PDA

View Full Version : Help please - gotta animate a line of ants

MarkSeb
08-25-2009, 07:26 AM
Hi,

I have to animate a line of ants crawling across the screen, climbing over an obstacle and then moving on, and then loop it so it looks like its one very long line.

How do I create duplicates of the ant so I dont have to animate them individually.

Sorry such a lame question but I specialize more on the visualisation side of things.

Oh, I'm working in Maya 2009.
KielFiggins
08-25-2009, 05:50 PM
I would suggest animating the ant doing a walk cycle in place at origin. On the ant rig, having a single top node that can be constrained to a motion path.

-Write a short script to select the original ants world node
-Duplicate > Special > Options > [x] Duplicate input graph
-assign the duplicate to the motion path with an offset/delay
-have the script be a for loop with a control number of ants populated.

This tutorial may help, though unless your right up on the ants, the feet planting shouldnt be a concern:
http://www.3dfiggins.com/tuts/MoPath/

Also, if you can keep the ants simplier, thatd be best. Since your probably going to have hundreds depending on size of the line and scale of the ants. If you can get away with a group of animated geometry pieces and no rig, all the better.

Good luck.
CGTalk Moderation
08-25-2009, 05:50 PM
This thread has been automatically closed as it remained inactive for 12 months. If you wish to continue the discussion, please create a new thread in the appropriate forum.