RoyBU

I found my own solution to the disappeared camera outline: I just brought in another camera and put a constraint on it to translate it to the position of the original camera. Now the second camera follows the first one around and gives me the outline I need when working on my camera path, etc. Roy

OK, duh, that's simple enough. Thanks!

Well, I don't know where I'm going wrong but I just tried it in a new default project and it did not work. Here, in excessive detail, is what I did: 1. Open new project 2. Right-click on "objects" in PWS and choose "new/model" 3. Go into "add" mode using button in upper right of modeling window and create a vertical, 2-CP spline 4. Using the lathe, create a cylinder, then delete the bottom ring to get an 8-CP circle 5. Create a new chor 6. Drag "Model 1" (my circle) into the chor 7. Right-click "Shortcut to Camera 1" in PWS and choose "new constraint/path" Here's where things go wrong. I can't select my circle model either by picking it or selecting it from the list. As far as I can tell, AM refuses to recognize it as a path and will only recognize as paths splines created in the chor itself. Roy (version 12.0w) P.S. As another minor irritation, many versions ago my camera icon disappeared from my chor. (When I select the camera shortcut the yellow lines and boxes show up, but the outline of the camera and the purple sight lines are always invisible.) If I drag a new camera in, it appears correctly, but if I tell my original shortcut to switch to that new camera it is still invisible. This is annoying now that I am working with the camera on a path. Anyone know how I can get the icon to reappear?

I am trying to rotate my camera around a model. Per Rodney's suggestion in another topic I made a circular spline as a model to use for the camera path, then dropped it into my chor. However, when I tried to path constraint the camera to this circular spline, it wouldn't work. The eyedropper picker would not allow me to choose it and it does not appear in the dropdown target list. The only targets that do appear are two other paths I've already made (created as paths right in the chor). So I guess I'm missing a step: how do I get AM to use this model as my path?

Thanks for the thorough explanation. I can't claim to understand it all, but it makes more sense and is less of a mystery than before. And I tried the arm rotation example -- very interesting!

Thanks for the replies. Good to know it's not just me, I guess. You're right it isn't that difficult to work around but the absence of cut and paste in that situation surprised me. The suggestion of another master pose is a good one, thanks (similar to what C-grid was trying to tell me, I think). Thanks to all.

I have a couple questions about how the "rotation" transform works. 1. Under the "Transform" property for the typical object in a chor are the "translate", "scale" and "rotate" properties. If I click the little triangle next to each, I can get the X, Y and Z (or X and Y for scale) listed separately. If I then click on just one of the dimensions under translate or scale, the graph for just that dimension will show up in the timeline and I can add or manipulate its keyframes. HOWEVER, if I click on just one dimension for the "rotate" property, I get nothing. The only way I can manipulate a dimension for rotate is to click on "Rotate" and get all three dimensions in the timeline. Usually this is fine, but when all three dimensions are the same value at the same point in time, it can be difficult to select the one I want. Why can't I choose one to work with individually like I can with translate and scale? 2. In addition to the X, Y and Z dimensions for rotation there is a fourth (appears as a white line in my timeline) whose purpose escapes me. When I change X, Y or Z this white line moves and if I move the white line my object rotates, but what is it meant for? Thanks in advance.

Hmm, I didn't really mean to get into a discussion of how best to rig the wings, but . . . I use one pose slider for the up and down motion of the wings, since I couldn't think of any situation in which I would want one wing to move up or down by itself. I have two other pose sliders (one left and one right) which cause one edge of a wing to twist, or maybe ripple would be a better word, similar to the way stingrays swim by rippling the edges of their bodies. I DO want these twist or ripple sliders to be independent, hence my original question about how to copy keyframes created in the timeline for one slider to the timeline for the other.

Sorry, I did not explain sufficiently. The model is not of a person but a flat object that is (in a fantasy sort of way) flying. The "twist" properties have to do with curling either the left "wing" edge or the right "wing" edge up and down to better simulate bird flight. Much of the time the curling needs to happen simultaneously on both right and left edges of the wing, but not always (which is why I did not make them one pose). So that's a long way of saying that changing the pose is not a solution. Isn't it possible to copy multiple keyframes from one pose slider timeline to another in one pass?

