exercise 6 door stuck

[Rob_T]

There's like a 3 "axis" matrix of possibilities.

 

one axis is the filters that decide whether any of translation, scale, rotation... etc. are eligible to be keyed by the Keyframe button

 

Yeah, I'm not sure where the controls for that option are; but one of the biggest issues I had was trying to keyframe a big bone like the hips or ankle control points (I never had this issue with the regular bones only ones with more complex controls) only to discover the next time I pose them that the keyframe didn't entirely take because now I've moved them in a direction or a way that I hadn't before and now instead of three sub keyframes (that''s the only way I can think to describe it) it has six and those three new sub keyframes were never keyframed so they are slowly moving through the entire animation and the only way to get them to stick is to try and determine where you want them before you made that last pose and make a keyframe there but you can't simply undo it because then those three new sub keyframes disappear. So you have to move the bone to where you wanted it before the newest pose, take note of the values in the property window, then undo that movement and then go back one frame before your latest pose and enter those values into the the sub keyframe properties.

 

a second axis is the filters that decide if a single bone, bone branch, or whole skeleton gets keyed.

 

This I understand a bit better. I won't claim to have it all down but I know where these buttons are and I'm pretty sure I know what they do. The constraints part of Lesson 6 helped with that.

 

the third axis is the choice of "only in filtered channels that pre-exist" or "all filtered channels"

 

Yeah this is the one I find most confusing. What is and what is not a filtered channel? For that matter; what's a filtered channel? For that matter; what's a channel? And what determines if it pre-exists or not? And what determines if it is filtered or not? And finally, what are the ramifications of choosing one over the other?

 

Yeah, much confusion over that one.

 

I'll try to think of a clearer way to demonstrate how these interact.

 

I'm sure any and all newbies would be grateful. I know I've been enormously grateful for all the help I've gotten.

 

I'm going to guess that you somehow had the "modeling mode" (Thom button) on while in the chor. That's the only way i can imagine copying and pasting two models together, while animating. Modeling in the chor is a feature of A:M, although rarely used.

 

I don't know what the "Thom" button is but I suppose anything is possible. The only button I used regularly to view the model that wasn't by default on for me in the choreography tools is the one that looks like an arm with a flexing muscle (which I assumed was called muscle mode but honestly I have no idea). I used it because it hid the rig and made it easier for me to see the results of my poses. But when I was trying to force keyframes through the process you descibed in your tutorial I was in the middle of posing so I doubt I had that view selected... but as I said, anything is possible.

 

Thanks again Robcat. This lesson was a biggie for me.

[robcat2075]

diagram:

 

http://www.hash.com/forums/index.php?s=&am...st&p=300598

 

 

the third axis is the choice of "only in filtered channels that pre-exist" or "all filtered channels"

 

Yeah this is the one I find most confusing. What is and what is not a filtered channel? For that matter; what's a filtered channel?

 

A channel is filtered if the filter button pertaining to it is ON. If a bone has rotation keys and translate keys ("channels") but only the translate filter is on, then the channels for translation are filtered at the moment , but the rotation channels are not.

 

 

 

 

For that matter; what's a channel?

Anything that is keyed has a channel with those keys. The channel is what you see in the PWS timeline.

 

And what determines if it pre-exists or not?

Either you've already made a key on a something or you haven't. If you already have, it must exist already.

 

 

 

And what determines if it is filtered or not?

those "axis 1" buttons.

 

BTW, "Axis" is not an official A:M term.

 

 

 

 

 

And finally, what are the ramifications of choosing one over the other?

 

Wanna force a key on all the bones you've been animating on Shaggy? turn on Translate and Rotate filters... turn on "'Key Model" Filter... Shift+Force Keyframe. Choose "Pre-existing only". This will force rotation and translate keys on all the bones in the model (because "Key Model" is on) that already have such things somewhere in their timeline.

 

If one of those bones didn't have, say, translate keys, it still wont' get translate keys, because they aren't "pre-existing".

