higginsdj Posted May 7, 2014 Share Posted May 7, 2014 Have an old model that works in AM 18f (rig) but falls apart once it is saved in 18f 'new format'. So what has changed? Not being a rigging person I have no idea what has failed. (its an old Eggprops character model). Being an Eggprops commercial model I don't think I can share it (Reixcherub model for anyone who still remembers it) Cheers Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Admin Rodney Posted May 7, 2014 Admin Share Posted May 7, 2014 It's hard to say without having more information. The first thing I would do would be to Import the model into a current Model versus import/open into A:M. A:M often knows what to fix but only if it is cued to interpret. I've 'fixed' a few really old models in this way. The second thing I would do is look inside the textfile to see if anything obvious stands out. If you can fix it there then you can save yourself a lot of work. (This should be step one but... that first method works pretty well) If you think its worth the time you can resave the model in steps and that incremental upgrading of the file can fix a lot of little things that otherwise wouldn't work. Rationale: Sometimes cumulative changes can break things that would otherwise work. Methodology: - Install an earlier release of A:M circa v11 and test the saved model (if it doesn't work there then you've got other issues with the model) - Install v12 or later release to ensure the updated format is utilized (save and test) - (alternatively... because this is available to anyone subscribed to v18) Install and activate v13 (or whatever websubscription version thereafter closest to the version you need) - (if this works... test in v18, if it still fails in v18...) Install and activate a release from a few versions later (i.e. v15) - Assuming the model works in any of these releases try it in the latest version (if it still doesn't work go back and try a few releases earlier) As an animator you might appreciate this. Basically you are triangulating the solution by choosing one extreme then another and then inbetweening to narrow down from all possibilities where the breakdown should be. Some other alternatives: - Contact William Eggington - Share the model with a highly skilled person who is likely to be able to fix - Rerig the character Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hash Fellow robcat2075 Posted May 7, 2014 Hash Fellow Share Posted May 7, 2014 The second thing I would do is look inside the textfile to see if anything obvious stands out. I would definitely do this. If you aren't familiar with text editing my "It Can't Be Done" series explains how to get started with that. If v18 is incorrectly interpreting or resaving old models that would be a bug to document and report. In the mean time dont' write over that old original file! If you want me to look at it I could do that. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
higginsdj Posted May 7, 2014 Author Share Posted May 7, 2014 Unfortunately it was saved as a PRJ file with everything embedded...... the new version of AM wants to save the model out when I try to save the project and thats where it falls appart. It appears to be a problem in the relationships somewhere because the pose slider to 'activate' the relationships only appears to affect one of the other 2 relationships when it should be affecting both and manually 'enabling' the relationship not being activated appears to do nothing. It's contained in a small zip so I can email it to you to look at. Cheers Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hash Fellow robcat2075 Posted May 7, 2014 Hash Fellow Share Posted May 7, 2014 Unfortunately it was saved as a PRJ file with everything embedded...... the new version of AM wants to save the model out when I try to save the project That that doesn't make sense. Something is embedded in the prj and yet A:M is creating a file name for it and a file path to save it to? Send it to me. You can attach it in a PM. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
higginsdj Posted May 7, 2014 Author Share Posted May 7, 2014 How do I attach it to a PM? I see no options there for attaching files! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Admin Rodney Posted May 7, 2014 Admin Share Posted May 7, 2014 How do I attach it to a PM? I see no options there for attaching files! If its okay with you I'm going to use you as a resource for spotting things that don't work. You seem to hit them all so given time we should be able to resolve all the world's problems. I checked your profile and you should be able to attach files NOW... whereas before you could not. Sorry about that! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
higginsdj Posted May 7, 2014 Author Share Posted May 7, 2014 LOL - it's when I get motivated to actually build something (ie for these contests when they come about) that I give AM a bit of a hammering Thanks Rodney Cheers Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
higginsdj Posted May 7, 2014 Author Share Posted May 7, 2014 Robert - message sent Appreciate anything you can do. Cheers Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Admin Rodney Posted May 7, 2014 Admin Share Posted May 7, 2014 it's when I get motivated to actually build something (ie for these contests when they come about) that I give AM a bit of a hammering smile.gif Keep on hammering! Problems are so very frustrating but when they are fixed... ah.... life is so good. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
