LW8 toolset vs Messiah:Animate

[Julez4001]

Maya6 as always as the previous version is fanatastic to use and powerful as long as you ar enot using it in a vaccumm..you need other ppl to use it easily. In a environment ..it reigns supreme.
By yourself..its a long journey.

[lmilton]

Julez,
I'm not going to comment on the particulars in your post, I know that you're only trying to provide some useful info. I'll leave others with good experience with both apps to dispute or support your claims.

However, you should be clear about the versioning for those who don't have messiah. You should title your post:

LW8 toolset vs Messiah:Animate 4

That's a fair observation considering that you like to point out that there are new things coming for other apps, and we *do* have something new coming.

Take care,

-lyle

[chikega]

Thanks Julian for the comparison. I agree with you all the way.

Both LW and messiah seem to share some of the same strengths. And unfortunately they share some of the same weaknesses - namely point level animation, FFD lattices, etc...

XSI, Max, & Maya seem to have a handle on this probably due to the object oriented nature of their core.

[lmilton]

Originally posted by chikega
Thanks Julian for the comparison. I agree with you all the way.

Both LW and messiah seem to share some of the same strengths. And unfortunately they share some of the same weaknesses - namely point level animation, FFD lattices, etc...

XSI, Max, & Maya seem to have a handle on this probably due to the object oriented nature of their core.

I wouldn't call those weaknesses. A lack of a particular feature is not necessarily a weakness. It's the implementation of a feature as it pertains to a particular app that can be considered weak or strong.

What's not understood is that direct point manipulation borders on modeling. The problem is that the data must be stored with the model, and that's when it becomes modeling (at least from our perspective). Keeping that in mind, we do have some point level animation features planned for a later rev... just not the one that's coming. However, there are ways to accomplish this.

As far as lattices, I've covered that, as well.

-lyle

[Julez4001]

YEP LYLE RIGHT!
LATTICES ARE PATENT-PENDING Technology.
Maya has paid to use this patent, others haven't ..its not because of PMG programming skills....


I've tried to change the subject.

Messiah:Animate 4.0

[chikega]

Originally posted by lmilton
What's not understood is that direct point manipulation borders on modeling. The problem is that the data must be stored with the model, and that's when it becomes modeling (at least from our perspective).

Yes, exactly, a 3d program that has modeling and animation integrated has more flexibility. Hence my reference to OOP where tools can be encapsulated and the line between modeling and animation becomes blurred. Houdini is the most extreme example of this.

In XSI for example, you can animate modeling procedures such as Extrusions, booleans, etc... My fellow medical animator uses some of these features for tough amoebic/microbial style animations of cells dividing and so forth ... not something I could do in messiah (or in LW for that matter). But that's not messiah's niche but rather character animation, which is it's forte. And you're right, Lyle, how well a feature is implemented can be deemed weak or strong - not whether it exists or not. My apologies.

I'm looking forward with great aniticipation what the next rev of messiah has in store for us.
:)

[fwtep]

I'll chime in regarding the original post.

Julez,
That's a cool list; thanks for the insight! But I noticed that it really only covers tools for setting up, not actual animation. Since you're comparing animation features, the actual animation process is just as important-- if not *more* important. After all, setup is something you do for a small portion of your time on a project. For example, you might spend a week on the setup (using the tools you mentioned) and several months on the animation itself.

In my opinion, messiah still wins hands-down when it comes to actually animating-- even moreso in the new version. And that opinion is not as biased as some might think. After all, I've been using LW since 1992 and have done plenty of character animation with it in TV and films from version 2-7.5. I haven't used 8 yet, but from everything I've seen, the "new" features deal mostly with setup.

The new version of messiah is filled with new features on the setup side as well as the animation side. The displacement stuff (as seen in Taron's renders) will get the most attention, but the new animation tools and enhancements are just as great.