I have a model with two user properties (pose sliders): "Twist left" and "Twist right". Sometimes I'd like the two properties two change exactly the same way for awhile. So in my chor I used keyframes in the timeline to define the "Twist left" property the way I wanted and then I selected all those keyframes with the mouse in the timeline. I right-clicked on the bounding box and chose "copy". Then I went to the timeline for the "Twist right" property and right-clicked on the timeline and chose "paste". Nothing happened. I tried the same thing but using the "Edit" button at the top of the screen and chose "copy keyframe" and then "paste keyframe". That pastes just the first keyframe, not the whole sequence. I've already gone ahead and done the keyframing manually, but it seems that this kind of copying from one user property to another must be possible and I'm just overlooking something simple (as usual). It sure would be handy. Using ver. 12.0w

Having just spent 15 minutes looking (unsuccessfully) for the plane loop tutorial in the 2002 manual, I just thought I'd point out that it is actually in the current technical reference: open Help/Help Topics from within AM, do a search on "loop" and look at the topic "About Aim Roll at Constraint Objects".

A possibly interesting update: Today I was working on a different version of this same project and after making a trivial change to the placement of a model in the chor, suddenly all the models went "blank" again. Fortunately, I happened to have two instances of AM running at the time and, having my wits about me more than usual, I closed down the "bad" instance of AM first, and THEN closed down the other, untainted version. Lo and behold, on starting AM again, everything was fine. This makes me think something gets corrupted and then that corruption is saved upon exiting AM to taint all further attempts until I reinstall from scratch. Since I exited a "good" version of AM after exiting the corrupted version, whatever it was got restored to its correct state. I think I'll keep two instances of AM running in the future, just as insurance.

I am ready to render a scene from my project and it will probably take several days. I thought I would use another computer in my house to do the render so I could keep working on other parts of the project. The two computers are connected by a wireless network. But what is the most efficient way to transfer the project to another computer to render? I tried consolidating the project onto the 2d computer, and all the relevant folders containing the project, images, models, etc. were created, but when I tried to open the project in the 2d computer, it still tried to find the images and models in exactly the same paths as they are stored on the 1st computer. Since consolidate project stores all the info in a directory structure starting with a folder called "C-" (representing the C: drive the project came from) I don't see how to make the directory structure on the 2d computer exactly match. So opening the project on the 2d computer just causes it to complain it can't find any of the data. There must be a way since I infer from this forum that people collaborate on projects. How is that done?

Well, just restarting A:M didn't do it, neither did restarting Windows. Not until I did a clean reinstall of A:M, including deleting the registry keys as described in the FAQ, did my decals come back. That also meant I lost a number of models I had imported for this project, and after I put those models back in the directories where my project expected to find them and tried to save the project A:M told me the project hadn't saved correctly. Indeed it hadn't! -- it seemed to be empty on trying to reopen it! Fortunately I had a fairly recent backup so I didn't lose lots of work. Thanks for all the help.

Help! I decided to just delete the decal that referenced the wmp image for that one model (the shield) and for some reason AM now refuses to show any decals for any of my models in the chor (in shaded view, of course). I don't think I did anything other than delete that one decal, but something has changed and it must be something in the program itself because (1) I can see my decals if I do any type of render (like shift-Q) and (2) even when I open other, completely unrelated projects the decals no longer show (unless I render). Instead of decals, I just get flat shading on all surfaces, the way things look before applying any decals. How can I get my decal view back?!

Your point is a good one; I guess I can see it both ways. The choice AM has made seems valid, my only suggestion is that it seems inconsistent to prompt a save (not "save as") for virtually every little change one makes, no matter how minor, but NOT for a change to a path, which in most cases will be significant. Once a user finds out about this quirk then it is easy to deal with, but quirks are what can make a program frustrating to learn.

Yes, on looking into it more I figured out that it must be something to do with the weather feature that no longer exists. I guess I'll just delete it. (And I believe it did come straight off the extras CD that way; must have been overlooked.) Now that I understand it better, I'm intrigued about weathering. Is there a specific way to approach it? Could someone point me to a tutorial? Or is it just a matter of learning textures and materials well enough to be able to think of a way? Weathering this shield would greatly increase the realism of my scene.

