Simple 4 bone 3D head turn part2

DK · Post by DK » Thu May 17, 2007 2:16 pm

Hi all.
Genete...it's a little late here so near time for bed. The T-Rex only has the 4 main control bones for rotation as per the human head. T-Rex has 14 bones in total including a root bone for parenting to the body but most of these bones do nothing but scale selected points in the head.

Capricorn:
This is the key, I have found that giving bones bound to selected points a different scale factor moves them at a different rate. So the points that need to stretch the most (the elongated parts of the head) have a higher scale value and move more dramatically.
Really...It's just a matter of figuring out a what a basic shape will look like in front and 3/4 view then figure out what points need to to move quicker in a rotation, ie the points at the back of the head and then assign a bone to them with a scale factor to match. It takes a little while to make a model but when it's done...man the animation is a breeze. I can really see a definate look and style starting to emerge. You can see that the model is kind of 2D based yet it has all the qualities of a 3D model.
AND SO QUICK TO RENDER!

Toonertime:
All the models should work fine in all versions of AS. There is no scripts just bones and switch layers. Try loading in the open source head model in this thread and see if it works ok.

I need to go to bed.

More tomorrow.

Cheers
D.K

DK · Post by DK » Thu May 17, 2007 2:31 pm

Thanks Genete and jahnocli.

I am not offended. The reason I made this head was to decisively do some experimentation that directly applies to the Human Model. This T-Rex has shown that things like body, ears, nose, arms hands in fact any shape is possible to make using the original technique...which was refined into the nose which has now been further refined by the T-Rex. LOOK AT THE TEETH! That is a new discovery. Layered objects with seperate bones and incrementing scale values. THIS CAN BE APPLIED TO HAIR!

I must experiment to sort all of this out, but if you want i am happy to start a new thread, but I fear that any new developments will hard to follow or missed entirely by some people.

D.K

capricorn33 · Post by **capricorn33** » Thu May 17, 2007 2:57 pm

DK wrote:Layered objects with seperate bones and incrementing scale values.

Ah, NOW I understand. Really, really clever!
I must try and replicate that right away.

Genete · Post by **Genete** » Thu May 17, 2007 3:09 pm

It is a little annoying the hour difference... When all of you have the most activity I have to go to bed and vice versa.

I think we must continue tracking all the settlements within this thread as well as it is a Tips & Techniques one.

@jahnocli: Yes there is room for both.

I want to spend some time to refine the original setup.

Also i want to share with you some other experiments... I have added bones to the switch layer that is binded to the scaled bone in the root bone layer (the half of the mouth) ... The bones are deformed as well!!! That's incredible funny!!!!
So you can create a animable mouth /eye or whatever in the front view that the scale deformation allow to maintain the bones deformation properly!!! Even also continue using Papagayo.

I have also tried to avoid the use of the spited mouth. Instead of that I have enclosed the complete mouth in a masked group and hidden a half of the mouth properly. In this way you can reuse your existing mouths.

Look this file:

http://genetita.googlepages.com/Genete.zip
(Please relink the sound track if it is not shown.)

This is a WIP of my self...

Only the mouth. the eyes and nose are for reference only.

Cheers!

heyvern · Post by **heyvern** » Thu May 17, 2007 3:20 pm

Scaling bone... scaling bones...

Man.. if I had only gone that way when I first started. I was focused on translation as the key.

I was close to this revelation when I started working on the body for my rig. I actually used the same scaling of bones to deform the body of my character and it was just starting to perculate through my head this might work for the face.

The genius of this whole thing is how scaling of bones can be used to translate bones (like in the nose) in "mirrored" directions (left right). I am going to use that "nose" trick quite a bit.

I went back to my original model and am in the process of redoing it with this new idea. It really is amazing and COMPLETELY different from what I started with.

My rig will still have quite a few bones due to the facial controls but only a fraction are needed from the original. Many of the mouth and eye controls can be handled using scale as well.

As you said DK my version of the rig will still be pretty complicated and of course I am scripting the wazoo out of it.

This is really cool. Just when you think you pushed the limits... something like this comes along.

-vern

human · Post by **human** » Thu May 17, 2007 3:30 pm

DK wrote:2.5D T-Rex (unfinished)

I think I have worked out how to make anything in Vector 3D!!!

http://www.wienertoonz.com/trex.swf

D.K

Great Ceasar's ghost!

DK · Post by DK » Thu May 17, 2007 3:52 pm

Dammit. I still have'nt gone to bed!!!
Vern yes, scale rotate is where it started for me looking at muuvists original post, but the real revelation was in the first version of the silver surfer head where I binded selected points to the head AND combined a horizontal translate. A whole new 2D, 3D combination jumped out at me.
The nose was the proof that it could work on other shapes, so I tried T-Rex to see if there were any drawbacks to the technique. It's solid for 3/4 turns. Full profiles will be another story. Hopefully your scripts or Genete's mathematical mind will push this to the next level. Right now, I'm happy to do two seperate models, one 3/4 and a 3/4 to full profile using a switch layer.
Genete. Your springy mechanism is rolling around in my head. I love the way you use it to control the scale bones.

