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I wish that was available in the regular timeline instead of just through animate 2.
I show a way to do it in the upcoming course.
Basically we'd use a TCB on either side with a linear between them.
The other alternative would be to send your keyframe work into aniMate (Create aniBlock) and work with the keys in there. It's really cool how we can use both together.
In creating this thread and that course, I've been impressed with a lot of ways that aniMate can simply make our lives easier. Making aniBlocks and Baking to the timeline... then perhaps creating a new aniBlock and working through some specific tweaks and then send it back to the timeline - doing these things can speed up the process immensely even though writing it and reading about doesn't make it feel true. It makes it sound like a lot of work - but it's actually making the job smoother and easier.
Just because we 'create a new aniBlock' doesn't mean that we have to save it. We can use it as a temporary means to get at the really cool key frame editor - instead of editing existing key frames, however, we'd only be key framing new changes to what's already keyed in. And we can do that in layers to avoid confusion. It's really cool stuff!
So while we're key framing in the changes within the aniBlock, we're using that Cubic Interpolation - which makes the process really easy and fast because it's never over-shooting!
Visit Dartanbeck.com for a Whole World of CG Filmmaking topics and articles!
The Power of aniMate 2
A new page at my website
A truly wonderful experience of animating in Daz Studio awaits, and this page will help you delve right in with ideas, links, images and videos
Along with the actual User Manual for aniMate 2 viewable/downloadable right on the page!
Links to products specifically designed with animation in mind as well as direct links back to this forum thread if you need help with any of it - I monitor this thread manually and I also get an email if someone responds - so you can expect to get answers in a timely manner.
I'll also be adding subpages to this one that will expand our learning experience within the realms of aniMate 2 and animating in Daz Studio in general - because in my world, animating in Daz Studio almost Always involves aniMate 2.
The Power of aniMate 2
A new page at my website - Come on in an Join the Fun!!!
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Newly Added Today
I have fleshed out new subpages for the following topics which should be a much nicer experience than digging through forum pages.
Let me know how you like/dislike the experience
Dartanbeck's workflow tips:
People keep asking for Daz 3D to add - or have someone else add - some decent animating tools to Daz Studio.
The crazy thing is that they've already done that many many years ago with a company that goes by the name of GoFigure.
I think that the free sample of aniMate that comes with Daz Studio is only some basics of what aniMate 2 truly is - though even that is pretty darned powerful - it allows us to use aniBlocks in creative ways to make truly amazing motions on our characters and vehicles.
But I think that most folks who own the paid version aniMate 2 don't quite understand the whole idea of how much animating power this plugin provides us. I know I certainly didn't. Not for years!
aniBlocks often get termed by folks who want to become pro-animators: "Canned Animations". And, although it actually should be, it's not meant as a compliment. In truth, those are professionally recorded and retargeted motion capture sequences that are Highly beneficial to Any animator's toolkit. Professional animators have their own collections of Canned Animations... we should too!
But when it comes to keyframe animation techniques, aniMate 2 can be a real boon!
Plot out the basics of your animation along the timeline as usual, and then while it's still in its early stages, create an aniBlock of it and finish it in aniMate 2 using Keyframe mode!
This gives us the power and pleasure of animating using layers.
It allows us to adjust the motion path in 3D space for each limb and the hip.
It gives us the wonderful Cubic Interpolation tweener, which is what aniMate 2 always uses.
Truly, there are a Lot of benefits to working this way!
I truly don't mean to mock the idea of exporting to other animation solutions - that's not it at all.
I might seem apprehensive about all of this - but that's simply because I've seen plenty of people like me, who just want to have some fun making our own animations in Daz Studio - only to have folks with "professional intention" minds boldly tell them that they shouldn't even try - you simply cannot animate in Daz Studio.
True, if your dreams are to become a professional animator at a studio, doing this stuff for a living, you'll want to learn the methods most common to those sorts of workflows. But that's entirely different in most Hollywood cases. You won't be doing the whole thing, though it's good to know the entire process. No, you'll be doing one aspect and passing in on, and doing that aspect again on the next file and so on.
If you plan on becoming a professional animator and actually know how to animate in Daz studio, it's amazing how much easier your life will be in that other world.
The methods I've come up with to make my life easier in Studio are tools that I've figured out how to make myself - using tools that Daz 3D provided us so that we can make custom content and sell it here. The tools are really good and easy to use.
This sort of 'thinking outside the box' is beneficial to animation supervisors. "It just won't work" is not.
So I'm trying to breathe life into a subject that has been shunned for Far Too Long. I fell prey to this line of thinking myself, or I'd have been using Studio l o n g ago, and loving it!
Making animated art for our own enjoyment? Daz Studio ROCKS at that!
