Can a bone in Model 'A', be a child of Model 'B'?

[Kelley]

I'm setting up my two [at the moment] UAV's for a straffing run. To make them appear very quickly from behind the tank column, I just translated UAV_T1 to its companion, T2, reduced T2 to about 5%, then enlarged it to 100% over a few frames. So far, so good.

 

Now I want to add a muzzle flash to the guns. I got a good, straightforward tutorial on A:M. I propose to translate the muzzle flash to the gun, make a repeating action so the gun just fires constantly, and then use the ON/OFF to make it visible as necessary. But the UAV and the flash have to grow together. Can the bone in the flash be a child of the chin turret bone?

 

On aiming the gun: I'd like to see the gun fire as the UAV approaches the target, swing 90 degrees to the left as they comes abreast, and then, a few last rounds as the target fall astern. Can the chin turret bone, being the bottom bone in the chain, be given a 'Point At' constraint when its parent may be directed somewhere else by the bones above?

 

Or might a null be placed inside the target vehicle to direct the bottom bone?

[Rodney]

Not a child per se.

I think you need to look to Contraints for your solution.

The Null you mention sounds like a good approach.

 

The experts will weigh in...

[KenH]

Why is there a bone (yellow arrow) going down? If you just want the turrets to rotate then the bone sticking out would do it. Or maybe I'm missing something.

[Kelley]

Why is there a bone (yellow arrow) going down? If you just want the turrets to rotate then the bone sticking out would do it. Or maybe I'm missing something.

 

Right. I was unclear. The chin turret is a sphere housed in a cylinder. The cylinder swings the guns left/right, and the sphere moves them up/down. As you point out, this is hardly necessary. [The rotation of the cylinder will hardly be noticable.] The sphere bone will suffice.

 

I went ahead and translated the flashes to the muzzles. I'm assuming that while they will move with the UAV, they will not inherit its properties [like size] over time? It would be nice to be wrong here.

[Kelley]

I put the bone in the turret...but, of course, the flashes stay oriented to the UAV and don't follow the muzzles. Can an object [the flash] be translated to a specific bone [turret]? Or, should I remove the turret from the model, bring it back as a seperate object, translate it to the UAV, and then translate the flashes to the guns/turret?

[heyvern]

You could use a scale like constraint. I believe you could target the model of the... whatsit... whatjamcallit... the model that is scaling. If either of these models are scaled differently initially you probably need to use that... dang... what's it called... compensate mode... phew.

 

My mind isn't what it use to be.

 

You can constrain bones from one model to another model. So the muzzle flashes could be constrained any way you want. Almost like "attaching" one model or bone in that model to another model or any bone in that model. So yes you can make the muzzle flash orient like anything you want.

 

-vern

[KenH]

My mind isn't what it use to be.

 

Not at all. You're just dealing with more complex issues than you used to.

 

Robert: If the flashes are sprites, perhaps the translation isn't being updated in realtime. Try pressing spacebar when you expect a change and see if that's the problem.

[Kelley]

Robert: If the flashes are sprites, perhaps the translation isn't being updated in realtime. Try pressing spacebar when you expect a change and see if that's the problem.

 

Ken: In this case, the flash is real geometry. Following a past adviso from you on lights and 'glow', I went into Bones mode and installed a light.

 

As you can see, a snapshot of the Bones window shows the flash glowing wonderfully. The pic. of the UAV from the animation, shows light spilling onto the turret, onto the rear of the tank, etc. but the flashes themselves are dark.

 

ps: the turret is now a seperate object. There's a chain of 'translate to' constraints, flash>turret>UAV, with 'scale like'...seems to working well.

[Kelley]

Good news. All that was required was to go back to the Flash>Bones and re-orient the Light Bone until it pointed forward with the geometry. And the fall-off circle was seriously reduced.

 

Now that the guns work, it's time to kick some butt.

[Dhar]

Does that mean we'll be seeing some animations next?

 

(I hope, I hope, I hope)

[KenH]

The flashes still don't look as "glowy" as they could be. You may or may not know there are glow settings in the chor properties:

[Kelley]

The flashes still don't look as "glowy" as they could be. You may or may not know there are glow settings in the chor properties:

 

 

...another thing dimly remembered from past excursions. Yes, I had seen, but forgot that, like 'Fog', there's more than one place to set it. Howe're, in this case, when I did look at it, the first setting was 15 and the second was 200. Haven't tried to play with new settings yet. That's for tomorrow. But thanks.

[Kelley]

Does that mean we'll be seeing some animations next?

 

(I hope, I hope, I hope)

 

Well then...here we go:

 

Bear in mind that these are rough-cuts, with much work yet to be done. A few examples: I added a road bed on top of the bridge and the tank treads are now sunk into it. There's camera bounce, landscapes will be textured. ground plane will become a river, yadda-yadda...

 

However; all crits and suggestions are welcome.

FLY_BY_01.zip

FLY_BY_02.zip

[KenH]

I think the blades should turn. (In the first one) In the second one, they should be faster and I think they should turn counter to each other......like their meshing into each other....as cogs do.

 

Looking very nice. Is the turret turning? If/when it does, I think it should move in quick turns.

[Kelley]

I think the blades should turn. (In the first one) In the second one, they should be faster and I think they should turn counter to each other......like their meshing into each other....as cogs do.

 

Looking very nice. Is the turret turning? If/when it does, I think it should move in quick turns.

 

Ken: Yes. Yes. And yes. The blades on the near UAV, at times, lose the Action and I have to pull it over from the Library again. Definitely the blades should rotate counter-clockwise, and will. That's another of the details stacking up.

 

The turret is turnable now. Just a single bone as you proposed. And 'fast'? Definitely. The clips I put up here started out as 10-sec. and I collapsed the key frames down to 5-sec. While I frequently get impatient with American films with their non-stop 1-sec. cuts that usually impart more confusion than drama, this is definitely a 'need for speed' situation.