I had the same idea not so long ago ... take a look at ...

viewtopic.php?t=19201

never thought of looking there! thanks for the reminder about that site!.

it's not *that* much different from including an image or audio (that's by file reference rather than data isn't it?). (and compositing software that I use works only by reference - not inclusion - so if (when!! :oops: ) I change something that puts video and/or sound tracks out of sync that's down ...

thanks a lot! I'm most grateful. I'm off to the sandbox...

thanks - I'd figured that you can use actions on bones - what I was thinking was that in (e.g.) your pose3 I could ALSO have (say) hairbangs up and eyes closed as well ... in other words morphing to pose3 would change not just group layer but also sublayers. I can see how "all I have to do"...

(crossed post whilst I was editing ... so reposted the edit here) 1 hour later.... ok - all good - I've just played with an eye shape that, even with just 1 bone and 4 vector layers each with a shape of 4 points gives amazing expression control, far better than the fixed expressions and jump change ...

... er ... not yet! Now I've found the page in the manual, I'll give them a try..
Thanks!!

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[edit deleted and re-posted as new message]

Hi. so I had this great idea about Poses and storing them so that you could just pop them into the timeline whenever you wanted them ... I somehow expected that the idea would not be new, so I looked in this forum and, sure enough, found the earlier threads on this subject going back 3 or more years...

if you don't want to change alll the fills and delete layers... imagine that you've duplicated the whole character, and done the rotations / deformations / soft edges etc ... you've put it in a bone group called "PersonShadowMask". create a new group called (say) "AllShadows". Ad...

oh.. what a tempting dangle ... are you going to say how!?!!

apart from the obvious "make sure you don't use new features.. " is it just a question of changing the

"version xx"

line to something that an earlier version of AS will recognise?

hi again! in essence, the same reply as to your "wrong" post .. but if that confused you I'll slow it down. Gilles and sbtamu have said much the same - dup what you need and then change its shape. If some layers don't change the "outline" shape (e.g. eyes) no need to dup. re swit...

I had a quick poke at this. doesn't seem to me as though a layer with 3d enabled works as a mask. >> any one had any better ideas? btw Joel - the apparent motion of regular marks on the edge of a rotating cylinder depend on where the observer is wrt the cylinder - so you'll maybe need to animate you...

depends on how strong and where in the sky your sunlight is (high = small shadows, low = long shadows). if the sunlight is very bright you'll have a strong shadow - like a shadow puppet - and Gilles has said it - you'll need a faithful, but distorted copy of the shape of your character (so no need t...

building .. you mean something like this? http://www.mediafire.com/?nbohitzq51waa3h did it in 10 mins.. so it's really rough, but ... it's a combination of camera movement (track plus pan), the perspective tool, image scale and layer visibility on a group of 4 layers, one for each face of the buildi...

personal view... I don't use 3d tools. I use AS's 3d options in the same way as I'd put depth and perspective into a drawing on any 2d canvas. the difference being, of course, that they can be animated and are subject to camera movement (unless you've clicked the "immune" box..). I do use ...