Roger

Is there some reason why I can't properly translate my nulls in bones mode? I click them to select, then hit the N key to translate. I try to move them, but nothing happens. Is it possible I locked them somehow? I am trying to move them in the Viewport, not in the PWS. For what its worth, they would move in Birdseye mode, but not in Front view, and then only on a diagonal.

Ok, I am adding the left and right knee targets now. My nulls show up in both the actions tree in the PWS and in the bones tree. Should the nulls only be created in Bones mode, and not in Action mode? I noticed in Rob's tutorial that he creates the nulls and positions them in bones mode, then does the constraints while in action mode. I think I may have messed up by creating the nulls in Action mode, and will need to do it the other way round.

Nancy, thanks - that's exactly what it was. I had the poses turned on in the Cho, but when I went to Action mode to test them out, they were not on. I did not realize that they were off - thought if you turned them on in one spot they stayed on in another.

I think I figured out where the extraneous poses are coming from - each time I add a new pose, even if I delete the previous ones, it tacks a number on the end and it shows up in pose sliders. Not sure why the old poses are still visible in pose sliders after deleting them from the Project Workspace. I've taken a screenshot of my bones and constraints for the legs, maybe I'm missing something, I'm about to collapse so if someone sees something obvious, let me know. If I move the hips, the feet don't follow but if I try moving the feet, the legs do not follow the feet. I thought I set up the kinematic constraints correctly.

Back after a bit more of a break than I thought - been busy. Anyway, I have 2 poses. One contains the fan bones, the other just has a relationship, but no bones associated with it. Not sure what it is doing. If I right click on that relationship for pose 3 and choose properties I then get the pose sliders window and pose properties window. In pose sliders, there is a Pose 1, but this pose does not show up in the Project Workspace. I take that back, it appears under User Properties, but its not clear what it does or what its controlling. If I click on it, all the bones light up.

That's just it, I have the original pose that controls the fan bones. There were no other poses than this one when I started working on the legs. Then, I created the new pose to deal with constraining the legs. I am not sure where the extra pose is coming from, unless I did something that created a copy of it.

Ok, I'm going for a real simple IK leg rig. Here is what I've done so far: 1. Moved the left and right foot to the same level as the pelvis (hips) 2. Kinematically constrained the left foot to the left femur and right foot to right femur When I move the hips, the feet don't move, which is good. However, when I move the feet, the legs don't follow. I know I must have missed something but am not sure what it is. Is there a constraint I missed? I have 3 poses - one governs the fan bones in the body and neck, I'm not worried about that one. The other 2 poses are set to on, so I'm not sure why the legs aren't following the feet. Seems like there should only be 2 poses, though, because while watching the "simplest IK leg rig" tutorial I noticed there is only one pose. What am I missing?

Ok, makes sense I guess.

Yep, inside appears to be gray, as if its a new or empty project.

Has anyone else ever noticed that occasionally, AM will not display a model when opening a project or choreography back up? For instance, lets say you have a project with only one model in it, and you open it back up, all AM will show is a gray screen. Then if you close and reopen it, the model will display. I'm not sure if its a problem with the graphics driver software or maybe I need to click on the model once in the Project Workspace in order for it to appear. Sometimes when i do that, I can see the model, sometimes I can't.

Well this is what I came up with, looks a bit odd but its ok I guess. I think the fact that I didn't use peaked splines gave me the bevelled look.

Well, I'm reviewing the tutorial now, so I guess I'll find out So far, it looks like it is set up the same way as mine.

Working on a treasure chest right now. So far, I have extruded 2 shapes to make up the lid and the body of the chest. I chose to do it this way since I wanted the chest to have some depth to it, and not a knife edge on the walls that make up the lid and body. However, now I'm left with the problem of closing the ends off. What would be the best way to go about doing this? I know I can probably come up with something that will work, but not sure it will look "nice". Is there an existing "best practice" for capping surfaces like this?

Yeah, I know - FK legs would be a real pain. I think I was planning on implementing your "simplest IK leg rig" but hadn't gotten round to it yet. I'm in the bone properties, do you need to turn "lock IK" on the bone in the end of the chain to start an IK leg rig?

I've done my CP weighting, probably need to re-weight the head and neck since I've changed those recently. I'm currently trying to puzzle out whether I set this thing up with FK or IK legs (I think they're FK, at least they're acting like that when I'm moving them around).

I think I am going to have to set up smartskin for my penguin, because for some of the more extreme positions of the joints, the model starts to look like absolute trash the way the skin pinches. Anyone have any tips for working with smart skin?

Yes, unfortunately I did render out a whole minute. I meant to render only 1 second, I must have placed the 1 in the wrong spot accidentally. But, I'm happy that I was able to successfully complete the exercise. At least I know what I was doing wrong now.

None have ever been found. Not in this century, nor in the last. Not in this universe nor any other. Gotta wonder why it is even in there, then. Anyway, I completed the exercise. Its not perfect, but doesn't look too bad after having been rendered. itsapitch.zip

Yes, I've already made sure to turn off the auto-balance stuff. Out of curiousity, in what situations would you want this turned on?

Ok, after doing this and then watching the bones pop up in the PWS when selected, it makes more sense. I'm going to see if I can complete the pitch exercise and see how it looks.

The first problem i see is that you are trying to select bones that appear within the sphere of a rotate manipulator. When the rotate manip (or any other manipulator) is on, A:M is waiting for you to do something with that manipulator and will prevent you from accidentally choosing other bones while you are moving the manipulator. You can go on to shift select another bone you want outside the manipulator which will turn it off and give you access to bones it obscured or you can turn the manipulator off by hitting R or on bones that present the rotate manip automatically upon selection (R won't turn it off) you can manually invoke the Scale or traNslate manipulators which appear smaller on the sceen and may not obscure the bones you want or you can zoom in so that the rotate manipulator is smaller in proportion to the character and no longer obscures the other bones. or if the bones you want are already listed in your chor, you can shift select them there. OK, this is helpful. It may just be easiset for me to select them from the list in the project workspace.

Ok - here is a new post of me trying to select bones. I am holding down the shift key as I'm doing it, about halfway through the video I switch to ctrl-clicking to select the bones. I only seem to be able to click on one at a time, and some of the bones I can't select at all. I am in skeletal mode in the choreography and not an action, I'm still not sure what I'm doing wrong. AM_screencap.mp4

Ok - after watching you do it again, I think that is what I did, because all the bones were highlighted yellow when I did it on my end. I think the only thing I did wrong was use the wrong option in the dialog when forcing keyframes. I will give it another go and see if it works this time.

Well, here is my vid. Ok, I think I see what you're saying - since there are no existing channels (since it is frame zero) then do you do all filtered channels? Or just not force anything on frame zero? Maybe I need to watch the tutorial again and take notes this time. AM_pitch.zip

Doh! Looks like I can't upload flash files, so I will have to redo this. Downloading camtasia now. BTW, any recommendations for screencap software if I don't have $299 to spend and would like to use camtasia (or something like it) past the 30 day trial period?