the users who want it to 'work'. Please don't create something that colapses under its own weight. And again, I strongly suggest that you have a production version and an alpha/beta/new release versions. Just my 2 cents, Rusty PS: I'm thinking that the rig could have a 'self-testing' system... just create a project that exercises ever aspect of the model (or perhaps even better a group of project files that test different systems -- new features, add another project that tests these to the test suite). When a new version comes out, sub-in the new version and sit back and watch.

Dear Wing_gundam_zero, The realistic humanoid models I've built have taken literally years of long days and late nights to build, texture and rig. It would take a very large sum of money for me to part with them (more than they are worth). That's just me but I'm sure others would feel the same way. If I were better and could crank them out in weeks it would be a different story. Its a long journey to get to the point were you can build one. You're asking for 'a basic outline'. I'm not sure exactly what you mean however, there are some very good realistic humanoid models on the AM CD and the two 'Extras' CDs (the latter can be downloaded). Using these as well as the numerous tutorials on this forum you can get good examples and instructions for: * how to construct the mesh (the construction of cps and splines -- beyond 'looking' good they must be constructed in such a way that they animate well too), * how to do the texturing (Flatten or use the UV editor, create the maps, apply them, deal with seams and layer the maps -- I have a tut for doing the face here and there are others. * how to rig the model (the Squetch rig is currently the big thing) and many of the models on the Hash CDs already have a rig installed. Rigs are complicated. They are essentially a mechanical engineering problem and a complex one. Cartoon characters involve the same steps but are FAR easier to create than realistic human models and I don't even mention hair, cloth, SSS and the vast landscape of character animation. With one exception, everything you need to create realistic human models can be found on this forum including help. The one exception is 'time'; you must supply that and you'll need plenty of it. Good luck!! Rusty

Double-check that you have re-parented everything the way that it is in Squetchy Sam. If that is correct, unhide all of the hand bones and check to make sure that the 'Z' rotation on the thumb bones is the same (in Bones mode). Those are what I would check. If either of those aren't the problem, I'll have to take a look at it to figure it out. Hope that helps, Rusty. Good advise. That did the trick. Rusty

David or Mark, I've adjusted the thumb (both bones as instructed and the splines) and it seems to have come out great. However I do have one issue. When turn the roll handle of the right_finger_thumb_control to roll the thumb, at each extreem end the tip of the thumb rotates. Since 'Sam' doesn't do this I must conclude that something went south with my fooling around. Any ideas? Thanks (yet again!), Rusty

Oh damn I knew that... but does image 2 indicate the areas to take them from and where to move them to? I think I need a nap. :-( r Edit: Sorry for the brain fart. After reading everything again, I'm almost certain I see light.

David, Hey, sorry. We have a communication glitch LOL. :-) Okay, at first I thought that you wanted me to do this: Image 1 Obviously wrong... now, I think maybe you want me to do this: Image 2 Please help me understand. Here's an extra picture in case you need to draw some pictures. Cheers, Rusty

It's either Apply or Done. If I hit Apply, the CP will move according to the numbers I put in, but if I don't like what I see and try to input different numbers, that is when it crashes. If I hit Done it will close the box and I'll have to choose the CP again, right-click and CP weight all over again. I reported this so its on the list but I was also sent a workaround: ---------------------------------------------------------------------- sgross - 09-30-07 08:49 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- As a workaround, click everytime after clicking . edited on: 09-30-07 08:49 This seems to work and it makes life much simplier if you can 'apply' until you have it right. Rusty

Of course the easiest way is to use the Posable installation. For that, you would open up the Action you used to export your model, rotate the thumbs the way you want them, export the model under another name, unhide all of the hand bones by holding down the shift key and unhiding the "left_hand_sizer" and "right_hand_sizer", delete all of the thumb bones, drag the thumb bones from the newly exported model into your character and run the InstallRig plugin. The second way to rotate the thumb bones would be to drag all of the thumb bones that are children of the "left/right_hand_IKFK" and "left/right_hand_geom" bones (they are both found as children of the "left/right_hand_sizer" bones) to the "left/right_finger_thumb_control" bones, rotate that bone in bones mode using rotate mode and then re-parent the bones the way they were when you are done. If you want to correct the model's geometry as well, hold the "Ctrl" key down while rotating. Hope that helps, Rusty. David, What you describe is not possible because the left/right_finger_thumb_control which you want me to move all the children of the left/right_finger_thumb_control to... is also a child of this bone. I can't move the parent and all its children to one of its children... at least not to my knowledge. Cheers, Rusty