Fred

[chikega]

Since we're having a nice open discussion. I would like to dwell a bit more on the subject of implementation. I received LW 8 a couple weeks ago and purchased Thomas 4d Rigging Tools not long afterwards, mainly out of curiosity. And I think, Julian, you can vouch for me on this one - but even with the nice autorigging tools - the response rate of LW is well .... butt slow. I go to move a control object, and even with the geometry turned all the way down to zero, it's, like my dad used to say, slow as molasses in January. Sure Newtek has incorporated tools into it's LW collective from the Ortho boys to make setups easier ... but, man, to animate in LW after using messiah is like night and day.

I'm spoiled after having experienced messiah's speed. messiah wins hands down on it's "zippiness" implementation.:thumbsup:

[Julez4001]

Sorry Fred..I was comparing on the basis that LW added to its NEW feature set and comparing those to what messiah currently offers.

PPL email me and private message me all the time about the two because they know I use both intensely.

I am not familar with the next rev only in that it will have M:s 2/0 new displacement tools. Didn't even know that animate section would be touched.

I stand behind the latest toolset* of messiah as not being intuitive as its features that came before it.

*Dopesheet/track works but its get chugged down or lacking after you start dealing with groups or multiple selections since messiah previously allowed all channels to moved in time and range..I still use this mostly as a poor man dopesheet.

(slipping this in) Gizmo loader - this could helped to have it offset - the dmorph work around is oka but its counterproductive.

*NLA:Compose - man ..this has been my bane of messiah.
walk cycle blending is a headache. The 2 tutorials are not enough especially if u hit an innocent mistake (like not being in the right mode) plus its just doesn't flow like the rest of messiah. Either this needs to be made simpler or a very large mini doc on all the simple and repetitive things ppl are going to use this for (walk cycles, basic repetitive motions, etc) and what to look for if it doesn't work (ie what the user may have set up wrong - innocent mistakes like when you guys prepared us for why lw can't render ur softbody with motion blur). It FEELS like no use uses M:compose around the forums.
Maya has been big efforts to get more users to use Trax as it has had a bad rep last two versions while XSI is king.


*Spherize - if metaeffector can have some sort of visual reference, why not it.

Still don't like the new way of fit all in th egraph editor ..the old way was much better.

Still miss motionclips - so simple..so fast ...so easy. (slipping another)


Now I am not complaining..Messiah is still the master at what it does..character animation. I still can do tons of things faster in messiah than I can in lw easier and unconvulted and less worry that it all qwill fall apart.
Faster expression, Faster IK, Faster Deformation (whether u use the original mesh or use a proxy) and SETUP mode kills other apps COLD and thats not for a lack of using Maya and LW.


;)

[Julez4001]

IK BOOSTER idea.
The sweetest thing about IK booster would be to have it in messiah (not asking for it just shooting out an idea) is that its big hangup could be killed via messiah expressions or dual bone effects.

[CarlDavis]

*NLA:Compose - man ..this has been my bane of messiah.

Ive managed to get my head round using compose the same way I would have used motion clips so dont feel im missing out much (apart from when a clip dosnt add a group to it so i have to save and reload the scene) But the rest of compose is useless, I can see it will be very useful and isnt as complicated as it seems at first. but along with finishing it they really have to get it working with keyfader experssions. I use them a lot in my setups and really didnt like the work around.

overall messiah is so much better than lightwave for character stuff, but saying its all about the implementation is only any good if things are finished, I really feel as if im beta testing and not using a final release.

Lightwave have a long way with character tools that probably only get sorted with a complete rewrite.

just my 2pence.

Carl

[chikega]

Originally posted by Julez4001
IK BOOSTER idea.
The sweetest thing about IK booster would be to have it in messiah (not asking for it just shooting out an idea) is that its big hangup could be killed via messiah expressions or dual bone effects.

If IK Booster were in messiah, I would imagine it would be in real time without the need to precalc and keyframing every frame. Actually, SoftIK in C4d is realtime and doesn't bake out. :D

[lmilton]

Originally posted by CarlDavis
*NLA:Compose - man ..this has been my bane of messiah.

Ive managed to get my head round using compose the same way I would have used motion clips so dont feel im missing out much (apart from when a clip dosnt add a group to it so i have to save and reload the scene) But the rest of compose is useless, I can see it will be very useful and isnt as complicated as it seems at first. but along with finishing it they really have to get it working with keyfader experssions. I use them a lot in my setups and really didnt like the work around.

overall messiah is so much better than lightwave for character stuff, but saying its all about the implementation is only any good if things are finished, I really feel as if im beta testing and not using a final release.