 

 

Which is why at frame 0 you want to do the initial maneuver in my vid where you CTRL-select all the bones you figure you are going to animate, turn on the translate and rotate filters, turn on the SINGLE bone filter, then Shift+Force Keyframe and choose "all filtered channels".

 

This will create translate and rotate keys (channels) on all the bones you selected (and only those). Basically this keys everything in its default position, which of course, you may now proceed to modify.

 

(You did not want to leave "Key Model" on since that would key everything in teh model, even bones you will never want to animate and never want to have channels cluttering up your PWS timeline.)

 

 

 

I've ignored the other filters in this example. Scale is rarely used in character animation, but you could if you wanted to. Things like Muscle, Bias, Pose... those aren't associated with a bone like rotate, translate and scale are. I forget if/how the Single and Model filters influence them.

[Rob_T]

Robcat, thanks for the extended explanation and diagram. I think I'm finally getting it. The only issue remaining I think is to confirm that while all this information is useful it doesn't solve what was probably the biggest problems I had with this lesson. I took a picture, sorry it was with my camera, with the duel monitor setup "print screen" and paste into Photoshop simply doesn't work for me. I've got a really crappy graphics card.

 

Ok, so if you check out the photo you can see the issue I had with control points. As I mentioned before, I never had an issue with regular bones. Just hips and ankles and I think the head and eye target but I'm not positive about those last two.

 

As you can see in the picture marked #1 there are seven different channels (thank you now I know what to call them, with all my experience with Sonar and Premier I was tempted to call them tracks or clips but neither fit) under the hips. When the model loads at the beginning it usually has 4. Even if you select the bones like you did in your tutorial for keyframing there is still just four channels. The problems I had arose when I moved the model in such a way as it activated those three other channels.

 

Now, if I understand you correctly, since these channels have not been keyframed, (they have in the picture I'm showing you so you will have to imagine you are with me when I had the problem I'm describing and we've just moved the hips for the first time in this animation in such a way that the three hidden channels appear, but as you can see from what is marked #2 these channels had no keyframe before this time period in the animation and this was a point in which I experienced this issue) they are not pre-existing and since selecting the hips and pressing shift+keyframe DOES NOT force a keyframe on them (believe me I tried, it only keyframes the first four channels despite having key translations, scale, rotations, and constraints clicked on) then they are, essentially, just one of what, a thousand or more filtered channels? Like you said, things that you would never want to move or keyframe.

 

And since they were never keyframed in the beginning they would slowly move and screw up the entire animation. If I "undid" the movement/pose that caused them to "activate" they would disappear and I could not keyframe those channels where I wanted the model to be, even though it was back where I wanted it because I "undid" the pose and as I mentioned before, if I tried to keyframe all the filtered channels my models merged and the whole project got pooched and I had to start from my latest save (just tried it again with my completed project... keyframing all filtered channels I mean, and although it didn't merge the door and shaggy like it did last time, this time around I only had one bone selected instead of all of them and it still did some very strange things to the animation... for example it turned the model 180 degrees from where it was facing before I attempted to keyframe it, and moved it 10-15 virtual feel to the right of where it was standing when I tried to keyframe it and no amount of "Undo" fixed the problem, fortunately I didin't save it that way and the lesson is done so it isn't an issue).

 

So I'm getting all of this now, kinda. I understand that the buttons on the lower left control what is and what is not filtered, that if it has a keyframe already then it is pre-existing and I get the single bone, branch and model buttons and roughly how they work.

 

But, and this is what I'm still trying to figure out, how would you go about keyframing those hidden channels before they are activated. Because nothing in this process, tutorial or explanation seems to resolve that. Because even if I keyframed all the bones in the beginning of the animation as you suggest in the tutorial, these channels simply don't appear until you move them. Selecting the bone and forcing a keyframe on it won't do it. And since they don't "exist" until you move them the only way to keyframe them is to choose all filtered channels (and as I've said that never worked out well for me).

