Export procedure for complex animations

Export procedure for complex animations

Postby TrabantDeLuxe » Fri Jun 10, 2016 9:47 pm

Hi there, another day, another question.

So, tell me, what is the export procedure for complex animated stuff. A valve gear let's just say, as an example, completely unrelated to my own work. I've exported doors before, which have a simple keyframed animation. Just hide all unrelevant parts, animate, end it works fine.

This procedure hasn't really worked for my valvegear, as it uses bones, IK solvers and point helpers. Should I leave these unhidden during export? And what about the pivots of the objects? I'm kinda confused as to how it is all supposed to work. Any insight into what the animation exporter actually does would be very welcome...

Cheers,

deLuxe.
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Re: Export procedure for complex animations

Postby JamesLit » Fri Jun 10, 2016 10:01 pm

All your helpers, bones, IK solvers, etc should all be unhidden during export. As for pivot points... as far as I know, it should be fine so long as it gives you the animation you want in 3DS.
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Re: Export procedure for complex animations

Postby TrabantDeLuxe » Fri Jun 10, 2016 10:45 pm

Allright, just tried that, but it stops exporting the hierarchy as soon as it hits a point helper or bone. As I've linked everything up to the wheels, the wheels get exported but nothing further.

Edit, neither do they export in the IGS file. The exporter seems to just skip the entire hierarchy as soon as it hits a point helper or bone..
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Re: Export procedure for complex animations

Postby TrabantDeLuxe » Sun Jun 12, 2016 12:56 am

Have been doing some additional investigation today, and I have learnt a great deal. I would like if someone could confirm the following conclusion:

The IA exporter only exports objects that have at least one keyframe. Objects controlled by parenting will simply inherit animation of their top node. Objects animated by constraints such as LookAt and such, will be skipped by the exporter unless a keyframe is present.

So. Further results of the investigation. Per Mike Adam's tutorial, I've experimented with using position and orientation constraints to move bits and pieces along with their respective bones. This has for now been applied to the RH valve gear, the LH valve gear is simply animated using parenting to bones. All works fine in 3DS Max.

Here's the hierarchy:
Image

Objects underlined in red are bones, that have been converted to edit mesh. Underlined in green are geometries. Green boxes are helpers, such as points and IK solvers. Underlined in yellow are objects that the IA exporter failes to recognise the existance of. All have one keyframe applied. See the export report below.

Image
So, we see that some geometry is being exported. However, all bits underlined in yellow in the schematic view are missing, leading me to conclude that these aren't being exported (i.e. TS will think 'lol those aren't animated).

Well, it's more of a report than a question, and I'd like to really apologise for coming over rather frustrated with content creation.
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