Sacman

I did not look at the project but when I made my simple chain, I translated the first bone in the chain to the 'Parent' or main object. I did not translate to the last bone in the chain. This caused the problems you are describing. Instead, I set the target of the dynamic constraint to be the 'child' object' main bone. This gave me the results I needed. I also set the offsets to 0 but you can set these offsets to place the end of the rope to whereever you need it in the child and parent models. Wade

I couldn't disagree more. To set up the attached sequence, I made a 'tube' with 30 bones and two nulls. Bone one is translated to null 1 Bone 2 is dynamically constrained to null2. The trageting method was changed to none. The translate offsets were set to 0. That's it. No other setup. Now, on the downside, I could not get rid of the squash that happens when the bottom loop of the 'rope' comes too close together. This would not be as severe if the motion wasn't so drastic. It can be minimized by increasing the drag a little. The only real disadvantage I see with using Dynamics is that there is no pre-roll option. Other than that, it seems to be a much easier solution. This 10 second video rendered in 1:13 with no multipass. Dynamics_Test2.mov

Or just use Dynamics. Wade

Noober, did you use cloth? I think the advantage to Dynamics is that it's basic premise is that it wants to maintain its modelled shape whereas cloth will collapse. I know you can increase the stiffness oft he cloth but that will also limit its flexibility. Wade

I did a quick test using Rob's project and dynamics. I drew added a 'Rope' to the model consisting of 21 extruded cross sections and ten bones. The first bone is a child of the Beast floating thing. I cheated and did not model the rope in place I connected it in the pose. The first bone in the chain is Translated to the Beast bone. The last bone in the chain is Dynamically constrained to the Floaty thing bone. That's it. It would need some tweaking to get it to look just right but I think it does what you want. I left Rob's lag contraints in place cause I thought they really add to the effect. I never thought about using lag so i learned something from this one. Dynamics_Test.mov

I think Dynamics coupled with Rob's lag solution would work great. Dynamics can be confusing though. Wade

You might be missing the little option button in the bottom left of the import box. You have to check it to import a series of images as an animation. Then follow the instructions above. Wade

First Search the forums: http://www.hash.com/forums/index.php?showforum=46 Second you might want to also try simbiont which offers some great looking materials that are ready to use. http://www.darksim.com/html/simbiontam.html Keep in mind that Materials, while resolution independent, will significantly increase render times as opposed to decals. It's a trade off which you may not be willing to make depending on what you are doing. Oh yeah, I believe there is an excercise in TAoM for materials about making a marble material but it has been a long time since I looked at it. Wade

Where in the world would you get the inspiration to do this? Kind of disturbing. Pretty well done for what sounds like not much work. The only noticable glitch was in the 'jog' cycle. There was a key frame missing that caused a jump back to the beginning of the cycle. Wade

What codec are you using? It would not let me view it. Wade

Great Tutorial. I learned some things from that. Can't wait to see more. Wade

Is that the old I wanna be a cowboy and you can be my cowgirl song from the 80's? I've got my hat....on I've got my boots....dusty That song was stupid funny. Wade

Okay so now I get attachments so here is a shot of what I am talking about: boy you can tell I don't spend enough time on here. Can't even figure out how to post images anymore. temp.bmp

No the shadow was rendered in A:M. For some reason I can't add attachments so I will explain. When you go to render to file, select advanced options. go to the Output tab click the expansion arrow next to buffers. You will see several buffers in there. Select the alpha and shadow buffers on. As mentioned above, the final image or image series will appear to be a black screen. However, the alpha data is there. Once you import to another app the alpha channel will be clear. Having said all of that, this could have been done inside of A:M, like I said, I was testing my skills in After Effects. Wade

I did using the process described above. I rendered with an alpha channel. Then I rendered with a shadow buffer. I composited in After Effects. It was all done simply to try out my skills in After Effects. I was pretty pleased with the results even though the shadow is techinically not correct for the lighting in my kitchen. Wade

I recently restored my laptop and had absolutely no problems re-installing version 15 from the same install file. Wade

Thinking out loud. If you built a very simple replica of the room and any items that you want to have the shadow interact with. Render with shadow and alpha buffers on. This should render the shadow with an alpha channel. It will look like a black screen. But trust me it will be a shadow with an alpha channel. Combine in After effects. This is covered in the tutorials noted above. I only recommend AE cause it is what I know. Any similar program will work. was rendered out with the war of the worlds model on an alpha channel and the shadow rendered out seperately. Granted, I only needed the shadow on the ground plane but the process still worked. I combined the background image, the model, and the shadow After Effects. Also, there is a version of Icarus that works with A:M. It is free but you will have to do some internet digging to find it. This is used for motion tracking. Having used it, you will want to mount your camera on a tripod and use smooth pans if possible. This will give the cleanest track. A lot of jerky motion will make it very difficult to get a clean track.

Gold has a highly reflective surface similar to the chrome materials. Without something to reflect it is not going to look nearly as good. If you are only doing quick renders in hte model window it is not going to truly show what you are going to get in the choreography. Consider using the chrome material straight off of the CD and then using a second material with an environment map. Consider the pics below, the first is the environment map. I only did a quick change to the color and wasn't really trying to perfect it. The second is a chrome material on top of the environment map. The third is the exact same shot but with the environment map changed to a grayscale image with the contrast tweaked to get a more chrome look even though it is still not perfect. Good luck, Wade

It also depends on what you mean. All of the Darksims have different options that are adjustable and most over time. For example, if you want to change one of the base colors from black to white over time, simply animate it using keyframes like anything else. However, to John's point, there are animated textures that simply need to be turned on. I don't think you will see this in real time, you probably have to render it to see the animation. Wade

Awesome!!!!

Sorry I am having a bad day and took it out on the wrong peeps. Wade

To help some with the annoyingly vague answer about Adobe Illustrator. Adobe Illustrator is a stand alone program that costs about $600 or you can get the entire CS3 Package for about $2,500. You create vector graphics which can then be imported to AM. It's nice to recommend another alternative but please provide more information about what you are doing. Not everyone has that kind of cash to toss around. Wade

Has anyone played this game yet? I have been playing it for about a week. Fantastic game if a bit repetitive. The graphics are great and the AI is fabulous. Wade

Too funny. Being the parent of a 19 year old....I have witnessed so much of this back and forth banter that I was laughing out loud. Then I looked at the From field on both of them and started laughing again. Wade

Okay, First press 'A' to add a spline Then click on the screen to add the first CP..... Just kidding How to Draw a Sword....get it? Wade