RE: Mental Ray Fatal error
I repro on 2015. Did you test on an SP? Your workaround is a valid one since MR is doing that under the hood anyway. Don’t know if much can be done at this point; However, it’s imo it’s rare to use deformers on nurbs. I’ll check if it’s logged. Manny Papamanos Product Support Specialist Americas Frontline Technical Support Customer Service and Support From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Chris Marshall Sent: Wednesday, October 14, 2015 10:57 AM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: Mental Ray Fatal error I know, the fatal error is me using Mental ray in the first place!?!? Maybe it's not a fatal error, but a schoolboy error!? Anyway, I converted the object to a polymesh and it's fine now. Not ideal but it works. On 14 October 2015 at 15:27, Chris Marshall <chrismarshal...@gmail.com<mailto:chrismarshal...@gmail.com>> wrote: Hi All, I have a nurbs object that's deformed with a lattice. I'm doing some shape animation on the lattice, but when I render a sequence, I get a Mental Ray fatal error after it completes rendering frame 1. I've remade the lattice animation on a new lattice, but I get the same error. If I delete the lattice, it renders ok. So it looks like an issue with nurbs/lattices/shape animation. Is this a known problem? Any thoughts/workarounds? Thanks Chris -- Chris Marshall Mint Motion Limited 029 20 37 27 57 07730 533 115 www.mintmotion.co.uk<http://www.mintmotion.co.uk> www.dot3d.com<http://www.dot3d.com> <>
RE: Glasswoks Lycra
The long extruded element may already be generated as a whole piece, and then is 'masked' off. Would definitely be easier if it were patch/nurbs based. Manny Papamanos Product Support Specialist Americas Frontline Technical Support Customer Service and Support From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of adrian wyer Sent: Thursday, October 02, 2014 6:46 AM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: RE: Glasswoks Lycra any idea how the UVs were created? a From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Rob Chapman Sent: 02 October 2014 10:37 To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: Glasswoks Lycra speaking to JJ about this the other day (am on a short gig at Glassworks so sat next to him) he said that it was verlet dynamic strands that were then meshed - most of the hard work was in the matchmove / roto integration and yes Softimage still very much alive and kicking here :D On 2 October 2014 10:08, adrian wyer adrian.w...@fluid-pictures.commailto:adrian.w...@fluid-pictures.com wrote: Alastair (or anyone else) any insight into how you extruded the geometry to have UV for the fabric patterns? been baking my noodle thinking about this a From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Sebastien Sterling Sent: 02 October 2014 02:57 To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: Glasswoks Lycra Looks like a bloody intense pitch meeting ;). On 2 October 2014 01:50, David Barosin dbaro...@gmail.commailto:dbaro...@gmail.com wrote: Wow. Cool idea and great execution! On Wed, Oct 1, 2014 at 11:39 AM, Byron Nash byronn...@gmail.commailto:byronn...@gmail.com wrote: Very nice spot. On Wed, Oct 1, 2014 at 5:41 AM, Alastair Hearsum hear...@glassworks.co.ukmailto:hear...@glassworks.co.uk wrote: Thanks for the compliment. Yes Softimage and Redshift Great result from the team here at Glassworks and such a good director work with. Alastair Hearsum Head of 3d [GLASSWORKS] http://www.glassworks.co.uk[Facebook]http://www.facebook.com/pages/Glassworks/150976168270682[Twitter]https://twitter.com/GlassworksVFX[Vimeo]https://vimeo.com/glassworksamsterdam[Instagram]http://instagram.com/glassworksvfx/ See our latest work here.http://www.glassworks.co.uk/ 33/34 Great Pulteney Street London W1F 9NP T +44 (0)20 7434 1182tel:%2B44%20%280%2920%207434%201182 glassworks.co.ukhttp://www.glassworks.co.uk Glassworks Terms and Conditions of Sale can be found at glassworks.co.ukhttp://glassworks.co.uk (Company registered in England with number 04759979. Registered office 25 Harley Street, London, W1G 9BR. VAT registration number: 86729) Please consider the environment before you print this email. DISCLAIMER: This e-mail and attachments are strictly privileged, private and confidential and are intended solely for the stated recipient(s). Any views or opinions presented are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of the Company. If you are not the intended recipient, be advised that you have received this e-mail in error and that any use, dissemination, forwarding, printing, or copying of this e-mail is strictly prohibited. If this transmission is received in error please kindly return it to the sender and delete this message from your system. On 30/09/2014 18:55, olivier jeannel wrote: http://www.glassworks.co.uk/video/lycra-moves-yousearch-type=allterm=all Beautifull film, out of curiousity are we still speaking softimage here ? attachment: winmail.dat
RE: BUG!?: Path-constrain tangency on closed curves
Hello. I do confirm that this particular functionality is broken since SI:2014 and that it worked in SI:2013. The issue seems specific with closed curves and happens with path and param types of curve constraints. I have logged the issue as a regression so it can get immediate attention here: SPR-14215 Tangency on Path constraint (path and param) broken for closed curves It’s possible this issue may have developed when resolving this fixed one: SOFT-8622 Evaluation of fcurve tangents yield incorrect results in long curve cases. Thanks. Manny Papamanos Product Support Specialist Americas Frontline Technical Support From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Thomas Volkmann Sent: Monday, May 26, 2014 11:34 AM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: BUG!?: Path-constrain tangency on closed curves Let's hope so! This feature is basic enough to be high on the priority list Eric Turman i.anima...@gmail.commailto:i.anima...@gmail.com hat am 26. Mai 2014 um 17:18 geschrieben: Correct. I reported the bug at the end of the beta for 2015, it works fine in 2013 but breaks after 2014. I hope that this regression bug is a low hanging fruit that they can get to soon. On Mon, May 26, 2014 at 10:10 AM, Thomas Volkmann li...@thomasvolkmann.commailto:li...@thomasvolkmann.com wrote: Hi, we just opened up an old scene and found that some objects were moving strange on their curves. It seems some bug was introduced to the path-constrain operator when using closed curves and tangency. Tangency is doing something wrong. A little python-script to reproduce: Application.NewScene(, ) Application.SICreateCurve(crvlist, 3, 0) Application.SIAddPointOnCurveAtEnd(crvlist, -4.12493302610738, 0, -1.5985306969839, False, 0, ) Application.SIAddPointOnCurveAtEnd(crvlist, -1.94612224821476, 0, -2.72067807367415, False, 0, ) Application.SIAddPointOnCurveAtEnd(crvlist, 2.89802986962416, 0, -3.2076476899737, False, 0, ) Application.SIAddPointOnCurveAtEnd(crvlist, 6.282590301302, 0, 1.95846476120408, False, 0, ) Application.SIAddPointOnCurveAtEnd(crvlist, 0.973061124107382, 0, 4.54152098679297, False, 0, ) Application.SIAddPointOnCurveAtEnd(crvlist, -2.87687636692617, 0, 3.71578989828504, False, 0, ) Application.SIAddPointOnCurveAtEnd(crvlist, -5.01338013942281, 0, 1.09038848867011, False, 0, ) Application.ApplyTopoOp(CrvOpenClose, crvlist, 3, siPersistentOperation, ) Application.ActivateObjectSelTool() Application.ActivateObjectSelTool() Application.GetPrim(Null, , , ) Application.ApplyCns(Path, null, crvlist, ) Application.SetValue(null.kine.pathcns.perc, 3.646, ) # on linux the objects rotation will be nan when this is 0 and tangency gets activated Application.SetValue(null.kine.pathcns.tangent, True, ) Application.SetValue(null.kine.pathcns.dirx, 0, ) Application.SetValue(null.kine.pathcns.diry, 0, ) Application.SetValue(null.kine.pathcns.dirz, 1, ) Application.SetValue(null.kine.pathcns.upvct_active, True, ) When you now move the path age slider you will notice that the null doesn't align to the curve like it should. Some observations: + was introduced either with 2014SP1 or SP2 (works in 2014 but not in SP2 or 2015, don't have SP1 available atm) + only closed handmade curves are affected (but not getPrimitve-curve-circle) + null rotation becomes 'nan' on linux when path-age is 0 and tangency is activated (no problem on windows) Please please fix it for for the absolute final Softimage version! cheers, Thomas -- -=T=- attachment: winmail.dat
RE: smoothing tagged keys on fcurves
In such situations, I call on the 'stretch keys' b and mmb, Unlike q, it works with a pivot according to where your cursor is placed. Manny Papamanos Product Support Specialist Americas Frontline Technical Support From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of adrian wyer Sent: Wednesday, May 07, 2014 12:42 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: RE: smoothing tagged keys on fcurves or be a brush based tool, like editing a weightmap we can dream eh? a From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of David Barosin Sent: 07 May 2014 17:36 To: xsi Subject: Re: smoothing tagged keys on fcurves You can hit 'q' to bring up the bounding region in the fcurve editor after you tag keys which does limit the effect. The smoothing introduce new kinks at the boundaries though :P It could use a falloff. On Wed, May 7, 2014 at 12:19 PM, adrian wyer adrian.w...@fluid-pictures.commailto:adrian.w...@fluid-pictures.com wrote: like the title says... curve processing affects the whole curve, ignoring selection i have a track with a kink, the more i try and smooth it manually, the worse it gets smoothing works fine, but i only want to smooth a small section i COULD create a null, copy the camera animation, smooth just that bit, and copy it back but really? this is 2014! a Adrian Wyer Fluid Pictures 75-77 Margaret St. London W1W 8SY ++44(0) 207 580 0829tel:%2B%2B44%280%29%20207%20580%200829 adrian.w...@fluid-pictures.commailto:adrian.w...@fluid-pictures.com www.fluid-pictures.comhttp://www.fluid-pictures.com Fluid Pictures Limited is registered in England and Wales. Company number:5657815 VAT number: 872 6893 71 attachment: winmail.dat
RE: Constrain in only one axis instead of all 3?
Just equals expression a null to follow all 3 pos axis of the hip. Now replace the posy expression and just put 5 (let say) in the expression editor for the nulls posy. Constrain the cam/effector to that null. Now you can use CnsComp. -manny AD Si and Mobu support From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Siew Yi Liang Sent: Friday, February 28, 2014 12:21 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: Constrain in only one axis instead of all 3? Hmm maybe let me describe my problem a bit more... I have a character that I'm planning to make run/jump forward etc. I would like to make an animation camera that follows his movement as he moves forward in space but without manually keying it (for now). So what I usually do elsewhere is just constrain the camera to his COG and then disable the constraint for axes that I don't need (otherwise vertical and horizontal movement combined in a camera is really vomit-inducing :P) Right now my solution is: null constrained to hip control (where this control's translates do not change as the animation progress) direct expression camera root axis = null axis But this doesn't let me keep the initial offset that the camera had (turning on ChildComp doesn't help unfortunately)...for now this is a simple workaround but I'm worried about in future what if I have to tackle a similar issue but with this exact same problem? Which is why I was wondering if anyone uses a simpler solution or if I have missed something about XSI constraints that allow for this... Yours sincerely, Siew Yi Liang On 2/28/2014 9:01 AM, patrick nethercoat wrote: ah yes, i see. how about setting the neutral pose on the constraining object (use current pose) before drag/dropping? May be a workaround for your situation if you can cope with the offset in your fcurves. On 28 February 2014 16:29, Siew Yi Liang soni...@gmail.commailto:soni...@gmail.com wrote: Hi patrick: Yes, I could make an expression that way, but I want a kind of automatic way to keep the constrained object at its original position (sort of having constraint compensation on) while making the expression...other than manually typing the offset values myself I was wondering if there was a better way to do this? (As sometimes the offset values won't always be readily available if there is a neutral pose, other things interfering etc...) Yours sincerely, Siew Yi Liang On 2/28/2014 8:08 AM, patrick nethercoat wrote: you can drag+drop fcurve widgets to create a constraint. that way you choose which axes are affected. or am i missing? On 28 February 2014 16:00, Siew Yi Liang soni...@gmail.commailto:soni...@gmail.com wrote: http://i.imgur.com/1rTjJXd.png I can only do offsets so far using the standard UI...I've been looking through the docs as well for something that can help me out but I haven't seen anything yet that relates to this :X Yours sincerely, Siew Yi Liang On 2/28/2014 7:51 AM, Sebastien Sterling wrote: isn't it an option in the pose constrain PPG ? On 28 February 2014 16:43, Siew Yi Liang soni...@gmail.commailto:soni...@gmail.com wrote: Hello! Had a quick question among all this current hullabuloo, hopefully it's not too silly...I was actually looking for a way to limit constrain to one/two axes in XSI on pos/rot/scale constraints, is there a way to do this in the constraint parameters itself? I can't find any such option... Right now what I'm doing is making a null, using an expression to link whatever axes I want to the first constraining object, and then constraining my 2nd object to that null to get around the problem (because I need the 2nd object to remain in place. I feel like what I'm doing is a little silly though, does anyone use a better way or have I missed something really obvious in the constraint PPG? Been doing some searching around and I couldn't find anything on this... Any help would be appreciated! :D Yours sincerely, Siew Yi Liang attachment: winmail.dat
RE: Survey - how would you do this?
