the prost process anim bp has the rigid body anim graph node
#animation
molten jewel
yea thats what i expected
If you make the main skeletal mesh comp the one that would be responsible for rendering the thing with customizable post process bp it should work
which means if it were the torso, all your torso skeletal meshes would need all the bones in the main one for anything that relies on it
so torso would double as main, and the only thing that can have customized post process bp
it gets tricky trying to bind new meshes into the main this way, but it can be done should you disconnect master pose before the switch and reconnect acterwards.
reef agate
eep, trying to understand. So the main skeletal mesh gets the post process bp on it?
molten jewel
yeah
reef agate
Then what should be in the post process bp besides my rigid body node?
cause the post process anim bp breaks the anim bp on the skeletal mesh
molten jewel
"Input Pose" node
reef agate
k trying now
molten jewel
gives you the output of the pawn's pose
reef agate
molten jewel
yep
reef agate
ya but not working.
I get no animation at all now
that anim bp is in the post process of the main character skeletal mesh asset
the skeletal mesh comp also has anim bp of course which is the main animation
but now that main animation doesn't play
molten jewel
what if you connect input pose directly to result?
reef agate
still nada
it's overriding the anim bp on the comp
if i disable post process on the SK comp, then my animation works
molten jewel
double check that the one with that input pose node is the one on the sk mesh
reef agate
hmm still fiddling. animation is working now. So the main skeletal mesh should have a post process on it with rigid body node and input pose?
molten jewel
your essentially allowed to customize the main's post process yea
if you think it might work on non-main, you could try again now that its working on main. but i believe thats a restriction with set master pose yea.
reef agate
i dunno if i'm doing something wrong arg. everything you said is working except no physics
molten jewel
https://youtu.be/v5bsApZsOTA?t=56 it does work, I use it for twist bones
but yea i recall a similar limitation, with post on main only.
molten jewel
old project yea, took awhile to understand the limitations of everything with clothing
reef agate
nice. well everything you said works except rigid body.
Right now rigid body is a post process on the main character skeleton mesh. Then I have another sk comp with hair sharing the same skeleton asset
the hair is following char fine using set master pose in construction script
input pose is working on the post process anim bp on the skeleton
but when i hook input pose up to rigid body animation still works but rigid body node is ignored
just not doing anything
molten jewel
your pressing compile on the post process yea?
would try something else like modify bone just to ensure its using it . Like you didn't disable the post process bp on the component yea?
reef agate
i'll try modify bone. i'll make arm go up or something one sec
but i am certain the post process anim bp is working cause if i unhook input pose, animation breaks
molten jewel
ah good
perhaps the physics asset needs to be set? I'm not real familiar with the rigidbody node
reef agate
post process is def working cause arm is now raised
maybe you can't use rigid body as a post process
that's a simple possible explanation?
molten jewel
i don't know enough about the node to say. i think it uses the physics asset though so if thats not present on the master, maybe this is why?
reef agate
hmm good call
still not working though doh
put the hair physics asset on the master
reef agate
Asking again (and once in a while) in case anyone has an idea why my copy pose from mesh (copying from my main character BP mesh to an actor bp with this clothing top item) is out of sync by a frame or a few frames. You can tell by looking at the neck and the mesh poking through.
vernal lion
Hey guys, when my blend space value changes from walking to standing, it seems to take like half a second to change from the time I set the value
and when it changes it is very sudden
I've tried using Target Weight Interpolation, as well as using VInterpTo to interpolate manually
nothing seems to change this behavior
molten jewel
all your animations in the blend space should be of similar times in duration @vernal lion
if its a long idle sequence, it doesn't belong with walk cycles
vernal lion
okay so that means they are just too out of snyc
Yeah I agree, i'll tell the animators
molten jewel
a long idle sequence coming from short walk cycle, will blend hyperspeed on entry kinda
vernal lion
okay
molten jewel
because yea it maintains time between things
molten jewel
i find a jog in place animation works really well for blending, so long as idle state or whatever is blended to fairly quick
vernal lion
so if it was just like a 1 frame pose for different blend values, it would be instant, or use the sample interp
does that sound right?
but it has to figure out how to blend smoothly
molten jewel
yea same would go for a fast animation, coming out of the 1 frame to 80 frame walk cycle will look slow motion
a jog in place will get you the best blend to slow walk, if your using state machines, you just want that idle loop to introduce quickly.
otherwise could manually use a blend node to overlay the idle in by alpha or something
obsidian current
Is anyone online now? I need some help to make the skirt animation not clip between my character legs. I tried everything i can possibly think of, from Apex to kawaii physics and no luck. Please, anyone? 😭
I can't fix this no matter what i do or what i try lol
Honestly i'm tilted
molten jewel
Is it apex?
obsidian current
I tried apex alredy, it basicaly gets the same result
molten jewel
It is bones then?
obsidian current
yeah
molten jewel
There’s nothing in place that would solve this really
Imagine it has a hard time blending?
molten jewel
what does your physics asset look like?
you'd be best to make a physics asset only for cloth
you can use the cone like capsule shape for the legs
but
molten jewel
yea that doesn't overlap the lgs
if you duplicate your physics asset
replace those capsules on the legs with the scaling capsule
make the shape larger than the vertices
like the shape has to be slightly larger than the leg
obsidian current
Scaling capsules?
molten jewel
second time today i can't remember the name lol
but there is a special capsule shape for cloth only
its a capsule with two radiuses at each end
its basically for legs
obsidian current
Let me try to add that, just a sec
molten jewel
you go to your mesh file, and set the new physics asset on for cloth sim (not the default physics asset for the mesh, but specifically there is an option for cloth sim)
tapered capsules wont work outside of cloth again
obsidian current
I just set up a single capsule for the whole thing?
molten jewel
no
obsidian current
Or one for each thigh and calf?
molten jewel
yep
any body parts you want to interact with the cloth
anthing that you don't want to interact with the cloth should have no shape
you right click the bone to add a shape to it, no constraints are neccisary for cloth
molten jewel
doesn't have to be this large
it should be like a centimeter past the skin
but could try using that and see if it still clips with legs.. though at that big it might eat the cloth at the joint
obsidian current
Still clipping with that giant thing
I'm scaling it down now to see if it would work
molten jewel
capsule shouldn't be touching cloth when you set it up, but should be bigger than the legs slightly yes
thats better yea
you did set your physics asset for cloth on the cloth settings?
obsidian current
What do you mean?
molten jewel
is it not flowing like cloth would?
obsidian current
Yeah, its not flowing like it should at all
molten jewel
influence should fade off almost instantly from the seam
obsidian current
You mean the paint influence?
molten jewel
yea
obsidian current
molten jewel
obsidian current
That painting isnt right?
molten jewel
its hard to tell tbh
its pink at the parts that are supposed to connect to the character?
opaque stirrup
hellow fellow humans
obsidian current
I'm trying to make this work over 2 months now
opaque stirrup
so prior I had used copy skeletal mesh, instead of master pose, because I was under the impression it couldn't do physics animations. Not it appears it CAN used physics animation, but just of the parent, which in my case is fine. Now my question is according to the docs Master pose has a much lower game thread cost vs copy pose, but I read somewhere here I think that Copy pose ran mostly on the GPU but master pose ran on the CPU so maybe it's a wash?
