seanc@pro-party.cts.com (Sean Cunningham) (05/18/91)
JMan's ACTION module is probably the most complex piece of the
package. After it's loaded you're greeted with another
hires-interlace screen that looks similar to the SCULPTURE module's
MODELER screen but with more gadgets. The ACTION module is for
"relative" motion. Relative motion would be the act of turning your
head as you walk along a straight path ("absolute" motion). JMan
lets you store a library of relative motions, or ACTIONS so that they
may be used later, and for other FIGURES having the same number of
SEGMENTS.
After you LOAD a FIGURE from the PROJECT menu, you see that you
have the same gadgets for controlling the aspect of your viewpoint as
well as the orientation of selected SEGMENTs. You can also use the
gadgets above each view window to change angles.
The left hand window is where you will modify a SEGMENT or group
of SEGMENTs across a series of frames to create one of several types
of animation. The right hand window lets you view the entire FIGURE
while animating. This right hand window is called the SKELETON
window, while the window on the left is the MORPH window.
There are several types of animation possible in the ACTION
module, and you'll more than likely use either more than one, or ALL
of them when animating a FIGURE. The first, is SKELETON motion.
This is the simplest form of motion, and can affect only whole
SEGMENTs. SKELETON motion includes ROLL, TILT, and SWIVEL rotation,
X, Y, and Z movement, and scaling along X, Y, and Z.
If you wish a movement to affect a SEGMENT on the CONTROL POINT
level, then you'll need to use MUSCLE motion. MUSCLE motion lets you
bend, twist and scale a SEGMENT point by point, using familiar tools
from the MODELER screen like GROUP and HIDE.
Then there is SPINE motion. Up until now, I haven't described
anything (except for the splines and cubic patches) that you can't
get in any other 3D package. Here's where JMan leaves them all in
the dust, and I don't care if it's IMAGINE we're talking about,
LIGHTWAVE or CALIGARI. SPINE motion, unique to JMan and JMan only,
allows you to animate a single spline and have this spline control a
much larger SEGMENT. The spline would be drawn down the length of a
SEGMENT in the MODELER section of the SCULPTURE module. The number
of control points along this spline should be determined according to
the size of the SEGMENT it will be controlling. After a FIGURE is
loaded into the ACTION module, and the SEGMENT containing the SPINE
is selected, you select one of the CONTROL POINTS on SPINE and choose
ASSIGN SPINE from the PREFERENCES menu. With this taken care of, you
click the SPINE gadget from the panel running along the top of the
screen. Now you can select any of the CONTROL POINTS along the SPINE
and use the scaling and rotation gadgets to modify the entire
segment. This is extremely useful for "squash and stretch"
animation, critical for believable characters. The only technique
that is even close to SPINE motion is Pacific Data Images'
"squashbox" technique, where a complex character is represented by a
bounded volume that can be distorted and twisted, etc. Then this
motion is passed on to the more complex object. Same thing with
JMan.
The motion in the ACTION module is keyframe based. You have a
FRAMES gadget that lets you jump ahead to establish a new keyframe,
or go back to an existing frame. However, the ACTION module isn't
limited to the method of keyframing so common to other packages.
The ACTION module makes use of CHANNELS, which are graphic
representations of motion. JMan uses splines to represent this
motion.
You open a CHANNEL window by selecting the appropriate type from
the PREFERENCES menu. Once open, you'll notice that it has the
standard gadgets of an Intuition window, but with extra gadgets along
the bottom and right side. The interior of the window, the CHANNEL
GRAPH, is where the motion will be represented. If you're working on
a large bit of animation, you can drag the CHANNEL window out to full
screen, and multiple CHANNELs may be open at a time. Each CHANNEL
window is for particular SEGMENT, so more than one of each type may
be open as well. Keep in mind, it can be *very* confusing if you have
several windows open.
The SKELETON CHANNEL lets you control the scale and translation
of a SEGMENT along the X, Y, and Z planes, as well as its ROLL, TILT,
and SWIVEL. The SPINE CHANNEL gives you the same controls. The BIAS
CHANNEL lets you tweak the ALPHA 1 and 2, GAMMA 1 and 2, and
MAGNITUDE 1 and 2. This is for when you've modified the ALPHA,
GAMMA, and/or MAGNITUDE values for CONTROL POINTS while performing
MUSCLE motion. And the MUSCLE CHANNEL lets you control the
translation of the CONTROL POINTS modified with MUSCLE MOTION along
the X, Y, and Z planes.
Once inside a CHANNEL window, select the parameter you wish to
adjust and use the gadgets along the bottom of the window to Add,
Delete, Peak, and Smooth CONTROL POINTS as you draw your curves.
There's also an Undo gadget to take back a mistake. Frames are
represented horizontally across the CHANNEL GRAPH, while the
percentage of the motion's completion is along the vertical plane.
Very smooth motion can be attained by experimenting with the
curvature of your graph.
You can check your progress by clicking on the AUDITION and
PREVIEW gadgets at the top. AUDITION lets you preview SPINE and
MUSCLE motion as seen in the MORPH WINDOW. PREVIEW lets you see the
SKELETON, SPINE, and MUSCLE motion together, as seen from the
SKELETON WINDOW.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> .SIG v2.5 <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
UUCP: ...!crash!pnet01!pro-party!seanc RealWorld: Sean Cunningham
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INET: seanc@pro-party.cts.com ____________________________________
// | * All opinions expressed herein |
HELP KEEP THE COMPETITION UNDER \X/ | Copyright 1991 VISION GRAPHICS |
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>><<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<seanc@pro-party.cts.com (Sean Cunningham) (05/18/91)
Both AUDITION and PREVIEW animations are saved to RAM: as a file
called TEST.
Once you have your relative motions the way you want them, you
will want to save these motions for use later. SKELETON motions
must be saved separate from MUSCLE and SPINE motion. MUSCLE and
SPINE motion may be saved individually, or together as a MORPH
motion.
Something that came up while using CHANNELs was that they do not
like to be closed, resulting in several "Green GURUs," but more of
the fatal kind. This occurred under both v2.03 and v1.3.2 of
AmigaDOS, and is something that needs to be worked on. Another
problem with the CHANNEL windows is specific to v2.03. The new
AmigaDOS windows are much wider on the right side than the older
AmigaDOS windows, so some of the CHANNEL PARAMETER gadgets are
invisible. You can still click on them and modify them, but it's
annoying not to be able to see them.
Next up: DIRECTION
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> .SIG v2.5 <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
UUCP: ...!crash!pnet01!pro-party!seanc RealWorld: Sean Cunningham
ARPA: !crash!pnet01!pro-party!seanc@nosc.mil Voice: (512) 992-2810
INET: seanc@pro-party.cts.com ____________________________________
// | * All opinions expressed herein |
HELP KEEP THE COMPETITION UNDER \X/ | Copyright 1991 VISION GRAPHICS |
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>><<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<