Here's something quick and dirty just I made. http://youtu.be/-77ALwrySsQ Hope this gives you some inspiration. -manny SI Mobu Support -Original Message- From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Matt Lind Sent: Tuesday, February 11, 2014 5:03 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: RE: Survey - how would you do this? Pay up ;-) Matt -Original Message- From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Eric Thivierge Sent: Tuesday, February 11, 2014 12:16 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: Survey - how would you do this? $10 says you can't use instances On Tuesday, February 11, 2014 3:13:50 PM, Emilio Hernandez wrote: Well, a quick solution will be 1. create a group of asteroids and add the animation of the asteroids. 2. create the torus that will hold up the asteroids belt. 3. Instanciate the group of asteroids. 4. Create a object to cluster constrain of the asteroids group in dispersed points in the torus. 5. Randomize the torus to create the jittering of the position of the asteroids group. 6. Animate the rotation of the torus. 2014-02-11 14:06 GMT-06:00 Matt Lind ml...@carbinestudios.com mailto:ml...@carbinestudios.com: I should probably mention we don’t do realism here. Think comic book style with a little Anime thrown in. __ __ Given the dimensions of the belt, asteroids could be up to 1 SI unit in diameter for the really large rocks. The camera might move through this belt, so the fact they’re small shouldn’t be so readily dismissed. This isn’t film/video where you can sweep the stuff you don’t see under the carpet. __ __ __ __ Matt __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ __ *From:*softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] *On Behalf Of *Bradley Gabe *Sent:* Tuesday, February 11, 2014 11:48 AM *To:* softimage@listproc.autodesk.com mailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com *Subject:* Re: Survey - how would you do this? __ __ Considering that the typical distance from one asteroid to the next is many thousands of kilometers, you really shouldn't have any issues with collisions if you scale them properly. __ __ At your scale of 40 SI units for the asteroid belt, each asteroid would be well sub-pixel in diameter anyway, so I would create a torus to represent the belt, make it only very slightly opaque and call it a day. Sent from my iPhone On Feb 11, 2014, at 1:23 PM, Matt Lind ml...@carbinestudios.com mailto:ml...@carbinestudios.com wrote: An artist came to my desk yesterday asking how to do what I felt was a simple task, but after getting 80% through it I ran into a speed bump realizing it needed custom scripting or other advanced tools to fully resolve to satisfaction. I had to give him a procedure that was ‘good enough’. This problem has multiple solutions, but I am curious how others would solve it: The problem: Artist must create an asteroid belt around a planet. The asteroids are likely 2D sprites which must face the camera and tumble as they orbit, but could be 3D objects as well. Asteroids must vary in size, shape, and animation speed (linear as well as rotational). Asteroids cannot collide with anything. Movement is generally slow – like a screen saver for your computer desktop. Asteroid positions are jittered within the belt. The question: Dispersing objects into a ring is fairly straightforward through a number of techniques, but how do you apply the random jitter to the object positions? The rules: __-__Cannot use ICE __-__Cannot use custom scripts, custom operators, or shaders. __-__Must only use tools out of the box that a junior or staff level artist would know how to use. __-__Must be able to create the asteroid belt, from scratch to completion, in less than 30 minutes – and be iteration friendly to react to art director feedback. __-__Ideally, the belt could be made a child of the planet in encompasses so it can be reoriented with respect to changes in the planet’s size/shape/tilt/orbit. __-__Final output must be able to exist with full integrity on its own in a vacuum.
RE: Gear installation question
Did you try C:\Program Files\Autodesk\Softimage 2014\Application\bin\setenv.bat instead of global? -m From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Szabolcs Matefy Sent: Monday, January 20, 2014 11:02 AM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Gear installation question Hey folks, Does anybody have an idea how can I install Gear without changing the Environment variable on the computer? Our head of IT was a bit nervous when I told, I wanted to change that... Cheers Szabolcs ___ This message contains confidential information and is intended only for the individual named. If you are not the named addressee you should not disseminate, distribute or copy this e-mail. Please notify the sender immediately by e-mail if you have received this e-mail by mistake and delete this e-mail from your system. E-mail transmission cannot be guaranteed to be secure or error-free as information could be intercepted, corrupted, lost, destroyed, arrive late or incomplete, or contain viruses. The sender therefore does not accept liability for any errors or omissions in the contents of this message, which arise as a result of e-mail transmission. If verification is required please request a hard-copy version. Crytek GmbH - http://www.crytek.com - Grüneburgweg 16-18, 60322 Frankfurt - HRB77322 Amtsgericht Frankfurt a. Main- UST IdentNr.: DE20432461 - Geschaeftsfuehrer: Avni Yerli, Cevat Yerli, Faruk Yerli attachment: winmail.dat
RE: Facerobot - wrinkle maps and mouth smooth doesn't work
I think I had the same issue once. It may have been due to topo edits combined with a 'freeze/freezeM I may have done. I realized the problem and reverted to a previous scene. Manny Papamanos Product Support Specialist Americas Frontline Technical Support From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Nicolas Esposito Sent: Monday, January 06, 2014 4:51 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Facerobot - wrinkle maps and mouth smooth doesn't work Hi having a strange issue with Facerobot I'm rigging the same face with both Gear and Facerobot to see which one is the best solution for my needs, I'm following the videotutorials on youtube from SoftimageHowsTo and I would like to paint the wrinkle maps As soon as I choose to do wrinkle paint or mouth paint basically the paint tool doesn't work at all On the Mouth paint option basically it doesn't affect the painted region ( nor delete or smooth, nor add ) On the wrinkle paint I cannot see at all the classic yellow lines that defines the wrinkle themselfat first I tought that was a graphic glitch, but even if I paint without seeing what I'm painting and I test the rig the wrinkle paint is not there at all The strangest thing is that the wrinkle paint and the mouth smoothing works with the other already supplied meshes ( RockFalcon, Mister Fitness ) but not with my mesh Did anyone had my same problem? Solution? Cheers attachment: winmail.dat
RE: Envelopes, Weights, Deformers and setting them up.
Perhaps deform by volume? This doesn't deal with weight though but can be flexible since you can interactively mod the radius on the volume deformers. Manny Papamanos Product Support Specialist Americas Frontline Technical Support From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of pedro santos Sent: Monday, January 06, 2014 4:45 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Envelopes, Weights, Deformers and setting them up. Hi We use Species here for ease and speed. So the head and jaw have their deformers, and the facial expressions are done through Shapes on a FaceRig panel. For some time now the animator wants some additional Facial controls so he isn't restricted by the range of the shapes. And he wants something that does not turn into a cumbersome task given the revisions/iterations over an asset. I'm fairly new to Softimage and these were the approaches I went about: Doritos I had it setup, just one thing that is dragging the process; Envelopes are generated by distance but there's always normalization. So if I want them to just have a straight spherical falloff into black I can't. Or even to falloff into another dummy null weight, I can't. So I had to paint, around the ears, on the top of the head and sides, neck, etc. I was trying to minimize paitings so iterations on a model's rig can be faster. I could put an inplicit per Derformer set on Bounding Volume Limit. But it's an abrupt cut off. Deform by Spine Creates the falloff I want from the curve. I like the drawn deformations it does on mouth and eyes. I do an operator per curve, since the combined weights of several curves seems wonky. The downside seems to be that I can't transfer them with GATOR. How would you come about to transfer Deform by Spine between objects to save time? General Concerns. I come from Lightwave and Envelopes to me seem to be like a box of weights that are usually normalized. I see that deformers like Cage, Spine also generate such box of weights, but they don't seem to be handled as envelopes. How flexible and manipulated can be weights and the underlying connections of Softimage between the mesh object, the weight, the control null and the deforming operator?? Seems to me that such weights don't exist without the deformers. This Imagehttps://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/143766132/Forums/SI-Community/WeightMapsDeform.png illustrates what I'me trying to do. Cheers probiner attachment: winmail.dat
RE: Problems with weighted constraints
The problem I'm seeing is that each time I move the arm(s) (either), be it by manually moving the animation controls I have for them, or by playing with my blending slider, these small nulls seem to not return precisely to their original locations. Key them perhaps, that way they know where to come back once the constraint is off/adjusted. If there is no key, once a single constraint is blended off, it will stay put. -manny From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of David Barosin Sent: Friday, December 13, 2013 4:21 PM To: xsi Subject: Re: Problems with weighted constraints offset1 and offset2, then its constrained to both, with a 0.5 weight on each constraint. Soft constraints are layered, meaning that the order the constraints are applied is important. The last applied constraint trumps the previous one. So if you want to blend a 50/50 amount you have to leave the first constraint at 100% and the second at 50% Think of it as the if last constraint reveals to the previous ones. Hope that makes sense. On Fri, Dec 13, 2013 at 3:43 PM, Sergio Mucino sergio.muc...@modusfx.commailto:sergio.muc...@modusfx.com wrote: I'm running into an interesting problem with weighted constraints. I have a feeling of what's causing it, but I wanted to see if anyone has ran into it before. I've got a fairly straightforward 3-arm animation setup. One chain is the IK arm, another chain is the FK arm, and the third chain is the deformation arm. Each joint on the deformation arm has two orientation constraints, targeting its corresponding joint in both the IK arm and FK arm. The weights on the constraints are controlled by a single Custom Parameter, so I can blend with a single control. There are some Offset controls parented to each joint of the Deformation arm. And there are a bunch of little nulls sitting on the deformation arm. These nulls are position constrained to two of these offsets each. Say, one of the nulls sits midway between offset1 and offset2, then its constrained to both, with a 0.5 weight on each constraint. The problem I'm seeing is that each time I move the arm(s) (either), be it by manually moving the animation controls I have for them, or by playing with my blending slider, these small nulls seem to not return precisely to their original locations. They land somewhere in the vicinity, but they have a hard time returning to their original place. This is more notorious when I perform fast movements (for example, by quickly dragging side by side on the blending slider I have for my Custom Parameter). If I drag said slider very slowly, they stand a much better chance of coming back to their original position. My feeling is that it's somewhat related to the fact that all the objects constrained in all cases, were constrained with Constraint Compensation on. Looks like all these offsets added together are causing rounding errors during the solve. Of course, this is just my gut feeling, but I wanted to see if anyone has ever seen a problem such as this. I'm kinda surprised SI would have problems with such a simple setup... there's a bit of stuff going on (I actually over-simplified it for the purpose of this explanation, but it's nothing crazy really), but nothing that should break like this. We're on SI 2012. Any pointers are welcome. Thanks! -- [cid:image001.gif@01CEF821.6C2F4710] attachment: winmail.dat
RE: Problems with weighted constraints