At the very top of the PWS is the Project Object which all other objects are under. Select this and bring up it's properties. Expand this and you will find the properties for the plug-in. This will allow you to set the location of for your backups. I set it to a folder I create under my workspace (i.e. the folder I'm using for my project, scene or model or whatever I'm working on). It works great and has saved my tail several times (V14 latest). One thing, if you need to recover a project file do not open the file from the saved location -- copy it to the folder you are working in first. Cheers, Rusty

David/Mark, Here is the hand when first placed in an action: If I click on the on/off pose Animation Controls->Steves Hand Gizmo->Hands and Fingers repeatidly the pinky moves up and the next two fingers move down. After about a dozen clicks it looks like this: Any ideas? And what is the purpose of this pose? Thanks, Rusty

David or Mark... The thumb on my model does not point in the correct direction. The fix for the thumb problem shown below, for the Squetch rig anyway, seems to be a modeling one (and then the related geom bone adjustment). This is because there seems to be no way to rotate the thumb as indicated in the image. However it would save me time if I could find a 'quick and dirty' fix. I was thinking of a new pose that would rotate the thumb and I envisioned rotating the thumb geometry bones however, they won't rotate. Can you think of a way that I can do a 'quick and dirty' fix for this? Is there a bone I can use in a pose to rotate the thumb? On this model (e.g. this outfit) the hands are not so important and I can get by... I think anyway. I don't think it's worth starting over anyway. Still if I can kludge it somehow, it'd be safer. Thanks! Rusty Edit: Thumbs often point the wrong way... perhaps a way to rotate them might be a good idea (if there isn't already a way I just don't know about).

Are you sure? I thought of doing this... and although you maybe right (and in fact it may work better)... with a bone, the position and length of the bone will affect the movement of the CP(s). Losing this control would certainly make some kind difference (and again, that difference might be for the better). I'll have to try it and find out. I actually thought of it while making the previous post but due to this concern only spoke to what I knew worked. BTW, the original incarnation of this (at least where I got it from) used 3 bones between each finger! Two had orient like constraints to each surrounding finger bone while the middle one had orient like constraints to the first 2 bones at 50% each. I could not see a use for the first two and got rid of them (my older models have all three). As I recall it was on a $25 video from some studio... the main attraction on the video was the rig for the bouncing boobs that they had on some God awesome female warrior model (excuse my language ladies). Cheers, Rusty

Thanks Mark. I am doing that as well. It is rare that I find an entire ring of CPs weighted the same way, especially on Gumbo who has more CPs than Sam. Trial & error is still a big part of this process. It just occurred to me that you may need the kind of weighting you're doing for the squash and stretch features of the rig which you certainly need for cartoon characters. I'm doing realistic characters and I will use very little of this kind of squash and stretch however, I will try to use the squash and stretch features of the rig to make one outfit model serve many characters... so I hope anyway. r

Thanks Mark. I am doing that as well. It is rare that I find an entire ring of CPs weighted the same way, especially on Gumbo who has more CPs than Sam. Trial & error is still a big part of this process. I wonder how well this will work? If CP weighting isn't dependent on the model (i.e. the spline placement)... if the same weighting will work for everything... then there's no reason it can't be automated. If a CP is in this area of that bone, then it gets these weights. If nothing else it would take you a long way toward your goal. Due to fixes in my model made by David for problems in the wrists and knees, I'm back to square 12 or somewhere close. I'm doing the weighing by: = moving the model and seeing what it does = by realizing what bones I can weight a CP or group of CPs to = by knowing what effect each bone will have on a CP or group or Cps This was working well for me and I'll continue in this fashion but I've been working with weighted CPs for a year or so and have gotten the hang of it a little better... at first I too based it on what someone had done on another model. Ever since figuring out how much work I've lost I've been reluctant to start in again. I lost almost the entire arm and some of the hand. I also lost the finger web fan bones... which is something you might consider... Just 4 bones that are children of the hand geom bone placed between the fingers like so.... Associate the CPs in the middle of the finger skin web then in one of the hand poses add orient like constraints to each first finger bone of the fingers around it and reduce the enforcement to 50% on each... And the skin web acts as it should... Cheers, Rusty

Sounds like a job for an Action... automated quality control... if you find you miss something you add it to the action and never forget it again. Rusty

That's what I thought too, Rusty. But if you look at Squetchy Sam, hardly a CP is assigned to a bone at 100%. The toe point, which you'd expect it to be 100% toes_geom, is actually weighted to the foot_geom as well. And then there is that "foot_shadow_geom" which came out of nowehere I'm starting at the feet and working my way up. Oh, what is the 'foot_shadow_geom' bone used for? Cheers, Rusty