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ktadie
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Joined: Thu Mar 06, 2008 8:05 pm

Easy and Fast Help needed Please.

Post by ktadie »

hey there guys, i have a school project where i want to use anime studio to creating an animation that teaches youg kids how to tie their shoe laces.

however, i am having som newbie difficulties with the whole bone setup.
all i am trying to do is make the shape of the two laces, and then put in the bones and move thme around at differnt frames/key frames, showing step by step the process done to tie the laces together.

however, i just cant get the bone fucnitons to work. i have made two rectagles, filled the shape however i cant insert a bone..

how can this be done? ;p


thanks so much! and sorry if may be obvious and easy for most of you, but it seems hard to me.

ktadie.
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heyvern
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Post by heyvern »

You need to read the help and do the tutorials. Bones are one of the main features of AS. All is explained in the tutorials and the help.

If after reading about the basics you still have specific problems come back here and ask away. I know it seems easier to ask on the forum but the answers will just be "copy and paste" from the help files and tutorials.

---------

I will give you a couple of hints. A bone layer is a group layer which contains vector layers.. You can't create bones on a vector layer.

Two "rectangles" won't be the way to do shoelaces. You should use long single strokes with a thick weight. You need lots of points in those strokes and lots of bones to control them.

Best bet would be to not use bones and animate the points (turn off auto-weld on the translate point tool).

-vern
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slowtiger
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Post by slowtiger »

From experience I know that you picked a tough job - animating any knots is difficult work! If you get that right, you really do a good job.
ktadie
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Post by ktadie »

yea i have, it just shows a stupid ready made elbow in the tutorial, which is not what i need.

so ehm, i have kinda gotten the hang of the bones, its just that the shape which i will be using are just two rectangles. now, after i have put in all the bones in the two rectangles, i can manipulate them, which then moves the rectangles. however, its like the two rectangles are together, even though they are not touuching. as soon as i move around with a bone in rectangle to the left, the bones in rectangle to the right will move according to it- how do i change that?

and is there a way of pulling the bones towards one side? since i will be showing how to tie som shoelaces, one of the laces (rectangles) will need to loop over the other, got under the other, pulled through holes etc.

thanx alot guys
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heyvern
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Post by heyvern »

Read the help about bones, bone parenting and binding. There is more than just a stupid ready made elbow. You need to understand how bones are connected. That is why the bones are moving each other. A bone moves with a parent bone.

As far as the shape ordering... as slowtiger said... you picked a really tough concept for your first project.

There is no way to animate shape ordering unless you put sections of the shoelaces on different layers and animate z-depth. This would be an advanced concept. If you do a search on the forum using z-depth as the search word you should find a few threads that explain this.

Basically to start with you will have break each lace into multiple pieces on different layers. They will still be connected but each layer can be reordered to create the illusion that they are moving over and under.

----

There would be another way to do this without using the layer z-depth trick now that I think about it. Same idea of using multiple layers but you just animate the visibility. Another option would be to animate the opacity of shapes to create the effect.

-vern
ktadie
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Post by ktadie »

ok, well i just figured out the layer thing.

but now i would like to know how to "stretch" the bones, making my differnt laces longer, as if u pull them. "Scale bone" does something very similar, however i can never use it. its always gray and un-click able...

and then i would also like to know how to assign certain parts of each object, to overlap other parts. since now i can only have one layer ontop of the other.

this would do the trick for me i think!

unless its the z-dpth thing u guys were talking about, which looks cery cery complicated.
Samb
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Post by Samb »

I would say forget bones and do it with points-animation.
you need like 100 bones for a smooth "tieing-animation".
points are flexible, can be stretched with no problems etc. so, before you go crazy with bones, try points :)
ktadie
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Post by ktadie »

how do i use points-animation?
where can i find it in anime pro?
it sounds good :D
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Rasheed
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Post by Rasheed »

Points animation is just using the Translate Points tool.

The way I would do that is to create a storyboard, draw key poses with a drawing program (doesn't have to be very exact), use those as tracing images for the keys in the translate points animation channel. Next, you refine the key frames, so you have a fluent animation.

You could even videotape the shoe lacing and use that as the basis of your drawings, or include the footage in your animation.
ktadie
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Post by ktadie »

im trying with the translate points, however it is kinda tricky, and i cannot insert a new bone into the parts which i have stretched.. any help on that?

and how do i choose certain parts to overlap each other. like object 1 overlapping object 2 at one part, and then the other part object 2 is overlapping object 1.'

thx in advanced
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slowtiger
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Post by slowtiger »

Years ago I had a similar task: to animate sailor's knots. I solved the problem with two circles, one white, one a bit bigger and black and under the first, and the "trails" function of MM Director.
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Rasheed
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Post by Rasheed »

I have made an animation for you, using some of the techniques I think you're going to need.

Image
  • point motion
  • masking
  • shading by overlaying a semi-transparent black layer
Here is the file: shoe.anme.zip
ktadie
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Post by ktadie »

Rasheed wrote:I have made an animation for you, using some of the techniques I think you're going to need.

Image
  • point motion
  • masking
  • shading by overlaying a semi-transparent black layer
Here is the file: shoe.anme.zip
omg rasheed, that is truely amazing! and thanx so much for giving m the file. iim going through it now, to see what you have done. thanks alot!

looks so simple though :P yet so hard for me :o
i guess usig bones was a bad idea.

slowtiger u'll have to explain alitle better for me please! and i will only be using anime studio though ;p

just looked through anime studio.. i really dont know what the masking and point motion is O.o where did u find the tool in the anime studio interface? ;p (sorry if im being a pain ^^ but thanks alot!
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Rasheed
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Post by Rasheed »

Do (not just read, but actually do) the tutorials, supplied with the software, and perhaps buy the official guide by Kelly L. Murdock. This isn't something you learn in an afternoon. You really have to take the time to learn, especially if you have no experience as an animator.
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heyvern
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Post by heyvern »

There is no "point motion tool". It is the same translate point tool used to move points around on the screen. If you use that tool on another frame the point is "key framed".

I am going to keep saying this over and over... no matter how "stupid" or "sparse" the included help and tutorials are... if you don't even read them at all you have nothing.
looks so simple though yet so hard for me
Those of us who are "experts" with AS only got that way by reading the help and doing the tutorials. There was a time when I had no clue. My only guide was searching the forum and reading the help... I read those help files... like a book... I just read it... from start to finish... I would constantly go back to it and eventually it sunk in and started to make sense.

-vern
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