'2 point' constraint...Which should probably be called '2 object' constraint. -manny From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Sergio Mucino Sent: Friday, December 13, 2013 4:32 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: Problems with weighted constraints Okay. I wasn't aware of this. How would you do this in a setting where you want the object constrained 80-20, for example? You don't want the constraint to be 100, because it means the object would move all the way with it with the constraining object, and you want it to move 80 percent only... Can I do 'hard' constraints in Softimage? Thanks! [cid:image001.gif@01CEF821.ADD0BAF0] On 13/12/2013 4:21 PM, David Barosin wrote: offset1 and offset2, then its constrained to both, with a 0.5 weight on each constraint. Soft constraints are layered, meaning that the order the constraints are applied is important. The last applied constraint trumps the previous one. So if you want to blend a 50/50 amount you have to leave the first constraint at 100% and the second at 50% Think of it as the if last constraint reveals to the previous ones. Hope that makes sense. On Fri, Dec 13, 2013 at 3:43 PM, Sergio Mucino sergio.muc...@modusfx.commailto:sergio.muc...@modusfx.com wrote: I'm running into an interesting problem with weighted constraints. I have a feeling of what's causing it, but I wanted to see if anyone has ran into it before. I've got a fairly straightforward 3-arm animation setup. One chain is the IK arm, another chain is the FK arm, and the third chain is the deformation arm. Each joint on the deformation arm has two orientation constraints, targeting its corresponding joint in both the IK arm and FK arm. The weights on the constraints are controlled by a single Custom Parameter, so I can blend with a single control. There are some Offset controls parented to each joint of the Deformation arm. And there are a bunch of little nulls sitting on the deformation arm. These nulls are position constrained to two of these offsets each. Say, one of the nulls sits midway between offset1 and offset2, then its constrained to both, with a 0.5 weight on each constraint. The problem I'm seeing is that each time I move the arm(s) (either), be it by manually moving the animation controls I have for them, or by playing with my blending slider, these small nulls seem to not return precisely to their original locations. They land somewhere in the vicinity, but they have a hard time returning to their original place. This is more notorious when I perform fast movements (for example, by quickly dragging side by side on the blending slider I have for my Custom Parameter). If I drag said slider very slowly, they stand a much better chance of coming back to their original position. My feeling is that it's somewhat related to the fact that all the objects constrained in all cases, were constrained with Constraint Compensation on. Looks like all these offsets added together are causing rounding errors during the solve. Of course, this is just my gut feeling, but I wanted to see if anyone has ever seen a problem such as this. I'm kinda surprised SI would have problems with such a simple setup... there's a bit of stuff going on (I actually over-simplified it for the purpose of this explanation, but it's nothing crazy really), but nothing that should break like this. We're on SI 2012. Any pointers are welcome. Thanks! -- [cid:image001.gif@01CEF821.ADD0BAF0] -- attachment: winmail.dat
RE: Cage deformer acting up
Try exporting/importing it as obj, maybe something on it needs resetting. Check the normals on import maybe some things whacky there. -manny From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Morten Bartholdy Sent: Thursday, December 05, 2013 10:29 AM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Cage deformer acting up It has been a while since I needed Cage deformers and I am running in to a weird problem with it today. I have frozen geometry with frozen translation, pick the cage deformer which is also frozen and translation zeroed, but when I apply the Cade deformer the deformed object pops to a very deformed state. I can see absolutely nothing that should produce this deformation offset. The deformed geometry has been imported from Maya, but I have deleted user normals, reoriented it and frozen everything before applying the cage deformer. Does someone here have any suggestions on what to look for and how to fix it? Thanks! Morten attachment: winmail.dat
RE: Remapping envelope weights
You can re-envelope the new mesh to the same deformers group then apply the weight preset. If you don't have the deformers in a group, select the weighted mesh and use Envelopeselect deformer from envelope. Create the group Create a new auto envelope on the new mesh with that group. Apply the weight preset. Or just use GATOR and go shopping. Manny Papamanos Autodesk Product Support Specialist Softimage and Motionbuilder From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Sergio Mucino Sent: Friday, November 29, 2013 4:25 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Remapping envelope weights Does anyone have a good way of re-mapping envelope weight deformers? I have a mesh that I need to load weights to from a previous version of itself. No vertex changes. What has changed is the deformers for the envelope. Same number of deformers, just different names (and objects). I need to just say oldEnvelopeName = newEnvelopeName for each, and load the weights the preset file has. Anyone knows of anything out there that can do this? Thanks! -- [cid:image001.gif@01CEED29.1F4A2D00] attachment: winmail.dat
RE: UV packing
Try UniqueUV, PropertyTexture ProjectionUniqueUV then play with the 'PolyPackUV' operator in the explorer window to break the islands up according to angles and other options. 'PolyPackUV' op is in the object..polymesh clusterstexture cords PolyPackUV In 'Unique UV' or 'Unfold' methods, at times it does not occupy the complete 0-1 workspace but that is normal because it won't scale the islands. You can scale/rotate/move them afterwards if need be in the texture editor. Manny Papamanos Autodesk Product Support Specialist Softimage and Motionbuilder From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Mladen Kevic Sent: Thursday, November 28, 2013 5:21 AM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: UV packing yeah i try that one, but it uses space even worse than i did. it without any reason rotate islands, and make very big gaps between them On Thu, Nov 28, 2013 at 10:53 AM, Luca superposit...@gmail.commailto:superposit...@gmail.com wrote: Using the Spacing parameter you can avoid island overlaps, but actually, it doesn't optimize the space as you'd like. 2013/11/28 Luca superposit...@gmail.commailto:superposit...@gmail.com You can use the Pack of the Undold Tool. In Texture Editor Tools Unfold Pack. In the Undfol ppg select the Pack Tab and then the Pack button. 2013/11/28 Mladen Kevic mladen.ke...@gmail.commailto:mladen.ke...@gmail.com Hi everybody I don't have much experience in UV, so sorry if this a stupid question, but i didn't find so far solution for it. Is there a tool or technique to 'pack' UV sets to use maximum of work area (box 0,0 1,1)? I manually unwrap object to have it nice and clean, but i think that i loose usable work area of image when i manually place it. thanks -- ...superpositiviii...qualunque cosa accada!... -- ...superpositiviii...qualunque cosa accada!... attachment: winmail.dat
RE: Extracted meshes and performance
What the others said plus personally, one mesh would allow for more flexibility, in that case why not use the actual mesh instead of extracting it. You may be taking a big hit right there by extracting it and keeping it live. To test : On a second instance of Softimage Get a very dense sphere Deform it with a 3-4 bone chain extract Check the interaction by moving the effector on the chain Keep that scene open... That’s what I do. -manny From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Alok Gandhi Sent: Friday, November 01, 2013 11:15 AM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: Extracted meshes and performance In theory, one mesh with more polys should be faster I think, because the scene has only one operator to update compared to many operators in case of multiple polys. But, if the number of polygons is too high, the overhead for each operator with single polygon may be less than processing the heavy poly data in one operator. This should be the case theoretically, but you have to do the tests to confirm as Eric said. On 11/1/2013 11:02 AM, Eric Thivierge wrote: Have you run any tests yourself in this respect? On Friday, November 01, 2013 10:58:56 AM, Sergio Mucino wrote: Simple, quick question. When dealing with extracting meshes from another one that is deforming (using Create - Poly Mesh - Extract Polygons (keep) ), what is a better approach to take, performance-wise? One single mesh with lots of polygons (relatively speaking), or several meshes with few polys? Thanks everyone! -- -- ALOK GANDHI / directeur technique senior- senior technical director alok.gan...@modusfx.commailto:alok.gan...@modusfx.com T: 450 430-0010 x225 F: 450 430-0009 www.modusfx.comhttp://www.modusfx.com - MODUS FX 120 Rue Turgeon, Sainte-Therese (Quebec) CANADA J7E 3J1 Follow us on Facebookhttp://www.facebook.com/ModusFX Twitterhttps://twitter.com/Modusfx attachment: winmail.dat
RE: plotting animation and sending too cinema 4D?
First re-import the .fbx into soft see if that works. If yes, it may be a C4D issue. -manny From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Chris Johnson Sent: Wednesday, October 30, 2013 2:58 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: plotting animation and sending too cinema 4D? Alembic is not an option unfortunatley. I'm going from XSI 2014 too an older version of cinema. I try plotting the shapes but when I export .fbx the shapes don't seem to ride with the geo...any thoughts? Is there a setting I'm missing when pltting the shapes to output to .fbx? The cinema guy can send me animated fbx geos and they seem fine but going the other way sin't happy. attachment: winmail.dat
RE: Shameless Plug | New blog little article
Good job and thanks. Ps: I see you like to experiment with a toon look. Maybe this will interest you to remove that 'clean' 3D look. https://vimeo.com/15257337 Perhaps you can push the 'randomize' deformer and instead make something more custom in ICE . -manny From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Vincent Fortin Sent: Wednesday, October 30, 2013 2:03 PM To: softimage Subject: Re: Shameless Plug | New blog little article Well done Olivier! On 2013-10-30 12:42 PM, olivier jeannel olivier.jean...@noos.frmailto:olivier.jean...@noos.fr wrote: I made this little exercise this morning and decided to share it. It's long and difficult to share a simple concept, double kudos and hugs to every tutorial makers ! I'm not sure it's clear, but it's rather simple. Honestly if you're a serious TD, jump to the next message, nothing to read here... I put it on my old and quiet since 2010 blog... http://facialdeluxe.blogspot.fr/ It's about circles and arrays. Oh, and I tried to mention the name of people I took things from, hope they won't mind, appologies if I forgot someone. Olivier attachment: winmail.dat
RE: Envelope Operator funkyness
Yes, also you may have inadvertently moved the 'center' (Button top right) of the skin element after the mute. Reset the center if that the case. Also, doing a “set reference poses” should alleviate this, I think you must do it on the deformers (bone elements) and skin. Save ur scene first;) -manny -Original Message- From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Eric Thivierge Sent: Wednesday, October 30, 2013 4:40 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: Envelope Operator funkyness If your nulls have moved since you initially did the bind yes. Select the mesh Envelope Reset Actor. Watch for a shift of one of the nulls. One probably has moved for some reason. If your nulls are in a good place where you want them, you can use the current positions of the nulls for the bind pose but selecting all of them and doing a Envelope Set Reference Pose. On Wednesday, October 30, 2013 4:35:17 PM, Sergio Mucino wrote: Taking a closer look, this is happening when I do the mesh binding. The mesh shifts a bit right away (no need to go through the weights editing step). Could it be related to transforms stored in the nulls I'm using to deform the mesh? I don't see how something like this could have been introduced, since all nulls were created by a script... anyway, just exploring all the options. Thanks for any help! On 30/10/2013 4:29 PM, Sergio Mucino wrote: I'm seeing something a little bit odd, and I was wondering if it was normal, or if someone else had seen it before. I've got a quite complex mesh that I'm enveloping to a set of nulls. Everything is ok. I then do a Smooth Envelope Weights on the mesh, and then maybe tweak some weights using the Edit Weights table. Once I'm done, if I take the Envelope operator and mute it/unmute it, I can see the verts of the mesh shift positions. Sometimes (on other meshes) its by a super tiny bit. Other times (as in this mesh) it is more noticeable. I was wondering why this would be. Am I doing something that somehow disturbs the rest shape of the mesh stored by the operator (if it is that way how it works)? Can this cause problems down the road? Can it be prevented? Thanks for any comments! -- attachment: winmail.dat
RE: Equivalent to Maya's Wrap Deformer...
Don't mean to hijack. From my tests on an envelope using extract then using those extracted polys as a cage, won't work. Use the actual skin mesh instead or duplicate it and delete what you don't need and use that as a cage. The solution I would use is to GATOR the mud to the char. Merge all the mud if you want to have a single element. Gator that to the character. Freeze the GATOR op. Gator is mostly practical because you will be dealing with 'weight deform' once frozen which is very fast. Also, you can save alot of time by testing on a simple scenario first and not on the production sample. Manny Papamanos Product Support Specialist Softimage and Motionbuilder From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Jeremie Passerin Sent: Tuesday, October 29, 2013 4:11 PM To: softimage Subject: Re: Equivalent to Maya's Wrap Deformer... Hi Steven, Well this is something I have created recently so maybe I haven't spotted the issues you're talking about. Though, I remember Enoch mentioning that the ICECageDeform wasn't working in 2010 but does in 2013. So maybe something has been fixed. My version use a similar approach, I simplified a little bit and added blend and scale support. Jeremie On 29 October 2013 12:55, Steven Caron car...@gmail.commailto:car...@gmail.com wrote: you might be able to skip the 'extraction' step because ICE might be faster. On Tue, Oct 29, 2013 at 12:49 PM, Sergio Mucino sergio.muc...@modusfx.commailto:sergio.muc...@modusfx.com wrote: Thanks a lot Jeremie! I'll give it a shot (I tried using the ICE Deform by Hull compound approach, but it's not working, very likely due to what David explained). Cheers! attachment: winmail.dat
RE: Equivalent to Maya's Wrap Deformer...