So it appears I could use either method, and most people seem to use master pose, so is there any good reason to use copy pose if I don't explicitly need custom animations or physics on a modular part? and could I not combine the two methods if I had one part that required it?
molten jewel
i've not used copy pose
but master pose is more or less what you want for clothes imo
no nodes are neccisary
opaque stirrup
not sure what you mean by no nodes 🙂
molten jewel
afaik copy pose needs a whole seperate anim blueprint evaluation
opaque stirrup
Well specifically I'm looking for modular body parts probably, so that raises an issue of I have a blueprint that can swap the meshes and this seems to work but it can't swap the master mesh, only child meshes. Is there a way to change the mesh of the master? Right now I just have an empty mesh as the master, and have every body part a child.
oh yeah I get what you mean, but that was pretty simple to set up.
I had already got that working, I just decided to try to see if master pose worked
and it looks like it works with the physics animation so I'll probably stick with that.
opaque stirrup
Well right now the empty mesh works
But I'm worried i'm taking an extra draw call for not many reasons.
Basically I'm not 100% set how I want to handle body damage, I might end up further breaking apart the mesh, so in that case each limb needs to be able to be swapped or culled
So originally I figured most head gear is gonna be like hats or helmets and not need to be skinned
but then I figured if I wanted head damage i'll need to swap the head mesh so I can't make that the master
and I can't make it the torso since that gets swapped out for stuff
so right now it's an empy mesh
Which I originally had to do anyway with copy pose was because I had a gap between the master mesh and the children
molten jewel
I used the torso as master https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZCENsu21hbI because i automate twist bones and some clothing draped over the arm so required a different post process blueprint.
iirc, the trick to swapping the master is involved.
it can be done, you just have to removee the things referring to it as master, swap mesh and reconnect
opaque stirrup
oh so now i'm worried, I figured it didn't mater which item was master
maybe I don't fully understand the workflow
molten jewel
the master needs to have all the bones used by all the sub meshes
opaque stirrup
yeah, I have one skeleton right now.
molten jewel
but it also is the only one that runs post process blueprint
opaque stirrup
yeah.
molten jewel
yea, you do need everything on one skeleton
opaque stirrup
my understanding is some of the physics stuff wont work on it, but would work on a copy pose?
molten jewel
could you clarify what physics stuff?
opaque stirrup
sec.
so right now i'm just doing a straight physics animation blend mix, which seems to work fine since none of it effects the children
so my misunderstanding is this wouldn't work at all, when it really means it only works at the master level
so my understanding is as long as the main physics asset represents the proper physics handling, then it should be fine.
there is this AnimDynamics thing I havent tried yet
that appears to be a lower cost non-full-physics tingy
used for chains or wiggly bits or whatnot
that apparently wouldn't work with master pose?
molten jewel
You can override the physics asset, seperate from the meshes bound, but i'm not positive if they all work together or not. But as far as physics in the node, it'll use whatevers on the master.
Post process blueprint would let you customize the different masters it sounds like.
opaque stirrup
yeah basically I figured i'd have to swap the master physics asset if I needed unique stuff
molten jewel
yeah
the things using the master just do a direct bone copy
likely the fastest way to do all of this
opaque stirrup
Do you think having the master be a empty mesh is too much overhead vs the more complex but possibly infrequent swapping of the master part?
molten jewel
I'm faily positive that its not a lot of overhead because fortnite does this
opaque stirrup
So do you think they use an empty mesh?
or do the more complex swap you're talking about?
molten jewel
they do use an empty mesh yea
opaque stirrup
Interesting, good to know.
molten jewel
opaque stirrup
then I might stick with that for now since i'm still a beginniner and was exatic to see my random body part construction script work at all
opaque stirrup
Well right now i'm just learning UE4
I must say I picked a nice time to get into this because they certainly seem to have added a lot of nice quality of life issues in the last few releases.
I'm excited to see what the future holds.
Thanks for the info, it's gonna give me something to chew on.
opaque stirrup
Interesting thing in that video
they said for those large monster crowds that game threads were more a issue than draw calls, that makes me less worried about some of my ideas for modular characters then 😉
misty dagger
I need to swap the third person character with my own, but I can't swap out the assets referenced in the animation blueprint. Any help please?
static falcon
animation blueprints are for a specific skeleton... so you need to retarget everything at once by right clicking on the blueprint and retargeting it to your skeleton
the main third person BP not the animation BP @misty dagger
sharp sail
Can anyone please tell me how I can extend the Humanoid Rig to accommodate more custom slots?
sharp sail
Ok, I have a head with an animation and I want to retarget to a head on a character I have.
To retarget characters you'd use the common Humanoid Rig, however this only includes 5 custom slots, and I need 12.
molten jewel
you pretty much can't do this
the custom slots don't particularly work well
I say 'pretty much can't do this' because its not designed to.
however, i have retargeted a dolphin to a shark in the past
You have to get creative with the bones, and results will be mixed
assuming this is some kind of facial rig
what is the hierarchy like?
if you paste a picture of the bone hierarchy its possible you might be able to get by using pelvis for head root or something
@sharp sail would consider not having seperate skeletons
for something so specific
sharp sail
The face skeleton tree is:
chest would be spine_03, neckRoot would be neck_01, head would be head, that would leave 9 items required.
I copied the engine's Humanoid Rig asset, it contains 73 bone options, however, there is no way of extended this.
sharp sail
same
opaque stirrup
@molten jewel I tried both your scripts and It dosen't appear to have done anything 😦
sharp sail
same for both characters, I mean
molten jewel
lol a month later or so buster?
opaque stirrup
I had the flu and not doing a whole lot
opaque stirrup
I assume i'm suppose to be running from the scripting mode, I can't tell what's executing or whats not working
molten jewel
Yea you go to the scripting tab
make a new script with +
name it after the thing your putting in it but you must put .py at the end of the name
then read the instructions towards the top of the script
and press the run script button to run it
sharp sail
no, one is like a normal character, same bone names, and has additional facial bones, the other is just the head
molten jewel
do both skeletons root at chest?
the only thing preventing you from sharing skeltons would be differences in parents
a mesh doesn't need every bone in its skeleton
but to use the same skeleton the hierarchy to the bones must be the same. so if your head only version started with root pelvis etc it'd be compatible and you wouldn't need retargeting at all
sharp sail
no, only the head. the character at the root itself.
i have asked the artist to provide an individual head and body, therefore the head skeletons will be the same, and i'll just arrange locations in the scene.
molten jewel
were the hierarchy to the head the same between meshes different skeletons wouldn't be neccisary.
you can omit arms still
and still use the same skeleton
ie the animations will work on either
sharp sail
sorry p@t, a little confused.
usually to retarget you use the humunoid rig as the go between.
this is for the FaceARSample project, so I've swapped out Kite Boy for my own character.
both skeletons have the same names from head onwards.
molten jewel
so rule with sharing skeleton is, if a bone exists on a mesh all its parent bones must exist to fit the same skeleton
you don't have to have every bone in a skeleton on a mesh for the mesh to use the same skeleton
but you need all the parents. so if you modify your head only version to hold all the parent bones (without deform) to the chest
then it will be compatible.
there is no way to retarget what you have here
using the humanoid rig
sharp sail
ok, thank you p@t.
i'll ask the artist to update head bones and pass this advice on.
green edge
Hey everyone, so a question, I'm no animator by any stretch of the imagination. I'm trying to put together a simple FPS style game, is there anywhere out there that I can buy animations from? Like pre made packs? That I can use in Unreal for any weapon / magic?
molten jewel
you are aware of the marketplace yea shadow001?
green edge
Yes I looked through there before I asked here actually
opaque stirrup
@molten jewel I keep retrying your scripts, and nothing really happens
green edge
I found something that'll work for my character himself but for the enemies and such idk
molten jewel
2.80 buster?
opaque stirrup
2.81
molten jewel
i don't have the scripts but, your following the instructions?