Lightwave have a long way with character tools that probably only get sorted with a complete rewrite.

just my 2pence.

Carl

Since you've gone out on a limb to slam Compose, you're going to have to give me some particulars on where you're having trouble.

Julez's problem can probably be traced back to the fact that he keeps attempting ot use time-based expressions (like keyfader) with Compose. I'd already mentioned that they're not compatible.

So, what exactly is your problem? Remember, you talking to the guy who actually coded it. And I can't address problems of which I'm not aware...

-lyle

[Julez4001]

Julez's problem can probably be traced back to the fact that he keeps attempting ot use time-based expressions (like keyfader) with Compose. I'd already mentioned that they're not compatible.


You mean Carl problem...

The simplest problem I can give you Lyle (and I didn't eman this to become a NLA:compose thread) is to take the IK rig that was created in the tutorials..make a walk cycle and then make a clip and make the character jump (fly, kneel, whatever) and then try blending between the two.

[CarlDavis]

the problems i have with compose are mainly that like most other things it isnt finished. Not being able to bake out a track is a problem for me and keyfader not being compatible is an even bigger problem. Almost every rig I use has a keyfader in it.
also compose isnt the easiest thing to understand, I think almost everyone who uses it finds it very confusing at first. this is as much a prob with the docs not being complete as they could be.

i think it will be a very powerful tool and cant wait to start using it a lot more. If other people out there are managing to make use of it in a production enviroment perhaps they could share there findings.

it would also be good to hear if there is going to be a different solution for fading ik and align expressions if keyfader isnt compatible

Carl

[markpassion]

can you not do the fading with a percentage step setup rather than KeyFader. Not sure if it will work with compose though.

Does my DynamicFunc plugin not help for fading Align?

Mark

[CarlDavis]

I will have a look at both of those, it would be great to start using compose more.

cheers Mark

Carl

[Julez4001]

Carl, what do you use fading align in your rigs for?

Like i said, Compose ..is powerful but I think it should be approach from a newbie standpoint when wanting to do the simple and repetitive things. When those things are proven then all the powerful features need to in the back like the SETUP mode.

Fred/Lyle

Use the IK rig from the messiah tutorials (the one with reverse foot) and do a couple different moves (doesn't have to be perfect) and blend between them. See if teverything is straightforward or was there things that need to be look out for.


I did. and I never got a smooth blend and the IK parts always increase in range no matter what mode (k, cp, ck, etc) I was in.

[CarlDavis]

julez
most of the time I algin the wrist to the ik then fade it off when I fade the ik off..

Carl

[OZI_Jason]

Back to the earlier mention of LW8 setup stuff. I had upgraded to LW8 (paid in sept 2003 :) for my home version and also my companies versions, and to say the least I am not overly excited..

Would be nice to see something new and innovative in LW8. It appears to me that lately LW is only prepared to follow or play catch up to the industry doers, so it feels like you are always 2 years behind. Won’t be long before they innovate a 'setup' mode :-)

Though LW8 has improved the rigging and animation the workflow in LW seems dated and tedious. Having to do the modeler and layout dance to get things going and then not being able to manage the expressions/plugins easily takes all the fun out of it. No wonder there are several people selling plugins to help LW user’s avoid the pain of rigging.

As LW is still slow on complex rigs the 'keyframe and preview' methodology still frustrates me. Messiahs updating of keys from the dopesheet while previewing in real-time rules.

I seem's to be a trend for large studios to model, animate, and render in separate programs. LW tends to get the modelling and rendering jobs in some of these pipelines, however my guess is not many of these large studios are prepared to use lightwave for rigging and animation only and then render back in maya or some other program.

I hope I don’t seem to negative on LW as I really do love the modeler and renderer OXOXOX. It just seems wrong when people try to compare setting up and rigging in LW to messiah as the differences are significant. Messiah was way ahead as a plugin 4 years ago.