 

The one and only solution that I found for this issue, as I said, was by posing the model as close to where I wanted it to be as I could. Noting the numbers for the attributes in the properties window. Undoing the new pose, move the scrubber however many frames back to where I wanted the movement of the hidden channels to begin, and entering the numbers for the attributes into the properties windows to force new keyframes in those hidden channels BEFORE the movement that activated them begins.

 

As you can see in #2 in the photo, there are four keyframes.

 

2 in Transform Translate X

1 in Transform Translate Y

1 in Transform Translate Z

 

The SECOND keyframe in Transform Translate X is what caused these hidden channels to activate. By going back several frames (after posing the hips where I wanted them and noting the attributes from the properties window) and entering the attributes for where I wanted the hips to begin animating towards the keyframe that activated the hidden channels I forced keyframes into the channels and achieved the result I wanted. Since the attributes were usually at or near zero it wasn't too hard.

 

It was a real bitch to figure out though. It occurs to me now (and it would have done me no good during this animation as I was already too far into it to try it as it would probably adversely affect the walk cycle in the beginning) that I could have moved those attributes in the very first frame, activated the hidden channels manually and then returned thier values to zero. Then at least they would have some kind of keyframe on them. Then I could just skip the first frame when I rendered the project. But this also begs the question "how would having those hidden channels keyframed affect the walk cycle I added to the beginning of the animation?" Could the very existance of these channels with keyframes mess up the walk cycle if these channels were not keyframed when the action walk cycle was created?" I don't know the answer to that. Perhaps some day I'll have occasion to experiement and find out.

 

All of that said, if anyone knows a better/faster way to force keyframes on those hidden channels in the control points than my property window process I am eager to know as it really made life difficult for me on this lesson.

 

At least, figuring it out, with your help, has led me to a point where I understand enough that I can at least, I hope, somewhat accurately describe the issue.

 

Thanks again for all the help.

 

 

EDIT: Now that I think about it, those hidden Channels aren't even filtered channels because they technically aren't channels until you move the model and they appear. They are nothing. Neither filtered nor unfiltered channels. They are simply an element (I don't know if that's the right word) of the model, waiting to be activated (by movement) before becoming a channel and then; possibly, depending on which buttons are selected, becoming a filtered or unfiltered channel.

 

Man this is a hard problem to wrap your (read my) head around.

[robcat2075]

since selecting the hips and pressing shift+keyframe DOES NOT force a keyframe on them (believe me I tried, it only keyframes the first four channels despite having key translations, scale, rotations, and constraints clicked on)

 

You're doing something wrong. I don't know what, but you're skipping something. But I know you're doing something wrong because that keyframe test topic I put up today had people do the procedure for forcing keyframes on bones that don't have keyframes and everyone seemed to have it work. No one reported it not working.

 

So I can only conclude you're doing something that is not the same as what is supposed to be done. I don't know what, but you're doing it.

 

When you find out, let me know, and then we can warn people to not do this thing that they are not supposed to do.

 

But I have no idea what you are not doing.

[Rob_T]

since selecting the hips and pressing shift+keyframe DOES NOT force a keyframe on them (believe me I tried, it only keyframes the first four channels despite having key translations, scale, rotations, and constraints clicked on)

 

You're doing something wrong. I don't know what, but you're skipping something. But I know you're doing something wrong because that keyframe test topic I put up today had people do the procedure for forcing keyframes on bones that don't have keyframes and everyone seemed to have it work. No one reported it not working.

 

So I can only conclude you're doing something that is not the same as what is supposed to be done. I don't know what, but you're doing it.

 

When you find out, let me know, and then we can warn people to not do this thing that they are not supposed to do.

 

But I have no idea what you are not doing.

 

Well you are right. That doesn't answer the question. But at least I got a laugh out of it. When I figure out what I did wrong I will be sure to let you know so you can warn others to do it... or not do it.. as the case may be.

[robcat2075]

This does work now, right?