Feature request

[Greenlaw]

Alright! I have some time off from work again, so I'm finally back to
using Animeeple. I was getting a bit nervous because my wife and I
have a short film project we need to finish this month, but there was
so much overtime happening at work that it was killing our indie film
project. Anyway, today I solved some iPi-Animeeple-LightWave workflow
issues, so it looks like we can finally get some shots done for our
short.

In brief, I'm using Animeeple to retarget motion capture created with
iPi DMC to a character that was rigged in LightWave 3D, tweaking the
motion as needed, and then sending an FBX back to LightWave for
lighting and rendering. The motion data seems to be transferring
fairly well, except for some feet slipping, which I expected because
the rigged characters are shorter and wider than the mocap performer
(me.) Also, I noticed some leg popping that wasn't in the original
data, which I'm sure can be fixed easily.

So here are my requests:

Hide Mesh option. It would be nice to be able to hide the mesh to see
the bones in motion. As I mentioned, there is some popping in the
legs, but I can't clearly see where this is occurring to correct it in
Animeeple because the mesh is hiding the bones. If this option is
already there, please tell me how to switch it on.

Slip and Slide Fixer Block. I'm sure this request is obvious. When
targeting motion to a rig that has different body proportions, the
feet can appear to slip or slide. It would be fantastic if you guys
could add a Block that could be applied to correct this problem. (I
know the Jimmy|Rig guys added a 'block' to do just this; unfortunately
J|R still doesn't allow users to import their own mocap data like
Animeeple can.)

One more request: Could you change the licensing scheme for the FBX
exporter plug-in. It was very frustrating that I could not use it most
of this week because I had no internet connection available to
'activate' it. I won't mind if I have to 'log-in' to the software to
use the FBX export plug-in, but requiring me to be logged live to your
server just to enable this plug-in (which I paid for, by the way) has
turned out to be counter-productive for me. It's my feeling that if
the export plug-in is paid for, it should be available to use whether
I have a live connection or not.

Anyway, thanks for all the hard work you guys put into Animeeple. If
you guys start offering a 'Professional' version of Animeeple, I'll be
first in line to buy; there are many users like me who are dying for
an affordable and easy-to-use alterative to Motion Builder.

Looking forward to the next updates!

Greenlaw

--
Streams - Episode 12 'Snowball' now at littlegreendog.com

Greenlaw
Partner | Little Green Dog | www.littlegreendog.com
Senior Digital Artist | Rhythm & Hues Studios | www.rhythm.com

[Greenlaw]

I Just found the panel that lets me hide the mesh and show the bones
only!

I would like to see the other requests happen though. :)

Thanks in advance.

[Greenlaw]

Are there keyboard shortcuts for stepping through an animation? If
not, could you add them?

[Greenlaw]

Ah, I figured out the leg popping problem: it was caused by the Fix
Feet property that was on by default. Turning this property off
removed the popping. Of course the feet are now slipping slightly, but
it was doing that anyway with Fix Feet on.

To be fair, the rig I'm using is unnaturally proportioned for the
purpose of testing; I needed any potential problems to appear obvious
to me. My final production rigs won't be nearly this distorted so I
may be okay here.

I have to say, the more I use Animeeple, the more I'm impressed by all
the 'little' features you guys have tucked inside. Your program is far
more capable than I first thought. Please keep up the fantastic work
guys!

Greenlaw

[Okan Arikan]

Hi Greenlaw,

I'm glad you like Animeeple. The knee pops are caused by the feet trying to reach the ground. You can solve it by turning off the "Fix Feet" which turns off the feet stabilization (but as you said, would cause sliding feet), or you can use the "Hip Displacement" option to bring the hips down a little bit.

Okan

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[Okan Arikan]

Hi Greenlaw,

These are very good ideas indeed. As you discovered already, you can turn off the mesh display. We have been thinking about the best UI to allow fixing the foot skate. We have a few ideas.

Let me think about the FBX licensing issue. I'm sure we can come up with a solution.

Okan

[Greenlaw]

Thank you very much for responding!

Animeeple is working quite well for our project and I'll be looking
forward to future updates! I'll let you know when the project is
finished. :)

G.

[kodirekka suresh]

Hi,

 

    There is a Animation Tangents flat  it,other wise Linear,where its Sliding bitween time.

 

--
Hi,
   I am suresh, Character rigger having experience of Three
years.I did many International projects having different style of rigs
in different pipelines.


Regards,
suresh.

[Okan Arikan]

   Hi Greenlaw,

   We just made another release of Animeeple which caches your user credentials when you successfully log in. Afterwards, if you have no internet access and try to login, it will re-use the cached user credentials so that you can export FBX even if you do not have internet.

   For this to work, you need to successfully login when you have internet, at least once though.

   Okan

[Greenlaw]

Okan,

Thank you very much for this feature! It will be a big help to me. :)

Best,

Greenlaw