opaque stirrup
nothing
so step by step I make a empty file
import the mannequin FBX
do them i'm suppose to duplicate the armature?
molten jewel
yes second armature
molten jewel
k did you duplicate the bones in the duplicate armature?
opaque stirrup
duplicated the bones just now
molten jewel
and whats the name of the script?
opaque stirrup
molten jewel
should be whatever.py
opaque stirrup
yeah
molten jewel
okay then you press run script button yeah?
opaque stirrup
I imported it as the .py and now it's got the fancy colored text
okay lets do that!
do I leave edit mode?
or stay in edit mode?
opaque stirrup
so i'm in edit mode with root.001 selected?
molten jewel
selection doesn't matter you just need to be in edit mode
on the duplicate armature i mean
molten jewel
k now look at the bone list
opaque stirrup
molten jewel
it worked
molten jewel
the other script
opaque stirrup
molten jewel
then select only the original and enter pose mode
molten jewel
you had root.001 selected in pose mode
now root is selected in pose mode
so run the script
stay in pose mode
molten jewel
yea your done with scripts now
molten jewel
go to root.001 and move a bone in pose mode
root.001 now drives the root armature
and those duplicate bones you made are each parented to the bones you see there, but they themselfs aren't shown
so now when you enter edit mode of root.001
you can reorient the bones you do see (the bones on bone layer 0)
to be easier to work with
don't move the bones head though
just the tail and roll
opaque stirrup
so I'd still need to manually re-orientate every bone in the rig?
molten jewel
yes
you didn't have to reparent every duplicate bone, and you didn't have to setup constraints on every bone
opaque stirrup
I don't even know where to begin on this.
molten jewel
everything the scripts did here, you can do any character at all from maya
take the thigh bone's tail and move it to the calf's head
opaque stirrup
I'm sad to see I can't use snapping
molten jewel
3d cursor is fine
molten jewel
select calf head, shift + s, set 3d cursor
select thigh tail, shift + s, move to 3d cursor
once your done moving the tails into place, you'll want to turn on axes and set up some standard for xz with roll
also
enabling mirrored edit mode is hit or miss, i wouldn't do it
opaque stirrup
wot
on a unrelated note
semi-related
if I import the fbx from UE4
and I delete bones that don't change the hierarchy, and just re-export the FBX as is (with the bones postions untouched) will that reimport into UE4 unmolested?
molten jewel
uh so
when you go to export
you select root
and export with selected only
for animations
you animate root.001 (but don't export)
the thing this does is that messed up orientation from maya is retained throughout this entire process
opaque stirrup
My wet dream right now is Epic getting off their ass and developing a native Blender workflow but im not holding my breath
molten jewel
imo blender needs to not y forward only
molten jewel
like it should be a rig option if its blender style or everyone else style
maybe yeah
opaque stirrup
I mean IMHO unless there is an amazing technological reason, Blender should try to conform to what are maybe 'industry' standards like that
or at least allow an option
but so back to my NEEDS
I might get back with you once I get this rig sorted out.
so once I get my root.001 re-orientated
molten jewel
tbh, blender does things the way it does excellently in most all cases
opaque stirrup
Yeah I like blender a lot
molten jewel
I would rather it becomes the standard
opaque stirrup
me too 🙂
molten jewel
but of course this is a bit of a pipe dream, or at least, it could take a bit
opaque stirrup
autodesk ruins everything aparently
molten jewel
yeah, fbx should just poof out of existence
opaque stirrup
But unlike autodesk blender has no finacial reason to make shit incompatable
anywhow..
so my priorities are being able to import a FBX animations and get them into a way I can edit them.
and then re export
so I can tweak existing animations vs author them from scratch
and I saw how UE4 has control rigs and fancy stuff but sometimes maybe better to do it the hard way
molten jewel
that is going to take some doing :D
opaque stirrup
okay so plan B
my second and probably primarily goal ?
when I export a character with autorig, it exports some bones that are not used by the rig in ue4
but I can't manually delete them in ARP because it'll break the export script
so can I just import the FBX, delete the bones, and re-export it again?
molten jewel
arp?
opaque stirrup
auto rig pro
molten jewel
yeah
opaque stirrup
these bones are stuff like some of the extra face bones I don't use or the mysterious 2nd breast bone
molten jewel
blender will delete bones yes
opaque stirrup
but I have to delete them after they're exported as a FBX
but even though their orientation is weird, if I just re-export them again it won't break the rig?
now for a related question...
I was watching the presentation on fortnight
I saw for say the head it just had from the root to the head, no limbs
so If i'm using master pose
on the body part segments, can I delete any bone that isn't from the root to the body part itself?
so if I have a mesh for the hands/arms, I can delete the legs and the head bones because they're not part of the hierarchy?
molten jewel
this is correct it wont break anything
opaque stirrup
and will there be a performance gain over just leaving the un-used bones for each body part?
I guess what im asking is, are the bones in the children a burden or just he master part?
I can't imagine they'd delete them at epic if it didn't contribute something
molten jewel
get rid of things you don't use yes
opaque stirrup
I'm still working out the kinks of my modular characters, I decided to switch from copy pose to master pose because I learned it can use physics from the master object.
but someone pointed out the physics animation component is still experimental since like 4.9 and the newest one is the rigidbody node in 4.22(?)
I'm not really 100% sure what the difference or pros or cons are
I know the physics animation works 100% exactly how I want it to and is fairly easy to work with
molten jewel
um well, this is something i've not used beyond just 'cool it does a thing'
with physical animation i mean
opaque stirrup
well basically i'm just doing a solo project so my goal is to use the default animations when I can get them
molten jewel
i personally didn't find it of much value for anything beyond zombies
opaque stirrup
my character has a tail and floppy ears?
molten jewel
but suppose you could like, amp it up with bullet impact or something
opaque stirrup
so I need to drive that off physics, or something.
well I was thinking of using it for something like a injury effect too
but for now it's nice to have the tail, if it uses the physics collisions I won't get annoying leg intersections
opaque stirrup
I tried spring bone with disasterous results
molten jewel
if you keep trying
molten jewel
all fo these things, it takes awhile to get the values right
opaque stirrup
well right now the physics blening is working perfect.
molten jewel
okay
opaque stirrup
Well the issue is anim dynamics cant do collisions
so i'd onherently get the tail clipping the legs
especially if coruched I bet
and in 3rd person it's gonna be really obnoxious
ears are small enough they don't self intersect body parts so they could probably be something simpler
I'll just need to experiment.
