About animation in modern games

# 1 28-01-2005 , 01:45 PM

Subscriber
Join Date: Apr 2003

Location: Borovnica, Slovenia

Posts: 434

Hello all.

I'm learning animation at the moment, and was wandering few things.
First of all, If you have games like doom 3, and you want to export character to hte engine. I have seen that some area on the model (i.e., where legs and arms are bending) have to use "influence objects" and similar techincs to make correct bending/deformation. Now, my question is, how dou you do that for games like Doom 3 Far Cry, maybe even Unreal engine 3, and how in older games?
Also, i.e., when exporting animation with skeleton into a game, what can I export? I mean things like locators, IK handels, deformers,etc?

Also, not to open a ne thread, I have another problem:
I am trying to animate hand. Now, when I try to rotate a finger joint, there is a problem, because the finger is not pointing at the same direction as "rotate tool". I would like to lock lety say "x" and "z" direction so the finger can bend only in "y" direction like it's normal. I know how to do that , but if I do that, the finger won't rotate as it should, because rotate tool is pointing in other direction. I should somehow rotate the moving point, but don't know how? Maybe I should use locators?

Thanks for help!

Last edited by Sil-Valeor; 28-01-2005 at 01:47 PM.

Quote

# 2 28-01-2005 , 01:51 PM

The Maya Mountain
Join Date: Aug 2002

Location: Seattle, WA

Posts: 8,245

I couldn't tell you about the exporting as each engine has it's own rules regarding that.

As for the fingers, with the join selected, in component mode, turn on the "?" selection mask (called Miscellaneous) and you can select the joint's local rotation axis and rotate it however you want.

-Mike
The Maya Toolbelt

Quote

# 3 28-01-2005 , 02:18 PM

Subscriber
Join Date: Apr 2003

Location: Borovnica, Slovenia

Posts: 434

Tnx, but still not working. I can "local" rotate, but but it still don't rotate the way I can adjust with Global rotate that the rotate toool is pointing in the same direction as finger bu only by moving finger itself. If I could now switch to local rotate it would be ok, but whne I do that, the rotate tool automatically rotate the way it was before.

Quote

# 4 28-01-2005 , 02:25 PM

Subscriber
Join Date: Apr 2003

Location: Borovnica, Slovenia

Posts: 434

Here's the pictures that show's the problem. You see the Rotation axis, that is colored in red? well, i need it to be rotated (not the model, but rotate tool) so it points at the same direction as selected joints (green one). So now, when I would select the red rotate axis, it would bend finger down as as it should.

Attached Thumbnails

Click image for larger version

Name: slika.jpg
Views: 308
Size: 52.6 KB
ID: 19399

Quote

# 5 28-01-2005 , 03:43 PM

The Maya Mountain
Join Date: Aug 2002

Location: Seattle, WA

Posts: 8,245

global rotate cannot be adjusted. Only local.

-Mike
The Maya Toolbelt

Quote

# 6 28-01-2005 , 03:52 PM

Subscriber
Join Date: Apr 2003

Location: Borovnica, Slovenia

Posts: 434

hmm....so how could I rotate the "rotate tool" without actually rotating that joint?

--Edited--

I think I found the way. I should rotate every joint so they in the X direction, freeze transf. on that joint and then rotate it back to previous position.

Tnx!

Last edited by Sil-Valeor; 28-01-2005 at 04:03 PM.

Quote

# 7 28-01-2005 , 04:18 PM

The Maya Mountain
Join Date: Aug 2002

Location: Seattle, WA

Posts: 8,245

As stated before, going into component mode and selecting the ? selection mask will allow you to select and rotate a joint's local rotation axis without rotating the joint itself.

-Mike
The Maya Toolbelt

Quote