When I animate in Messiah I feel comforted in the fact that the animation is not only good for the purpose it was intended but can be easily repurposed into another character if required, great when time=$$$.

I am hugely impressed with what the messiah team have produced. I hope the program grows and is a profitable venture as I could not imagine animating characters back in LW. :bowdown:

Rant mode off :)

[Julez4001]

Good Points OZI_Jason
... some may argue that lw now have a rig format and scale heierarchary that will help one not have to completely start over and they'd be right. With the Orthos Bones kicking in...KW is not bad for rigging even up there with Maya in flexibility (not extensibility..Maya will always win when it comapred to how much you can do with a rig) as a one-man shop. Maya out of the box rigging can be very tedious but many ppl have come up with mel scripts, plugins that have mad erigging in Maya quick and painless thoigh weighting an object is still aggravating at times.

The big hangup is that ever since lw 5.5 ..character animation in Lightwave has not been its shining point.
each upgrade made things better. Endomorphs by far is the core innovative feature that LW has came up with. BUT with messiah been released since 5.5 ... its coreness has not change and what it had 5-6 yrs ago still outshines Lightwave character tool/features. Thats a testament. Newtek should have just bit the bullet and just focused on this ..I guess this is what everyone thought LW8 was suppose to do it but it really smells "half-ass-Y". They thought of a few tricks but didn't think of it as a pipeline.

It just doesn't work.

[Miyazaki]

I´m no Messiah user yet. But from what I saw(Demo) it seems to be superior over LW8 in nearly every aspect.
The following just reflects my personal impression.

Dopesheet- much better in messiah.
In LW8, although you can select different kind of objects(camera, lights, bones, objects) together in Scene Editor, it`s just a half-hearted solution because these 'faked' multi selection deosn`t appears in Layout(Or maybe I missed something big?! ). Setting keyframes for different kind of objects at the same time becomes a hard task IMHO. Conclusion: half-hearted and not well thoughtout.
One of the main problems of LW is still that not everything is working together. Better than before, but not as it shold be. Dopesheet doesn`t supports everything, IK Booster is not working with every editors..... it`s along list.

Non Linear Animation (Motion Mixer vs Compose). I haven`t played enough with Messiah compose to give an objective rating.
But compared to other NLA systems, such as MB Story Tool, Motion Mixer in LW lacks serious features and workflow.

Graph Editor
I like both, both good enough to achieve good results in short amount of time.

Setup Mode
Messiahs SM rocks. LW8 implements a Setup Mode by allocating frame 0 for bone setup. Messiahs Setup Mode is a real Mode, not just a fake and, I hope that`s correct, totally independent of the animation mode. Conclusion: in LW8 half-hearted again.

IK
Also much better and faster in Messiah. Although IK booster is a nice addition, it`s in no case a substitution of old IK.
And old IK, besides the new, is still way too slow in comparison to other solutions. Oh and yes, Messiah has a kind of spline ik. Conclusion: see above.

Expression System
No doubt, again complete victory over LW8. The 'new' Expression editor is just a graphical representation of the same old outdated system and with many expression nearly unusable.
Conclusion: No doubt, Messiah wins.

General speed and stability
Very important for me. Messiah isn`t just only faster in viewport speed, feedback, IK and expression, it`s more stable, too.
I´m tired of waiting for previews. MB is king in viewport speed at the moment. And Messiah, form what I´ve seen so far, comes near the speed of MB.

Beside these, there are a lot of other features in which Messiah far excels LW8.
OK, no hardbodies or cloth, but the softbodies are realtime.
My personal opinion is LW8`s still nowere near Messiah in terms of animation.
Since they are both working well togeher, even in the demo, it`s nice to have both.

I hope to purchase Messiah:Animate anytime soon.
Is there an option to upgrade to Studio from animate and a way to bake the Messiah:animate displacement in LW?

