URGENT - Workaround for a mask within a mask??

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satanictesticles
Posts: 23
Joined: Tue Jul 26, 2005 6:06 am

URGENT - Workaround for a mask within a mask??

Post by satanictesticles »

Hi,

My current scene involves a character looking into a mirror.

The way the two objects (character and mirror) are structured is as follows

Within the character bones setup is an eyelid group to control the eyelids using masking.

CHARACTER (bones)
* eyelids (group) (with Masking settings of HIDE ALL + MASK THIS LAYER)
** eyelids (mask this layer)
** pupils (+add to mask)
** eyes (+add to mask)

Within the "Mirror" group is a duplicate but horizontally reversed clone of the CHARACTER bones animation, also using masking on the group to reveal the character in the glass but not the wood of the mirror.

MIRROR (group) (masking settings HIDE ALL + MASK THIS LAYER)
*character (BONES duplicate) (mask this layer)
*glass (+add to mask)
*mirror wood (do not mask this layer)

MY PROBLEM: When my character moves outside the glass area of the mirror, everything disappears as expected - except the pupils and the eyes, as these are masked under the character bones setup. So I have floating eyewhites + pupils where they are not wanted.

Can anybody suggest a way around this?

Thanks
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slowtiger
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Location: Berlin, Germany
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Post by slowtiger »

I'd do the reflected character as a separate scene, render it as a video with a lossless codec, and import it into the scene into the mask of the mirror.

One can animate the whole scene with everything until the movements are OK, the copy the scene and erase everything which is not needed in that part, then render it.
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heyvern
Posts: 7035
Joined: Fri Sep 02, 2005 4:49 am

Post by heyvern »

This is a bit annoying but...

have you tried rendering?

Apparently nested masks do work... you can't see them in the edit view. They only show up in the render.

Try the set up you have and render one frame to check it. I just did an exact duplicate test and got the eye ball to mask even though in my edit/preview the eyeball appeared not to be masked.

the blue thing is the mirror... and there is a big face. You can see in this picture the eye is masked. In preview it doesn't show that way.

Image

-Vern
satanictesticles
Posts: 23
Joined: Tue Jul 26, 2005 6:06 am

Post by satanictesticles »

HA!! :roll:

You're right, heyvern, it doesn't even render. Maybe I should've tried that first instead of wasting your time, and my time! :D

Thanks for pointing out that stupidly simple answer for me!! Hehe.

:oops:
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