Mixing blend shape and skeletal animation in wards

artefon

What is the best way to export an animation that is a mix of blend shapes and skeletal animation?

I am trying to animate an eyelid and using bones would be a tough task. I found some information regarding Flex Animation [1] but I don't know if it's possible to use .vta with wards and mix it with a .smd animation.

Is it possible to achieve this? Can anyone point me to more resources?

[1] https://developer.valvesoftware.com/wiki/Flex_animation

Sukotto

I "think" Flex animation is only supported on heroes, I've seen Hawf do it for his Faceless Void head but I think wards and couriers are bone only.

heboltz3

just flex on em.

EDIT for real advice.

I've 'never' seen flex bones implemented into the dotes by workshop contributors, and I think I've only 'rarely' seen blendshapes, and I'm not even sure if those were blend shapes. These are in quotes because I'm a bit out of the loop, and I usually just do straight up joint chains & hand keyed everything for my animations. I don't trust or rely on any Valve tech/support when it comes to my babies.

I am all for experimenting on this idea, but I'm fairly certain that these things aren't supported. Hayes or Helenek might know more.


(Also Hayes Helenek & Harry. #animationHSquad)

brianchenito

commenting to save thread, I'm also interested in whether flexes or morphs are possible

sammarth85

One of the export options in SketchUp is as Animation. This would often be used in order to show someone else an animated fly-through of your design. The viewer may be your client, who doesn't use SketchUp, but is able to view videos online.

Spudnik

I think Hawf knows his way around flexes, hit him up.

MechBgum

Only bones. Flexes are for heroes and for facial animation only.

artefon

Thanks for the information. I ended up using bones.