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ub52
06-06-2003, 06:58 PM
Hello,

I've had about a week now with motion builder and really luv working with it. Many thanks to 3DDave for the Lightwave bones rig which I'm using. However, I'm now trying to actually bring some very simple keyframed animation back into Lightwave and not getting what I would expect. There are 2 problems, one I'm not getting any Z axis translation, and two, I'm not getting the complete range of frames that I worked with in MB. Here are 3 pic's which should explain thing better.

The first pic here is of my character in MB with some very simple keyframes applied between frames 0 and 120. Notice the FCurves window is displaying the keys set on the HipsEffector's Z axis.
http://members.cox.net/rlandry52/PrePlot.jpg

Here in the second image, I've plotted the control rig's data back to my Lightwave skeleton, ready for exporting. Notice the keyframes in the timeline and FCurves window for the Z axus of the Hips bone of my character.
http://members.cox.net/rlandry52/PostPlot.jpg

Finally in this third image I'm back in Lightwave with my original scene file load. I've merged the FBX data and then opened the Graph Editor on the Z position channel of the Hips bone. Where are all the keys? Also notice the timeline is set to display frames 0 through 120 but only keys up to 100 are showing. (Doh, just figued this out as I was writting this. I didn't set my frame rate to 30fps before merging. Anyway, first problem still applies).
http://members.cox.net/rlandry52/PostMerge.jpg
3DDave
06-06-2003, 10:27 PM
Problem solved, see below!!
policarpo
06-06-2003, 10:36 PM
Are you using MB 4.03 by chance?

where did you get build 4.04???

can you post the .LWS, .LWO and the .FBX of the scene so we can verify if this is happening. I'm using MB 4.03 and LW 7.5c.
3DDave
06-06-2003, 11:04 PM
Originally posted by policarpo
Are you using MB 4.03 by chance?

where did you get build 4.04???




Sharp Eye Policarpo!

What's up with that, 4.04?
ub52
06-07-2003, 12:18 AM
Originally posted by 3DDave
Sharp Eye Policarpo!

What's up with that, 4.04?

hehehe. When I installed MB on my notebook and got my license file from Kaydara I was connected to the internet via a wireless PCMCIA card. When version 4.03 generated my Machine ID it was taking the fact that I had this card installed. Then when I used my notebook without the card plugged in MB would not run saying I had an invalid license. I contacted Kaydara support and they said they had a fix and thats what cha all see. The support staff at Kaydara rock.

With regrad to my problem here, I tried a test using the model and rig Policarpo posted and using that scene file seems to work as expected. By that I mean the model actually translates along the Z axis when merged back into Lightwave. I noticed the rig in that model is different than the one you posted earlier 3DDave. So I'm going to try and adapt that rig over to my model. If that fails I post some files later tonight for you to look at.

Cheers, and thanks for your assitance.

-ub52
3DDave
06-07-2003, 03:39 AM
I figured out what the problem is!!

It has to do with Recording Pivot Rotation, i.e. you can't zero out your bone rotations in Lightwave and then export your rig to an FBX file. I reset the bone rotations back to the way they were after converting the Skelegons (thanks to the Irrational Bone Plug-in it was a fast one button procedure).

http://www.irrationalnumber.com

I will update the scene file for Rev D.

This is really turning out to be a nice collaboration.

Thanks for everyone who has given input into this rig.
ub52
06-07-2003, 05:03 AM
Originally posted by 3DDave
I figured out what the problem is!!

It has to do with Recording Pivot Rotation, i.e. you can't zero out your bone rotations in Lightwave and then export your rig to an FBX file. I reset the bone rotations back to the way they were after converting the Skelegons (thanks to the Irrational Bone Plug-in it was a fast one button procedure).

http://www.irrationalnumber.com

I will update the scene file for Rev D.

This is really turning out to be a nice collaboration.

Thanks for everyone who has given input into this rig.

BINGO!!! Thanks so much. After I had adapted your rig to my model and converted skelegons to bone in Layout I did what I always do at that point in Layout, zero out the bones rotation. If I don't do that every thing comes back into Layout just fine.

Thanks again.
-ub52
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