Switch Selection concept for v13.5

[kungfudork]

I'm so excited to see Lost Marble back at the helm of MOHO!

I have a concept I want to share, that I think would be an awesome improvement to workflow. I'm no programmer but I feel like all the data is already there in the software it just needs to be displayed differently.
Currently you can scrub through to see your different options in the Switch Selection window and whatever you stop on is keyed. There are a few things that slow you down....one, is hunting down your switch layer in the folder strutcture....two, is
you must then scrub back and forth to find the option you want. I propose all options are visually at once and when you click on the picture you need it keys that one. You could then have tabs of each switch layer in your scene.
I mocked it up here:

[arglborps]

That would make things easier, especially since you don't need to select the layer in the layers window (can be messy with tons of layers), but you could just tab around between switch layers for the current rig. I'd like to have that. I'm making excessive use of switch layers for mouth shapes and hands, so it would be time saver for sure.

I'm just wondering how hidden/invisible switch layers would appear here and how to activate/hide them (e.g. I have two different sets of mouth shapes one for neutral/happy one for angry/shouting, only one of either will be shown at any time).

[synthsin75]

I wrote a tool that does that years ago, but due to some scripting limitations, I never felt it was ready for distribution. I might revisit it to see if anything can be improved.

[gilcartunista]

Fantastic Wes! would you like to try on my current project is it possible?

[MrMiracle77]

I wouldn't mind seeing something similar implemented for actions.

I'd even be happy just being able to assign a custom icon to an action.

As a small workflow addition, you could even set the timeline to advance by a pre-set number of frames when you click on the switch layer/action you want.

[A.Evseeva]

It would be fine, Wes, if You share the script. It is very interesting, how did You implement the thumbnails.

[synthsin75]

It would be fine, Wes, if You share the script. It is very interesting, how did You implement the thumbnails.

I'll see if I can get it a bit more solid before posting it. The thumbnails are just PNGs, render by the script and brought in as image buttons. The biggest problem with that is, if you want to update the thumbnails, you have to shut down and restart Moho, because it doesn't release the memory of the first one. I'm currently automating this on Windows, using an AutoHoykey script, but for a general release, I'll probably just add a dialog informing the user to do this. Another issue is getting the image buttons in a dialog to immediately update the workspace, although I may have figured that one out since writing it. And then my method to center and zoom the layer's content needs work, because I was using the same for all the switch sublayers but need to do it for each layer individually.

[strider2000]

I think I was one of the people that was talking with Wes about that idea when he was working on the script I definitely agree that the ability to see all the images at once would be great. I mainly use switch layers for hand and mouths, but with a general dialog like you suggest, I can see there's potential for more things that can be done, especially if you work with bitmaps. I've always wanted to try to display all the images at once, but was always busy with other things. It'll be cool to see what Wes comes up with I still think it's a great idea

[DK]

This is a great idea! Moho needs some visuals somewhere in the Switch Layer environment that show you your selections. Animating complicated characters I find myself selecting a switch layer then struggling to read through a long list of tags to find the right one. Most of the time I just get lost in scrolling up and down the list several times before finding the right one.

Cheers
D.K

[A.Evseeva]

if you want to update the thumbnails, you have to shut down and restart Moho

and this is a problem! I even thought about using python app to show a dialog with thumbnails.

[strider2000]

if you want to update the thumbnails, you have to shut down and restart Moho

and this is a problem! I even thought about using python app to show a dialog with thumbnails.

Of course it would be great if you didn't have to shut down Moho. However, I don't know about others, but I typically do most of my art creation in a separate session than animation. I see the selection pane as mainly for animating. I tweak lots of things during animation, but, at least for me, adding or tweaking my switch layers is not something I typically do during the animation process. So, ... I'd be willing to live with that

[A.Evseeva]

So, all the image files used in some project have to be copied to Resource folder and restart Moho after this?

[Penny]

Would probably be a nice feature even if personally I never (I mean never) used the switch viewer. With tons of sublayers could be probably useful but i doubt that moho will handle it easily without crashing or slowing down enormously.

I find myself comfortable using exclusively shorcuts which I would to remind for those who are interested to speed their workflow.

Directly in the viewport you can:

ALT + right click = select directly a layer
ALT + SHIFT + right click = select the group which contains the layer

and the most useful related to this thread, if pointed on a layer inside a switch one:

CTRL + ALT + right click = Opens a dropdown menù directly in the viewport to select another layer of the switch group

I hope someone will find this useful

[synthsin75]

if you want to update the thumbnails, you have to shut down and restart Moho

and this is a problem! I even thought about using python app to show a dialog with thumbnails.

I've thought of using an external script too. While it's easy enough to pass arguments from Moho Lua to external apps/scripts, it's not as easy to get data back. I think the only way is to write the data to a file, so Lua can read it.

So, all the image files used in some project have to be copied to Resource folder and restart Moho after this?

Yeah, I render all the images directly to a separate ScriptResources folder for each project. So the user doesn't have to handle them, but Moho does have to be restarted.
I'm looking to see if I can delete that folder and have the user just reload tools (ctrl+alt+shift+L) before rendering the new, updated thumbnails.

Wait, I just had an idea. Updating the thumbnails might work if I rename the files, so Moho isn't loading the same image from memory. I'll test that out today.

Of course it would be great if you didn't have to shut down Moho. However, I don't know about others, but I typically do most of my art creation in a separate session than animation. I see the selection pane as mainly for animating. I tweak lots of things during animation, but, at least for me, adding or tweaking my switch layers is not something I typically do during the animation process. So, ... I'd be willing to live with that

That's true, I guess.

[synthsin75]

Fantastic Wes! would you like to try on my current project is it possible?

Yeah, if someone has a file, especially with nested switch layers (like mouth switches inside a mood switch layer, like happy, sad, neutral, etc.), that would help testing. I don't need the whole character, just the bone/main layer with one or two nested switch layers with their art.

PM me if you don't want to share it publicly.