Kudos the small Messiah team :bowdown:
Just a handful of developers, but a very powerful and well thought out application :thumbsup:

[chikega]

Miyazaki: I have MB as well. It's speed is exceptional and it's NLA and Storyboard is extremely powerful. The only thing that prevented me from going any further with MB is that it's somewhat limited to Bipedal and Quadrapeds. It's extremely challenging if not impossible, from what I understand to rig a winged creature or an octupus. messiah's setup mode is a true setup mode and you can pretty much rig whatever you can imagine.

Kricket was selling his Animate 3.3 for something like $150 - I believe it's still available. I'm not sure what the uprade fee will be - so you may want to hold off until the new releases which should be really soon.

http://www.cgtalk.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=143643

As far as upgrading from Animate to Studio, I'm not sure how that would work - but I'm not pmG, so you'll have to ask them to be sure. The only reason I say that is because the dongle that comes with Animate is tied to Animate. It won't work with Studio. So, you'd have to send in that dongle if you traded up.

For baking displacements, Point Oven Pro is the way to go. Mark Wilson developed this plugin for Passion Pictures. There is a free version at the bottom of the page but it, of course, doesn't have all the bells and whistles.

http://www.ef9.com/ef9/PO.htm

:)

[PauHana]

I upgraded to LW 8 thinking they were honestly going to put some effort towards the interaction with characters in layout. I'm pretty pissed at this point and I feel I bought an upgrade to modeler which I didn't really need. There are those who preach about everyone else not being able to work with Lightwave in it's current state because they don't know what they're doing. Sounds like a pretty defensive stance .
Sorry I'm ranting but I feel like I got jacked for a $500 upgrade based on hype...never again.
I tried motionbuilder, but I hate the interface and rig limitations.
Keep up the good work PMG...but we'll still give you an earful to keep you forging ahead:D

[Julez4001]

Hey.
Fred said that Animate has been upgraded too....
I wonder whats in store.
Just make sure everything works with everything.

[Miyazaki]

Chikega, thanks for the information.
I´ll wait till next release ;)

Regarding LW8, I have some serious stability issues with the new bone tools, dynamics and dopetrack.
<whining mode>
Damn I´m frustrated :cry: . 'LW8 will not be released in december because we want to release a stable 8' :rolleyes:
My understanding of a stable release is that it doesn`t crashes 40 times a day. Oh yes, some old bugs still in there :buttrock:
</whining mode>

I know it`s a hard task to fix bugs, even more with an old architecture.
Considering this, it`s time for a refurbishment.
The highend beasts Maya and XSI(not to mention rock solid and never crashing C4D) are more stable although they are by far more complex than little LightWave.

[lmilton]

Originally posted by CarlDavis
the problems i have with compose are mainly that like most other things it isnt finished. Not being able to bake out a track is a problem for me and keyfader not being compatible is an even bigger problem. Almost every rig I use has a keyfader in it.
also compose isnt the easiest thing to understand, I think almost everyone who uses it finds it very confusing at first. this is as much a prob with the docs not being complete as they could be.

i think it will be a very powerful tool and cant wait to start using it a lot more. If other people out there are managing to make use of it in a production enviroment perhaps they could share there findings.

it would also be good to hear if there is going to be a different solution for fading ik and align expressions if keyfader isnt compatible

Carl

You can bake motion using Shift-Return.

With KeyFader, think about this: you're fading from the computed motion (be it IK, expressions, effects, compose, etc.) to the original keys. And that's the big problem. Compose's output is *computed motion*, as it should be. When you use KeyFader, you're fading out Compose's motion back to the original keys that exist on the object(s). So, when say that it's not working, you're expecting Keyfader to "read your mind" as to what should be blended.

How do you solve this problem? Take control over the blend by using Compose to explicitly tell the program what to blend. Here are the steps:

1. Create a track that contains your clip instance that you want to compute before IK, and set it to <IK.
2. Duplicate that clip instance on a separate track and set it to IK> (or post IK).
3. Set the operator on that second clip instance to =
4. Use the MixTrack function instead of KeyFader. You want to mix the *second* track.

The cool benefit of this is you can offset the clip instance, it works on all objects in that group, and you can even control the time via expressions.

Please give it a shot, and let me know how it works for you. Or let me know if there's something I'm missing...

