Copying Set Driven keys

Spudnik

Hey guys,

I'm currently doing bone driven facial rigs for a few characters and I was wondering if it was possible to copy the Set Driven keys (that I use for my GUI) from one character to another with a similar bone setup? Obviously this wouldn't give me a perfect result since the characters are different, but I was wondering if this could give me a baseline to work off of so I don't have to start from zero for each character.

Oh and another thing: I have some animation on one of the characters where the helm opens and closes that I would like to turn into a slider in my GUI as well. Is there a way to turn animation into a control slider (is that a word?) using Set Driven keys like I have for the rest of the facial rig? To the extent of my (very limited) knowledge, you can't do Set Driven keys with animation on the bones, so I was wondering if there was another way or a workaround.

I'm working in Maya 2012.

Thanks in advance!

Spudnik

Anybody? I tried copying the keys directly but that didn't do anything :S

Damien_B

Not sure, need to test this for myself. But, can you copy the sdk nodes in the hypergraph and hook them up to your alt skeleton?

Spudnik

My question is, how would I go about doing that, because that's exactly what I want to do, I just haven't found a way to successfully copy keys or the nodes from one skeleton to the next.

Damien_B

I'll have to do some tests as, I too am interested in this. I'll see what I can see, and get back to this thread over the next few days.

//

Its been a while since I dug into this stuff but to answer your second question about sliders: I would use sdk's sure. I remember having some luck with the component editor for that kind of thing. If I remember right, open component editor, select master (x-y-z) in left column, selct slave(x-y-z) in right column. and link or wire them. I'm sorry dude, been a minute. I'll look into this more and give a write up if no one else has responded.

Spudnik

Absolutely no need to apologize, I appreciate any and all help that you guys have to offer!

That said, I'm not sure what you mean by selecting a master and slave in the component editor, though.

Damien_B

Sorry again, I've been easily distracted lately, I meant to say the connection editor...You can select your "slider" as the master to drive your "slave" helmet anim. (if that makes sense)
I'll get back here soon with a solution to the multiple skeleton sdk problem. Maybe someone else will chime in between now and then...