Don't know if you have the option but you can use Plotshape on the point cached mesh . I then tested Cage and that worked, GATOR also worked even when frozen . -manny From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Sergio Mucino Sent: Tuesday, October 29, 2013 4:32 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: Equivalent to Maya's Wrap Deformer... Thanks Manny. Earlier in the thread I explained why GATOR won't work for me in this case. Thanks anyway! [cid:image001.gif@01CED4D1.2F309710] On 29/10/2013 4:24 PM, Manny Papamanos wrote: Don't mean to hijack. From my tests on an envelope using extract then using those extracted polys as a cage, won't work. Use the actual skin mesh instead or duplicate it and delete what you don't need and use that as a cage. The solution I would use is to GATOR the mud to the char. Merge all the mud if you want to have a single element. Gator that to the character. Freeze the GATOR op. Gator is mostly practical because you will be dealing with 'weight deform' once frozen which is very fast. Also, you can save alot of time by testing on a simple scenario first and not on the production sample. Manny Papamanos Product Support Specialist Softimage and Motionbuilder From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Jeremie Passerin Sent: Tuesday, October 29, 2013 4:11 PM To: softimage Subject: Re: Equivalent to Maya's Wrap Deformer... Hi Steven, Well this is something I have created recently so maybe I haven't spotted the issues you're talking about. Though, I remember Enoch mentioning that the ICECageDeform wasn't working in 2010 but does in 2013. So maybe something has been fixed. My version use a similar approach, I simplified a little bit and added blend and scale support. Jeremie On 29 October 2013 12:55, Steven Caron car...@gmail.commailto:car...@gmail.commailto:car...@gmail.commailto:car...@gmail.com wrote: you might be able to skip the 'extraction' step because ICE might be faster. On Tue, Oct 29, 2013 at 12:49 PM, Sergio Mucino sergio.muc...@modusfx.commailto:sergio.muc...@modusfx.commailto:sergio.muc...@modusfx.commailto:sergio.muc...@modusfx.com wrote: Thanks a lot Jeremie! I'll give it a shot (I tried using the ICE Deform by Hull compound approach, but it's not working, very likely due to what David explained). Cheers! attachment: winmail.dat
RE: GEAR and Global Scale
I just tested with one of my gear chars. Global-Scale does break the spine but only when pushed past 3. Easy to overlook while testing because the range goes from 0 to 3 on that slider. Manny Papamanos Product Support Specialist Softimage and Motionbuilder From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Daniel Kim Sent: Wednesday, October 23, 2013 12:19 AM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: GEAR and Global Scale I've done many characters with Gear, but had no problems with global scale @_@ --- Daniel Kim Animation Director Professional 3D Generalist http://www.danielkim3d.com --- On Wed, Oct 23, 2013 at 4:10 PM, Adrian Lopez vfxw...@gmail.commailto:vfxw...@gmail.com wrote: Hmmm.. weird. We just finished a four character job with GEAR rigs and extensive scaling.. never had a problem. Have you tried emailing Jeremie? He's incredibly responsive if not too busy... On Tue, Oct 22, 2013 at 7:36 PM, Mirko Jankovic mirkoj.anima...@gmail.commailto:mirkoj.anima...@gmail.com wrote: Hello, I'm having some weird issues with scaling character rigged in gear using global scale from anim_prop on global_C0_stl. For one his fingers kinda wonders of from character and also some deformations in back as we.. Just wondering if anyone else noticed anything weird happening when using global scale to rescale gear rigged characters? got even worse problem with rigs based on animal templates as well. Thanks -- Adrian Lopez CEO.Producer.Director Liquid Light Digital www.liquidlightdigital.comhttp://www.liquidlightdigital.com attachment: winmail.dat
RE: Fatal BSP2 error
Animating render vis may be interfering with things like motion-blur in some negative way... Just set the visibility to 'on' for that frame (remove the keys) and re-render it. -manny From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Sven Constable Sent: Wednesday, October 23, 2013 5:10 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: RE: Fatal BSP2 error I think at that particular frame I have an object with it's render visibility animated from off to on... I remember having problems with that too. Try setting/keying primary and secondary rays off instead. sven From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Paul Griswold Sent: Wednesday, October 23, 2013 10:04 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: Fatal BSP2 error I think at that particular frame I have an object with it's render visibility animated from off to on. I'll give batch a try see what happens. I've tried rendering with all diagnostics turned on and I can't see anything else listed that it's having a problem with. -Paul On Wed, Oct 23, 2013 at 3:47 PM, Ponthieux, Joseph G. (LARC-E1A)[LITES] j.ponthi...@nasa.govmailto:j.ponthi...@nasa.gov wrote: BSP is an optimization algorithm. It divides up the scene into smaller boxes in order to optimize the raytracing speed. When BSP2 was introduced it was apparently further optimized to set automatically to what it thinks is the best settings internally. I'd try changing the render type to rasterize or scanline, and I would also try render from xsibatch to see if that works. I'd bet that since everything works but that frame you could either move the camera or an object just a bit(gotta find the right one first of course) and it might free it up. -- Joey Ponthieux LaRC Information Technology Enhanced Services (LITES) Mymic Technical Services NASA Langley Research Center __ Opinions stated here-in are strictly those of the author and do not represent the opinions of NASA or any other party. From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Paul Griswold Sent: Wednesday, October 23, 2013 3:41 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: Fatal BSP2 error Straight render from Softimage, not a preview/region render. Though I think I'd get the same if I tried those as well. I'm searching through all my textures for the scene now - there are a lot of animated ones, and I'm wondering of one of those are corrupt. -Paul On Wed, Oct 23, 2013 at 3:37 PM, Ponthieux, Joseph G. (LARC-E1A)[LITES] j.ponthi...@nasa.govmailto:j.ponthi...@nasa.gov wrote: Is this coming from render region, preview, or render(interface)? Or is it from xsibatch render? Have you tried using the older bsp and changing the bsp settings? Search for MI_FORCE_OLD_BSP in the documentation. -- Joey Ponthieux LaRC Information Technology Enhanced Services (LITES) Mymic Technical Services NASA Langley Research Center __ Opinions stated here-in are strictly those of the author and do not represent the opinions of NASA or any other party. From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Paul Griswold Sent: Wednesday, October 23, 2013 3:25 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Fatal BSP2 error I'm stuck back using Mental Ray on a project and on 1 particular frame I'm getting this: // ERROR : FATAL: BSP2 0.4 39 MB fatal 551109: runtime exception 0xc0fd: stack overflow // ERROR : FATAL: BSP2 0.4 39 MB fatal 551109: runtime exception 0xc0fd: stack overflow // ERROR : FATAL: BSP2 0.4 39 MB fatal 551109: runtime exception 0xc0fd: stack overflow // ERROR : FATAL: BSP2 0.4 39 MB fatal 551109: runtime exception 0xc0fd: stack overflow // ERROR : FATAL: Mental ray has encountered a fatal error condition and has been disabled for the rest of this XSI session. // It is advisable to save your work and restart Softimage. // You may file a bug report at http://usa.autodesk.com/adsk/servlet/item?id=12331406siteID=123112SelProduct=Softimage. // A dump file and script log has been generated on your user folder, please attach these files when submitting a report. // WARNING : 3030-REND-RenderPasses - Command was cancelled. // VERBOSE : CM_DefaultPrims_EndCommand Called // VERBOSE : CM_ICEPortExplorer_OnEndCommand_OnEvent RenderPasses(null); // INFO : Successfully saved scene before
RE: Expressions on constraints... huh?
All you have to do really is select the divot (where you key on the custom parameter) and drag and drop it to the U location divot in the constraint. This works. However, I noticed in 2014 SP2 there are no divots on the custom parameter set making it impossible to key their values in the interface... weird. It may be the particular QFE I'm using... I'll check it out. Since it may be missing, just right click on the divot of the U Location select 'expression editor' In the expression editor, select 'object' (on top of expression editor) nullcustParamsetcustparam Apply. Now the custom param in the null will control the U Location of the other null. -Manny SI and Mobu support From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Sergio Mucino Sent: Monday, September 30, 2013 3:03 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: Expressions on constraints... huh? Hey Eric. I got carried away with a different task. Let me get back to you on this one a little later. (I also tried your other suggestion with the = sign... didn't make a difference, if I remember correctly). I'll let you know ASAP... thanks! Sergio Mucino Lead Rigger Modus FX On 30/09/2013 11:48 AM, Eric Turman wrote: I know this sounds really simple, but did you set a relative value of the U position for each extreme of your custom parameter? On Mon, Sep 30, 2013 at 10:25 AM, Sergio Mucino sergio.muc...@modusfx.commailto:sergio.muc...@modusfx.com wrote: This should be a simple one. I've got a null constrained to a curve (param). I have another null on which I created a Custom Parameter, so I could drive with it the U Pos parameter on the curve constraint for the first null. I've connected them using the Parameter Connection Editor, and the constrained Null shows the following expression on its Path %age parameter: l_fcv( Rig.CustomPSet.Path_U_Pos ) However, when I go to my custom parameter on the second Null and change the value, the constrained null does not update. It does nothing. What am I missing? Thanks for any help! (P.S. I also tried getting rid of the l_fcv part of the expression, since it reads to me as if it was expecting a function curve as an input... but this didn't change anything). -- Sergio Mucino Lead Rigger Modus FX -- To unsubscribe: mail softimage-requ...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-requ...@listproc.autodesk.com with subject unsubscribe and reply to the confirmation email. -- -=T=- -- To unsubscribe: mail softimage-requ...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-requ...@listproc.autodesk.com with subject unsubscribe and reply to the confirmation email. attachment: winmail.dat-- To unsubscribe: mail softimage-requ...@listproc.autodesk.com with subject unsubscribe and reply to the confirmation email.
RE: Expressions on constraints... huh?
Seems like someone changed the default behaviour of the Floating Point Number custom parameter. You have to enable 'Animatable' and 'keyable' now in 2014. Logged it. -Manny SI and Mobu support From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Manny Papamanos Sent: Monday, September 30, 2013 3:45 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: RE: Expressions on constraints... huh? All you have to do really is select the divot (where you key on the custom parameter) and drag and drop it to the U location divot in the constraint. This works. However, I noticed in 2014 SP2 there are no divots on the custom parameter set making it impossible to key their values in the interface... weird. It may be the particular QFE I'm using... I'll check it out. Since it may be missing, just right click on the divot of the U Location select 'expression editor' In the expression editor, select 'object' (on top of expression editor) nullcustParamsetcustparam Apply. Now the custom param in the null will control the U Location of the other null. -Manny SI and Mobu support From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Sergio Mucino Sent: Monday, September 30, 2013 3:03 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: Expressions on constraints... huh? Hey Eric. I got carried away with a different task. Let me get back to you on this one a little later. (I also tried your other suggestion with the = sign... didn't make a difference, if I remember correctly). I'll let you know ASAP... thanks! Sergio Mucino Lead Rigger Modus FX On 30/09/2013 11:48 AM, Eric Turman wrote: I know this sounds really simple, but did you set a relative value of the U position for each extreme of your custom parameter? On Mon, Sep 30, 2013 at 10:25 AM, Sergio Mucino sergio.muc...@modusfx.commailto:sergio.muc...@modusfx.com wrote: This should be a simple one. I've got a null constrained to a curve (param). I have another null on which I created a Custom Parameter, so I could drive with it the U Pos parameter on the curve constraint for the first null. I've connected them using the Parameter Connection Editor, and the constrained Null shows the following expression on its Path %age parameter: l_fcv( Rig.CustomPSet.Path_U_Pos ) However, when I go to my custom parameter on the second Null and change the value, the constrained null does not update. It does nothing. What am I missing? Thanks for any help! (P.S. I also tried getting rid of the l_fcv part of the expression, since it reads to me as if it was expecting a function curve as an input... but this didn't change anything). -- Sergio Mucino Lead Rigger Modus FX -- To unsubscribe: mail softimage-requ...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-requ...@listproc.autodesk.com with subject unsubscribe and reply to the confirmation email. -- -=T=- -- To unsubscribe: mail softimage-requ...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-requ...@listproc.autodesk.com with subject unsubscribe and reply to the confirmation email. attachment: winmail.dat-- To unsubscribe: mail softimage-requ...@listproc.autodesk.com with subject unsubscribe and reply to the confirmation email.
RE: Child objects not following animation (GEAR?)
