Cloth Animating Attached group Video Tutorial

[jason1025]

Thanks to Robert I was able to make a tutorial on this. Its very powerful information helping to unlock the power of animating cloth.

 

 

If you cant play the video I recommend downloading quicklime player and using that. If that does not work download VLC player and use it.

[jimd]

excellent! thank u Jason, thank u Rob

j

[thefreshestever]

very, very usefull... thanks a lot!

the setting you were looking for at the beginning was "collision tolerance" in the simcloth properties in the chor btw...

[jason1025]

very, very usefull... thanks a lot!

the setting you were looking for at the beginning was "collision tolerance" in the simcloth properties in the chor btw...

 

thanks

[nimblepix]

Great stuff! Thanks.

[robcat2075]

This is a very disappointing circumstance. When I explained this material to Jason i thought I was helping him get a specific project done, i didn't know he was going to turn around and immediately post it here.

 

I told him that I did NOT want to make a tutorial on it yet because I was hoping to write a comprehensive book on cloth in A:M. I've spent more than a year figuring cloth out and wanted to recover some of that effort by selling a book on it. Posting this here very much damages the potential of that project.

 

I've emailed him twice telling him i didn't want this up here yet, but it's still here, which is very disappointing to me.

[jason1025]

Just to clear the air.

 

I sent Robert a check for $50.00 for this information.

 

We had a nice conversation on the phone. I urged him to make video tutorials on this information as it would help the community. My recollection of Roberts response was that he said he would put it in a book if he ever got around to writing it. I responded with something like "video tutorials are much easier for me to understand because of the nature and complexity of the subject"

Robert agreed but because of a small community and lack of enthusiasm he was reluctant. I took from that response that he may never write the book.

 

After my paid tech support call I still continued to struggle with this subject and some other cloth related issues. After figuring it out on my own trying to recall Roberts instructions I felt this information was worth a video tutorial.

 

I honestly felt Robert was going to be happy that I had created a video tutorial with his help. He never mentioned that this was a trade secret and not to pass it on.

 

I really like Robert he has helped me out on numerous occasions for free. He is disappointed in me for creating this video tutorial and I am disappointed that after our nice phone call I could have completely miss understood the "sensitive" nature of this subject.

 

I didn't even think of taking it down after his fisrt email because I thought the damage had already been done and didn't see the point.

 

I also don't feel this one video tutorial will hurt sales of his book.

 

Robert I will be the first to buy your book when it comes out!

 

Who else will join me? Let Robert know

[Rodney]

I'll still buy your book Robert.

 

(There has always been a stress line between free and paid work here in the forum. It's not always easy to maintain that balance)

[itsjustme]

I think the book would be a "must have". I'll definitely pick up a copy.

[jimd]

yep i'm in

in fact if you want take advanced orders

[thefreshestever]

i´m willing to pay double-price if i can get one or two other video-tutorials upfront

 

but maybe it will be more lucrative for rob to sell the information as e-book or video-tuts, for me it doesn´t matter if i get the desired information on paper or pixels...

[itsjustme]

but maybe it will be more lucrative for rob to sell the information as e-book or video-tuts, for me it doesn´t matter if i get the desired information on paper or pixels...

 

Good point, Sebastian. I'll second that...an e-book or video tutorials would work fine for me as well.

[jason1025]

I think Rob should use pay-pals free subscription payment option and allow all of us to subscribe to his video tutorials for like $10.00 per person per month. In exchange for us each getting $10.00 debited from our accounts each month Rob posts 1 video tutorial every week continuously. If he got 20 of us to subscribe he would make $200.00 per month minus paypals take "2.9% plus 30cents per debit"

 

3 of the 4 "VIDEO" tutorials each month could be short and tiny lessor known features of AM that may or may not help with everyday productivity. But he could have 1 grand Video tutorial each month where he shows us how to do something really cool like make that Slinky animate down stairs or How to make a parachute carry a ball.

 

He could possibly take requests if he ran out of ideas.

[Walter Baker]

Jason,

I saw the tut. you did above back when you first posted it. I am trying something and was going to look at it again but now I can not find the link to it.

I tried the film section and have looked through your other tuts. Can't find it.

 

Since I got this new Mac I seem to find little mystery things so I checked on my older Mac and still can't find it.

 

I sure would like to look at it again,

HELP!

[dblhelix]

 

11 Eugenes to dress.

and it ain't about walk cycles.

please someone do something soon-ish?

pixels preferred, text AND image.

[robcat2075]

Oh, OK, go ahead and put it back up.

[Xtaz]

Hi Jason ... about the tutorial ... Do you intend to put it back ?

[robcat2075]

briefly the Basic Elements:

 

-Attach groups allow you to fix a part of a cloth mesh to a bone so it doesn't fall freely. Holding a handkerchief would be a use of this.

 

-The Flag tut in TAoA:M will introduce creating cloth attach groups. Do that tut.

-the Attach group CPs must be associated to a bone.

-Attach Groups must be turned ON in the Model.

-Attach Groups can be turned ON and OFF in the Chor

-To make a character hold a handkerchief, constrain its attach group's bone to his hand.

-To make the handkerchief drop, turn its Attach group OFF in the chor .

-When the Character wants to pick the handkerchief up again the group can be turned ON to follow the bone still constrained to his hand.

-The group will follow from whatever distance it is when the group is turned back on.

-If a cloth falls such that the original attach group is not in the right place for a character to reach (underneath the rest of the cloth, perhaps?), a new group in convenient location can be selected in muscle mode in the Chor. Rename this group in the model, make it an attach group, add a bone for it in the model and resave the model. Return to your chor and use the new bone for moving your cloth around.

 

It is possible to to get confused while doing these maneuvers and get unexpected results, however it does work.

 

My BUSSTOP animation is an example of using various attach groups to: keep the rope from sliding off Shaggy while he was carrying it, let it fall when he needed to drop it, not jitter when it needed to lie motionless, and be picked up again to do the dance.

[Gerry]

I'm about to start animating the girl's dance sequence for my video. My plan is to animate the model, with the skirt (which will eventually be a cloth material) hidden, so I can focus on the character movement. Second, I'll unhide the skirt, create the cloth simulation, and go from there. Though I had good luck with my initial cloth tests a few months ago I learned later that there are a LOT of settings for cloth that I need to learn a bit about.

 

Any comments on the process as I've outlined it I'd be glad to hear them. I'll be posting stuff over in my WIP thread.