Thanks for answering my quesiton, it means a lot to get some life feedback on my problems 🙂
molten jewel
would say, its going to be a nightmare to up keep if tail collision is a must
but it can be done, just you will get strange times with tail
opaque stirrup
Well I need to look into rigidbody if only because I saw it has built in LOD support
I know if I disable the bones in the LOD the physics dont run obviously
so maybe it's a moot point
I'll need to experiment
anyway I gotta run TTYL, thanks for the help! I'm having to learn new art techniques in blender, fix up and learn materials in substance and ue4, then figure out how to implement it all in blueprints (cause I'm no coder sadly)
it's a lot to take in all at once.
delicate junco
@opaque stirrup you mean something like that for the tail ? https://twitter.com/ruyo_h/status/1154181687426732032
opaque stirrup
@delicate junco yeah at least for the body itself also
like I said if the tail is hanging down it's oing to sometimes hit the legs and that'll be noticable if the character is crouched and sneaking slowly
Well I got a pretty detailed physics asset as is for the ragdoll, so I figured it makes sense to take advantage of that for animations if I can
delicate junco
@opaque stirrup Oh ok then I think the rigidBody node is what you're looking for
opaque stirrup
well physics animation works, but im confused how to use ridgidbody
and what benefits it provides
molten jewel
if you want it to drag on the floor, i'm not sure rigidbody would work? I really don't know though :D more of am asking question to dimy
delicate junco
Afaik rigidbody is faster than animDynamics, has actual physics and is faster to tune than the many animdynamics nodes. You just put a rigidbody node, a physics asset with constraints and it pretty much does the magic, at least that's what I heard, will try it myself soon lol. I've been trying to gather as much info as I can about this subject
Check this little demo, I put a timestamp https://youtu.be/r40PJ6r_P4c?t=1916
They even rely on it for some big skirts in Fortnite https://youtu.be/Oe7fYS9qxmk?t=1273
molten jewel
i hate when people say 'performance for free'
curious if rigidbody does interact with world though, I thought it was its own px scene
delicate junco
Yeah lol
If I understood the experiment correctly in the first vid at 34:40 it seems to be the case
molten jewel
like.. the collisions on the character update. but i don't think the bones interact with the world beyond that
i think to actually react with the world you'd need to set the bone to simulated on physics asset (not an anim node thing)
delicate junco
You have to set it to simulated already if you want rigid body to take care of it I believe
Yeah seems to be the case : https://youtu.be/FwDT2b-8x9c?t=862
molten jewel
its too bad you can't have the anim graph work with physx. i've tried making twist bones work with ragdolls and its a big nope.
delicate junco
Erf 😦 Fortunately I probably won't need such functionnality 😅
molten jewel
surprised there are no twist bones nodes that come with the engine. they are almost impossible to blend
delicate junco
I know there's this but never tried it https://docs.unrealengine.com/en-US/Engine/Animation/NodeReference/SkeletalControls/TwistCorrective/index.html
molten jewel
yeah, thats a bit much for twist bones
dusk cedar
Hi everyone, I was wondering if there is any real tutorials on how to make your own animationo for your games (with blender if possible)
molten jewel
you'd probably want to just see general animating with blender tutorials
Not much difference between animating with blender for other things, beyond maybe just more looping stuff
misty dagger
Here is a noob questions is there a way to set in ue4 only bones to see and names I kind of send my models with bones and animations but I can't get the hierarchy rigth the blend space mixing somehow works but I can see still bones that collapse to bones that should't , I want to fix it before I send extra animation and try more mixing it
honest bobcat
Is the UE4 mannequin skeleton "fit" for AAA games? That is, does it make sense to pay someone to make animations on it, assuming in the future I can rig any humanoid model to it? or is there a chance it will "lack" something?
misty dagger
You sure you will rig only humanoid? And have example of animation everything you need ?is cheaper if you can load the skeleton in blender or any 3d software And rig yourself the lacking ones but is this really what you need?
keen solstice
So I've been stuck on something for a few days here and I can't figure it out. I want to make my side scroller character turn around and have a turning animation as she turns. I want to make it so that if you push left and she's facing right, she'll make a full turn no matter how long you press the button.
Anyone have any ideas?
As you can see, sometimes she faces the camera. I also want to add an animation when she's facing the other direction.
I think I understand machine states to a degree, but I'm having a hard time figuring out the other stuff like even graphs and how to make things do what I want.
keen solstice
feel free to pin me if you have a good solution : )
arctic tapir
I haven't been able to get cloth simulation to collide with my rig's physics asset, I'd appreciate any ideas
made the physics asset really simple just for testing
for context, this is unreal 4.18
keen solstice
don't know how to get it to work, but your project looks so COOL!
arctic tapir
thanks!
honest bobcat
Bumping: Is the UE4 mannequin skeleton "fit" for AAA games?
@misty dagger I'm talking about a specific model so yes I'm sure it will be humanoid. I don't have all animations I need, no. Does it matter? and I'm not planning on rigging it my self
delicate junco
@keen solstice Root motion could be an option here. Basically you'll have to do the whole turnaround animation in Blender (careful, all the root bone movement will be in the engine too) and then set "enable root motion" for that one. After that when the player will press the input to turn the anim will be played and take care of all the rotation itself, as the root bone will drive the movement, not the capsule.
@arctic tapir Did you check rigidBodies ? https://youtu.be/FwDT2b-8x9c?t=850
arctic tapir
@delicate junco thats basically using a ragdoll effect, not the cloth simulation
although maybe that will work as an alternative to cloth physics
keen solstice
Root motion? I saw some videos on it but idk anything about it. Can I have root motion only for turning or would I have to redo animations (again xD)
I made her turning animation in Blender, I just don't know how to apply it to her in a side scroller
arctic tapir
@keen solstice What I'd do is store the current desired direction in your pawn blueprint. Then, also in that blueprint, rotate the character to match the desired rotation. While rotating, you can have your animation blueprint go to a turn left or turn right state which would play the corresponding animation
delicate junco
@arctic tapir They just showed a ragdoll applicattion but they use it for cloth physics too : https://youtu.be/Oe7fYS9qxmk?t=1277
arctic tapir
interesting, i'll check it out
maybe its better to use that than the apex cloth simulation
keen solstice
I'll try that out once I finish eating.
delicate junco
@keen solstice Basically with root motion the animation is what's driving the movement : if you move/rotate your root bone during your blender animation, this movement will be reproduced in the engine as is. You won't have to redo every single anim don't worry lol, you can perfectly combine root and non root animations.
Mokazon's solution is good too btw, if you don't want to do root motion
keen solstice
oh okay. I was thinking about doing root motion cause I think that may be a good solution for steps and slopes? I'm not too sure though.
arctic tapir
you mean making your foot angle on a slope instead of clipping through it, for example?
arctic tapir
you'll need to do some IK within unreal for that, that's not a root motion thing
keen solstice
oh okay
arctic tapir
root motion is basically where you have a bone at the base of your armature that moves the whole rig. With root motion, if you move that base bone in your animation, you can have it move the character actor itself in unreal.
delicate junco
^
delicate junco
Yeah when you want to do some very specific or accurate movement without having to mess with the engine's physics parameters (speed, gravity etc) it's a good approach
arctic tapir
yeah root motion will help you avoid slight foot slipping
keen solstice
ahh nice!
I think I understand now. I just thought it was something I'd have to change for each animation.
I do have a root bone on her.
however, I did make an animation with he turning around already. I designed it so it would turn with the capsule when she turns.
arctic tapir
so it's turning in place basically?
keen solstice
Yeah
arctic tapir
if you want to do the root motion thing, all you'd have to do is add a rotating animation to that base bone then
keen solstice
oh okay.
delicate junco
Btw if you want your vertical movement of your root bone to be taken into account you'll need to set your movement mode to "flying". Otherwise gravity will mess with it. Just remember this if you need it one day lol
keen solstice
2 weeks from now I'm going to forget that and run to this server crying for help 😂
delicate junco
Lol, dw I don't think vertical root motion is that common, except for stuff like climbing or launching combos in BTA games like DMC
delicate junco
@arctic tapir You could check this too btw https://github.com/pafuhana1213/KawaiiPhysics
arctic tapir
cool, I'll take a look
delicate junco
I think RigidBody would be the better option though
arctic tapir
im so confused....
I added the rigid body thing
turns my character into a triangle
and there's tiiiiny upper body of my character sitting on top
keen solstice
that looks painful 
So how can I store the "curremt desired direction" in my pawn blueprint?
arctic tapir
for example, you could just have a boolean variable
where true means right and false means left
or you could make an enum with 'left' and 'right' values
etc
keen solstice
I did make one of those
I had help setting this up.
