Shapes and Welds and Bones Moving Around

[Toontoonz]

In a previous forum the discussion was on problems with lots of shapes in Moho and bones - when the bones move the shapes have a tendency to move over each other do some unusual things.

I have been trying to find a way to control lots and lots of shapes better in Moho. So I thought of welding. After a miss-start and help from ulrik I got welding to work.

So I made this round ball with 12 different shapes welded it, then boned it.
Works pretty good - none of the shapes overlap anymore like before.

See quick test:

[T]

Very nice...

Is welding a new feature, or yet another one I didn't realize I had all this time?

(or is it just a term for something I know how to do already but call something else?)

Either way, it looks good.

[T]

Ah, how did I miss this (or forget it)... Tutorial 2.1

Ok, I know what this is, and I just didn't know to call it welding.

[Lost Marble]

In a previous forum the discussion was on problems with lots of shapes in Moho and bones - when the bones move the shapes have a tendency to move over each other do some unusual things.

I guess I didn't understand what you were talking about before, but now I think I do. Let's talk some more about how bones work:

Bones control the points in a piece of vector artwork. They have no direct influence over the curves in that artwork. The curves just automatically connect the points. So, if your artwork has very few points, it can't bend very well under the influence of bones. An example might help show what I'm talking about:

http://www.lostmarble.com/misc/bones_n_points.moho

Play back the animation and look at the bones. See how both bone structures bend the same way, but the rectangles respond very differently. Now select the vector layer and look at the rectangles. The one on the left has just four points (at the four corners), while the one on the right has extra points along the long sides.

When the bones move, the left rectangle is only controlled at the two ends where the points are. The right rectangle, on the other hand, has more places for the bones to exert their influence, and can therefore bend smoothly.

If your artwork has few points in it, and bones don't seem to move your objects smoothly, you may want to add some more points.

[ulrik]

Thanks for this tutorial LM, I should have known this but it had slipped my mind, for me I have to hear and see things over and over again.

[Rasheed]

I'd like to comment on this, because I'm trying to find out how to use bones effectively.

Not only the number of points matter, but also the complexity of the shape. Look at this setup:


I think this shape will be very difficult to animate with bones. It seems that these kinds of shapes will require tweaking with points translations as well.

It is quite possible that not all shapes can be animated using bones animation. So, I think if you want to use bone animation, you should first test if it can be animated before using it in your animations.

[Toontoonz]

LM - My point wasn´t the number of points in a shape, it is having multiple shapes in a character and that they distort, overlap and move unnaturally when it is bone animated, as shown in this sample:



When the shapes are welded together (as shown in first clip at the top) the shapes do not seem to overlap each other or slop around as with a character that has lots of shapes that not welded together, but loose.

The alternative to controlling these loose, separate shapes is using lots of bones, which takes lots of trial and error experimenting to get it right.

[Toontoonz]

To try and explain what I noticed here is another graphic.
If separate shapes are on a character or graphic when bones move them they all twist and distort differently which causes overlapping and gaps.

When I welded the shapes together I did not get any gaps or overlapping - every shape moves perfectly together.

Here is an image trying to detail it better.
http://img517.imageshack.us/img517/1223/gaps2in.jpg

[Rai López]

ToonToonz, you can put the grid to 1 (i.e.) to put your not welded points EXACTLY at the same position, then that points will react EXACTLY in the same way to the bones movement avoiding gappings and holes, I use it continuosly cause not always is interesting weld certain points and works perfect to me... CIAO!

[Toontoonz]

The grid idea would work if the grid lined up with every point.
How do you do it with curvy shapes? How does one line up two curvy shapes perfectly to each so there is no gap?

And I tried it -two rectangles perfectly aligned next to each other - if you use the Scale bone during your animation it still makes a gap between the shapes.
Welding - no gap, no matter what.

Click below to see larger views:
Perfectly aligned

Used bone scaling - gap appears:

The more scaling, the more gap. This would not happen if the two rectangles were welded to each other.

[Rai López]

HI again! Of course, in that cases it'd be necessary weld, but I only wanted clarify that sometimes coul be avoided if the the circumstancies are favourables like in your previous image...

[Toontoonz]

Ramon, thanks for the input and comments -
I thought that a lot of people are not necessarily familiar with welding in Moho and it could be a big help in the creation of animation.

I have welded an entire character together (human type figure) with lots of shading, shapes and things and it worked very well - better than no welding.
This Moho welding method is somewhat similar to creating a model in a 3D animation it takes a lot more work up front to create the model (in this case all the welding) but in the long run one can save time in the animation process and get better effects and less problems with the lots of different, unattached shapes. (I remembered these tricks from my former days of making 2D model characters in Hash AnimationMaster - its works just the same as in Moho.)

Just another thing for people to try and see if it can work for them and their style of animation. I am always experimenting trying to find new ways to work in Moho.

[Rai López]

I am always experimenting trying to find new ways to work in Moho.

...I TOO!

[Lost Marble]

Toontoonz - I can't view your movie for some reason, but I think it may still have to do with the number of points in a shape, and how they are arranged. When you weld points, you know for a fact that they are at the same position, and are under the influence of the same bone(s). If you just line them up visually, they may look close but not if you zoom in. When you start moving them around with bones, those differences can show up.

Try re-downloading the file I posted before - I made a couple changes:

http://www.lostmarble.com/misc/bones_n_points.moho

Now there are two smaller rectangles. The two on the right move together. They are welded together, but that's not really the reason they move together. The move together because they have points that line up at the same places. The easiest way to ensure this is to either weld points, or use the grid. So, welding can make this work more smoothly, but the real issue is that bones control points, so you sometimes need to put some consideration into where your points are.

[Toontoonz]

Zippyvideos seems to have problems sometimes.

Here is a re-load to try:Click here to watch Mr. Tubngub
Lots of shapes flopping around - nothing welded.
In particular Watch at bottom near legs how the grey shading comes out of the body form. I did the same thing with welding and many fewer bones and did not have the same problems.

There are over 20 bones in the character.

If you think what I am doing is incorrect then what is the purpose of welding? When and why should one use it?
As you say in the tutorial about welding: "The resulting shape is much cleaner and easier to work with:"