grouping in animation master

[kgartner]

i am teaching animation master for the first time and my students have asked about grouping objects (character to car, weapon to hand). i cannot seem to locate anything regarding this. can anyone help me? thanks

[Fishman]

What you are looking for is the concept of constraints. They should be explained in The Door is Stuck exercise as well as the help file. There is even a video tutorial. - It is here: http://www.hash.com/VM/ Look in the Misc section for constraints and compensate mode.

The type of constraint you are describing is a "Translate to" constraint. There are others such as "Aim at", "Orient Like", etc. They are powerful animation tools.

 

Good Luck!

 

Scott

[Fuchur]

There is although the possibility to group and translate objects in the Cheoregprahie, but I think this is not animateable...

The much better way is to use constraints, where you can let a character lay something down, etc.

 

A tip for the future: Compensate-Button is your friend

 

You will know what I mean, if you are learning to use constraints.

(Short describtion to constraint to objects together...:

 

In chereography-mode:

1.) Align two objects how you like them to be aligned, for example a hand near a ball.

2.) Go to the first object and rightclick on it.

3.) Choose "New Constraint->Translate to" -> your mouse will turn into a picker.

4.) Activate the compensate-mode (-> it is most likely located at the top of your screen in the same toolbar as your translate/rotate/scale-manipulators are located. The button looks like a leg built of boxes.)

5.)Go to the second model and click with the picker on it or use the "target"-attribute of the constraint in the PWS/Attribute-window.

6.) Move the second object around and you will see that the first will follow.

 

*Fuchur*

[KenH]

Of course an easier method (but less flexible) would be to have Bone 1 as the parent and Bone 2 as the child. Then the hand cps are assigned to the parent bone and the gun to the child bone.

Then when you transform the hand bone, the gun bone will do the same.