I wanted that so that she would have different animations for left and right though.
keen solstice
I've been stuck on this for hours. : /
raven eagle
If anyone is in need of some free mocap, take a look at this 🙂 : https://twitter.com/Trolljeigur/status/1208393688528949250
Twitter
opaque stirrup
Is there a way to 'retarget in place' animations if I update the skeleton on a character?
reef agate
Hey peeps, something went wrong and I'm hoping I don't have to spend a day figuring out or re-doing. For some reason on my humanoid character, the root bone has stopped rotating and now the hips are rotating instead so the characters legs are swaying back and forth. It's like the character is balancing on the root : /
I am pretty savvy with this stuff and I have no idea what happened
It's like my hip is locked in place and just rotating. hard to explain : /
further clarification. I'm now comparing the same anim - original one working in an older project and new one and it looks like the hip is rotating on both, but the local location is not doing anything
molten jewel
you must have the retarget mode on the bone set to skeleton?
reef agate
checking right now
i bet u r right
Yup @molten jewel u just saved me hours
i still don't fully understand retargeting options. I usually just try them all until one works for retargeting
when i want to retarget an animation from two identical skeletons but each is its own asset, which retarget option should i choose and should it be the same for all bones including root and hips?
molten jewel
skeleton == do not read translation from animation files
you use this on bones like elbow which don't move
then it uses wahtever the meshs' ref pose location is for the bone
so it lets you share animations (kind-of) between different metric characters
so long as the orientation of the bones is similiar/identical
reef agate
gotcha so since i'm using identical skeletons to retarget i don't need to use "Skeleton" on any bone
because they're identical metrics
so I can just go animation on everything or?
molten jewel
say one character had a longer arm than another
reef agate
ya i totally get it
molten jewel
it wouldn't have a longer arm if it were st to animation
reef agate
we would want to ignore location in that case
molten jewel
animations don't store thing in space of ref pose if that makes sense
yea, so only option is to ignore it wholly yeah
reef agate
Really appreciate the help there @molten jewel sending some serious karma points your way haha. I was on the verge of re-importing a lot of assets to try and redo things for no good reason (in retrospect) haha
So I gather hips is a bone that usually needs local location. Are there any other bones on a human that need it?
root bone of course if you have root animation, but anything else?
molten jewel
really that and ik bones are it
sometimes people will translate twist bones but, most just ignore them
honest bobcat
I'm trying to change the retarget pose for the ue4 mannequin following a tutorial from epic, but the buttons are different.
I don't have "save pose" and if I change change the pose it doesn't seem to last.
I tried to click the "modify pose", but it wants a pose asset which i don't have.
I tried to create a pose asset, but it then wants an animation and I have no idea what kind of animation it wants or even why
neon zenith
aight
I done got a daz character in ue4 but skinned to an epic rig
but it won't show up on right in retarget manager
obviously robot dude is all setup
So is sucker punchish girl character
sup with that?
neon zenith
k, got it with a little help over in lounge...
somethings not quiiiiiite right with her run cycle
misty dagger
Some bones may not be mapped properly @neon zenith
neon zenith
ah
misty dagger
Animation retargeting is a lot of trial and error, at least for me 🙂
what you think is the index finger in your skeleton, may be a completely different thing that UE thinks 😄
It also depends on your skin modifiers
go back in the 3-D software you're using, open your mesh and move some bones around, double check your skin modifiers
misty dagger
from experience, a lot of trial and error for me 😄
neon zenith
ah, yah, skinning mucked up somehow
bugger
fwiw it's fine in blender
must be the addon I'm using to export a game friendly rig from rigify
misty dagger
@neon zenith To be honest, I'm surprised I was able to be coherent about this, animation and 3-D is really not my cup of tea 🤣
neon zenith
🙂
you been big help!
yah, export addon messing up skinning
have code, guess i do a little python diving eh?
fallen karma
how do i change the mesh of the default ue4 third person character, but change the mesh?
misty dagger
@fallen karma Open the character blueprint, click on mesh on the left side, and then change the mesh in the drop-down menu on the right side, if you want to do it in the editor
fallen karma
anyone have any tutorial on making a character? i am an awful artist?
misty dagger
you can also do it via C++, there is code to get the mesh component and load whatever mesh you need
fallen karma
how to create a mesh, but let the bones work with the bones they already give you?
and use animations they give you
misty dagger
who is they? 😄
misty dagger
@fallen karma ah,OK, Some YouTube videos may help...
You can also play, and by that I mean trial and error, With the free paragon assets from the marketplace
it should help clearing up some stuff. At least it helped me 🙂
molten jewel
you intend on making a character with mannequin bones @fallen karma ?
timber star
Hello,
Anyone know if there is a place where it s possible to download skeletons (humanois) with face rig
reef agate
Hey All, I just asked this super long question in physics but thought i'd re-post here since it's so animation relevant. Apologize in advance for it being so long. I'm really trying to move past this decision I need to commit to.
I'm struggling to settle on a primary physics system for my game characters modular clothing and items like wings/accessories. I thought it would be clever to make all items either 1)a socketed actor (to an appropriate joint on my char) with a skeletal mesh comp or 2)the same, but with a reduced version of my main skeletal mesh in my character bp including the root bone so I can use copy pose from mesh with rigid body in component space.
Every option provides its pros and cons in terms of quirks. Taking wings for example: without a root bone, socketed to a chest joint, I have to use rigid body in world space since there is no input copy pose mesh from which the wings could get their velocity. Regular physics work great with little to no work. World Space rigid body on the other hand takes much more fine tuning.
My main question is: what's really the performance difference between regular physics (i.e. a custom collision profile set to physics only in the details panel of the SK comp) and on the other hand, Rigid Body in an anim bp for something like wings? Is rigid body significantly more performant?
delicate junco
@reef agate Did you check this video ? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oe7fYS9qxmk It has a lot of stuff you're talking about so you may want to check it. I'll refrain from answering about performance since I'm not an expert.
reef agate
@delicate junco ya, ugh that video is exactly what I'm talking about, unfortunately it's a very superficial video. Strangely superficial
For example. Jeremiah keeps talking about swapping skeletal meshes and animations and "attaching" but never once does he actually say whether or not he uses separate actors for items or character parts like hair, backpacks or wings
delicate junco
Doesn't he say so at the beginning ?
reef agate
using actual actors and attaching them poses problems different than if you were to have a child SK comp that you are using to swap skeletal meshes
delicate junco
He shows a bunch of hair, head etc saying they are differrent meshes iirc
reef agate
ya unfortunately he completely side steps the actual issues
casting to get an animation from your main character into an actor with an SK Comp and an animation poses tick issues but even more importantly:
Does the hair, wings etc when they do have their own skeleton have a skeleton that includes the root or not? if it does, then using copy pose from mesh is easy because you just have a reduced skeleton and then rigid body is fairly straightforward
but what if your hair skeleton simply attaches at the head joint and not the root
in this case, you can't use copy pose from mesh because the hair is driven by being socketed to the head joint
with hair or wings socketed to their appropriate joints rigid body needs to be setup differently than if your skeletons all have a root and attach at the root and then you use copy pose from mesh
delicate junco
Did you check that one ?https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YjQRBHvltOk
Different presenter, didn't bother to watch cause it looked really similar but they may give more info on that point
reef agate
if he would have just shown the editor and some skeletons it would have clarified a lot!