Thanks, Rodney, I may just put in that feature request. I realize it may seem a bit silly to experienced users, but when something unexpected like this happens to me as a new user, I don't know whether to start worrying that I've screwed something up or not. And I do try to save frequently, sometimes after making just one change, so that if I mess something up I know I can go back to the most recent good-up-to-here state. Since AM will not save unless it perceives something has changed, having to change something and change it back just so I can then save is a bit distracting. Thanks for the response. This community is definitely one of AM's best features.

Well, OK, thanks for the reassurance, but as a relatively new user it sure seems unexpected that every little change I might make as I work on a project causes the program to asterisk the project EXCEPT for changing the contours of a path. I had already come up with your suggested work around, and, well yeah it's not that big a deal, but I see no reason for this behavior. Thanks again for the response.

I have been working on making a path for my camera to follow in a choreography. I have "discovered" that when, after making the path, I move one of the control points to tweak its position, AM does not seem to realize that I've changed something and so no asterisk appears by the filename and I cannot save my project. If I do undo, then the control point moves back to where it was, so AM does realize I've moved it for purposes of undo. And if -- after I have changed a control point's position -- I then change something else, including something related to this path (like rotating the entire path), then the asterisk appears and I can save and the changed control point's new position does get saved. So why can't I save right after moving a control point? Is this normal behavior or has something gone wiggy with my installation? (Version 12.0w) Another weird thing that makes me wonder if I should reinstall is that upon opening my project the asterisk appears as if I have already changed something even though I haven't (of course, since I just started a new session). When I tried opening other projects, this doesn't happen. Does that suggest something weird is lurking in this project?

I am using the shield prop from the extras CD in a choreography. Every time I open this project I get the message "Missing Image IO plugin" for the file "bouclierADc.wmp". That file is in fact in the path listed. I checked my options and determined that the IO plugins are in the standard place. However, there is no iio file listed for a "wmp" file. I have these: AVI.iio BMP.iio EXR.iio JPG.iio MOV.iio PCX.iio PNG.iio TGA.iio Is there someplace to get the needed plugin?

Another update: I wondered whether there was some conflict between versions 11 and 12 of AM. So, after setting a Windows restore point, I uninstalled version 11. Then I opened my project (in version 12 of course) and determined that the decals were still disappearing. However, when I created a new project, created a new model and applied one of my TGA decals, it worked fine. Then I went back to my original project and reapplied the decal for the top of the box. Now in my chor frame 0 still shows all the decals, and when I move off that frame the other decals disappear but the newly applied decal remains. So, the mystery isn't exactly solved, but it looks like if I just reapply all my decals I'll be ready to move on. Did uninstalling version 11 do this? I can't be sure.

OK, thanks for helping me find how to turn decals on and off. I checked and decals were in fact turned "on". In the meantime I also installed 12.0w, but that made no difference. My model still goes blank as soon as I move off frame 0, and the behavior is the same whether in preview or final render. Edit -- I have another computer which used to run AM so I tested this problem on it. It has an earlier version 12 (12.0q) but the same graphics card (though with an earlier version of the driver). I applied a TGA to a simple one-patch model, dropped it in a chor and - what do you know! - it was fine for all frames. I don't know what to do now - perhaps I'll try removing AM and reinstalling it.

More info -- I did a quick test in my version 11 of AM and it showed the decals fine throughout the whole preview. Then I went back to version 12 and discovered that if I use a JPG image to decal a model, it worked fine in an entire chor, but if I use a TGA image - poof! - it would disappear after frame 0. Aargh! I don't look forward to redoing all the decals using JPG -- I thought TGA was a good format for AM?! I can't seem to find a place to turn on decals under render options. I assume you mean Tools-Options-Render, and the tech reference does refer to the ability to turn decals on and off in that dialog, but there is no such option in my version. Was it moved somewhere else (and maybe my tech reference is out of date)?

When I move off frame 0 in preview, the decal disappears. Thinking that perhaps decals just don't show in animations (except, apparently, on frame 0), I tried both a quick render (shift-Q) and a final render but still got no decals. All the decals are TGA images. The decals show fine in the model window. After my initial post I tried the model in an action window and the same thing happens in preview - I can see the decal in frame 0 but after that it disappears. Running on Windows XP SP2, AM 12.0t.