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View Full Version : just bought messiah...WOW, but some questions

vjholofx
11-03-2005, 03:14 PM
i am an xsi quy and been an animator (2d and 3d) for over 20 years. i also use zbrush since version 1. i recently got fed up with all the hoops other software puts u through to get to animating and had made the decision to just draw my stuff in flash and be done with 3d for a while. i did a project for ARTE in europe and took this path and got paid and they loved the work so i thought this would be the way to go on other stuff...but then i figured i had heard so much about pm i could spare 300 bucks on the off chance i could use it for something down the road.... i also was a bit hesitant as there is no mac port. i have a acer pc laptop so i gave in and bought a license.

all i can say is WOW...this was the first time in all my years that i could just be an artist instead of a technical detective when doing 3d stuff. i really am suprised more people are not using this soft for character animation. i still love softimage for some stuff but it is to complicated to get things done. painting vertex maps a million times really pisses me off. all the different ways to do one thing can get to be a bit much really.

i rigged a complex character in pm in under an hour and was off to the races. i am going thrióugh all the tuts and i did order joe cossmans cds.

i will post some work from a current project next week when i get back from paris.

i have looked all over to the answers to 3 questions but have not found them. maybe someone in the know can help me: maybe the answers are on joes cds but i wont get those until next week :sad:

1. is there the ability to bring audio in for lip sync?

2. i bought animanium for 400 bucks last year:rolleyes: works great with their skeleton models but forget getting ur stuff in to the pipeline to animate and u have to make everything in MAX first:eek: . is it possible to set up this kind of IK system in pm. where could i find this kind of tutorial. ( i have downloaded every tut off of the pm homesite and i want more!!!)

3.lastly i am interestd in how to keep a characters feet from going through the ground. i know it is in the documentation...i just have not come across it yet.

there ya have it.

just want to say that the soft really made me optimistic about doing character work in 3d for the stuff i am doing. THANKS ALOT
cheers
AAAron
11-03-2005, 05:42 PM
Hi I´m still pretty fresh my self, but I can hint you on nr:

1. playtab-> waveaudio haven´t tried it my self though.
Panikos
11-03-2005, 06:30 PM
3. There is tutorial scene in the CD that ships with messiah, made by [Soul-Medic]
Its a pair of legs with cartoony shoes.

Basically, u use IK and nulls placed in world coordinates to restrict the IK goal from sliding below ground

I've never seen how XSI handles IK and animation, but I am very happy messiah user.
To be honest, messiah never dissapointed me.
Once you understand the principles, its a joy to rig, animate and render.
stooch
11-03-2005, 08:02 PM
to prevent feet from moving through the ground, you want to create 2 nulls, one for each foot. Parent them to the main character null make sure the main char null is at origin or you have to adjust the expression later on. This is to make sure that the ground controllers move witht he character if you use the main null for world transforms.

Then use the 'max' expression to evaluate both the feet and the ground nulls and set the output to the foot controllers on Y axis with any offsets to compensate for parent coordinates so that they correspond with feet in world coordinates..

I also like to connect the Z transform of the feet to the Z transforms of the ground controllers so that they follow the feet and make them easier to grab. I turn off all channels for keying on the ground controllers except the y axis.
vjholofx
11-03-2005, 08:44 PM
thanks guys for the speedy replies.

i will try the playtab audio and see what happens. xsi make u format ur audio a certain way. i am interested in if i can just bring in a wav and get to business. i will try it out.

the principle for restraining nullls and ik targets is the same as in xsi...alright this is very good.

like i said before i have to go to paris for a short job but will post my results next week.

once again thak u guys for all ur replies.

cheers
pelos
11-03-2005, 08:51 PM
when i get back to home, (i am in austin right now visiting my brother) i will upload 2 video tutorials that i did to rig a character, it takes like and hour, to do it all, even using complicated expression =)
Layer01
11-03-2005, 11:20 PM
when i get back to home, (i am in austin right now visiting my brother) i will upload 2 video tutorials that i did to rig a character, it takes like and hour, to do it all, even using complicated expression =)

that would be GREAT! let us know when you post them.

and welcome vjholofx, i look forward to seeing your stuff :D
vjholofx
11-18-2005, 11:37 AM
Hey guys,

Paris was great. i ended up staying a week longer. just a wee bit too much red wine : )
I have gone through joe s riggin cd and now am rigging one of my characters. everything is going very well. i have one small problem: when i set up the ik chain on the arm and try it out it bends in the wrong direction. i did everything that joe does on the muscle man nate tut. everything is y axis on the bones are in the right direction but the arm twist the wrong way.

somewhere in some tutorial video i saw someone correct this problem very easily but i cannot find it now. please advise. anyway thanks again. i am looking forward to posting soon and getting ur imput.

cheers
holofx
Suricate
11-18-2005, 12:10 PM
In the 'Animate/Inverse Kinematics' you can set the direction of any item, either '+' or '-' . In the case of an arm with a bicep and a forearm, you probably have to change the direction of the forearm bone.
vjholofx
11-18-2005, 04:10 PM
Thanks a whole bunch. that did the trick. i was trying to use that with the whole chain selected.

i must say also that the learning curve with this sotware is much much faster than i expected.

it might be good to have in future releases pre defined rigs that the user can change to the dimensions of their character and add on take of different features if they want.

don t get me wrong. i am really learning alot from joe s cd s and am enjoying it. just i have about 20 -30 characters to do and i am going to have my work cut out for me over the next weeks. i am aware i can take riggs i already made and adjust them to different characters once i et the hang of all that entails. newbies always want it easier.

cheers
holofx
stooch
11-18-2005, 06:16 PM
there WAS a feature called autorig but it got removed. i really hope they bring it back, that feature was one of the key reasons why i chose messiah to begin with.
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