delicate junco
Yeah I get what you mean, didn't dive into it myself that much unfortunately so I can't give an answer 😦
I'm pretty sure he talked about some data assets having references about the skeleton or something at one point for the items
There's that page too but doesn't give too much details https://docs.unrealengine.com/en-US/Engine/Animation/WorkingwithModularCharacters/index.html
reef agate
ya he talks a bit about the data assets having skeletons and animations references but it's still totally unclear whether he means the data asset has a reference to an actor with those or if he's just swapping SK references on SK Comps in the main character bp
Since he often talks about "attaching" we can only assume he's hiding the fact that these items are actually actors
because you can't "attach" a skeletal mesh unless it's in an actor : ) Unless in an unclear way he's considering "attaching" to be a child SK comp of a parent SK comp **edit (but attaching would be a terrible word choice here because the child sk comp is obvs already attached since u can't spawn components at runtime hehe)
i use data assets also
so ya, unfortunately he's basically a genius but not a great speaker in terms of clarity
misty dagger
my understanding (quite limited) is he uses the same skeleton for every asset and working with modular characters should get you there. if you want extra bones for wings build them into your parent skeleton?
delicate junco
Yeah for backpacks he just tells that they attach them to a socket and that they don't use copy pose from mesh https://youtu.be/Oe7fYS9qxmk?t=881
reef agate
@misty dagger i totally understand you, but I (after one year of experimenting) decided not to use add peripheral bones to my parent skeleton)
because i have over 500 character parts
my parent skeleton would look like a nightmare alien from 1000 universes : )
i have 1000s of skirt bones, wing bones, hair bones
so i want to keep the parent skeleton clean
my inventory system is great at memory management. Right now I use actors for clothing and hair so i can destroy them when not equipped
so i'm not worried about having multiple attached skeletons
delicate junco
Ok seems they only share some parts of the base skeleton : https://youtu.be/Zwc9uuOYfFg?t=147
So yeah the root info seems to be in the parts
Here he seems to have the root and the necessary children to get to the part's bones
reef agate
@delicate junco the most salient part of that backblings section you linked is unfortunately where he drops the ball. He says for the second one the following: "rigid bodies in action... simulated in component space... since it's... um.. I THINK we are driving in some of those forces, component linear scale and velocity scale"
totally unclear. he doesn't even know the most important detail
if that backpack is its own actor, exactly how/where is he getting those scales
that setup is key
casting to the main char skeleton and pulling velocities from a main skel bone or what? : P
showing that setup would have been awesome
he did say he's not using copy pose from mesh which means the backpack is def socketed to a back/spine joint. It doesn't itself have a root. If it did he could attach at root of main char skel (might not even need a root in the backpack skel to do this edit) and just copy pose from mesh
delicate junco
Ah yeah was talking about the character parts above lol
yeah the accessory stuff is still weird
reef agate
i gotta grab a coffee and i'll watch all your links. I have watched them before but you know... easy to miss a quick slide or tidbit
delicate junco
@reef agate Ok I think they explain it here https://youtu.be/YjQRBHvltOk?t=2771
Linear scale seems to be the answer here
reef agate
wicked watching. that item is particularly interesting because it's likely if not obviously a weapon blueprint actor
which mean it's likely socketed to the hand right? But then why do they even have animation data going into the component pose pin?
it already moves with the hand joint since it's socketed!
annoying how the slide cut off what is actually going into rigidbody lol
delicate junco
i don't know fortnite at all but I think the shark plush could be an individual item socketed to the bar, so they could replace it with any other accessory if they wanted too
reef agate
ya totally, but my point is it doesn't need or shouldn't even have any copy pose from mesh data feeding into the Component Pose pin of the RigidBody node
delicate junco
Ah I don't think they have copy pose from mesh in this case
reef agate
so we are left to wonder lol?
delicate junco
Just the rigidbody node imo with some linear scale adjustement to give it the little movement
reef agate
well SOMETHING is plugged into the RigidBody Component Pose pin though as you can see in the slide
unless that slide was just borrowed and is fake
obvs that person borrowed the slide cause we saw it in another vid
delicate junco
Yeah but it would just be the basic stuff imo like pose -> local to component -> rigidbody -> component to local -> end
It would be the anim state of the plush
reef agate
what do you mean pose?
my concern is that there should't be any pose at all
it's just a socketed item
reef agate
hehe. well this is all tricky stuff and ya again an example where they aren't being clear : P
delicate junco
Yeah definitely, I'd like to have more info about everything related to anim Blueprints and animdynamics/rigidbodies too, there's no great resource out there...
reef agate
@delicate junco quick example of rigid body on my system with no component pose at all
the danglies on the head...
it's just a unique hair/dangly skeletal mesh in an actor that i socket to the head of my main character bp
delicate junco
Try putting the linear scale value to 10 000 like they did in the vid ?
reef agate
so rigid body can work in component space with no source pose going into the component pose pin
delicate junco
Just to see what it does
reef agate
ya i def gotta experiment with that linear scale stuff! it depends a lot on my constraint settings in the physics asset.
I'm so far from an expert. usually just takes endless tweaking every param in the physics asset till something looks ok
lol
delicate junco
Yeah same lol, trying to learn that stuff at the moment cause I'll need it at some point too
reef agate
But I could make that hair skeleton have a root bone. Essentially it would just be a drastically reduced version of my main character skeleton
then i could use copy pose from mesh into rigid body component pose pin
then the velocities actually come from the source skeleton animation
like a head skeleton on a stick : P
so which method is better is my main question? : )
i also have to start thinking about collision... not even sure if those danglies will collide with the main character or not yet since the main character has its own skeleton/physics asset
delicate junco
I really don't know tbh lol, I guess that as long as it works it works, provided you don't have some performance issue at some point
Oof yeah forgot about that part too lol
Probably won't collide tbh but you never know
reef agate
ya totally. the thing that sucks is that i'm creating all these assets myself so whether i use a root bone and copy pose from mesh or I just socket the hair to the head is a big question because it could mean 3 months of work down the tube if i happen to hit a roadblock and realize i should have just kept root bone on every asset : )
or vice versa
it's a lot of work in Maya : P and more importantly it requires a different physics asset setup depending on which way i go**
if epic just showed once what their hair skeleton looks like (i.e. does it have root like hair on a stick and use copy pose or just socket to the head like in my vid/screenshot?) that'd save me
delicate junco
Yeah I perfectly understand. You should try to ask p@t when he comes back tbh, he may know more about this
reef agate
i'll test collision soon
delicate junco
What I would suppose from this slide is that hair may have some root if it's considered as a character part too https://youtu.be/Zwc9uuOYfFg?t=147
reef agate
anyhoo thanks for hearing me out haha
just wanna keep the convo going in general in case anyone can share some insights
delicate junco
Np lol, I'm interested in that stuff too
vagrant vigil
got this weird problem when I run at 45/-45 angles, it only sometimes plays the footstep notify (for sounds and dust effect). Just wondering why its possibly skipping over the notify? Works fine when I'm straight forward or straight right. Also using 45 degree RunLeft/RunRight animations so not sure whats up
also tested with both a 1D and 2D, same problem
delicate junco
@vagrant vigil If you blend between anims the blend may skip the notifies, that may be it
vagrant vigil
yeah thats my guess so i guess im gonna have to do footsteps another way
delicate junco
You may want to try this before
Try to set "highest weighted animation" in your blendspace parameters @vagrant vigil
vagrant vigil
yeah theyre on that :/
delicate junco
Erf, did you try to adjust the "Trigger Weight Threshold" in the notify that they're talking about ?