The cool new workflows I've been coming up with might help you out. I only say this because, when I was using Daz Studio, but not for rendering or animation, I was using it as a toolbox. That knowledge of the tools inside Studio is what helped me to create my fluid new method.
But you really don't need that. If you like what I'm doing and want to see how I do it? Yeah... that's why I'm making courses on the various subjects. I still have a long way to go - and it just keeps getting better. But I started with what I felt to be the most important breakthrough, and that's what my first big course covers.
At that time I thought that most folks interested in this had already mastered aniMate 2 - but then someone aksed me what a key frame was.
After having many discussions about animating and using aniMate 2, it became more and more clear that a Lot of people who already own aniMate 2 aren't completely familiar with the power this gives them - so I started this thread and asked Paul Bussey at Digital Art Live if we could do something with this. He agreed.
Since I started digging into all of this, my workflow is becoming even more powerful, fun and exciting with the epiphanies that come along with researching for something this complete! I love that!!!!
In both courses (this one for aniMate 2 isn't released yet) I demonstrate how we can take advantage of rendering strategies to speed up our workflow, leaving a Lot more time for making more and more animations, so we can keep the ball rolling. That will be the focus of my next course. Mentioning and touching upon these subjects is one thing. In this next one we'll actually have that as our main topic and really dig in!!!
Remember - Animating is a Lot of fun and is very rewarding. When we do it by ourselves for ourselves we get to win in so many ways - number one for me is that I get to work on My projects from My imagination. Once you reach a professional level, that part of it goes away, and your end of the pipeline becomes more like just another job in the factory - not the Fun I'm having with all of this.
Join me in discovering all of the wonderful tools and features of GoFigure's aniMate 2!
The Power of aniMate 2 - Now Live at Daz 3D
An essential part of my entire workflow, aniMate 2 eneables me to go back and forth between it's non-linear block format of adjusting animations and Daz Studio's timeline fluidly to get exactly the motions I'm trying to achieve.
Along the way we'll visit more essentials to this whole workflow.
In this course, you'll clearly see why I'm having such a great time aniMating in Daz Studio!!!
To help even further, I'm growing a cool pile of pages in my website: The Power of aniMate 2
I created a forearm twist and hand bend. I used the 3d Universe Cartoon male (G8) because I thought the limits might be different
than base G8 figure. However I do not see the dials when trying to create another instance of the 3d Universe Cartoon male. I've
tried restarting studio etc. The only workaround is to merge the Cartoon's Male's scene where I created the dials into my current scene which is a bit of a hassle. Any suggestions
on something I may have missed? Other than not using a base figure I also deselected some unrelevent boxes during the ERC Freeze session. not sure
if that could cause a problem? do I have to do an ERC bake after desecting? Any tips welcome!
I need to add an update. Do you still have the scene saved where you've created your dials?
To add them to the base figure:
File > Save As > Support Asset (way on the bottom) > Morph Asset
In the dialog, you must select only the new dials you've made and wish to save. You'll find those under the top line's hierarchy under Pose Controls, if that's where you've made them to be - as I demonstrate.
Don't forget to put your name and give it a product name. This will allow you to update your collection in an organized fashion within the file structure - making it easier to work with.
In other words, each time we add new dials, the name of the product we've saved previously (even if its not for sale) will show up in the Product drop-down.
This is beneficial because the actual data files for the dials will be in our My DAZ 3D Library under:
data > DAZ 3D > Figure Name (Genesis 8 > Female, for example) > Morphs > Our Product Name
Sometimes we save a dial and later wish to remove it. Going to this folder (above) is where we can find it and delete it.
hello
I noticed in your teaching video that there is a sub attribute of Anim+under the Pose control attribute, but it is not included in my DAZ3D pose control, which means that modifying animation keyframes can only affect the current frame, and the modifications made in the next frame have changed back. Do anim+attributes require any plugins to be installed
I apologize that I haven't seen this until now.
"Anim +" is the name I give my own custom control dials that we make in my first course - Dynamic Character Animation in Daz Studio
They're like the standard pose control dials that all Genesis figures come with, but I make a LOT more of them for a LOT more control over animations - especially for tweaking motion capture data that I pull into the timeline via aniMate 2 - however, they even work if the aniBlock remains active (not baked to the timeline).
1:15 of this promo shows what I'm talking about:
I have a rather extensive bit of information about all of this on my site at Dartanbeck.com
The Power of aniMate 2
Scroll down past the promo for the course and you'll find links to articles, links to helpful products and more.
The information included backs up the course in textural form - giving deeper understanding of the course material. In writing the information, it became clear that a visual course was necessary to really help drive these techniques home. Together, this set of pages and the course make an excellent way to keep exploring aniMate 2's potential - there's a LOT to digest in one go - or even just a few projects. So there will come a time when we'll recall that there's a lot more to this thing, and we can go back to the course and these pages to always show us more - which is really what this is all about - growing our animations skills in Daz Studio!
