Layer animation 3ds...is it possible?

[Piflik]

Haven't tried it, but in the Layer Manager right-click on the Layer and chose 'Object Properties'. There you hit all thes Buttons saying 'By Object' to switch them to 'By Layer' (or at least the render control one). Then rightclick again on the Layer and chose 'Layer Properties'. There you animate the Visibility Spinner.

[sundialsvc4]

I'd approach the task by shooting each complete model, minus background. Then put them all into a (2D) video compositing program. Now you can easily blend the various effects together.

If various pieces need to "come and go," shoot each piece by itself. Now you can simply cross-fade between them in the compositor.

It's important that the various layers have "Z-depth" information included with them, so that the compositor can correctly determine what is "in front" at all times even though compositing is inherently a 2D, pixel-by-pixel process.

Each strip must of course be shot from exactly the same camera path, lens, etc, but in CG that's trivial to do.

To get the "reflections" that you want, you need to know where your ground-plane and reflective ground-surfaces will be (of course), and you should shoot a reflections-only pass. You'll get a peculiar-looking strip which contains nothing but reflections ... cast upon nothing-at-all, with no alpha. But this, now, is another layer of material that you can composite into the mix, adjusting alpha and so-forth. Blended with a "blank plate" consisting only of background, it appears to be a true reflection, of whatever transparency you like. You get the idea.

[fatsober]

Thanks for the replies- I tried the by object/layer approach but it didn't really do what I wanted it was a kind of all or nothing an I was looking for something a bit more gradual although even using the track manager/dope sheet it can be tricky to get the transition just right. I had thought about using composite or editing program but that takes me somewhat out of my depth. Generally our animations are put together in QT with the h234 which is often perfect for our needs. Is there anything you would recommend. I have a few things on the mac (imovie) which are a bit simple in terms of their functionality so I'm thinking I might need something a bit more advanced (win or mac)

[Bonstar]

Any compositing program should do what you need, chaging the opacity in a compositing program is one of the most basic things you can do, all it usually involves is moving to the appropriate time in the time line and adjusting the opacity values. 100% being fully visible and 0% being invisible.

These are some of the more common compositing programs;
After effects
Nuke
Digital Fusion

But even editing programs such as premiere or final cut have basic opacity fading capabilities.

Don't be afraid of compositing... Rendering out passes makes life so much easier when you get a client that likes to constantly tweak things! It'll save you render time in the long run for more complicated projects too!

[ivanisavich]

Visibility is inherited by default. So just link all the objects in a layer to a hidden object, and animate the visible of that hidden object --- the rest of the child objects should have their visibility affected likewise.

This is NEVER something you'd want to do within max though. The realistic option would be to render out the three building passes, and then animate the visibility in your compositing app of choice.

[sundialsvc4]

Set up each of your models with "an empty at (0,0,0)" or somesuch, so that you can have the camera "in perfect registration" from one shot to the next. Then, arrange your models so that that empty is "at the center of the floor." This will make it easy for you to be sure that all of the shots "line up."

You should build the models with the same materials, the same lighting and so-on so that none of the strips "clash" with one another.

Then, it's just a straight-ahead compositing job. The various strips will "cross-fade" from one to the next.

[mef]

Of course you can do it. There are actually a few ways and there all quite easy. I'm assuming that when you say that you grouped everything together in a layer, that you just placed them there and didn't actually make a group.

Option 1:
Select all of the objects in the layer and then in the top menu bar go to group and choose "Group".
At this point everything will be affected as one object.
You can then go to object properties and animate the visibility settings.

Option 2:
Select all of the objects in the layer and then right click anywhere in the workspace on or near the objects and go to object properties.
In the "Rendering Control" Group, there is a button next to the "visibility" number box. If it says "By Object" click on it so that it says "By Layer" click "Ok" to make the change.
If you open the Layer Manager, click on the icon that looks like a stack of papers that is by the layer name. It will open the layer properties dialogue and you can animate the visibility from here.

I believe that option 2 might be better for what you're doing based on how you described your work flow. If not, there are other options.

Marc





But the problem I have is that each layer contains hundreds of elements. Is there a way to add a visibility track to an entire layer? Have tried grouping the elements in the layer but I still cant add a visibility track to the whole group. There must be a way to do this as going through the list of elements and adding a track to each element will take me longer than the modeling! Can any one offer any advice?





Edit: I didn't see that Piflik has already answered the question before posting. The only thing that may not have come across clearly is that you can change all of the object properties at the same time.

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