vagrant vigil
yeah im just not sure. going to redo some things. oh well its okay
reef agate
Testing out an item that I can equip on my player character by socketing it. The item has rigid body physics. Got my fingers crossed someone could point me to getting the item to collide with my character. Character of course has a physics asset, but all constraints are set to default on the character. No collision enabled on the main char SK comp or the item actor SK comp.
reef agate
iz it impossible?
meager plank
hey can someone please please help me? I want to start using turning animations. What is this called? Is it called locomotion or something. This is my first time using turning aniamtions
ripe yew
Is there any way to increase an animation's z-axis?
misty dagger
@meager plank you mean Blend Space ?
meager plank
@misty dagger Yes
misty dagger
@meager plank You can take a look at the way Epic implemented blend spaces For their free assets from Paragon
restive yew
Try bumping down that min bone size
stoic thistle
can montages be overriden in child animBPs ?
lunar hatch
Hey guys, Complete noob at animation. I was wondering how i would go about adding a turn in place on a third person character when the yaw is greater than 90 or less than -90
molten jewel
korvas, you want to raise the animation off the ground?
sudden sedge
anyone else get out of vram issues when importing a bunch of animations?
opaque stirrup
Can someone here save me 😦
I had to fix the thumb bone in my mesh, so now all my retargeted animations are broken. This is like the 10th time I had to manually retarget like 100 animations.
Is there a way to update the retargeting without manually doing it from scratch again?
molten jewel
I wish they would simplify retargeting for sure. If it’s like you retargeted anims and then made your own anim bp with the retargets it’s very time consuming.
opaque stirrup
yeah.
I'm using ALS as a base, and I can retarget the animation blueprint, but then I need to do tweaks on it.
It's just a mess, I just want to update the existing retargeting
I discovered I had a bug in my thumb bone.
So I fixed my thumb bone, not all my retargeted stuff is broken 😦
molten jewel
Delete with replace is the simplest way to do it. But time consuming: yes
opaque stirrup
yeah it's a lot of animations, so delete and replace is very time consuming 😭
I guess I'll need to, but animation retargeting is very badass, but It really should be streamlined.
molten jewel
You could use editor python to streamline it. But it really just be built in yeah
opaque stirrup
I'm not skilled enough to know what that is 🙂
On the side note, whenever i try to preview-non-retargeted skeleton it crashes UE4, every time
I just thought it would be interesting to see how different my skeleton was from the UE4 one, I tried to match it as close as possible
opaque stirrup
This is taking forever, I wish I could bulk replace reference by name mask
molten jewel
Using source control with retargeting is painful too
opaque stirrup
in what way?
Anyway I know I shouldn't be flippant with my skeleton but sometimes you don't catch errors until you're playing with it in game really.
I'm just grateful weight painting is pretty easy to fix
But it would have been badass if I could tweak bone positions easier with some kind of automated re-retargeting
also I wish I the reference replacement could be a bit smarter
molten jewel
It just checks out a lot of files and then unchecks out. Makes the process longer
opaque stirrup
oh yeah I notice that.
molten jewel
Re-retargeting 
opaque stirrup
I just mean reapplying the retargeting with a modified skeleton
in-place conversion vs making a copy
since we're not dealing with the original animations anway
opaque stirrup
I'm not really femiliar with blutilities yet 😭
molten jewel
do you blueprint?
its pretty much just blueprint for editor things. like if retargeting is exposed to it, then you could make a big array of paths to all the animations you need to retarget and hit some button to retarget and reoutput delete iwth replace etc one by one with a button
opaque stirrup
yeah
molten jewel
i don't know if retargeting is exposed though tbh
opaque stirrup
I need to look up on Blutilities
molten jewel
will check quick
opaque stirrup
I can't open up the documentation for it on the UE4 website
it keeps kicking me back to the main page
molten jewel
this is how you start one
opaque stirrup
okay so now what do I do for a parent class
molten jewel
Well I've used ActorActionUtility before, this adds a option to rightclicking an actor. Trying EditorUtilityExtension to see if that lets me just put something in file menu or something
opaque stirrup
Thanks for the help 🙂
molten jewel
eh yea, it doesn't seem like delete with replace is an option in blutility
seems unlikely there is much that can be done to make the process easier. figured maybe just have it do the deletion and replace for you but it does not seem possible..
At least i know not to recommend blutilities for the actual tedious stuff now lol
opaque stirrup
😭
I'm just gonna delete the animation blueprint and re-convert the whole thing
there are some references that don't auto-replace references
I wonder if a Blutility could fix that?
molten jewel
Yeah idk, i'd recommend just slow and steady approach
it might only take a couple hours
opaque stirrup
I've given up on sorting my animations
each time I need to redo this, it just dumps them all into one folder, and then I have to manually fix up a bunch of references.
molten jewel
its my least favorite thing with the engine
always penalized for organizing or reorganizing
opaque stirrup
Well, at least it has some kind of automatic references
Its a breath of fresh air compared to the last thing I worked on, everything was just manually edited xml files
so if you changed one file name you had to go and track down all references
magic zealot
Hi all, I making simulation of boat driving , I could only make it to this stage, but couldn't find a way to make the analytical splashes when the boat is running .
Could you help me solve this problem?
My problem is the same as the picture I sent
opaque stirrup
@molten jewel maybe you could answer this about blutilities, could one be made to allow numeric input for a translate/rotate widget that dosen't have a built in numeric input?
fervent acorn
@magic zealot I can't help you (sorry) but I was wondering where you got the water from?
molten jewel
i dunno really buster. I've only used blutilities for basic stuff.
may find better help in #editor-scripting
@magic zealot would highly recommend asking in #niagara
neat lichen
https://gyazo.com/df778e214bb646aa9871adb5320b6c32
anyone ever have this issue while rigging in blender?
This is the only wheel that does it
causes this to happen
molten jewel
Lol
Well, it kinda looks like a hierarchical issue
What does the skeleton hierarchy look like
fervent acorn
just imported these rigged FP arms and the bones look like this in blender https://gyazo.com/b28d8238e156436913f9aac726654a70
what steps do I have to take to get the arms animation ready?
molten jewel
They are animation ready
fervent acorn
ok so how do I solve this https://gyazo.com/3c92fbc199490a6c16b96da14673b3d9
molten jewel
That is an ik bone
You just don’t translate bones like that joint though
Thing is maya draws bones as shown exactly in ue4 and blender shows bones as Y axis forward
fervent acorn
ok
so should i animate in maya?
bc it seems easier to start in
without all the bones sticking out in the way
molten jewel
Do you have to use a character authored in maya?
fervent acorn
I don't know what you mean
molten jewel
If you had a character in blender, it’d show up fine in engine. I personally wouldn’t recommend maya over blender
But if it’s only mannequin, there are some solutions on google for animating it in blender. Just meant you can certainly animate it as it shows there. It’s not ideal of course yeah
If your bones were all y forward like a character made in blender from scratch you’d have no problem getting it into engine was what I meant
fervent acorn
It works in just fine UE but I wanted to do reload anims/etc through blender
but it seems like there's some prep to do before I can get to animating
molten jewel
Proper way of doing it involves many constraints
But yeah there are multiple mannequin blend files on the internet with this work done for you
The hands look compatible
fervent acorn
wdym? I can take the mannequin blend files to animate and just attach the animation data (or whatever would export) to the asset store arms?
molten jewel
I can tell that it’s mannequin from the one twist bone that is incorrect by the same amount
So yeah you can
fervent acorn
ok
molten jewel
So long as the thing exports the same way, you could just swap mesh data out for your iron belly thing
molten jewel
Nah I am familiar with it
fervent acorn
oh ok
molten jewel
Ps
They scale the weapons up by 170%
Because mannequin skeleton is so messed up lol
fervent acorn
they scale their weapons?