I can't say I've ever had issues with this and I have quite an elaborate rig added to a GEAR rig. The schematic helps me to quickly discover unusual problems like.. enveloped deformers.. or something... In the Shematic, enable Show'Operator links' and 'Associated Model links' and perhaps disable 'Links on selected' Manny Papamanos Autodesk Softimage and MotionBuilder Support From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Michael Heberlein Sent: Thursday, July 04, 2013 6:46 AM To: Softimage List Subject: Child objects not following animation (GEAR?) Hey gang, I have a GEAR rig here (hats off to Jeremie for this great tool) that's not very complex but some child objects are not updating when their parent control is animated. However, they follow when I move the parent by hand. Making all children visible all the time or adding local transform expressions, pose constraints, etc. didn't help. After I also moved one of the children manually, their evaluation wakes up and everything works fine for the current session. It falls back to the odd behavoir when I reload the scene or model (tested on different machines). Has anyone experienced this before and am I missing something obvious? I could not reproduce the problem in a simple scene so it may be related to some GEAR magic. Thanks, Michael attachment: winmail.dat
RE: 2014-2013
Converting a scene is wasted time imo and may yield bad results at render due to passes and data that doesn’t port over. Personally, I would override the render manager and just render with xsibatch –render [“scenepath”] –skip in a command prompt. You can run on 5 separate terminals to one SI license. Manny Papamanos Autodesk Softimage and MotionBuilder Support From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Rob Chapman Sent: Friday, July 05, 2013 8:31 AM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: 2014-2013 or try an earlier .xsi version export of the scene made into a model...? On 5 July 2013 12:41, Sandy Sutherland sandy.mailli...@gmail.commailto:sandy.mailli...@gmail.com wrote: Well you could write out caches - then export obj of geometry - go into the previous Softimage, import the obj - load the cache onto it and redo the texture - UV should go with the obj - camera you could try fbx. S. On 2013/07/05 12:38 PM, Pingo van der Brinkloev wrote: I don't evern have caches. This scene is so simple. I'm using 2 texture maps and everything else is super simple animation and geo. Isn't there a cheat? Somehow to get soft to think it's a 2013 scene? P On 05/07/2013, at 12.33, Sandy Sutherland sandy.mailli...@gmail.commailto:sandy.mailli...@gmail.com wrote: attachment: winmail.dat
RE: Rendering crowds on a farm
Hi Jeff. I meant 'well documented' inside the defect log of SOFT-9095, for an eventual fix. The defects and feature-requests are accessible by AD staff only. -manny From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Jeff McFall Sent: Monday, June 17, 2013 2:36 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: RE: Rendering crowds on a farm Manny, Just curious - when you say well documented do you mean via forums or is there an active/up to date Autodesk link which covers these kinds of details? I had similar issues early this year and would say that I struggled to find any information for this or other issues other than asking via the forums. Wondering if there is an Autodesk go to location that would be a good place to start when having troubles like this... Apologies if I am missing the obvious Jeff From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Manny Papamanos Sent: Tuesday, June 11, 2013 1:05 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: RE: Rendering crowds on a farm This is a known issue and well documented. From my tests at the time, I would repro this if I rendered on several computers with 'xsibatch -render' and the -skip flag. If your render management app is using the same flag internally, it will have the same issue. However, there was no issue when I tested on two computers with: On one: xsibatch -render [path to .scn in quotes] -frames 1,100,2 on the other: xsibatch -render [path to .scn in quotes] -frames 2,100,2 run this on a SI command prompt. Manny Papamanos Autodesk Softimage and MotionBuilder Support From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Andi Farhall Sent: Tuesday, June 11, 2013 12:01 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Rendering crowds on a farm Hello, having got completely stuffed by crowd texturing and FBX exporting i've taken the fairly drastic measure of not using textured characters and just using a coloured shader, and also reverted to the conventional point cache way of caching rather than using fbx which is much simpler and much quicker However. i'm getting issues when rendering on the farm, i.e all my actors are now a single colour. Load the scene and render it locally and it's fine which makes debugging it rather tricky I'm using a technique i saw on Stephen Blairs blog for colouring crowds which works a treat but i can't be sure if the farm is disliking this, but i've added the user attributes to the cache list, i've cached from frame one, rendered from frame one and it still comes out incorrectly. I've tried a get and set for all the custom attributes on the cached cloud, I even locked the farm submission to one machine for the whole sequence and still i'm not getting the goods. I have spoken to someone from another company who was doing crowd stuff recently and he said they had to render everything locally as the their farm did exactly the same thing. I'm just wondering if there's anything i've missed before i resign myself to rendering everything locally myself. cheers, Andi. ... http://www.hackneyeffects.com/ https://vimeo.com/user4174293 http://www.linkedin.com/pub/andi-farhall/b/496/b21 http://www.flickr.com/photos/lord_hackney/ http://spylon.tumblr.com/ This email and any attachments to it may be confidential and are intended solely for the use of the individual to whom it is addressed. Any views or opinions expressed are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of Hackney Effects Ltd. If you are not the intended recipient of this email, you must neither take any action based upon its contents, nor copy or show it to anyone. Please contact the sender if you believe you have received this email in error. attachment: winmail.dat
RE: Crowd FBX won't save in scene
The materials issue is something I repro when batch rendering on more than one computer and using -skip. I was asked to test this on the current SP1. From my understanding, the scene has to be recreated in the SP1 because there were some changes in the core compound most likely. Hopefully that one is fixed, will let you know. Manny Papamanos Autodesk Softimage and MotionBuilder Support From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Andi Farhall Sent: Friday, June 07, 2013 11:08 AM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: RE: Crowd FBX won't save in scene Hi Ivan, the problem only occurs when i've imported an FBX with a few thousand actors. I don't get it at all with the simulation scene i generate the FBX from cheers, A http://www.hackneyeffects.com/ https://vimeo.com/user4174293 http://www.linkedin.com/pub/andi-farhall/b/496/b21 http://www.flickr.com/photos/lord_hackney/ http://spylon.tumblr.com/ This email and any attachments to it may be confidential and are intended solely for the use of the individual to whom it is addressed. Any views or opinions expressed are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of Hackney Effects Ltd. If you are not the intended recipient of this email, you must neither take any action based upon its contents, nor copy or show it to anyone. Please contact the sender if you believe you have received this email in error. From: hack...@outlook.commailto:hack...@outlook.com To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: RE: Crowd FBX won't save in scene Date: Fri, 7 Jun 2013 15:05:35 + I've also tried the standard point cache procedure an i ended up with broken materials in the cache. Not very handy, so at this rate i'll be rendering locally on one machine! cheers, A http://www.hackneyeffects.com/ https://vimeo.com/user4174293 http://www.linkedin.com/pub/andi-farhall/b/496/b21 http://www.flickr.com/photos/lord_hackney/ http://spylon.tumblr.com/ This email and any attachments to it may be confidential and are intended solely for the use of the individual to whom it is addressed. Any views or opinions expressed are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of Hackney Effects Ltd. If you are not the intended recipient of this email, you must neither take any action based upon its contents, nor copy or show it to anyone. Please contact the sender if you believe you have received this email in error. From: hack...@outlook.commailto:hack...@outlook.com To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Crowd FBX won't save in scene Date: Fri, 7 Jun 2013 14:33:18 + Hello, I understand there are issues with CrowdFX and exporting via FBX, and I wanted to check if the issues I seem to be having are part of that known issue. I'm using 2013sp1 I can bake out an FBX fine, and read it into a new scene and it works fine and dandy. Then i try and save the scene and it refuses, citing a load of CLSid errors. It works as expected if i have less than about a 1000 actors but more than this and the problem appears, and seeing as a production sized bake is taking nearly an hour to import I'm wastin gtime i haven't got. Apart from that, this is the first time i've opened the crowdFX box and i have to say it's pretty darn good. cheers, A http://www.hackneyeffects.com/ https://vimeo.com/user4174293 http://www.linkedin.com/pub/andi-farhall/b/496/b21 http://www.flickr.com/photos/lord_hackney/ http://spylon.tumblr.com/ This email and any attachments to it may be confidential and are intended solely for the use of the individual to whom it is addressed. Any views or opinions expressed are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of Hackney Effects Ltd. If you are not the intended recipient of this email, you must neither take any action based upon its contents, nor copy or show it to anyone. Please contact the sender if you believe you have received this email in error. attachment: winmail.dat
RE: Setting and Manipulating Keys Very slow in Referenced Model
Hi Enrique. I repro the issue in 2013SP1 QFE1 x64 with your test scene sent to support. The keying issue is nonexistent in 2014 x64 with your test scene but the f-curve editing issue is still there. Also, I tested my own gear character and things are fine with gear and ref models. I recreated a character keyset on your scene where I included all rotation and all translation on all controllers. Making it heavier than usual and things still seem to go a lot more smoothly when keying or editing. You may have omitted a very critical step in your pipeline: As you may know, 'Key all keyable' is the worst option to use because it will key all the parameters sr+t unless you edit them in bunches in the keyable parameters editor under (KP/L). At the end, inside the keying panel (KP/L), if we take the finger bones as an example, only rotation should be present if you use this option'Key all keyable'. I personally use 'character key set' method for blocking then go with marked params... Key sets are good because you can interactively see what you are keying in one list by selecting the (two keys icon on bottom right)inspect plus when you open the fcurve editor it reflects all keys in the char key set. If you have omitted this, then you're looking at 3x more data that has to be processed. Without this due diligence, the entire scene bogs down because you're dealing with too much data and this probably gets compounded with reference models. The real time playback will also suffer. Tips: Only include controllers in the keying list. There are a big pile of nulls that are being keyed unnecessarily in your scene. Also, the little man icon objects, don't include that either. Most likely someone may be using key all keyable and this may be bogging things down. To be on the safe side: I would go to the model level and lock what you don't want the animators to animate like all the scaling on all controllers and things like translation on controllers meant to be rotated such as finger bones. Subsequent scenes will profit from this, I don't know about current ones though. What does everyone else do to keep things from being keyed in ref model situations in a production environment? Manny Papamanos SI and Mobu support From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Tim Crowson Sent: Wednesday, May 22, 2013 1:07 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: Setting and Manipulating Keys Very slow in Referenced Model Gotcha. Just making sure the vocab was clear. Yeah that's just asset management then... I have to say we don't have a good system in place for asset versioning either (also a small shop with real constraints), but it's something we're aware that we need. -Tim On 5/22/2013 11:55 AM, Sandy Sutherland wrote: Tim - it would be a system that controls VERSIONS of rig models for e.g., they would be tested, then passed on to become the 'current' version, which would then update the references. Basically to avoid say a rigger just writing out the model that is used by a bunch of animators, possibly adding some 'feature' or changing a hierarchy or whatever that then breaks the animation in the scene on the reference model. S. On 22/05/2013 17:40, Tim Crowson wrote: Just to make sure I understand the terminology... when you say 'versionned' referencing, do you mean a workflow that uses controlled 'resolutions'? -Tim C. -- Tim Crowson Lead CG Artist Magnetic Dreams, Inc. 2525 Lebanon Pike, Building C. Nashville, TN 37214 Ph 615.885.6801 | Fax 615.889.4768 | www.magneticdreams.comhttp://www.magneticdreams.com tim.crow...@magneticdreams.commailto:tim.crow...@magneticdreams.com Confidentiality Notice: This email, including attachments, is confidential and should not be used by anyone who is not the original intended recipient(s). If you have received this e-mail in error please inform the sender and delete it from your mailbox or any other storage mechanism. Magnetic Dreams, Inc cannot accept liability for any statements made which are clearly the sender's own and not expressly made on behalf of Magnetic Dreams, Inc or one of its agents. attachment: winmail.dat
RE: Face Robot sculpting lips problem
