svetlik

Must admit to being new to texturing. Been tinkering with AM for 15 yrs. but didn't start using it seriously until couple yrs. ago when I started this project. I'm actually not new to CG tho. Have worked for film and TV for 11 yrs. using Prisms (now Houdini), Softimage and Maya but only as a modeller and animator. Learned quite a bit from that tute by Zandoria studios (Balrog) where he manipulates the model in Action to apply the maps. So I'm having some success but still need a lot of help from someone who's been down that road. Just trying to get that "richness" like in the movie "Tin Tin". I know that's quite a leap but have to strive for something. There are SO many things in that film that nobody will ever notice but it all contributes to that amazing quality. I'm finding that manipulating the model in Action has its limits, because if the cps have to "stretch" too far you still get stretch artifacts. Hope this explains better. Thanks for responding.

Don't have any images of what i mean but if you study films like "Tin Tin" you can see the cloth textures in the close-ups. I know they're usually invisible to the lens but since I have several close-up shots of my character (the one I entered in the "Finish the Unfinished") I'm trying to get more richly textured close-ups. Towards that realistic but "illustrated" look of that film. They textured the CRAP out of EVERYTHING! and it's a beautiful piece of art. I'll keep looking for an image that illustrates what I mean and if I find one I'll send it but I hope this explains it better.

Can anyone guide me to some tutorials on thread/cloth texturing techniques? Tried the Weave plugin but couldn't get it to do anything. Any help appreciated.

YES! Thanks again robcat and fuchur!!!! You guys are the BEST!!!!!

Great, now I can't reach the ftp server. Is it working right now er whut?

No, using Oj. I'll download the recent AM and try that. Thanks I'll let you know.

What did I do??? See attached pic. NOTHING in the prj. was changed. Open it up today and all my chrome is gone. Environment map worked fine 3 yrs. ago so what has changed and how do i get my chrome back?? I'm sure I'm missing some small detail but can't get the env. map to work like it did before. Any help appreciated. Checked the image used and it seems fine.

Right clicking on these has no "delete" in the drop down list.

That works for the PWS but it won't go away from here...

Messed up a pose and can't delete it. What am I not seeing? Any help appreciated. Apologies if I've asked this before.

FOUND IT!!!!! It was the old "Phantom within a Phantom" syndrome! You'd be proud of me robcat! There were a couple of old Pose sliders hiding in the model that would show up in the properties panel and pose slider window but NOT in the PWS relationship folder!!! (not sure how that happens but then I still haven't figured how Santa delivers all those gifts in one night either) So once I found those I gleefully deleted them and all was right with my tiny little world. Many thanks to you and all the other AM ninjas who take the time to help me.

Set up the gradient materials and the pose sliders exactly as robcat did but can only get the trailing end to work. Been over and over all the details for 2 days and I give up. See attached prj file. Hope your listening robcat. I'm missing something obviously. Just can't find it. ThreadsEnigma.prj

Absolutely brilliant. I tried making 2 gradient materials but didn't know how to nest them as you did. Still trying to comprehend exactly how it works. Bravo robcat and many thanks again. I'm still curious though is it possible to move a decal along a model by animating the numbers somewhere or not? (without having to resort to a sequencial animated map)

This clip wasn't done with the animated gradient. This was done with the booleans and you can see all the weirdness where they join/overlap onto the loom. There's also a lot of rendering anomalies that aren't clear in this clip with many objects in the chor that the booleans intersect with Totally unrelated and separate objects. (but that's another topic) The animated gradient worked great except it couldn't give me the "end of the rope" that I needed so I went back to the booleans. Hope that clears that up.

Yes just a sharp end of the rope, so to speak. The booleans almost work but since these two objects overlap in the chor the booleans are interacting with each other in ways I don't want, even though these are two separate objects. Also discovered that booleans alter/shift the rendering on any object they overlap in the chor. even unrelated objects. This makes me very sad. That's why i'm now trying to animate a decal (transparency map) across the object to get the same effect that your animated gradient material could do. So, my question, how do I animate a decal in x or y axis to achieve this? Or is this not possible?

Still trying to get this "thread" effect to work. Robcat's clever animated gradient material almost worked but didn't get the "end of the snake" of the thread I needed to follow the moving thread. (see attached) Tried adding two animated gradient materials but couldn't get that to work. i then reverted back to animating them with booleans but they caused a buttload of problems in the chor. so now i'm trying to animate a regular decal along the length of the threads (which are then reshaped in the chor.) and cannot get anything to happen. So my question at this point is How can I animate a decal's position along a model? Have tried doing it in Action but nothing happens. Any help appreciated. Sc103aa.mp4.mp4

My apologies if I've offended. I'm grateful that you Hash fellows are still working so hard to help us. Been using AM since 1992 but only in the last few yrs. been using it every day so thanks for all the help from you Hash Ninjas.

Understood. One more question that I've searched the manual for - What is the meaning of a Pose slider being red or pink? Sorry for the dumb question and thanks for all your help robcat. Writing to Hash support or anyone else will get a response in a few days or not at all. Really appreciate all your help.

So that Define Relationships links all the poses shown so when you move one - they ALL move? (which is mostly bad that I can see) and I had noticed that a while ago when making multiople pose sliders. But when "off" you can adjust each one independantly and not affect the others, right?

Ok that seems to have done the trick. Thanks robcat.

SPOKE TOO SOON!!! Soon as I close the project and reopen it the Pose snaps back to 100% - and I can't get rid of it. Back to square one. I've tried deleting the model from the chor and resetting the settings in the pose slider settings but it keeps snapping back to 100. I don't know what else to try.

That did it!!!! I don't know what I'd do without you robcat. I thought the settings in chor would override everything but apparently not. It was ADDING to it! A thousand thanks (again)

Thanks to all the help from robcat and others with my "thread" reveal pose I set it up and it works fine in the pose window, and the threads flow as wanted but as soon as I put it into the choreography - ZIP! NOTHING! No effect and the pose slider is wigging out-displaying numbers that aren't the same as the timeline. See attached PRJ and JPG file screenshot. Any help greatly appreciated. Why would it work in the pose windows and not the chor?????? ThreadsTest01.prj

Thanks again robcat that explains it all.

robcat how do you determine the numbers to setup the Pose? i see the 1st attribute is not set and the 2nd to 100% transparency but how do you make such a sharp line between 0 and 100% transparency in the Pose?