Even after all of this, I'm still making new aniBlocks using Bone Minion, and still making partial aniBlocks! :)
I'm still animating every single day, and aniMate 2 is the driving force of all of it.
If you're really into this stuff, keep an eye out for the free webinars - The Creative Cart - which have been running every month. I try to give fresh pointers in regards to animating in Daz Studio in each session - "Animation Corner"
I have a thread in the forums New Free Digital Art Live series that advertises the dates of each upcoming episode, but The Creative Cart on my site is where it all actually happens - dates, support pages, links to sign up, and links to the collectable episodes available here at Daz 3D if we miss the show.
Hey Dartan/All,
Could anyone point me in the direction for a good article on interpolation and how it works with 3D animation. Whenver I make an animation I set the first frame to Linear as instructed and I don't know why Lol.
Thanks!
I use Linear because a Linear Interpolation is a straight path from point A (the key with the interpolation setting) and point B (the next key frame in the timeline).
Why is this important to me?
In animation creation, I always add extra morph dial changes as I go - say, expression changes, muscle movements... whatever. Then I go back to a point in time when I want that dial to be zeroes again - so I zero it. With a Linear Interpolation, the dial will then remain zeroed from the very first key (0) to that point when I just zeroed it. Many dials can go below 0.00, so if that first key is set to TCB, there would be changes to that value between the first key, which is zeroed, and the next key where I zeroed it - it wouldn't stay zeroed.
Now, there are times when we'd like that fluctuation - and that's when I select that specific dial's first key frame and change it to TCB.
The biggest reason, however, that we need to change that first key in the first place is because the Bake to Studio Keyframes function sets all of the first keyframes to "C", which is Constant.
The Constant interpolation hold the value firm until the next key frame - very useful for creating instantaneous change.
Now - "I" need to change that first key because I never begin my 'actual' animation starting at frame 0.
If you'd starting your animation from frame 0, rather than use the 30 buffer zone I talk about, you don't need to change the first key frame's interpolation - because the next key is on the next frame. When two keys are right next to eachother in the timeline, there is no interpolation. One key simply goes to the next.
Interpolation Types in Daz Studio:
Hope this helps. Let me know if you have any questions - always happy to help!!! :)
THat helped! Thanks!
My pleasure!
Hey all. Have another question if Dartan or anyone else can answer. I have Bone Minion and I want to transfer G8 animated pose presets to G9. Do I just do this the same way as if using Aniblocks but just stay in the timeline?
If you want to preview the motions using aniMate, there's something that we can do to help that along.
If you preview aniBlocks on the bone Minion in its default state, it will be writing data to Genesis 9 so heavily that the preview isn't much help to us.
Option 1 - Turn off auto transfer
Bone Minion is just a rigging skeleton-looking thng, but it can still serve as our previewer. Simply select Bone Minion and in the "Bone Minion" section of the Parameters plane, remove the check for Auto-Transfer. Now we can preview without writing data, Just turn it on again after the aniBlock is loaded and we want to transfer the motion(s) to the target figure. This way we can easily assemble several aniBlocks together if we need... etc.,
Option 2 - Bring in some Help
Another methos is to go ahead and have a Genesis 8 (in this example) in the scene for the purposes of previewing. This way we can build and tweak our animation onto Genesis 8 with the full preview and, when done repeat the process onto Bone Minion.
In either case, the reason I do all of mine in the timeline is so that I get all frames recorded once in a single playthrough. Otherwise we could, in fact, just let the animation run in aniMate 2 until we feel that we've recorded enough key frames.
Now, since Bone Minion only writes data for the current frame that it's on, we can also filter our animations if we prefer to. I never do, but it's quite popular to only record every third or fifth key frame if our intention is to edit the motion later. Bone Minion and Daz Studio make this simple. With Bone Minion active and selected, click through only the frames you wish to record. Likewise we could type the frame number into the "Current" field of the timeline. Like 5, 10, 15, 20, 25... for example.If any of the points between recorded keys isn't enoughfor the animation to look good, simply click in between some frames with Bone Minion active and selected.
Tip - if you want to play back what has already beed recorded without recording anything new, simply make sure that Bone Minion is not selected and it won't write data.
But we do Not have to "Bake to Timeline" the aniBlocks onto Bone Minion. We can leave the aniBlocks in aniMate 2 on the Bone Minion, head to the timeline and let it record onto the target figure.
I'll be sure to try this out. THanks again.
Awesome.
Sorry for all the write-up. In short, the answer to your question is "Yes"
Great deal this asset is now on sale in the store. https://www.daz3d.com/the-power-of-animate-2--animating-with-precision-in-daz-studio