3ds Max >> animation curves >> tangents
polycounter lvl 12
Hello everybody!
Im new to polycount, but I heard its the biggest online community for game developers and designers.
I used Maya for many years, but now, I started using Max, so I'm new to this software.
I wanted to ask you about a problem I've been having with 3ds Max animation curves:
I Can't see the animation curves TANGENTS on the curve editor!!! :poly122:
I have the foot (for example) of the biped selected, I see the animation curve and the keys on track view panel, the SHOW TANGENTS and SHOW ALL TANGENTS buttons are both ON and the tangents simply don't appear!! I have on motion panel selected quaternion and the keys were made with auto-key and the default tangent option on, although now I NEED to edit all the tangents of the animation. Even if I change it on curve to slow, or fast, or any other tangent option, still I don't see ANY transformation on the curves :poly122:
I can't animate propperly wthout seeing the tangents... What's WRONG?? WHY aren't they visible??
PLEASE help! :poly142:
thanks************
Im new to polycount, but I heard its the biggest online community for game developers and designers.
I used Maya for many years, but now, I started using Max, so I'm new to this software.
I wanted to ask you about a problem I've been having with 3ds Max animation curves:
I Can't see the animation curves TANGENTS on the curve editor!!! :poly122:
I have the foot (for example) of the biped selected, I see the animation curve and the keys on track view panel, the SHOW TANGENTS and SHOW ALL TANGENTS buttons are both ON and the tangents simply don't appear!! I have on motion panel selected quaternion and the keys were made with auto-key and the default tangent option on, although now I NEED to edit all the tangents of the animation. Even if I change it on curve to slow, or fast, or any other tangent option, still I don't see ANY transformation on the curves :poly122:
I can't animate propperly wthout seeing the tangents... What's WRONG?? WHY aren't they visible??
PLEASE help! :poly142:
thanks************
Replies
However Biped uses its own curve method (bit annoying really, it's inconsistent) and you have to change the curves using the "ease in" and "ease out" keyframe tools in the Biped panel rollouts.
I think that's how you do it anyway, I'm not an animator and it's been a while since I used Biped but from what I recall you can't edit tangents at all in the graph editor for Biped objects.
Biped has two modes:
Quaternion, which uses TCB (Tension, Continuity and Bias) values to edit the curves. You won't get bezeir handles on TCB values, instead you right click the key and a change the parameters in the pop up window. Very different from what you're used to I bet.
Euler, is very much like you're used to, it gives curves with handles and you can the tangents however you like using the standard methods.
A word of caution, Euler works on everything but hands and feet those will eternally stay Quaternion. Thanks to how it handles the IK/FK blending with planted keys. Also the Euler curves are really quaternion interpretations of what is in the Euler looking curve editor. It "should" quack like a duck and smell like a duck but sometimes its not...
You set Quaternion or Euler mode in the biped menu also under the Quaternion/Euler rollout.
If you're stuck using Quaternion curves I suggest using the biped keyer script, it has several presets to adjust the curves on any selected piece on the current key frame. Pretty handy and take a TINY fraction of the frustration out of working with quaternion curves.
http://www.scriptspot.com/3ds-max/bipedkeyer-v1-4
I also suggest installing the Worker of Biped script which makes selecting biped pieces easier it as some advanced functions that may or may not work depending on your version of max and what your biped is set to, but the selection is bang on great.
http://www.scriptspot.com/3ds-max/worker-of-biped
http://www.scriptspot.com/3ds-max/andye-tools-v1-0
Bitmap also pointed me to a small cache of scripts that looks pretty handy. It has a biped selector built in along with a bunch of other stuff I haven't tested out.
http://boards.polycount.net/showthread.php?p=865223
Also check out Monsters curve editor scripts, they're awesome too I use them all the time on regular objects.
EDIT: Looks like MoP beat me to the punch, heh, hopefully some of this is a helpful addition.
yesterday I got to the point where I understood that in quaternion mode there AREN'T ANY tangents.... so, it leaves me with euler curves, which actually have the bezier handles. Although I tried to correct some animation with it, It doesn't seem to work 100%, because (for example) i have this static pose which is supposed to be stoped for about 20 frames, but there is a slight rotation of the hand back and forward between the 2 keyframes. So, on the curve editor, I flattened all the curves >>> the result is that the slight move still happens... I don't understand this!
@Vig:
the key scripter you gave for me biped, it works exclusively with quaternion mode or can I use with both methods?? I would try it out, is it easy to install, or does it come with help?
other thing , which is annoying me A LOT!:
i realized that with the biped system when animating, for example, I key the hand on a certain pose, or the shoulders, and what happens is that I get the same key frame on every link (bone) behind the hierarchy of the hand. If I rotate the hip, I get keys on all the back links... which takes me a lot of time to correct during the animation, cause I has to be done on every link manually, right?