Hi, Nothing related in our db under this. I checked with a Rock Falcon scene an this works well in 2013. Some things to check: In the schematic.. On the instance that appears when you hit mouth, check that there is E,C,I in schematic associated with the node. Check that there is E,V for the Face and that facial soft tissue operator is below the envelope op. Perhaps there are move components in the Modeling stack that interfere, delete them as a test. Move the teeth back and forth, it may reveal something... Send the scene to us, I can take a look or log something. Manny Papamanos Autodesk 3D Graphics Specialist : Softimage | MotionBuilder | Mudbox From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Bradley Gabe Sent: Thursday, February 14, 2013 11:30 AM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: Face Robot sculpting lips problem Check the map for the soft tissue operator for the mouth, and see if you can reduce the effect by painting it out. On Thu, Feb 14, 2013 at 8:19 AM, Sandy Sutherland sandy.sutherl...@triggerfish.co.zamailto:sandy.sutherl...@triggerfish.co.za wrote: Hi all, We are trying to do some sculpting around the corners of the Lips on our character and we are getting a funny effect, you select tune sculpt lips - do the sculpting and it looks great - BUT when you hit apply, the sculpt changes a bit, it no longer looks quite how you sculpted it. Any ideas how to get round this? Thanks S. Sandy Sutherlandmailto:sandy.sutherl...@triggerfish.co.za | Technical Supervisor http://triggerfish.co.za/en http://triggerfish.co.za/en http://triggerfish.co.za/en http://triggerfish.co.za/en attachment: winmail.dat
RE: Fcurve editor crashing soft
Hi. Did you receive this? Cause I didn't. Also, if you know where to get RC1 please let me know. -manny From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Chris Chia Sent: Tuesday, February 05, 2013 7:23 AM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Cc: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: Fcurve editor crashing soft Stephen, U sent it to Manny? On 5 Feb, 2013, at 7:24 PM, Stephen Blair stephenrbl...@gmail.commailto:stephenrbl...@gmail.com wrote: Hi I already sent a repro scene to Autodesk, so they have at least one. And I did try muting all the events. In fact, the problem is repro if you load just sitoa.dll and nothing else. Thanks // Stephen // Solid Angle Support On 05/02/2013 5:48 AM, adrian wyer wrote: shitty BT broadband doesn't play well with a 300+Mb scene file. ;o) and my usual preference is to eliminate any extraneous junk from the scene to make it easier to trace the problem for support a From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Dan Yargici Sent: 05 February 2013 10:29 To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: Fcurve editor crashing soft this makes it VERY difficult to send a low complexity scene to support for repro I don't mean to sound like a smartarse, but why not send a high complexity one then? :) DAN On Tue, Feb 5, 2013 at 12:20 PM, adrian wyer adrian.w...@fluid-pictures.commailto:adrian.w...@fluid-pictures.com wrote: as noted, we have had lots of issues with this, but if we strip an offending scene down to just an animated null/root, the unwanted behaviour ceases this makes it VERY difficult to send a low complexity scene to support for repro having already lost PLENTY of production time to this bug, we can't justify MORE time spent trying to create a repro scene at our expense a From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Steven Caron Sent: 05 February 2013 05:41 To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: Fcurve editor crashing soft fyi, i animate regularly, have arnold loaded, and haven't experienced this. it must be very specific data set that causes it On Mon, Feb 4, 2013 at 9:35 PM, Enrique Caballero enriquecaball...@gmail.commailto:enriquecaball...@gmail.com wrote: This is great to know. I am now disconnecting Arnold from our Animation WG. I had it in there due to Laziness On Mon, Feb 4, 2013 at 11:53 PM, Stefano Jannuzzo stefano.jannu...@gmail.commailto:stefano.jannu...@gmail.com wrote: In SItoA, most of the ipr events are managed through the dirty list. Since it's not perfect, we manage some through the OnValueChange event. Can you guys test after disabling the event in the plugin manager? On Mon, Feb 4, 2013 at 4:24 PM, Kamen Lilov kamen.li...@chaosgroup.commailto:kamen.li...@chaosgroup.com wrote: On 2/2/2013 2:26 AM, Stefan Kubicek wrote: Just wildly guessing here but since renderers need to update e.g. the Render Region when values are changed in the scene, which sometimes fails when the built-in mechanisms are used, I suspect both Vray and Arnold are making heavy use of some custom OnValueChanged events. Maybe this could cause problems when used excessively and/or or with deep hierarchies? Can't speak for Arnold, but yes, VRay does rely heavily on OnValueChanged. Hope this helps the dev folks at Autodesk No virus found in this message. Checked by AVG - www.avg.comhttp://www.avg.com Version: 2012.0.2238 / Virus Database: 2639/5582 - Release Date: 02/04/13 No virus found in this message. Checked by AVG - www.avg.comhttp://www.avg.com Version: 2012.0.2238 / Virus Database: 2639/5582 - Release Date: 02/04/13 attachment: winmail.dat
RE: Fcurve editor crashing soft
Crap !$@ Was meant for Chris. -manny From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Manny Papamanos Sent: Tuesday, February 05, 2013 4:42 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: RE: Fcurve editor crashing soft Hi. Did you receive this? Cause I didn't. Also, if you know where to get RC1 please let me know. -manny From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Chris Chia Sent: Tuesday, February 05, 2013 7:23 AM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Cc: softimage@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: Fcurve editor crashing soft Stephen, U sent it to Manny? On 5 Feb, 2013, at 7:24 PM, Stephen Blair stephenrbl...@gmail.commailto:stephenrbl...@gmail.com wrote: Hi I already sent a repro scene to Autodesk, so they have at least one. And I did try muting all the events. In fact, the problem is repro if you load just sitoa.dll and nothing else. Thanks // Stephen // Solid Angle Support On 05/02/2013 5:48 AM, adrian wyer wrote: shitty BT broadband doesn't play well with a 300+Mb scene file. ;o) and my usual preference is to eliminate any extraneous junk from the scene to make it easier to trace the problem for support a From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Dan Yargici Sent: 05 February 2013 10:29 To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: Fcurve editor crashing soft this makes it VERY difficult to send a low complexity scene to support for repro I don't mean to sound like a smartarse, but why not send a high complexity one then? :) DAN On Tue, Feb 5, 2013 at 12:20 PM, adrian wyer adrian.w...@fluid-pictures.commailto:adrian.w...@fluid-pictures.com wrote: as noted, we have had lots of issues with this, but if we strip an offending scene down to just an animated null/root, the unwanted behaviour ceases this makes it VERY difficult to send a low complexity scene to support for repro having already lost PLENTY of production time to this bug, we can't justify MORE time spent trying to create a repro scene at our expense a From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Steven Caron Sent: 05 February 2013 05:41 To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: Fcurve editor crashing soft fyi, i animate regularly, have arnold loaded, and haven't experienced this. it must be very specific data set that causes it On Mon, Feb 4, 2013 at 9:35 PM, Enrique Caballero enriquecaball...@gmail.commailto:enriquecaball...@gmail.com wrote: This is great to know. I am now disconnecting Arnold from our Animation WG. I had it in there due to Laziness On Mon, Feb 4, 2013 at 11:53 PM, Stefano Jannuzzo stefano.jannu...@gmail.commailto:stefano.jannu...@gmail.com wrote: In SItoA, most of the ipr events are managed through the dirty list. Since it's not perfect, we manage some through the OnValueChange event. Can you guys test after disabling the event in the plugin manager? On Mon, Feb 4, 2013 at 4:24 PM, Kamen Lilov kamen.li...@chaosgroup.commailto:kamen.li...@chaosgroup.com wrote: On 2/2/2013 2:26 AM, Stefan Kubicek wrote: Just wildly guessing here but since renderers need to update e.g. the Render Region when values are changed in the scene, which sometimes fails when the built-in mechanisms are used, I suspect both Vray and Arnold are making heavy use of some custom OnValueChanged events. Maybe this could cause problems when used excessively and/or or with deep hierarchies? Can't speak for Arnold, but yes, VRay does rely heavily on OnValueChanged. Hope this helps the dev folks at Autodesk No virus found in this message. Checked by AVG - www.avg.comhttp://www.avg.com Version: 2012.0.2238 / Virus Database: 2639/5582 - Release Date: 02/04/13 No virus found in this message. Checked by AVG - www.avg.comhttp://www.avg.com Version: 2012.0.2238 / Virus Database: 2639/5582 - Release Date: 02/04/13 attachment: winmail.dat
RE: Face Robot refresh
Hi Kris. After spending some time troubleshooting this one. The head element FR_head is not disappearing but deforming the verts to infinity due to the MetaMouthOperator. Looks like it may be due to a crappy value someone may have set inside the MouthAdjustProperties operator that FR is not happy with. Once I replaced the MouthAdjustProperties with a preset I saved out of a RockFalcon scene, the face reappears, and stays there when the scene is reloaded. So: 1 Find the MouthAdjustProperties in the FR_head element 2 Open the operator and Load Preset (attached) 3 Save scene Let us know if that does it. Manny Papamanos Autodesk 3D Graphics Specialist : Softimage | MotionBuilder | Mudbox From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Chris Chia Sent: Tuesday, February 05, 2013 1:10 AM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: RE: Face Robot refresh Check your partition. Clear your preference folder under user home Check the explorer... Check the camera visibility This is what I could think of. From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Kris Rivel Sent: Friday, February 01, 2013 9:08 PM To: Softimage List Subject: Face Robot refresh Anyone ever run into a situation where your main face robot mesh just isn't visible? Its in the scene and set to visible but I can not see it. I load in the model, set the active face robot node to the right model and save it out. But when I reload, the face is hidden. The toggle face control in the face robot editor does nothing too. Any ideas what causes this? Is there some sort of force refresh or something to fix this? Kris attachment: winmail.dat
RE: Rigging resources
Ah yes Jason... Those were the days ;) Whatever happened to Maude? The 3dmastermind training is still quite useful since the rigging tools and techniques haven’t changed much and also shows some good animation tricks. Couple that knowledge with modern toolkits like Gear or Species and you can get by just any character rigging/animation/lip-synch project with ease. If you know someone who’s trying to get initiated to rigging in Softimage let me know and I’ll give you a complimentary copy if you’re a member on the list. Send a message to 3dmasterm...@live.commailto:3dmasterm...@live.com Ciao. Manny Papamanos Autodesk 3D Graphics Specialist : Softimage | MotionBuilder | Mudbox From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Jason S Sent: Monday, January 21, 2013 4:22 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: Rigging resources Known Manny for a long while, even before the SI years, at a small comany called PRH Showed me a number of tricks, and even then he was da' man :) On 21/01/2013 3:09 PM, Luca wrote: Yeah, me too bought the DVD from Manny, about 4 or 5 years ago. I'd like to see something more. His tricks were nice... 2013/1/21 Adrian Lopez vfxw...@gmail.commailto:vfxw...@gmail.com Manny Papamanos released a rigging DVD for Soft a few years ago, We purchased and enjoyed it, but it may be getting a bit dated by now.. Still, alot of useful techniques from someone very close to the software. Unfortunately a second edition was not forthcoming... On Mon, Jan 21, 2013 at 12:40 PM, Jeremie Passerin gerem@gmail.commailto:gerem@gmail.com wrote: A child cannot drive it's parent in Softimage. That might be a big problem for May riggers sometimes. I would love it to be possible actually. Another thing is the scaling hierarchy that is different in Softimage. Though, you can have it behaving like Maya in XSI. I'm actually frustrated that you an't have it behaving like Softimage in Maya :) -- Adrian Lopez CEO.Producer.Director Liquid Light Digital www.liquidlightdigital.comhttp://www.liquidlightdigital.com -- [Image removed by sender.]...superpositiviii...qualunque cosa accada!... attachment: winmail.dat
RE: Rigging resources
Nice list Alan, some other neat features are the non-linear workflow (I see people really struggling in Maya with this) and also the 'shadow' display of rig elements is cool which works with nulls also, this saves you time and makes the scene lighter. Manny Papamanos Autodesk 3D Graphics Specialist : Softimage | MotionBuilder | Mudbox From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Jason S Sent: Monday, January 21, 2013 10:49 AM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: Rigging resources Also, although it might be a good thing for a transitionning rigger to to know the pluginless basics, but still don't forget Gear! http://gear.jeremiepasserin.com/videos.html On 21/01/2013 9:58 AM, Alan Fregtman wrote: also: - get the ribbon spine out of your head -- there are far better ways to do a spine in Soft. - you need not have UVs to save your weighting natively. :) - IK comes free with any bonechain, you don't need to create an IK handle. - there are no disconnected nodes floating in your scene, except possibly those in ICE or the rendertree. For example if you have something constrained to another, and delete the other, your constraint ops will disappear into the cosmos and not linger in your scene. - always use 2D bone chains in Soft. the 3D one is for very rare cases. - Maya's history concept = Softimage's operator stack - Maya's UV sets = Softimage's texture projections and Maya's UV projection = Soft's texture subprojections - In Maya you have one history stack, in Softimage you do also BUT it's split to several sections, Modeling, Shape Modeling, Animation, Secondary Shape Animation and sometimes Simulation and Post-Simulation. This lets you do witchcraft like have a finished rig and modify your topology while having UVs, shapes, materials, clusters, weight (influence) maps, etc. cleanly adjust to it automagically. This feature will save your life. - Freeze button will make all your operators permanent, and ruin your rig. Freeze M(odeling) will only freeze below the Modeling marker. As I recall, it's quite tricky in Maya to do the equivalent of a freezing of the topology modifiers you may have applied after the rig was done. - Freeze Translation will reset your pivot to the parent's, or if no parent, the world center. In Maya's equivalent it keeps the pivot in place. To keep it in place, use Set Neutral Translation instead. - You can't add more bones to an existing bonechain, or remove bones, without having to recreate it completely. (Annoying, I know.) You can always chain some chains together of course. - Be aware that Neutral Pose is not the same as putting the object as a child of a parent in the same transformation. For example if you rotate a child and neutralposed, when you have animated it translating around and expect to adjust the position curves, for example posY, to actually go UP in the zeroed (neutralposed) orientation of your child, it won't, it will always be relative to the parent's transform regardless of what the neutral pose says. Also, FYI, neutralposes can be undone (Transform-Remove Neutral Pose). - ICE is awesome for custom deformers and many, many things. That's all for now. On Mon, Jan 21, 2013 at 4:51 AM, Michal Doniec doni...@gmail.commailto:doni...@gmail.com wrote: I've trained many people back and forth, doesn't take long if a person is open minded. Most people do't want to go back to Maya after a while too :) Main differences to point out: - Softimage joints have no orientation in Maya sense - anything can be enveloped - pose deformers are built in - FK chains are usually built from nulls - explain how referencing and models work - show them synoptic and animation mixer (export/import animation/pose) Other than that (and probably a few other things I forgot), it's the same as in maya. Personally I tend to go back and forth and most techniques apply to both packages. On 21 January 2013 09:30, Enrique Caballero enriquecaball...@gmail.commailto:enriquecaball...@gmail.com wrote: I recently trained someone during their transition. And basically, there are no useful tutorials that I could find. The thing is though, once she gets her head around some of the simple differences between Maya and Soft, it shouldn't be that painful of a transition. This is the path that I took recently. The first mistake she will make is that she will start enveloping everything to bones. So let her know that we usually only use Bones if we need IK and introduce her to Nulls and how to use the neutral pose for rigging etc. Then she will need to learn the curve deform and what happens when you deform a curve with another curve. A quick explanation about quaternions will be very helpful And then the Pose constraint, and how it works with constraint compensation. But if you want her to be enthusiastic about the process. Start with the strengths, show her ICE and the power