-lyle

[lmilton]

Originally posted by Julez4001
Carl, what do you use fading align in your rigs for?

Like i said, Compose ..is powerful but I think it should be approach from a newbie standpoint when wanting to do the simple and repetitive things. When those things are proven then all the powerful features need to in the back like the SETUP mode.

Fred/Lyle

Use the IK rig from the messiah tutorials (the one with reverse foot) and do a couple different moves (doesn't have to be perfect) and blend between them. See if teverything is straightforward or was there things that need to be look out for.


I did. and I never got a smooth blend and the IK parts always increase in range no matter what mode (k, cp, ck, etc) I was in.

I'm really under the gun right now and would appreciate some assistance. Can someone out there try it out an post a link to an mpj so we can test it out?

Also, Julez, you're not really giving any info. You're saying that you'd like it to be simpler, but you're not being clear on what is so complex. We've already gone through one stage of simplification, please point us in the direction in which it should be further simplified.

BTW, Julez, I know that you're aware of this because you have been with us for a long time, but others may not: my replies may come off as "testy", at times. This is not the case. We like to engage our users directly in order to "get down to business". This requires that we be direct but it's not nasty or negative in any way. Those who have a long history with us understand this, and have helped to make the program what it is. So please don't read our posts as negative. Everything's cool;)

-lyle

[lmilton]

Originally posted by Julez4001
Hey.
Fred said that Animate has been upgraded too....
I wonder whats in store.
Just make sure everything works with everything.

As I said before, there are no *big buzzword features* in the next rev of animate. You won't see a "HUNDREDS OF NEW FEATURES" press release from us because it's meaningless when it comes to addressing user's needs. We focused almost entirely on workflow and user experience. So, when you see the next rev, you'll be wondering where are all the new features. But when you actually *use* it, there will be no doubt our focus:

Users first, marketing second.

-lyle

[lmilton]

Originally posted by OZI_Jason
When I animate in Messiah I feel comforted in the fact that the animation is not only good for the purpose it was intended but can be easily repurposed into another character if required, great when time=$$$.

I am hugely impressed with what the messiah team have produced. I hope the program grows and is a profitable venture as I could not imagine animating characters back in LW. :bowdown:



Thank you very much, OZI_Jason & others:) After enduring such long work stretches, it's sentiment like these that makes all the pain & frustration worthwhile:D

-lyle

[Julez4001]

Lyle can we geta preview of what messiah animate features will be upgraded?

[DaveW]

Originally posted by lmilton
As I said before, there are no *big buzzword features* in the next rev of animate. You won't see a "HUNDREDS OF NEW FEATURES" press release from us because it's meaningless when it comes to addressing user's needs. We focused almost entirely on workflow and user experience. So, when you see the next rev, you'll be wondering where are all the new features. But when you actually *use* it, there will be no doubt our focus:

Users first, marketing second.

-lyle

That is very good to hear.

[pelos]

i like more the way to parent thing in LW that messiah, (in messiah i still getting weird stuff and i cant undo that, )
and i like that LW have a shematic view, i would like that in the new messiah, some times i dont know where are some things, wile in the schematic view i can put it where i want i just go for it.

[gameboy]

@ lmilton:

I've seen in this forum a little while ago mentioning something about messiah:animate having the capability to export to the directX (.x) format. Is this a feature planned for the next release? Will the export include the model along with its animation data? :drool:

[Julez4001]

Originally posted by pelos
i like more the way to parent thing in LW that messiah, (in messiah i still getting weird stuff and i cant undo that, )
and i like that LW have a shematic view, i would like that in the new messiah, some times i dont know where are some things, wile in the schematic view i can put it where i want i just go for it.

You can set up armatures ..a slight longer way to get what u want
but it can be nice and clean

[pelos]

julez you are right with the armatures, but some times having so many thing in the view port is to load it, and every time you want to select somethign is kinda hiden under something else,
thats why i dont like the autorid that come now with messiah,
(in the video show how to hide and unhide armatures, i am still working on learning them well)

[chikega]

"Autorid" - good one. :)

[pelos]

jaja thanks chikega for the grammar,
i ididnt want to tell this in the forum but the new version of autorig is call it "autorid", with 100 new features, !!!jaja
and now have finger with all ready sliders


(i hope that in Messiah studio 2)

[chikega]

That's the spirit! I just might have to do one too. :)

[Julez4001]

Well the cool thing about Armatures is that it doesn't slow your rig or response time down at all (Thanks, PMG) so once you make a nice rig flow ..you can hide everything else but the few armature controls.

