robcat2075

That looks good Mark! I think the large shadow area on the left need some sort of fill so it's not so dark and less flatly shaded.

I have dim memories of those shows!

Dali-esque

Lovely!

"Play with The Force values, Luke"

It's amazing it works at all! It is possible to copy a keyframe from one PRJ, load a new PRJ and paste the Keyframe onto the same character. Try doing that in any other software! However, without watching you do it i don't know what filters you have set, nor how fully keyed the bones are keyed in each case. For example, if you copy a key from a bone that has translation keyed but is still unkeyed at it's default rotation, and paste that onto a bone that has translation and rotation keyed, you'll get the new translation but no new rotation. What you are trying to do is far beyond the scope of "It's a pitch" which is intended as a bare introduction to keyframing. My suggestion... bite the bullet, pick one PRJ and redo the missing pose and then continue on. Lesson learned and the extra practice posing the character will do you good! Also, watch my "Keyframing Basics" video, in the tuts link in my signature, for further explanation of keyframing workflow and info about filters. I hope to cover the topic better in a NewTaoA:M segment, but that's for the future.

Now over 70,000

Cool! Looks breezy!

I wish we could identify why the lines happen when they happen.

I spotted one at 0:20 and a few later. I dont' see any correlation between the lines and any keyframes. It can't be a Force because there's no force in the chor. Since they are rather infrequent and the particle effect is brief, I'd say paint the lines out of the affected frames and hunt for the cause later. That will get your shot done today.

When do they happen? How much do i have to render?

Try loading this and see if the particle keys work. Sparks4_explosion_fina5x2.prj

the MaryKate model has lots of references to decals from somewhere but I'm never asked to load those ?

Something is looking for something.

If I load your original file into a text editor and change MatchName=Shortcut to Material1 MatchName=Streak Emitter to be like this MatchName=Material1 Name=Shortcut to Material1 MatchName=Streak Emitter and load that into A:M, then your original emission rate keys are recognized again.

If you start a blank project, save it and reload it, you still get that?

looking at teh PRJ in a text editor I see that the channels that are being ignored start ike this... MatchName=Shortcut to Material1 MatchName=Streak Emitter the channel that is being recognized starts like this MatchName=Material1 Name=Shortcut to Material1 MatchName=Streak Emitter I'm not sure what that means but it's a clue.

the "Shortcut to Material1 " that has the grey gear icon is the one that is being ignored.

There's stuff missing. It wants me to find a file with no name... I'm also missing "Shortcut to Material1_0.par" that's a baking file. Can you put up a PRJ that doesn't need either of those, then I'll know I'm testing the same thing you are. Going ahead I found i could make a keyframe to reduce the emission rate to 0 and it woudl survive a save and reload, but it was in a new "shortcut to", the original one is being ignored. I have seen this before. We should ascertain the circumstances that cause the original material channels to be ignored. Is it because it was baked at some point??

I tried to do your listed steps as I interpreted them but I don't get lines. Post your version of the PRJ that does it and then we'll know.

explain what you mean by that one. If the first one changes from positive to negative then it's already negative at the second one and can't change from positive to negative again unless there was some other key that made it positive again. Post your PRJ for what you mean.

In general, i think you have more splines than you need for the shapes you are making.

What version are you using?

Basic rules of splining... When two splines intersect they have to cross. They can't touch and do a u-turn away from each other. They have to cross like an X. Only two splines can cross, not three or more. Don't dead-end a spline where two other splines already cross. The crease at the top by the shoulder looks like a spline dead-ending at another spline intersection. Don't dead-end one spline into the side of another spline. Use a hook if you have to end a spline in the middle of another spline. This spline is a certain problem. Both ends are dead-ends in the middle of another spline...

Yeah, I'm going thru the tuts I want to keep in New TAoA:M. I had always just done my lathing around the default axis an had never tried using a moved pivot until now. It does work in V15 so it must be a fairly new bug.