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Sorry, got here late... it seems he should start falling before the right arm goes forward. It's a tough nut to crack, but I think it would promote the unstable balance of falling a little better. He almost seems to be yanked out.

The hair map's group is before the skin group... that's why her head has that dull overtone... Move the hair group in last place of groups... or after the skin group. She could use another group of finer hair at the forhead to blend the hair edge better. Use the same hair map.

You could use hair with maps of "puffs" of clouds cookie cut. The Hair would have to be thick and almost flat to pull it off... and the patches you use to emitt them should probably be like a solid clump shape. EDIT# you could even have the hair emitt from the skydome using a map-- like what's being done in the forum where they are using painterly hair! I haven't had time to do anything in A:M for a while, this was the next thing I was going to try... I'll let you know if it works for me, unless you try it and post first.

The first one is fantastic, but it's kind of quick at the portion when the 'wormhole'(??) effect begins... the Earth is blotted out... maybe you could fade it in some places so we can still see the planet. You must be reading the minds of every scifi fan out there... good work!

Why not just make a sky hemisphere? edit* Because you will not run out of sky with 360 of it. And what happened to your lovely fuzzie clouds -that are famous!

Nicely splined. You made good choices with your hooks. You din't have to use double hooks... I used many double hooks in my ears.

Well, you should look at it with some lights on it in the chor. Testing it under those lighting conditions will let you know if you need the lip edge loop or not. The lighting in the action or camera view doesn't help there.

It's a little complicated in the chor... but I just have both models in the same space... ))-The hero one is active and the proxy is not... ((-The hero has normal rig constraints... the proxy doesn't (only dynamic constnts.).

You have a valid point there... they could be nulls translated to the proxy hands and feet, with "lag" on the translations... they would follow the proxy's hands and feet... then you could translate the "hero" rig's hands and feet to these "lag" nulls. You would only have to animate the proxy rig without dealing with the pose sliders for each limb.

Well, There are two different rigs here. So if you wanted, you could stretch the character's cp's in a pose and animate the stretching via the sliders. Interesting...

NICE so far! If you include as much detail in the ears... you'll have no problem, but you will be adding a lot of hooks.

!!!!NICE splinage! The lips might need more definition. Just place a spline loop around the outer edge of the lips. It will cause an edge like a bevel. Same thing around the eye openings. Just to define the edges more... What you've done so far is great and if it suits your style, you may not need to add the loops, but I just suggest this because it looks a little too smooth and lips and eye lids have strong edges. Good luck on your finals!

I thought about it, but don't have time straight away! Just wanted to post quickly the idea of it. I supplied the project file for all to play with and see the inner workings, in case I didn't explain thoroughly. I'll probably play with it later... after I actually make a gun or some projectile for the person to react to. Thanks for all your comments... it makes me want to fiddle more with some other things I never had time to delve into.

If you want to examine the project... without the textures... Project1313.zip

And a slo-mo version (stretched out in timeline). Simulated so the dynamic constraints would make keyframes. DynamicHitHardSlowLg.mov

Made a proxy rig... all of the bones have dynamic constraints. In the chor I constrained (orient-like limbs/torso-- and the pelvis is translate-like) the rig(main bones/limbs) of the hero character to the dynamic bones of the proxy. This is the result: DynamicHitHardLg.mov

Eh..yeah, I'm in there, too!

Your thinking is highly critical and much appreciated... but don't you think that it really doesn't need anymore movement in the hips? And yes it is very difficult to get the motion of the cropped out portions... the legs... but his leg does jerk in the reference at that point also... just roto-ing the angles led me to the result... not perfect, but better than any attempt I could imagine on my own. Thanks Robcat. For my own needs, though, I think you are right about the smooth arcing. EDIT:: I just viewed the link and it seems that the animation is missing the last 2 frames of the animation... when I compressed it, I think they got dropped also, where his hips move more! Darn!

The DV Garage site has some really good tutorials on the site... and they even have grunge maps to download. You do have to sign up to enter the site, but it is totally free. And a good place for skylights is the Jeff Lee Skylight Site or Yves Skylight Rigs Tutorials & Models. Hope the above links can help you.

The model has to be embedded for smartskin to work? No. The project file you posted doesn't have a model in it. You could embed the model so it is saved in the project... the textures that are missing you might want to include also in the zip file... please.

Cookie cut maps uses a color or the alpha channel to "cut" part of the map with that color or alpha channel. It's a color map and transparency map rolled into one map! You could do the same thing with a color map and a transperency, but with a cookie cut you get a cleaner result, I believe and you don't have to make 2 maps!

Heres the reference vid I used as a reference in the action. HSMreferenceLg_Prog001.mov

I found some files of martial arts wizs that display the talents of some respected stunt people in hollywood before they became so hot they don't need reels of their work anymore... I'm not sure if their is a law against rotoscoping to someones actions on video, but it's good practice for me, since I stink at animation... Maybe I should just make an online comic-book instead of trying to flesh things out in animation. By no means am I finished with it--having problems with getting the hands to stay put--FK. I'll post the reference vid in the next post Check out the result I rendered out... HSM1Lg_Prog001.mov

NICE! Can't wait to see it all...

Thanks Don, You always come through! Always organized! I owe you some tut time now (just let me know when, probably at any weekend you want! I'm all yourz.)... ... ALL you guys are great! Sorry I didn't stay for the rest... John and Scott I'll definitely have to see your work next time... I know I missed something and wished I could have stayed. Mech-- sorry about the shoulder thing...(I finally remembered that I used smartskin for the clavicle to move the bicep's translation)... I don't think I ever solved it for smooth shoulder upward movement. I'll I.M. you from the forum if I come up with something. Zach, I'm so glad you showed us how to create the "Post-Extrapolation Method"-(accumulate) ... Vern, I'm surprised by the detail in your models... even God would be impressed (that you appreciate all those molecules). Oh... And John... I'm not going first next time, no matter what you say! Maybe there should be a rotation of first show-n-teller. Gee, thanks a lot Vern. I'm never going to animate AGAIN! FALSE!