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You can close the ends of your box a couple of ways. The easiest way is to create a new spline from one corner to the opposite corner - be sure you attach the CPs in the new spline to the CPs in the existing square. Another way is to 1) select all the CPs in the spline ring that defines the open end of the box 2) switch to side view 3)hit the Extrude button 4)scale and translate to newly created CPs until the hole is no longer visible. Another way is to insert a CP halfway up each of the vertical splines in your picture. Then connect the CPs with a new spline.

An excellent reason to render with light buffers to EXR format. Then you can just change the lighting in A:M Composite to look like it's night. I think I remember hearing that all lights must have values other than 0,0,0 or 255,255,255 in order to be able to change the colors in AM Composite.

That's a very good test Robcat. Don't underestimate the power of ole' fashioned hand animating

Thanks for the welcome back and my son had a very,very rough year with a severe illness but he much better now... That's good to hear.

Welcome back digman! How's your son?

Thanks for this post. One more A:M mystery solved

Another thing you can do is use the Limit Manipulators property. Open a Model window for your book model. Switch to Bones Mode. Select one of the bones in the book. Look in the Properties Panel for something called Manipulator Options. Expand the disclosure triangle beside it for more options. Leave "Manipulation" set to "Standard". Set "Limit Manipulators" to ON. Another disclosure triangle will appear. Click on it for more options. Set all the Translate, Rotate and Scale options to OFF *except* the Rotate axis on which you want the bone to follow. Bring your book model into a chor or action and grab the tip of the bone and move it around. It will only rotate on the axis you specified.

That is looking very promising. Please keep us posted!

You may not have to reformat. Just email support@hash.com with your problem and see if there is any other solution.

Not sure about the settings, but do you have a dvd player? Try burning one and see if it will play.

Suuuweeet! Great model Eric.

Nice motion Robcat More! More!

Use the "ease" property of the path constraint. Set it to 0 at the beginning of your animation and 100% at the end. In the middle you can key other values to govern how far it is along the path. 40% at 4 seconds and 40% at 5 seconds would make it stay at 40% from sec 4 to sec 5. Of course you have to zero slope those two keys. You will probably want to set the Interpolation Method o the Ease channel to Zero Slope. Yes, but you'll need to key the enforcements of the two path constraints so one is completely off when you want the object to really be on the other path. And vice versa. And of course you'll have to do some keys on the ease of both path constraints so they are not going thru the default 0 to 100% ease simultaneously. Sure, you can do that, but it is easier to use a single path.

Position the default Model Bone of the hammer (the Big Black Bone) - in the Model Window - so the base of the bone is where the back hand is likely to grip the handle. And the end of the Bone extends a little past the top of the hammer head. This way you can position and rotate the hammer more easily in the chor. Add a child bone to the handle where the front hand will likely grip it. With this bone selected, look in the Properties Panel for "Manipulator Options", and click on the disclosure triangle for it. Turn "Limit Manipulators" to ON. Another disclosure triangle will appear. Click on it to see more options. Set Rotate > X, Rotate > Y, and Rotate > Z to OFF Set Translate > X and Translate > Y to OFF. Now you will only be able to translate the bone along it's Z axis - which should be along the length of the hammer's handle. Plop your character and the hammer into a chor. With the character still in its default "T" pose, rotate the hand that will grip the back of the handle 90 degrees on its Z axis, so the palm faces forward. Place the hammer so the hand is able to grip the handle at the appropriate position. Close the fingers around the handle and adjust the position of the hammer until the character is able to grip the handle. *Now* - turn on IK arms for this arm. Constrain the IK hand controller to Translate To and Orient Like the Hammer (the model bone). Make sure Compensate Mode is ON - it is ON by default. Position the hammer and the arms so the front hand can grip it in the appropriate place on the handle - hopefully it will be very near the base of the hammer's child bone. Close the fingers of the front hand so it grips the handle and make adjustments as necessary. *Now* - turn ON IK arms for this arm. Constraint the IK controller to Translate To and Orient Like the hammer's child bone. Now you can slide the child bone up and down the length of the handle and the hand will follow it. If you rig it this way, you will have to move the hammer in order to move the arms, but I find it easier this way.

Yeah, I think I've met him too! The hair coming out of his ears is a dead giveaway. Nice model Myron.

Way to go man. You might be able to tighten it up some by editing out some dead space here and there. But that was pretty funny. Nice job.

I know just what you mean David. Rigging is a bit like solving a series of puzzles that all relate to, and affect, one another.

VERY nice image!

Great looking model. Nice to see you posting again!

Assuming you are moving the Model Bone and do NOT have the model constrained to a path. Select the Model Bone in the chor in the PWS and switch to Channel View. Click in the Channel window and hit [Ctrl-A] to select all the keyframes. Right-click in the selection box and choose Curve > Interpolation Method > Zero Slope. (This will make Zero Slope the default interpolation method for all the model bone's keyframes) Now double-click in the same selection box and, in the dialog that appears, set Interpolation Method to "Default". Now all your Model Bone keys are zero-sloped. Go to the frame on which you want your model to stop moving and set a keyframe. Go the frame you want your model to start moving again and set another keyframe. Delete all other keyframes between the stop/start keys.

excellent. Nice work.

Oh that's great. Very entertaining. Cool song Myron!

If you want to be able to control the beard and drape it over the shoulder and such, then you will have to animate the control null at the end whenever you want the beard to move. If you want the beard to bounce and sway on its own whenever you move the character, but not have much control over it, then as far as i know, you can't have a "Target" for the dynamic constraint (The control null).

You should save all those choreographies out as separate chors. If your Project file gets corrupted, you will be SOL. Are you sure you set the Blend Percent to 100% at the appropriate time? You have "Transition to next Action" ON for both Actions. When you use "Blend" you usually turn those off. In order to use "Transition to next Action", you can keep the Blend Mode to "Replace". And do not overlap the actions. In fact, space them out several frames. You should see the red action bar in the timeline slope down in the space between the two actions. However, I prefer to use Blended actions because sometimes the model does screwy things between actions when using "transition to next Action". What went to the last frame? The last frame of the chor? How many frames does the chor have? What do you mean by "it stayed at that point?"

Set your last action to Blend. Make sure it is *under* the first action in the PWS, And make sure it overlaps the first action by 6 or 12 frames (more or less) On frame 0, set the Blend Percent to 0 Several frames before you want to second action to be fully activated, set the Blend Percent to 0. Several frames later, set the Blend percent to 100%