Hello everybody...

i want create an animate a character for my game and export the model to md2 format (to use into Blitz3d). But i've some problems with the animation.

I've Created a skin, bones and attached the skin. Now i can animate my model by moving some bones, but i can't move all the model.

In fact, i want compose a jump movement, when my model jump, its body move (legs, arm,...) and _all_ the model move. (translation).

Is it possible to do this : animate legs and arms and move all the model in a same animation ?

I hope you understand my problem, my english is very poor so i've some difficulties to explain...

Thanks!

hi Hubert,

to move the whole model just move the root bone, that is, the bone being the parent of all the other bones in the IK chain. In a human-like model the root bone is usually assigned to te hip.

If you use multiple chains then you can move all the chains inside the skin frame in the hierarchy panel, so that all the chains are childs of the skin. This way you can move the whole model by moving the skin.

As always, if you need more informations feel very free to ask .


bye, Alex

This doesn't work for me.  I believe that i've another problem with my bone hierarchy... I must do some tests to find where is the problem !

I've some bugs with 3dc when i experiment to move my model (it crash!), but it's a new pc and i've not updated my video driver yet.

i believe that i must understand and use your animation hierarchy tutorial before experiment the md2 ! In fact bones is for me too complicated ;-) Perhaps animation hierachy is the best choice for the newbie ;-)

hi Hub,

a Canvas skeleton is simply a hierarchy composed by bones. The only difference is that you need to include the skin in the hierarchy (at the top level) and to set the effect range of the bones (the bones shape).

So the techniques explained in the hierarchy animation tutorial can be used with skeletons as well. Let me know if you meet any problem with the tutorial !


bye , Alex

Thanks Alex,  your tutorial is fantastic !

I've realised an very simple animated model and incorpore it in my Blitz code. In fact, each .x exported file represents an action (walk, run or  jump). Then , it's very easy to use the different files into a simple sequential animation into Blitz3d.

hi Hub,

that is a nice solution until we get a better sequences support . You could also use a single timeline to store all the sequences, but using different models makes it simpler to modify a single sequence.


bye, Alex

Hi Alex

Blitz have a new animation command : ExtractAnimSeq

This command allows you to convert an animation with an MD2-style series of anim sequences into a pure Blitz anim sequence, and play it back as such using Animate.

Example:
mesh=LoadAnimMesh( base_mesh$ ) ;anim sequence 0.
ExtractAnimSeq( mesh,0,30 ) ;anim sequence 1: frames 0...30 are 'run'
ExtractAnimSeq( mesh,31,40 ) ;anim sequence 2: frames 31...40 are 'jump' etc etc...
Animate mesh,3,1,2 ;play one-shot jump anim

I've not yet use this command.

You can find here a demo of my first game animation test (1,5 Mo) :
http://www.bayre.com/worklog/upload/alpha22_05_02.zip. I use an amd 1800 xp, geforce2, i've not tested this into an other machine ! At the beginning position the mouse into the middle of the window. Then you can orient the camera when you move the mouse pointer. Use the left and right mouse button to zoom in/out. Use the directional keys to move the man.

good job !