Here's a link to the T-Rex anme file. This work took me a couple hours to do but i'm more than happy to share it with you all

http://www.wienertoonz.com/trex7.anme

Cheers
D.K

EDIT:
Try not to scale rotate the profiles...this work has already been done. All you need to do is copy past the correct keyframes into the timeline to get the left, right and centre movements. Angles are controlled by the middle verticle bone. This is a job that will be performed with actions in the final version.

D.K

Genete · Post by **Genete** » Thu May 17, 2007 3:55 pm

Oops!. file not found...

EDITED: NOW WORKS!

(Don't think I'm harassing you DK! really it didn't worked!)

jahnocli · Post by **jahnocli** » Thu May 17, 2007 5:13 pm

I'm using Firefox on a PC - worked OK...

capricorn33 · Post by **capricorn33** » Thu May 17, 2007 10:13 pm

I am trying my best to get the hang of this scale 2.5 model thing...
After lots of failures and a thousand headaches I got it this far. Not anywhere near the perfection of DK:s example, the "trex", which I used as model, but still... better than nothing...

http://members.lycos.co.uk/hasse/AS/lion25D_cap.mov
http://members.lycos.co.uk/hasse/AS/lion25D_cap.anme

It's really difficult because I'm only guessing all the time with the all the scaling parameters and bones placements... Would be nice to know how to go about it when you start building a new model. How to PLAN it. (I'm looking forward to that tutorial which I hope someone will write someday...

)

The trick with layered objects with different scaling rates is really neat, DK! Love it.

The next thing would be to find a way to create tilts too, and not only sideways rotation?

Something like this? (and don't ask me how I did it. I was just guessing and fiddling around with the parameters...

)

http://members.lycos.co.uk/hasse/AS/moretilt_3.swf
http://members.lycos.co.uk/hasse/AS/nosetilt_3.anme

DK · Post by DK » Thu May 17, 2007 11:32 pm

Brilliant Cap!!!!
I made a tutorial earier in this thread for the human head model. It explains how to go about setting up a rig etc.

Cheers
D.K

Genete · Post by **Genete** » Thu May 17, 2007 11:40 pm

This is getting more interesting on every new post....

Nice lion cap!!!
Also clever tilt of the cartoon face! It is funny to see!!

Now see my two bones control head 3/4 side to 3/4 side turn. I have integrated the nose and the ears into the main bone layer, added some bones to make possible the control and now you can control the side to side rotation automatically with only two scaled bones. Also I have modified the parent ship of the bottom bones of the neck what were wrong.
You can also rotate the big bones that modify the shape of the head if you want.

Notice that the controlled scaled bones ARE NOT HIDDEN beyond frame 1 although I have checked the "Hide controlled bones" menu item. This is a bug.

http://genetita.googlepages.com/3-4_hea ... nes_G.anme

Although there is a complete control of the head rotation you don't lose the lateral rotation of the head, just turn the vertical central bone.

If you look to the helping bones that moves the ears from one position to other, you can see that I have set up a kind of mechanism that can "rotate" (in scale terms) the shape from one side of the head to other. Could it help to perform the SIDE TO SIDE TURN...? I bet yes but have to try...

Have fun!
Genete

EDIT: I have accidentally move one of the upper bones of the neck. Anyway those bones make a good job if they are a little away of the controlled point.

DK · Post by DK » Fri May 18, 2007 12:17 am

Genete:
If there was a way to limit a bone's, (the ear bone), scale when it reaches the side profile? This would solve the full side to side rotation problems. At the moment there is no control over how much a bone distorts points or a layer.

Vern: can you write a script that could do this?

Cap: You have discovered something there. Verticle movement via the translate tool

D.K

heyvern · Post by **heyvern** » Fri May 18, 2007 1:19 am

Vern: can you write a script that could do this?

Yes I already did sort of.

In that file I posted earlier for one bone control my script has a scale limit when the head turns. I basically just have it stop at "1" on either side so the bones can scale further on one one side but not the other.

This could be any number besides 1 though.

Right now it is "hard coded" into the script but the concept works so a way to set a value for the limit would be needed... maybe based on something like the bone name? Not sure exactly.

Since the scale in my script is based on rotation maybe the limit could be applied to the rotation limit of the bone? The numbers aren't "exact" so it... it would have to be some funky kind of conversion... using the bone name might be easier.

-vern

human · Post by **human** » Fri May 18, 2007 4:01 am

capricorn33 wrote:...I got it this far. Not anywhere near the perfection of DK:s example, the "trex", which I used as model, but still... better than nothing...

http://members.lycos.co.uk/hasse/AS/lion25D_cap.mov
http://members.lycos.co.uk/hasse/AS/lion25D_cap.anme

Capricorn, I wanted to complain that your modesty is a bit misplaced.

The shading on the lion may not be quite as slick as DK's T Rex, but it's a really superb model. (... could use some feline nostrils...)

Hope to see much more--and learn from you.

The talent on this forum is stellar...