[ljilekor]

Also, Julez, you're not really giving any info. You're saying that you'd like it to be simpler, but you're not being clear on what is so complex. We've already gone through one stage of simplification, please point us in the direction in which it should be further simplified.

This one is kinda hard to explain. It's about time stretching clipinstances.

Currently the time parameter graph represents the % (0-1) of the clipinstance (including the loops) on the Vertical-Axis.
the length in % (0-100) of the clipinstance (including the loops) on Horizontal-Axis

eg. clipInstance of 20 frames long looped 6 times = 120 frames.

In Graph the value of 1 is reached at frame(not a frame but a percentage) 100 so 1 loop equals 1/6= 0.1666

I think this approach of timestretching is very confusing. The horizontal axis in the graph represents a percentage instead of frames. In the Vertical axis 100% (1) is relative to the number of loops. So the whole timing changes when a loop is added

I think a better approach would be to do the timestretching like in most video applications.
The vertical axis represents the % of the clipinstance 1 loop = 100% ( or 0-1 )
The horizontal axis simply represents frames (like it always does)
In this case loops must be created dynamicly!
eg. clipInstance of 20 frames long looped 6 times
In the graph put value 600% (6) on frame 120.


Just as a test try this one:
I want 5 loops to frame 50 and 2 more until frame 110

If done my way the solution is quite simple (key: 5 on f50 , key 7 on f 110).
The graphical representation of the clipinstance should show 5 short loops until f50 and 2 long ones until f110.

If done the actual way its way more difficult
make sure that 7 loops fit perfectly in 110f by dragging and stretching.
frame 50= 50/110 *100= 45.4545 5 loops 5/7 =0.714
(key: 0.714 on f45) (key: 1 on f100)



OK now, the director wants to add 2 fast loops at the end to f140

My way you'd just need to add (key: 9 on f140)

The actual way you'll decide never to use the timestretcher ever again. Cuz this simple request is too damn hard to achieve.


I hope I made my point.

[Julez4001]

quote:
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Also, Julez, you're not really giving any info. You're saying that you'd like it to be simpler, but you're not being clear on what is so complex. We've already gone through one stage of simplification, please point us in the direction in which it should be further simplified.
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Also make a couple of animation (walk cycle, a jump) using the Fred foot and leg IK rig... Compose screws that up no matter what mode (ck, k, etc) you are in. Part of the rig works but then one of the leg is multiplied by whyever reason while the rest of the body doesn't respond. It had an expression to keep the upperbody rig to match the lower body.


I uploaded that rig to yahoo group before and never really got a str8 answer but I know you guys are busy so really, don't bother with it till u get a free minute (don't laugh) because I looking forward to m:s 2.0.

I been working without compose for a while and I can live without it till u guys can seriously go through it.




----------------------------------------

SIDENOTE
IN STUDIO: Please make it intuitive to copy/paste gradient markers & flip from one side of the gradients to the other, sort of like Photoshop also a way to store color palette to match colors.

[Freebooter]

I had major problems with compose until I got to using control objects instead of bones to control the rig. It also helps to be very careful about the grouping of the objects to be clipped.

The best way for me is to clip ONLY the objects that control my rig, i.e, the IK goal, but not the bones in the chain, Arm controllers, but not the arm bones, and so on.

Since then, compose has been a very enjoyable feature to unlock and play with.

Nic

[Sil3]

I never really played with compose, dont know why, it seems much confusing right now, but on ANY rig we should NEVER key the Bones/IK Goals etc directly, we should ALWAYS use custom objects that will drive those Bones/IK Goals.

[Freebooter]

Couldn't agree more Sil3; :thumbsup: Took me ages to figure that one out.