higginsdj Posted May 8, 2014 Author Share Posted May 8, 2014 OK, OSX version UI has other problems which are irritating (trying to select a bone from a list in relationships locks up the AM UI - anyone know a workaround?), I may have found the problem. AM 18 seems to have renamed the bone references in the relationships with a leading 'i'. Even when I select the null in the UI using the picker it is appending a leading 'i'. In the working version of the model there is no leading 'i' in the name or the relationship reference. So next I will try some manual text tweaking.... Cheers Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
higginsdj Posted May 8, 2014 Author Share Posted May 8, 2014 Nope - looks like a bug. I changed all reference to KHips but AM interprets it as IKHips in the Relationship (and displays it as such) even though it displays the Null's name as KHips. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hash Fellow robcat2075 Posted May 8, 2014 Hash Fellow Share Posted May 8, 2014 I believe that character that appears as an I in a constraint properties is really a | (a vertical bar, the character above the backslash on my keyboard) It signifies something of a change of directory level in a path. You may see there are also some dots before it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hash Fellow robcat2075 Posted May 8, 2014 Hash Fellow Share Posted May 8, 2014 I notice that in the v8 file the Hips are constrained to KHips but after I resave in v11 the target becomes ..|KHips and the Hip Null no longer functions. A search and replace that eliminates all the ..| in the resaved file may be part of the solution. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
higginsdj Posted May 8, 2014 Author Share Posted May 8, 2014 The reference to KHips and ..|KHips seems to change depending on what window you have open so that may be a red herring. The problem does seem to be that the hip just won't translate and orient to the KHips null. Cheers Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
higginsdj Posted May 8, 2014 Author Share Posted May 8, 2014 Well I can fix it by deleting the constraint then editing the relationship and adding the hip constraints in again - BUT - as soon as I save the model/project it breaks again. Must be a bug! Cheers Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hash Fellow robcat2075 Posted May 8, 2014 Hash Fellow Share Posted May 8, 2014 It's something peculiar to this old v8 format. If i resave in v10.5 that file is able to be reloaded and still work in v10.5. That is a small success. I notice that I get an error when i resave. "file argument" or something like that. Also the v8 file is crashing my text editor which is weird. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hash Fellow robcat2075 Posted May 8, 2014 Hash Fellow Share Posted May 8, 2014 This is quite a riddle. To look at the relationship properties it appears that the constraints are there and properly targeted and yet, they stop working. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hash Fellow robcat2075 Posted May 8, 2014 Hash Fellow Share Posted May 8, 2014 I think I've found it! There was a leading space on one of the Pose names " OLAAfans_DoNotTouch" in the original file. Somehow that is correctly interpreted when the original file is loaded but lost or corrupted on resave causing all of the constraints in that Pose to not work. I text edited it out of the original file then loaded and resaved that from v18 and have sent you that v18 MDL. Try it out. I haven't looked to see if the smartskins are working. Those are sometimes trouble on old models. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
higginsdj Posted May 8, 2014 Author Share Posted May 8, 2014 Wow - as simple as a leading space in a relationship name....... Looks like it is workign so far - will keep you posted. Many thanks for this Robert. Cheers Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hash Fellow robcat2075 Posted May 8, 2014 Hash Fellow Share Posted May 8, 2014 It's ironic that they were so careful to use underscores instead of spaces in their pose names but then left a leading space on the front of one. D'oh! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
higginsdj Posted May 8, 2014 Author Share Posted May 8, 2014 Looks like some Fan bones aren't working - but hey, can't have everything. Rather than digging further I might just practise rigging with the new rig system in AM. I may as well try to do one sooner or later Cheers Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hash Fellow robcat2075 Posted May 8, 2014 Hash Fellow Share Posted May 8, 2014 Which ones are not working? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
higginsdj Posted May 8, 2014 Author Share Posted May 8, 2014 Both shoulders (I am assuming those bones are supposed to act as FAN bones - I could be wrong of course) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hash Fellow robcat2075 Posted May 8, 2014 Hash Fellow Share Posted May 8, 2014 Both shoulders (I am assuming those bones are supposed to act as FAN bones - I could be wrong of course) Do you mean the bones names "clavicle"? Those you animate directly to adjust the shoulder when you wish to. They won't be dragged around by the IK arm. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hash Fellow robcat2075 Posted May 8, 2014 Hash Fellow Share Posted May 8, 2014 there are some bones visible in that thing that are a mystery to me. Like I'm not sure what "ArmControl" is intended for. It's possible that some bones are visible that should not be... but i don't know. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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