Question: Mocap Walk Blending

[ReD_MeRkIn]

my advice to you is use the mocap as refrence, and reanimate the walk cycle from scratch the way you need it to be.
I have worked with Mocap on several projects, and editing walks to make cycles is a waste of time.
Rig up a character, Put your mocap on a template layer, and rotoscope it.
I hope this helps.

[elvis75k]

Agree!!

[antweiler]

You can loop using the TRAX Editor.

First I get rid of relative motion by using the script Motion Control by Dirk Bialluch.
With this I can Offset the Z Translation of the Root and Feet, so that the character walks on place.
I dont lose subtle motion, and i can reapply the Z-trans later (in my case done by our game-engine)

A good helper ist the script ckCharList.mel which enables you to save and reimport character sets, because they sometimes lock the animation channels.

The loop ist created the following way: Look into your animation for the starting and endpoint of the Loop (two steps).
isolate these frames with some time left after the loop for blending (about one step or so). Duplicate the clip, and position it so, that the startpoint is under the corresponding endpoint of the loop on the first clip (almost similar pose). Create a blend between the clips. The Loop should be perfect between the last overlapping frame, and the corresponding frame at the beginning. The rest is merging and splitting (and of course finetuning)

Antweiler

[Nemises]

Thanks for the advice guys :)

Keyframing isnt an option, as Mocap is the subject of the piece.

I do want to maintain relational translation, and have had limited succes thus far in blending (I have been using a very similar method to Antweiler, except without stripping the translate, but to no avail thus far)

The main problem is, that the overlap in the blend causes the translate to go backwards a bit (probably why you strip it out).

I think I just need to plug away at it a bit more...I appreciate the comments, and it at least tells me on on roughly the right track well, Antweilers does anyway ;) )

Regards,
Nem

[elvis75k]

i have experienced with imported mocap data... My skeleton had just one cycle, then stop... the easyest way to loop it is this:
Go in the grapheditor, select all the joint: the curves appear, try to pick every curve, not the keys (yes after select a curve, all their keys become yellow...) after you select the curves. go in the view menu (grapheditor) and select >infinity. Now go on the menu Curves (always grapheditor) >post infinity and select >cycle.

DOne!

[Nemises]

heh..Nice..
Thats esentially the same as making it a Clip in Trax and Cycling it, but just kindof..avoids the trax editor ;)

I think the main problem I'm having is dealing with the blend..the only experience I've really had with Mocap before this is using Character Studio in 3ds Max 4 with the sample mocap in there...all perfectly clean and cyclable...CS also has a REALLY nice Blend editor.

It might come down to Keying a Blend to make it look right, but thats cool....its all good experience, and "learning the ahrd way" etc..

Thanks all.

[ReD_MeRkIn]

Maya isn't really the best tool for editing mocap.
Kydara does it a lot better, and as far as i know that's what most people i work with (at EA Europe) use.
We don't use the trax editor at all anymore, it's too buggy.

[Nemises]

In reference to that!..
I have the Motionbuilder Freelance edition, but have , as yet, been unable to find a practical way to use it to manipulate the Data I have!.

I have clean Acclaim data (.htr)....
This can be imported direct into Motionbuilder, and manipulated, which is great (I'm assuming, as I have only little Motionbuilder experience).....however, I haven't been able to figure out how to effectively translate from a .fbx set of motion in Maya, to a Maya skeliton.

How I am doing it now, is the HTR Motion is saved as keys on a skeleton (by way of the LifeForms Demo which imports directly onto a Skeliton)..
I then use a set of Orient and point constraints to translate that motion to my Character Rig.

Does anyone know how I can set up the same thing with .FBX animation?...
If I try to do the same thing (take the motion for each joint in the .fbx and orient constrain it to a rig) it comes out all wrong..

About 20% of the joints are correct, and the rest seem to be oriented completely differently.

Perhaps I should do some homework on Motionbuilder first, and post the questions to Kaydara.
If Motionbuilder has superior tools for Mocap manipulation, then I want to use that instead (since I allready own a liscence)

Thanks if anyone has anything to add that might help me :)

[kamsvag]

When working with mocap I would suggest you pick a package more suited for the task, one such as motionbuilder from kaydara, then you can import your clean and cycled animation into maya.

[kamsvag]

I just read that you have motionbuilder, then you should use the motionblender and have the character looping. There's a tool in there somewhere. I haven't touched motionbuilder myself yet, only been working in filmbox, but since motionbuilder is simply an enhanced version of filmbox I'm sure they have the same tools in the package...

[3DDave]

In Motion Builder you can use your mocap data to drive another character, like the one you have in Maya. The way to get it to work right is to rig up your character in Maya per the Motion Builder reference skeleton on Page 302 and export it to an FBX file. Load it up in Motion Builder, then append your scene with the mocap data. Characterize your Maya character in MB and set the input character as the mocap data.

[Nemises]

Thanks for the comments all..
I've followed everyones advice, and gotten in some good MotionBuilder education.

The solution 3dDave suggests above holds true...
an expanded version of that explaination for anyone interested is at:
http://www.kaydara.com in the support/discussion boards (a thread I started asking similar questions to above..very in depth workflow written by a Kaydara employee..may be helpfull to others?)

MB has the tools needed to cleanly transition between different animations (mocap or otherwise) as well as the added advantage of (easilly) remapping data to bipeds of different physiologies.

It also has a Great Character keyframer (reminds me of Character Studio but better!), with pre-defined IK (with FK options), and cool stuff like groundplane colission.

Anyways, I'm looking forward to using it to improve my animation, and give me options that I couldnt have achieved with Maya alone wehn it comes to Mocap and blending :)

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