N

[Sil3]

Yah, learning from mistakes it´s still the best way to learn sometimes :D

[lmilton]

Originally posted by gameboy
@ lmilton:

I've seen in this forum a little while ago mentioning something about messiah:animate having the capability to export to the directX (.x) format. Is this a feature planned for the next release? Will the export include the model along with its animation data? :drool:

I do know that there has been a lot of work done on .x support, but I can't really say anything specific about it, yet. When I know more, I'll try to post some info.

-lyle

[lmilton]

Originally posted by Freebooter
I had major problems with compose until I got to using control objects instead of bones to control the rig. It also helps to be very careful about the grouping of the objects to be clipped.

The best way for me is to clip ONLY the objects that control my rig, i.e, the IK goal, but not the bones in the chain, Arm controllers, but not the arm bones, and so on.

Since then, compose has been a very enjoyable feature to unlock and play with.

Nic

Nic, you're correct. Think of Compose as a controller for those items that should be directly animated (i.e. it's a controller for your controller object;) ). Including any "non-animatable" items in the groups desitined to be controlled by Compose will cause as much problems as if you've animated those objects directly.

Julez, you did upload a file a long while ago. I remember that I and other users checked it out on yahoo and I think the problem was in your source material (i.e. the items and/or keys recorded into the clips).

As I said, I'm a bit swamped right now, but if you have a *new* simple scene that clearly demonstrates your problem then maybe I, Nic, and others can take a look and we can really identify the problems... no matter who owns them. I think you know by now that I want to help, I just need a little help to help you:D

-lyle

[Julez4001]

Don't sweat it, Lon.

I already started making a controller based rigs according to Nic ..trying to get rid of as much controls to the bones as possible.
I know that you are always willing to help.

Sometimes it just takes a different perspective.

[buttkissing mode off]

julian
:scream:

[Freebooter]

Julez,

Dig out one of Mark Willson's rigs as a ref. The Wyle E Coyote rig is a real good example.

N

[chikega]

For those of you who are just chiming in ... the Wild E. Coyote file is found under the "Project" folder, NOT the "Scenes" folder.;)

[JohnJ]

Guys, thanks for an interesting discussion. I recently bought Timothy Albee's book on character animation and really developed a taste for it. But I was wondering how Lightwave 8 stacked up against Messiah for character animation and this thread was a big help in deciding where to spend my meager funds.

I have tried the Messiah demo and liked it and now I'm glad I held off on my 8 upgrade. I still plan to eventually upgrade but when finances are limited its sometimes an "either/or" tug of war (Messiah or Lightwave upgrade).
Thanks for all the info!

JJ

[chikega]

LW 8 has not really had any significant improvement in the rendering department - so, if or when you should decide to go with messiah for CA then, you're not really losing out on a "new-improved" renderer. ;)

[Sil3]

I was wondering how Lightwave 8 stacked up against Messiah for character animation and this thread was a big help in deciding where to spend my meager funds.

Ever since 2000 that Newtek claims the next Character Animation tools in LW will be everything we need, no more third partie programs. Until now and with every LW release we realise that is perfect bullshit.

Messiah is :buttrock: :buttrock: :buttrock:

[tjnyc]

You have to have know it was BS. No app can really claim that. XSI comes real close with 4.0. Houdini is probably the only app that does provide everything and an environment to create custom CA tools and toolsets without coding.


Cheers,

[chikega]

You have to have know it was BS. No app can really claim that. XSI comes real close with 4.0. Houdini is probably the only app that does provide everything and an environment to create custom CA tools and toolsets without coding.


Cheers,
I agree, Tony, Houdini is unbelievably configurable - but, man, I think they're the only company that is holding onto their nose-bleed level pricing. I contacted the sales office earlier this year and I was quoted $8000 US dollars plus $1600 yearly maintenance for Houdini Escape (their CA package). Eek!:eek:

[tjnyc]

I agree. That price doesn't even include the particle toolset. The way the market is going, SideFX has to decide if they can sustain revenue at there price structure. They might be doing fine with their current customers, but they might not be getting many new sales, when other companies in comparison are far more affordable.

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