RE: Rigging resources
If you mean eliminate one of the bones...no. Chains are seen as an entity. You can click enter on the bone and set the bone display to none. Also, you can 'break a chain at bone' to break the IK at a certain bone. Manny Papamanos Autodesk 3D Graphics Specialist : Softimage | MotionBuilder | Mudbox From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Eugen Sares Sent: Monday, January 21, 2013 12:05 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: Rigging resources Am 21.01.2013 17:51, schrieb Miquel Campos: 2013/1/21 Alan Fregtman alan.fregt...@gmail.commailto:alan.fregt...@gmail.com You can't add more bones to an existing bonechain, or remove bones, without having to recreate it completely. (Annoying, I know.) You can always chain some chains together of course. You can add bones .. Skeleton menu Add Bone to Chain ;) Btw... is it possible to delete bones out of a chain as well? Miquel Campos www.akaosaru.comhttp://www.akaosaru.com attachment: winmail.dat
RE: Normal Maps in Softimage
Here’s a good cage example. http://www.poopinmymouth.com/tutorial/normal_workflow_2.htm Look at barrels at bottom. Feature request was already logged and I updated it: SOFT-5435 Ultimapper needs cage support to control ray length and direction Manny Papamanos Autodesk 3D Graphics Specialist Softimage | MotionBuilder | Mudbox From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Szabolcs Matefy Sent: Thursday, December 13, 2012 3:03 AM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: RE: Normal Maps in Softimage In SI using ultimapper you set an overall scan distance. In other solution there is a cage (the clone of the original low res model) and you tweak this cage to set the distance on a per vertex level. It’s almost critical in game dev where you might need different distances on your model (armpit, behind ear areas are good examples) From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Eric Cosky Sent: Thursday, December 13, 2012 5:41 AM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: RE: Normal Maps in Softimage Being primarily a Softimage user when it comes to 3D tools (I also use 3dcoat, fwiw), I don’t know what I’m missing with respect to “proper cage functionality” so if you don’t mind explaining that a bit further I’d appreciate it. Ultimapper always seemed to work for my simple limited tests for baking maps within Softimage, but maybe there is a better way? Or maybe there are bugs with it I haven’t noticed yet? Just curious, thanks. -Eric Cosky From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com]mailto:[mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Williams, Wayne Sent: Wednesday, December 12, 2012 5:24 AM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: RE: Normal Maps in Softimage Because Softimage doesn’t have proper cage functionality most folks I know that still use Soft have ditched baking normals with it. Xnormal (freeware) is pretty much the quasi-standard app for baking these days. 8 bit maps are fairly standard in my travels. If you are trying to get more “bump” to your normal you can duplicate the map in photoshop, double click it to bring up the layer dialog and set to overlay and uncheck the blue channel. Merge those together and you have a “stronger” map. Another thing to note is depending on what you will be viewing in you may need to invert the green channel of the normal map, else the normals will look flipped weird. Also, if you are going to be viewing this in a game engine as the final result, it is typically standard workflow to check your normals there, because in the end, it doesn’t really matter what they look like in Soft/Maya/Max. -wayne From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Adam Sale Sent: Wednesday, December 12, 2012 2:15 AM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Normal Maps in Softimage So, My Softimage decided to play hardball with me and stopped working earlier this evening. What I had wanted to test out tonight were Normal Maps in Softimage. I don't do a whole lot of texturing , and have known the normal map to be a little strange in my past dealings with it. One of my students is having an issue generating normal maps out of mudbox and getting them to work in Softimage. Is anyone having success with this, or do you generally import high res meshes into soft and use Ultimapper to create the maps. When creating maps, is it best to create 16 bit or float maps/ Do they always give superior results to 8 bit? My main issue with the normal maps out of Mudbox, is that they don't look like the correct scale or relief of the normals mesh in midbox, or even when I apply the normals to a similar mesh in Maya, and the fact the normal map 3 node doesnt allow us to scale normals is a bit perplexing. The workaround with mixing the normal map with a mix 2 color node set to mix with RGB at .5 and B at 1 doesn't quite cut it.. Is there a good working solution that I am simply missing? A better normalMap node perhaps? Irie.. Adam attachment: winmail.dat
RE: AD Support issues
Hi Ronald. I usually become the owner of all SI cases but for some reason this one was handled by another agent. I am the owner now. As you know, we came up with a solution to your vector displacement map issue and the case is ongoing. Let me know if there are any more issues. Manny Papamanos Autodesk 3D graphics Specialist / Softimage and MotionBuilder -Original Message- From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Stephen Blair Sent: Tuesday, December 04, 2012 10:51 AM To: ron...@toonafish.nl; softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: AD Support issues What is consumerreport ? The only people from AD support who would be on this list are technical support people like Manny. On 04/12/2012 10:40 AM, Toonafish wrote: Is anyone from AD support on this list ? There seems to be an issue with consumersupport. I can't seem to get in touch with them anymore and I no longer get confirmations to my replies. Is this just me ? Thanks. -Ronald attachment: winmail.dat
RE: Importing FBX from Maya to SI
Hi this is known and logged here: SOFT-7341 Send to SI: Animation is erroneously plotted when object is frozen in Maya I had made a video displaying the problem at the time : http://www.3dmastermind.com/MANNYrepro_when_frozen.mp4 This only happens when you freeze transformations in Maya... So you know what not to do. Manny Papamanos Support Specialist, Softimage and MotionBuilder Montreal, Quebec, Canada From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Alok Sent: Monday, October 29, 2012 11:08 AM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: Importing FBX from Maya to SI Exactly which parameters in maya scene that are getting extra keys in soft, it is just transforms of locators, curves, meshes, surfaces or something else like some other attributes? [cid:image001.gif@01CDB5CC.C64467A0] On 29/10/2012 11:03 AM, David Barosin wrote: Yeah someone else had the same issue. in and out of maya fine but not softimage. Just check to see if there are pivots that are not zero'ed out. On Mon, Oct 29, 2012 at 9:44 AM, Debdas Mohanty devj...@gmail.commailto:devj...@gmail.com wrote: Hello David, Problem is when i am importing the same FBX file i.e. exported from maya and importing again in maya and other softwares, its showing no change in animation curve. But only in softimage, it is changing. Why i dont know? As Sandy suggested me to change the import fbx default frame rate from 30 to 24 and it worked for him. But no good luck for me yet..May be i am missing some thing... - No virus found in this message. Checked by AVG - www.avg.comhttp://www.avg.com Version: 2012.0.2221 / Virus Database: 2441/5361 - Release Date: 10/29/12 attachment: winmail.dat
RE: Multiple pivot
Having the constraint switch is the easy part. The tough part is having the two pivots react to each other as if the selected one is always the parent. aka: 'dynamic parenting' This page comes to mind: http://area.autodesk.com/forum/autodesk-softimage/ice---interactive-creative-environment/ice-dynamic-parenting/ Perhaps you can take Phil's compound and make it work for you. -manny SI and Mobu support From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Szabolcs Matefy Sent: Friday, October 12, 2012 12:02 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: RE: Multiple pivot Funny, turning to shaded mode resolved the issues...at least I have seen what am I doing :D unfortunately I can't key it, so I'm still looking for a solution... From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Peter Agg Sent: Friday, October 12, 2012 5:37 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: Multiple pivot Yeah, your best bet is probably just reading the Plugin script - as I say it looks well commented so you can always just recreate what he's doing yourself. On 12 October 2012 11:30, Szabolcs Matefy szabol...@crytek.commailto:szabol...@crytek.com wrote: Thanks Unfortunately it doesn't seem to work on 2013 SP1...so still seeking for solution From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Peter Agg Sent: Friday, October 12, 2012 5:18 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: Multiple pivot I remember seeing a tutorial ages ago ...and after a bit of digging it looks like it was 'PoseBalls' by Mike Malinowski (twas 3D world 136, apparently). Looks like he's got a version of it up on http://www.softmonkey.org/ . Looks like he's been a good chap and commented it all pretty well. I can't say I've had any luck with the multiple constraints with slider method, personally. Whichever way round I try the half-arsed Softimage evaluation doesn't like it. Maybe there's a special order/technique for it which eluded me. I can't say I trust the Pivot Kinematics either so this PoseBalls thing has been on my 'must deconstruct and work out' list for about 2 years now! Alas I've never gotten round to it so I have to credit Mike instead. :) On 12 October 2012 10:41, Szabolcs Matefy szabol...@crytek.commailto:szabol...@crytek.com wrote: Hey guys, I need a solution for multiple pivots At this moment my idea is to have all the pivots pose constraining the object in question, and a slider activates which pivot is active. The animator is however not satisfied, he would like to grab the pivot and animate the object through the pivot... I'd welcome any idea... Szabolcs ___ This message contains confidential information and is intended only for the individual named. If you are not the named addressee you should not disseminate, distribute or copy this e-mail. Please notify the sender immediately by e-mail if you have received this e-mail by mistake and delete this e-mail from your system. E-mail transmission cannot be guaranteed to be secure or error-free as information could be intercepted, corrupted, lost, destroyed, arrive late or incomplete, or contain viruses. The sender therefore does not accept liability for any errors or omissions in the contents of this message, which arise as a result of e-mail transmission. If verification is required please request a hard-copy version. Crytek GmbH - http://www.crytek.com - Grüneburgweg 16-18, 60322 Frankfurt - HRB77322 Amtsgericht Frankfurt a. Main- UST IdentNr.: DE20432461 - Geschaeftsfuehrer: Avni Yerli, Cevat Yerli, Faruk Yerli attachment: winmail.dat
RE: zoom limits
Even if you cut the interest, it looks like the camera uses an imaginary interest to reorient itself (when u hit 'f' for instance) and behaves the same as a cam with interest. I think what is needed is an option like 'interest follows camera'. However, this can be a nightmare if you are doing camera work and keep it on. Perhaps it should work on the user view only. -manny From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of David Gallagher Sent: Friday, September 21, 2012 5:07 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: zoom limits Would be nice to have those new developers put this on a list. Thanks Brent! On 9/21/2012 11:14 AM, Adam Sale wrote: same behavior.. Camera hits a wall and stops dead. I'd like to see this behavior changed as well.. a royal PITA when trying to get in close for modeling detail work.. Usually, I just tag points and then reframe, but still would be nice to have this adjust automatically.. On Fri, Sep 21, 2012 at 7:44 AM, Eric Thivierge ethivie...@gmail.commailto:ethivie...@gmail.com wrote: What if you delete the interest? Eric Thivierge http://www.ethivierge.com On Sat, Sep 22, 2012 at 12:37 AM, Brent McPherson brent.mcpher...@autodesk.commailto:brent.mcpher...@autodesk.com wrote: That is actually a tricky one because when you zoom in the Nav tool you are not changing the FOV but rather moving the camera closer to the interest. (e.g. the point about which the camera orbits) When the camera reaches the interest you can't go any further. In Maya when you start zooming and the distance between the camera and the interest gets small they reset the interest to some fixed distance further from the camera. So you zoom in close, release the mouse and on the next zoom the interest will be reset and you can zoom some more. This solution is probably the best compromise but requires some care to ensure the zooming feels smooth. -- Brent -Original Message- From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Len Krenzler Sent: 21 September 2012 14:46 To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: zoom limits I've always wondered about that too. Seems odd and maybe should be added to the small annoying things list. On 9/20/2012 3:02 PM, David Gallagher wrote: Is there a way to make the navigation tool (I use the Alt key) not have limits when you get close to the camera interest? I just realized I can use the zoom tool separately to get in closer. That certainly helps, but I'm curious why there's a limit at all and how to change it. Dave G -- _ Len Krenzler - Creative Control Media Productions Phone: 780.463.3126tel:780.463.3126 www.creativecontrol.cahttp://www.creativecontrol.ca - l...@creativecontrol.camailto:l...@creativecontrol.ca attachment: winmail.dat