On maya you have this tool box, called channel box, and that box allows you to simply intruduce numerically the values you want to any given bone, which is VERY VERY handy, cause if you want to put 5 bones to 0 values, its very quick and easy to do that.
I was wondering if MAX has any box like this, one I can simply introduce the value I want....?
this might be getting confusing :poly142:
thanks guys! see ya later***********
Yep only quaternion with TCB values. Also you can "break" curve handles into by holding shift and dragging one of the handles. You can also click "custom" in the tangents box second red curve line from the left.
Welcome to biped. This is probably the single most frustrating thing remaining in biped. You animate systems, Left Arm is one system as is the spine, the right arm, right left ect... You need to specifically create new keys sub-links if you want to to behave any differently.
Now heres another kicker, you can't drag one axis away from the others. For example if you wanted to offset the X key away from YZ you would need to create a new key and mimic the curves for YZ as close as possible. Totally re-tard-ed.
Down in the lower right are two type in boxes, one is to move the selected key to another key by type-in and the other is the value.
One other thing I find helpful. If you hold ctrl while dragging keys it will lock to the direction you first drag. Ctrl + mouse vertical locks the key moving vertically. Ctrl + mouse horiz yea you guessed it.
Shift + drag copies keys, shift + ctrl + drag copies keys but locks the movement.
Right click in the curve editor brings up a tiny quad menu , handy for selecting add keys, move keys, scale keys.
Good luck it sounds like you're almost out of the woods!
thanks!
If its a TCB curve you'll need to crank up the tension to flatten out the curve.
I'm pretty sure you're using the right boxes but just in case these are the ones I'm talking about. There are some weird refresh bugs with the biped workbench. There are times it stops updating. Normally closing it and reopening it will fix that. Also make sure autokey is turned on, there are specific edits it won't let you do and will "snap back" to previous settings if its not on.
This should work in the regular curve editor and in workbench, in Euler and TCB as long as you're set to "move keys" (right click). If all that checks out it might be good to restart 3dsmax. This kind of wonky stablity seems to happen the more you undo actions. Especially if you undo a few actions quickly while its still undoing the first. The more you work with biped the less this becomes an issues. It's still a fickle b!tch at times but its getting better. 3 years ago I would have told you to not even bother with it.
Is it possible you could be set to the wrong curves like "Rot Speed"? The two main sets of curves you'll be editing are Rot Curve and Pos Curve.
About the workbench, I was on the correct box, but I haven't figured out how it works, so Im doing everything by setting free keys, on euler mode, and then refining the tangents. So far , so good.... Your tip about the tension really helped me!
about the box where I can place the number values, how does it work?
I'm not sure if you have played that much with planted keys (IK). But that takes some getting used to.
You select a key and the box on the left lets you type in a frame. The box on the right adjusts the value up or down. They only change the position of the key in the curve editor not any of the behind the scenes TCB values. For that you're stuck right clicking the key.
About playing with planted keys, no, I haven't played with them enough to understand the differences and how it works. Im working with max for almost 2 weeks now, but I had to start by rigging a character and animate it.
so now, I tweaked a bit more my animation (its a female golf player), so I have been animating a swing, which is the most complex movement she will do. this is for a game using the OGRE plataform.
Im using OGRE exporter and viewer to check if everything is allright before uoloading it to our system.
what happend was:
I animated with euler curves (like I said on the earlier post), but the legs slide back and forward when I play the animation of the swing (on ogre viewer), where the legs (on max) are completely still. I don't know if you know about ogre or this kind of problem, but this is the reason why I had to change to Max, from maya, cause I also had problems exporting animated models that became distorted on Ogre....
do you know ANYthing about this kind of problem? the geometry doesn't become distorted, only the entire leg that moves out of place and swings during the whole animation.....
many many thanks!!
But I can offer some advice based on other exporting I've done.
If the legs where sliding around inside of max I would say use planted keys, but since you're exporting it gets infinitely more complex and planted keys aren't always a good idea. Still you could try adding planted keys to the feet and see if they stick.
It could be the way it is interpreting the curves, so you could test for that by exporting with a key on every frame. Most exporters have this an an option, if not you can save the biped animation (small disk icon) which has an option to save a key per frame. Then load that back into your character then export. You could also try setting it back to quaternion and see how well it exports.
Also make sure to delete or collapse any extra layers you have on the biped. As those will effect the way things are exported.
Good luck!
Why does exporting always fall on the animators... grr...
anyway, the legs on max are perfectely still, there is no movement on them, so what I will try is to export with keys on every frame...
tried to change it back to quaternion but the same thing happens.
other thing I realized is that on a walk cycle, every animation of the model is correct on the mesh viewer, but in the case of the swing, where there is NO animation on the legs (they're just planted on the ground) they swing on the viewer... perhaps it has to do with the fact that has no animation, I will also try to put some sort of animation on the legs and check it on the viewer...
wish me luck! :poly142:
Sorry for the necro but I'm wondering if this has been fixed yet? I'm currently using max 2012 and it still seems to have this "issue".