Poses help

[ColinCohen]

With Pose Controller, you don't need to use the Graph Editor. Just keyframe your initial pose once, click Save, and you're set. When you want to load a pose, select the pose you want, click Load, select the object you want to apply the pose to, and click K to keyframe it.

If all your characters use the same bone structure, you can even reuse poses between characters. You can also mirror poses; for example, a lefthand first to a righthand fist.

[what_happened]

ok, I found my issue, but unfortunetly, it has created yet another.

Can someone explain "Master Plugin" - if not I'll just look it up at home in the manual.

I use the pose controller master plug in... I guess... I create a pose, save, create another pose, save. etc.

Then I slide to a keyframe, click on the pose I want to load, and click on the "k" button.
Layout promptly crashes. every time.

What is wrong with this scenario. Am I NOT doing something correct? I am beginning to think I should look for a much more stabe package that can handle animation..

[ColinCohen]

If you send me your scene file (and corresponding objects), I'll take a look at it.

colincohen@verizon.net

[faulknermano]

How do you all do it?

if pose controller doesnt seem to work for you then you do it the "old-fashioned way". poses are just made up of keyframes of certain items in layout. figure out which parts of your character belong to a pose. once you do that you can create a selection set (Scene Editor favorites) for convenience. when your character "strikes a pose", use the negative frames to store them. like frame -1 for a body pose, frame -2 for a hand pose, etc etc. do this by inputting the negative frame when you press enter on the pose.

to retrieve the pose, simply go to the negative frame number and then create key on the frame you want using the same inputting method.

to make it simpler, i cooked up a short lscript:


generic
{
poseFrame = integer(recall("poseframe",-1));
ct = Scene().currenttime;
reqbegin("Get Pose Frame");
c1 = ctlinteger("Pose Frame",poseFrame);
return if(!reqpost());

GoToFrame(poseFrame);
CreateKey(ct);
GoToFrame(ct * Scene().fps);
}


modify this script if you want. what it does is simply automates pose retrieval. you still need to select the items that are involved in the pose though.

[what_happened]

I could, but im not getting anywhere. I am using a default T4D rig (han solo) to learn how to animate. I think my biggest issue is I have no idea how to properly use a "master-plugin" I open up the rig, click on layout>>plugin>>master plugins and add the "pose controller."

At this point, I move all the different parts around, arms, head, waist etc. and then I open up the scene editor, highlite every bone in the toon, and then hit "save" on the pose controler" - when I try to load a pose, LW crashes, so, either the plug in is no good (which I highly doubt) or I dunno what is going on. I just have to wait until I get home to read about master plug ins and how to use them I guess. I am obviously doing something incorrect here.

I bet I can crash any LW rig trying to implement "pose controller" - only cuz I dont know whats going on.

Another completely wasted day, but I will continue to press on...just a bad day to try to quite smoking I guess. LOL

[what_happened]

Cant I just Pose the toon, hit a button to save it, and then past that particular pose elsewhere on the time line?

For instance, I have a base pose, a sneak pose, a proud pose and a sad pose.

I start out at keyframe one. base pose.
keyframe 10, proud pose
keyframe 20, sneak
keyframe 30, sad
Keyframe 40, base
keyframe 50, sneak

I should just be able to chose a pose and somehow paste it on the specific keyframe, right?

For some reason I just can't get a different pose on a different keyframe. If I start out on frame one, at base pose, I save it. STILL on keyframe 1, and edit the position and rotation of the arms, head, hands, fingers and waist. I save this as pose 2 (still on keyframe one)

Technically, I have 2 poses, but if I go to keyframe 10 and choose a new pose, LW either crashes (using pose controller) or nothing happens (using a selection set in scene editor)

How do you set a keyframe for each bone, without having to choose it individually, and setting the keyframe there, it just doesnt seem right to have to go through every bone and keyframe it for one pose.

If I edit the position and rotation of an arm, thats 2 key frames, then I want to edit the position/rotation of the hand on the same keyframe, thats 2 more, then fingers, etc.. all on one keyframe, you looking at 10+ keyframes for a simple arm movement, not to mention the other arm, and any other elements you move. Before you know it, you'll have a ton of keyframes within one frame. There has to be a way to copy all these and just paste them where need be, weather it is a bone that has moved or not. One big copy and past across the whole board.

Sorry if this sounds basic or something, I am just trying to understand this, I know I am missing something, but I just cant put my finger on it.

If I knew how to copy/pase across the board, I know I could save these poses on -1 etc, or anywhere for that matter

[faulknermano]

How do you set a keyframe for each bone, without having to choose it individually, and setting the keyframe there, it just doesnt seem right to have to go through every bone and keyframe it for one pose.

this is why Scene Editor selection sets will be convenient for you. once you define a selection set, you can select it (and thus everything in it) and then make the key.


If I edit the position and rotation of an arm, thats 2 key frames, then I want to edit the position/rotation of the hand on the same keyframe, thats 2 more, then fingers, etc.. all on one keyframe, you looking at 10+ keyframes for a simple arm movement, not to mention the other arm, and any other elements you move. Before you know it, you'll have a ton of keyframes within one frame. There has to be a way to copy all these and just paste them where need be, weather it is a bone that has moved or not. One big copy and past across the whole board.

i dont quite get what you mean here: how can you have more than one key per channel per frame? once you are happy with a pose that should go to its own frame. if you make any adjustments on that keyframe you change that pose. you have to create another pose at, say, frame -2. if you mean pose as some sort of movement, i think you're not communicating it properly. you may be defining "poses" for "action clips." in this case you might reasearch on using motion mixer.


If I knew how to copy/pase across the board, I know I could save these poses on -1 etc, or anywhere for that matter

the create key in lw has three options for determining which items are affected by its functions: selected items, seleced items and its heirarchy, and all items. it's in the popup of the create key dialog box.

[Triple G]

Are you sure you need to be keying every single bone for your poses? Unless it's a rig controlled completely by FK, all you should really need to key are the IK controllers, not every single bone. (Well, that and anything you're controlling manually such as maybe finger rotation or head rotation...depends on how the rig is set up.)

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