molten jewel
Yeah like the glock is huge
fervent acorn
ooohh
that might be annoying for me
so I first tried to animate with this model when I was working in Unity and I corrected/ordered all the bones https://gyazo.com/846ba9f7ed5373fa1762da17804fbd34
should I be doing this on the ironbelly model?
or the mannequin model?
fervent acorn
oh great
molten jewel
You’d have to reexport the mesh
But if you find mannequin on google
I believe there are some projects out there specifically for a pre rigged and exportable version of the skeleton
The trick is ultimately that you make the bones as you want to, but use constraints to keep them as they need to be on export
fervent acorn
ok so let me make sure I'm understanding
If I make these ironbelly bones look pretty/easy to look at, I could be breaking the default animations that came with it (which is fine for me) unless I re-export the arms mesh
molten jewel
I hear this a lot lol
fervent acorn
lol
molten jewel
Yeah
If you alter the armature in any way, you don’t alter the animations already in the project
So that Y axis
That they point so strangely
It would look forward in blender but it’s side in the animations
So without reexporting your animations will treat side as forward
And reexporting a new armature will make the old animations wrong in the same way
So
Imagine you have a pretty skeleton
And on your bones of the pretty skeleton you have child bones that point the same way as the ugly maya bones
But you hide those
And then on a separate armature, you use bone constraints to align the messed up bones (now hidden) in the animated armature
Again, believe people have done this work for you already
If you find a mannequin project, you can just swap out mesh data
fervent acorn
ok I'll find one
steep talon
sry... I'm very new to Unreal artist stuff (I'm a programmer)... and wanted to make a small little "game"...
this is my task right now:
- making a AI character wich walks randomly
- on a specific event it goes to position
- when it reaches this position to a small "sequence" which does something (f.e. slides down a slide)
- after that it returns to "idle" mode (on the botton of the slide)
do you have some guidelines or help for me where i can get started implementing such a thing?
or some suggestions or what ever?
molten jewel
@steep talon as far as animation goes, the third person template has an animation blueprint that will accomplish what you need.
as for navigation #gameplay-ai might be the best place to ask.
navigation will just send inputs to the ai
steep talon
important to not is... this happens to a ai character not the player
molten jewel
making your animation blueprint work if controlled by player or not
yeah is irrelevant
in terms of animation
steep talon
ah ok..
molten jewel
pawns in unreal
these are things driven by controllers
such as PlayerController (actual input devices) or AIController (navication/behavior tree)
the layer of abstraction is to make everything the same for some reason
steep talon
mhmhm
molten jewel
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3GV6-4uhkYc @steep talon may be a place to look
steep talon
jeah thanks will try ^^
muted fossil
is there any good material for proper professional tips on animating, looking for things to look out for in doing a natural looking animation, lets say i want a run anim, then how to foot in relation to the hips, femur, tibia etc need to be handled. Even better if the material is on reverse joint legs like a chicken (doing a mech with reverse joints so thats why im askin)
not asking for rigging, but proper looking natural feeling anim tips
molten jewel
for what its worth, we walk on the joint your calling reverse here
just think of chickens as tip-toeing sneakily.
muted fossil
again, asking for industry standard tips on what makes an animation look and feel natural and not a puppet on strings 🙂 in my case i happen to have a reverse joint mech, but the general idea would suffice cuz i can adapt it i think
molten jewel
Reference is the best source usually, but yeah i dunno industry standards for this type of thing
muted fossil
im asking for materials/utube channels anything on the topic but proper quality not something made for views and likes
aha yeah i once found some weird site with lots of reference vids of animals
molten jewel
yeah, i know of sites for human reference but not really animal
oh yea?
that sounds handy
muted fossil
let me see if i can find it again
havent saved it 😦 ....
i did find this video at one time
for walking the hind legs will do just fine but the reference is not good for running 🙂 cuz the dog uses the front legs for assist so it will not match on a just 2 legs animal at all
need to find me some running ostrich reference >.>
ive done the anims in 3ds max long time ago need to redo them in Blender now
as u can see it isn;t even close to chickens per say as the femur is parallel with the ground but the material im asking for might be a nudge in the right direction
or what's the mindset in the industry, ive heard in some GDC or other walk around the studio documentaries that really good animators don't want to bother with motion capture, that they will be able to animate better faster on their own
i guess there are some ppl like that but is the way things get done when u actually have the time and not pressured by deadlines (where i think mo-cap might help save some hours) ?
misty dagger
@muted fossil Hey I remember you having the future cop lapd project how is it going
muted fossil
too much lazyness from me im afraid 🙂 but i've done some updates to the 1st map meshes and now i'm updating the walker (mesh and animations from scratch in Blender)
misty dagger
needs a mocap suit for an ostrich i suppose
muted fossil
hahaha yes 😄
look it up on utube (my channel) not sure if u saw my latest vid (its kinda 3 month old now)
with the holidays i wanted to pump some more hours in it hopefully ill post something again
ive looked into IK for foot placement in Unreal as well so that's something ill be adding with next video as well
misty dagger
maybe this could help https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KzjorJfvF4U
well i mean the robot doesnt have his legs stretched in idle, they are rather bent
muted fossil
hell yeah, but as i feared, my femurs are parallel to the ground and that's making it harder to animate and look normal
yeah
misty dagger
can the upper legs bent vertically downwards?
muted fossil
i have the IK in Blender for both legs, working smoothly thats not a problem, but looking at the original trailers for the game, he's not supposed to walk like an ostrich 😦
misty dagger
well then small steps i suppose
muted fossil
yeah, i mean the running part is out of the question i think, will return to it after i have the rest, but unless i bring him higher from the ground so he can use the damn legs it will look like Sonic i think 🙂
molten jewel
um
want to say a montage might be what you want here
but i've used montages: not at all
believe people use them for things like fractional reloading
combos in attacks are likely another use
gusty bramble
@misty dagger Would this work? https://docs.unrealengine.com/en-US/BlueprintAPI/Animation/BindtoAnimationFinished/index.html
hardy relic
Yeah you're probably going to want to use a montage for that.
crude moat
So I have an anim montage playing from spine_01 and up (UE4 mannequin), and when the button that plays the montage is pressed, the character takes a snap forward for a split second then returns back to its correct actor rotation (bUseDesiredControllerRotation is set to true, and bOrientRotationToMovement and bUseControllerRotation are both set to false during this time)
Has anyone experienced anything like this before?
radiant herald
Hey Guys, I have an issue and I dont know how to fix it. I am working on an Animation Blueprint for a First person Shooter and I got this bit for when you aim. It should first play the AimIn and then go to the AimIdle, but for some reason it directly skips to the idle ... If anyone can help me out here I would appreciate it ^^'
this is the transition rule from the AimIm to the AimIdle
molten jewel
how long is teh aim in animation?
cinder ether
How would you sync up two animations? Like say people fighting.
molten jewel
question was just asked cody
radiant herald
@molten jewel 14 frames(.5 seconds). So it should be visible
molten jewel
i think montage might be the way to go, but haven't used it.
is loop off on the aim in sequence player?
molten jewel
it looks like it should
only thing i'd recommend is just maybe slowing the playback rate on it
and see if it makes any difference
molten jewel
do you have that animation in multiple places or something?
radiant herald
Nope, Just there
it even snaps, when I set the bool just in the animation Blueprint Preview
molten jewel
what happens if you just delete the idle state
curious if it even plays
er
you could just set the result to false too manually
radiant herald
weirdly....it still snaps...
molten jewel
spooky.