Hi there,

how would I generate reusable clips from animations of the toon character? I'm searching for a way to create “Clips” from keyframe ranges that I can play back on the Toon-Character then.

Let's say I do the following:

- I animate the toon character. let's say it's a 25 frames walk-cycle.
Now I would like to select the 25 frames and say “you're clip ‘walk1’”.

- I animate the toon character again. this time a 12 frames running-cycle.
I select the 12 frames and say “you're clip ‘run1’”

Then finally:

- I place another Toon-Char with the same rig in the scene, copy it 20 times and let them all play “walk1” with a random frame offset so it looks like a crowd walking.

or

- I animate a new Toon-Char which starts with walk1 and the blends into run1 and back out into walk1, so I don't have to animate the transitions by hand, etc.

What tools would I use for this?
Gimme a hint where to start with the research

Cheers,
elderic

First, create channel groups for all your channels. Right-click on the Toon character object and choose “Create Nested Channel Groups”. Now you have channel groups for all can scope your toon character animation channels.

Right-click over a channel group (eg. Animation) and choose Motion Effects > Create Clip. If desired, choose to remove the original animation so that you can start from scratch for the next clip. Repeat this for all your motions.

To use the clips, you will need to learn how to use CHOPs (aka CHannel OPerators) inside the /obj/motionfx node. To tell the Toon character to use any of those created clips, you click on the export (orange) flag of any CHOP node in the network editor. To blend and sequence those clips, use the Shift, Sequence, Blend, Composite, etc. nodes.

Thank you very much.
Once again you were very helpful

Have a nice transition into 2010!

Cheers,
Elderic

there is one video on the side effects that show part of that, i mean at least show how to create a group for the channels.

and there is another that who how to mix a or blend not sure awalk cycle to a run cycle using the toon character.

pelos
and there is another that who how to mix a or blend not sure awalk cycle to a run cycle using the toon character.

where exactly can i find this tutorial?

http://www.sidefx.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1180&Itemid=241 [sidefx.com]