Moho Forum

I'm regularly thwarted in my desire to use a switch group because the transition between group members is too abrupt. So just because I'd like to have a 2-3 frame fade between switch members, I have to forego the switch group entirely and do all the transitions by hand. I assume there is no such thing as switch group transitions, but is there some sort of trick I don't know about or a plug-in that will do this?

I too would like to have this knowledge. Thanks for asking Jkoseattle.
By the way Lab rat is way cool reminded me of Danny Elfman OingoBoingo. Nice video good music.

Not a simple solution, but what I do when I know there's a series of transitions:
Create a group layer and make it fade in/out in the exact fashion I need.
Multiply this layer. Move duplicates in time.
Put my stuff inside.

(Another solution in TVPaint which works well with still images: just stretch the clip with interpolation switched on.)

slowtiger wrote: ↑Mon Jan 06, 2020 8:35 pm Not a simple solution, but what I do when I know there's a series of transitions:
Create a group layer and make it fade in/out in the exact fashion I need.
Multiply this layer. Move duplicates in time.
Put my stuff inside.

(Another solution in TVPaint which works well with still images: just stretch the clip with interpolation switched on.)

I don't understand what you are doing here. Could you elaborate?

uncle808us wrote: ↑Mon Jan 06, 2020 6:31 pm I too would like to have this knowledge. Thanks for asking Jkoseattle.
By the way Lab rat is way cool reminded me of Danny Elfman OingoBoingo. Nice video good music.

Thanks for the kind words about Laboratory Rat! It's been compared to Oingo Boingo by others as well, and I would like to officially point out that the original song was written before anyone had heard of them, so it's not derivative!! The video was my first attempt at animation, I did it using Adobe Premiere though. for documentation sake: it's here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hGUrv-rwrK0

uncle808us wrote: ↑Wed Jan 08, 2020 2:27 am

slowtiger wrote: ↑Mon Jan 06, 2020 8:35 pm Not a simple solution, but what I do when I know there's a series of transitions:
Create a group layer and make it fade in/out in the exact fashion I need.
Multiply this layer. Move duplicates in time.
Put my stuff inside.

(Another solution in TVPaint which works well with still images: just stretch the clip with interpolation switched on.)

I don't understand what you are doing here. Could you elaborate?

I also don't understand what you're doing here. Could you elaborate II?

if you join this up with the discussion about "vertical" separation (http://www.lostmarble.com/forum/viewtop ... 13&t=33260) and noting that you've used premier then you can have ..

a file with the bg that runs for the whole video duration

one file for each of the groups that you're currently switching that start and end a few frames before and after the otherwise "hard" switch point using the bg (or audio as here: http://www.lostmarble.com/forum/viewtop ... 9&p=189689) as a reference only (i.e. render these without the bg)

assemble in premier and - either fade in /out the footage if you use multiple video tracks for the scenes as in the "audio" post, or cut together on one track and use a "dissolve" transition between the scenes - all that layered over the bg/audio

Jkoseattle wrote: ↑Mon Jan 06, 2020 5:25 pmI assume there is no such thing as switch group transitions, but is there some sort of trick I don't know about or a plug-in that will do this?

Switching between groups requires Moho 12.5 and higher. Earlier versions of Moho can interpolate between layers but not groups containing layers. This feature assumes you're modifying a duplicate of another vector layer in the switch. Otherwise the 'morphing' transition effect cannot occur.

To me, Interpolate Sublayers became way more useful after 12.5 because I typically need masking effects in my mouth and eye switches.

Interpolate Sublayers is meant for vector art, but it may be possible to use with image layers too. If you want to do this with image layers, you will need to add copies of a mesh warp layer to each group for the interpolation. Depending on your character design, that could get over-complicated, and you might be better off creating in-between image frames. The downside of that is you'll wind up with a lot more layers. If you take this route, be sure to give your layers logically descriptive names. (For images that need to transition, I usually just draw the shapes needed...it usually looks better. I'll use a mesh warp when the deformations I wanted aren't going to be extreme.)

When Moho's developers added group interpolation to switch layers in Moho 12.5, I experimented with it for a few characters in Boss Baby. On my most recent demo reel, you can see Group interpolation used in the 'Granny' scenes near the end, and I may have used it for the Kung Fu Panda stuff. It works very well but it does require a bit of pre-planning with the base shapes. For example, if you need to add or remove any points after you've started, you've pretty much hosed your morphing capability and will need to start over. It's best to experiment with the setup you want in its own project file before committing to it in your full character rig.

Hope this helps.

Do you think the devs will iron out the few kinks there are with switch transitions relatively fast?

Can you be more specific? What kinks to you mean and in what situation?

As far as I know, the Switch group is working correctly but I'll be happy to pass on any bugs you discover to the devs.