RE: My scene now thinks it was created with the student
To make it clearer: I repro this. If you do a 'fileopen' on a commercial scene while you were on a 'student' scene then save the scene you repro. (scene will become a student scene). If you do a New scene first, before 'fileopen' then save the scene you don't reproduce the issue. I logged it here: SPR-4862 Commercial scene gets infected with Student scenes Thanks. Manny Papamanos Autodesk Softimage and Mobu Support Specialist From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Dan Yargici Sent: Thursday, September 20, 2012 4:48 AM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: My scene now thinks it was created with the student Thanks Nick, however there is a seemingly subtle but quite important difference in my case that I didn't re-save the student scene, I re-opened a scene that was created with a commercial version and re-saved that. A scene that had never touched a student version suddenly began to think it had. DAN On Thu, Sep 20, 2012 at 6:41 AM, Nicholas Hong nicholas.h...@autodesk.commailto:nicholas.h...@autodesk.com wrote: Defect. Tracked in SOFT-6990 - Licensing: Scene does not recognise Commercial License when Student license scene is re-saved. Regards Nick attachment: winmail.dat
RE: Car wheel motion blur
You're right. If you paste the parent's translation to the spinning element, it still reproes as well, so hierarchy is not important here. From what I can see, despite the linear motion, the ark you're getting is because although the object is moving in a linear way, it has to evaluate the spinning motion also for the motion vectors. I have a feeling it's always been like this. Setting the wheels to 'deformation blur' may seem ok but are your 'deform' 'motion steps' set to 1? I made a quick video here: http://www.screencast.com/t/gHNvdMW0X2JC As you can see, it seems ok when you set the transform steps to 1 (Perhaps your deform steps were set to 1?) I'd have to check in previous versions if it's the same. I should have some time later and I'll let u know before eod. -manny|SI support From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Ed Manning Sent: Wednesday, July 18, 2012 12:48 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: Car wheel motion blur I have reproduced this behavior. 2013 SP1. various types of objects as parent and child. Even with both rotation and translation on one object. Manny -- try using a fairly large translation amount per frame. At low speeds it's not really noticeable. At high speeds it's glaringly evident. At higher speeds still, it's hard to see again. Looks like a real bug to me. On Wed, Jul 18, 2012 at 5:21 AM, Arvid Björn arvidbj...@gmail.commailto:arvidbj...@gmail.com wrote: Yep, more steps only produce a smoother error :-) On Wed, Jul 18, 2012 at 11:03 AM, Jack Kao jack@grapecity.commailto:jack@grapecity.com wrote: Have you played with adjusting the motion steps in the renderer options? attachment: winmail.dat
RE: Car wheel motion blur
Same thing in 2010. Although it seems weird, I don't think it's a bug. It seems related to the way it evaluates the blur without calculating subframes. One way out of this is to double or triple the anim length (animationsequence animationscene) and then step render. -manny|SI support From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Manny Papamanos Sent: Wednesday, July 18, 2012 1:33 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: RE: Car wheel motion blur You're right. If you paste the parent's translation to the spinning element, it still reproes as well, so hierarchy is not important here. From what I can see, despite the linear motion, the ark you're getting is because although the object is moving in a linear way, it has to evaluate the spinning motion also for the motion vectors. I have a feeling it's always been like this. Setting the wheels to 'deformation blur' may seem ok but are your 'deform' 'motion steps' set to 1? I made a quick video here: http://www.screencast.com/t/gHNvdMW0X2JC As you can see, it seems ok when you set the transform steps to 1 (Perhaps your deform steps were set to 1?) I'd have to check in previous versions if it's the same. I should have some time later and I'll let u know before eod. -manny|SI support From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Ed Manning Sent: Wednesday, July 18, 2012 12:48 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: Car wheel motion blur I have reproduced this behavior. 2013 SP1. various types of objects as parent and child. Even with both rotation and translation on one object. Manny -- try using a fairly large translation amount per frame. At low speeds it's not really noticeable. At high speeds it's glaringly evident. At higher speeds still, it's hard to see again. Looks like a real bug to me. On Wed, Jul 18, 2012 at 5:21 AM, Arvid Björn arvidbj...@gmail.commailto:arvidbj...@gmail.com wrote: Yep, more steps only produce a smoother error :-) On Wed, Jul 18, 2012 at 11:03 AM, Jack Kao jack@grapecity.commailto:jack@grapecity.com wrote: Have you played with adjusting the motion steps in the renderer options? attachment: winmail.dat
RE: Car wheel motion blur
Hi Matt. You're right, however, if you look here: http://www.screencast.com/t/gHNvdMW0X2JC this happens even with a short rotation shift per frame. I'll try to ask a Maya or Max guy to repro. -manny From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Matt Lind Sent: Wednesday, July 18, 2012 2:55 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: RE: Car wheel motion blur The issue is caused by extreme rotation values. Motion blur typically solves rotations along the shortest arc between frames. Which implies the maximum rotation you can have between frames which solves correctly is 179.9 degrees or else you'll get the 'rewind' effect. Mental ray does have some built-in logic to solve on a window a little larger than 179.9, but probably not beyond 360 degrees. Mental ray is largely dependent on information coming from the host application to resolve these kinds of things In your case, the difference between frames is 421,039.2 degrees which is way beyond that solvable range. The motion blur arc is so stretched out it's wrapping around itself hundreds of times like thread wrapped around a spool. Your shutter open/close times are so close together it reveals only a very tiny portion of that path which results in the strange arc you see. The solution is to reduce the number of rotations by a multiple which retains the persistence-of-vision of the wheels appear to rotate correctly, but where the delta between frames is less than 360 degrees. Matt From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Arvid Björn Sent: Wednesday, July 18, 2012 12:58 AM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: Car wheel motion blur Here, I've recreated the problem in the simplest possible setup, no weird rotation order and it's centered on the null, just draw a region to see the problem. File: http://www.stopp.se/arvid/motionblurbug.scn Different rotation speeds of the ball yield different arcs though, so sometimes you'd get lucky to hit a number that doesn't show the problem, which is why the problem appear at random for us. The problem was solved by skinning the geo to the null instead of parenting it, which invokes deformation motion blur, but the scene gets more complex and the rig gets heavier. Please see if I've missed something in my settings, I'd love to solve the problem without skinning! Cheers On Tue, Jul 17, 2012 at 6:09 PM, Manny Papamanos manny.papama...@autodesk.commailto:manny.papama...@autodesk.com wrote: I did a quick test and the blur seemed to look good in MR on a simple cube spinning on a moving cube hierarchy. Be sure you don't use 'offset' in the MB settings or the wheels or they may look like they are coming out of the wheel wells. Check the transforms on your 'centers' on the wheels and all the parents for weirdness. If something weird is based on the parents, one way out of this is to plot and then use that motion on the wheels. Also, perhaps playing with the 'rotation order' may help, I would make sure that the spinning axis is first on the list. -manny|SI support From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Arvid Björn Sent: Tuesday, July 17, 2012 10:20 AM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: Car wheel motion blur Thanks, I tried your suggestion, but there's nothing wrong with the parenting. It is related to parenting, but that's not where the problem lies. It works fine with deformation motion blur with the exact same center of rotation, so that proves that the problem is in how transformation motion blur is being evaluated. When evaluated per point with a global vector, everything's fine. I wish I could force MR to do that even though I'm not actually deforming anything. On Tue, Jul 17, 2012 at 1:56 PM, Alok Gandhi alok.gandhi2...@gmail.commailto:alok.gandhi2...@gmail.commailto:alok.gandhi2...@gmail.commailto:alok.gandhi2...@gmail.com wrote: Most probably the motion samples are creating an arc due to parenting. What you need to do is to check this is take the fcurves and scale them quite a bit. This will allows you to see in slo-mo the trajectory of the wheel as it moves along. If you see the undesired arcing then I would suggest changing the parenting so the center of motion is at the center of the wheels. attachment: winmail.dat
RE: Car wheel motion blur
I did a quick test and the blur seemed to look good in MR on a simple cube spinning on a moving cube hierarchy. Be sure you don't use 'offset' in the MB settings or the wheels or they may look like they are coming out of the wheel wells. Check the transforms on your 'centers' on the wheels and all the parents for weirdness. If something weird is based on the parents, one way out of this is to plot and then use that motion on the wheels. Also, perhaps playing with the 'rotation order' may help, I would make sure that the spinning axis is first on the list. -manny|SI support From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Arvid Björn Sent: Tuesday, July 17, 2012 10:20 AM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: Car wheel motion blur Thanks, I tried your suggestion, but there's nothing wrong with the parenting. It is related to parenting, but that's not where the problem lies. It works fine with deformation motion blur with the exact same center of rotation, so that proves that the problem is in how transformation motion blur is being evaluated. When evaluated per point with a global vector, everything's fine. I wish I could force MR to do that even though I'm not actually deforming anything. On Tue, Jul 17, 2012 at 1:56 PM, Alok Gandhi alok.gandhi2...@gmail.commailto:alok.gandhi2...@gmail.com wrote: Most probably the motion samples are creating an arc due to parenting. What you need to do is to check this is take the fcurves and scale them quite a bit. This will allows you to see in slo-mo the trajectory of the wheel as it moves along. If you see the undesired arcing then I would suggest changing the parenting so the center of motion is at the center of the wheels. attachment: winmail.dat
RE: wire colors
Yes, the color widget is available in the display property but it seems not to work when you multi select objects and edit the object's common assets in Selectiondisplay. I tried it as far back as V2010 and it seems to do the same, nothing logged :( As far as I know, those listed assets in the top part of selection in the MCP are common and should affect all selected elements. (I use this all the time to open a multi ppg) Anyone is able to change multiple object's wireframe color in one go in the UI? What bothers me more is the fact that when you do set a color and then make the element unselect-able, it turns grey... arghhh! -manny|SI support From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Alan Fregtman Sent: Friday, June 29, 2012 10:48 AM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: wire colors The sad truth is XSI toolbars don't support color widgets. :/ Bitmap buttons is as advanced as it gets. On Fri, Jun 29, 2012 at 10:41 AM, Paul Griswold pgrisw...@fusiondigitalproductions.commailto:pgrisw...@fusiondigitalproductions.com wrote: I guess I should have phrased that better. Why, when you click on the Palette and Script Toolbar, are you only given a choice of 13 swatches rather than just having a standard color picker available? If it's going to be swatches, it might be nice to have it work more like Photoshop swatches where you can have your own custom set of swatches and aren't limited to just 13 colors. Thanks, Paul From: Gareth Bell gareth.b...@primefocusworld.commailto:gareth.b...@primefocusworld.com Sent: Friday, June 29, 2012 10:33:09 AM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: RE: wire colors Can you not just set the display property and then you have the standard RGB mixer to make any colour you wish.. From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.commailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Paul Griswold Sent: 29 June 2012 15:26 To: Softimage Mailing list Subject: wire colors Just out of curiosity... Why is the Wire Colors picker so limited? Why isn't it just a standard color picker? I like to use wireframe on shaded and it'd be handy to have more than 13 colors to pick from. -Paul attachment: winmail.dat
RE: Gear rig problem - joint spinning at render time
What are you rendering with? Does this happen when you render (not capture) in hardware render ? -manny Softimage, Mobu support specialist From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Mirko Jankovic Sent: Tuesday, June 12, 2012 5:33 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Re: Gear rig problem - joint spinning at render time I had something similar with joints in arm... also viewport scrubbing everything clean and in rendering rotating... in any case geometry caching is safest way to go and that was only thing that helped at the end. attachment: winmail.dat
RE: Animation layers info
I don't think you have a choice not to use them if you use mocap but I haven't heard anything bad about them really. -manny SI/Mobu support specialist From: softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com [mailto:softimage-boun...@listproc.autodesk.com] On Behalf Of Enrique Caballero Sent: Tuesday, June 05, 2012 3:51 PM To: softimage@listproc.autodesk.com Subject: Animation layers info Hey guys, just looking for some advice. I seem to remember somebody telling me that animation layers were buggy. I dont remember the specifics though. Recently the animators here have discovered them and are incorperating layers into their workflow. Any information on whether animation layers are problematic at all would be appreciated as I dont want to endorse the technique until im sure. Best, Enrique attachment: winmail.dat
