putting something inside something else

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Ryder
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Post by Ryder »

funksmaname wrote:i'm sure when south park started there was no library of assets - they just built up over time from necessity! There's no way you're going to plan ahead for every possible situation - i would spend less time making it futureproof and more time animating it to make it good enough to run that long :)

maybe another option is to have two layers, grouped in a folder so they can be easily accessed, and knock the back helmet layer away from the camera slightly in Z space? that way it should appear behind the rest? I've not tried it but should work...
You know, that might be an idea... build everything with respect to z-space...

All backgrounds negative, all objects that have an "inside" are split to negative and positive z space, then all characters at z=0

And with respect to planning ahead... of course assets are built up over time, but without having a workflow philosophy... you will be trapped in that decision forever.

You have to know HOW you will generally approach a massive workflow, right up front, or you are pretty screwed.

Was it Lincoln that said... if I have 9 hours to chop a tree, I'd spend 8 hours sharpening my axe.

Regards,

Ryder
Ryder
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Post by Ryder »

slowtiger wrote:We're not doing 3D here, so we just can't create a bucket and expect it to behave like a bucket.

But we can create a bucket with a front and back layer, put it inside a group, import it into any scene, and just drag those two layers into any other character rig and bind it to the same bone so it acts as one bucket. What's so hard about that?
Take a look at the z-space idea above... That would be one method... which really does point to something that I think is true about AS (though not well explored by me), and that is we ARE working in 3D. This opens up a world of possibilities.

One thing that comes to mind are new hotkeys/scripts that "bump" layers up and down through the Z layer in increments...

I'm an animator with 25 years experience... I **know** that production environments can and in some cases MUST be optimized, with great effort in the planning stages, in order to be successful.

So even though I am new at AS, I know very well what is important with respect to efficient and productive workflow, and the types of things to focus on. Asset management is high on the list. The ability to drag in a bucket, a car, a hat, or a thousand other assets and have them behave in a predictable/useable way without additional work would be very important to rapid development.

Now, for your example (with front and back layers) can the bone be bound to those layers in advance in order to save a step? Essentially drag in before the object it will interact with, then drag the lowest layer down to bracket that object...

Best regards,

Ryder
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heyvern
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Post by heyvern »

Ryder wrote: Instead think South Park...

Planning scenes in advance is not going to happen.
I assure you that even South Park has a script written for each episode and has some sort of story board and shot list. It is not done "on the fly". They don't just make it up as they go along. What I suggested previously still applies, you create a shot list, know what needs to be animated and create the assets that are needed for each shot.

You can't possibly plan for any and every possible situation for years of episodes. You create what you need for each one and build up a library. If stuff can be reused later than that's good, you reuse it.

I am not suggesting "one off projects" I am suggesting creating a single use "rig" for a character that interacts with props. They can be used over and over.

p.s. By the way, they use Maya for South Park. It's all 3D.

-vern
sbtamu
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Post by sbtamu »

Ryder,

Off topic a second. Do you happen to have A degree in Industrial Engineering? You speak the same way I do when I am teaching or consulting a company about work flow or JIT Inventory and managing assets etc.

Stephen
Sorry for bad animation

http://www.youtube.com/user/sbtamu
Ryder
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Joined: Sun Aug 08, 2010 12:17 am

Post by Ryder »

heyvern wrote:
Ryder wrote: Instead think South Park...

Planning scenes in advance is not going to happen.
I assure you that even South Park has a script written for each episode and has some sort of story board and shot list. It is not done "on the fly". They don't just make it up as they go along. What I suggested previously still applies, you create a shot list, know what needs to be animated and create the assets that are needed for each shot.

-vern
Obviously...

But that does not speak to what I am persuing at this point, which is a basic asset methodology.

When you have properly managed assets, just like a good rig job is thought out in advance, doing the work is that much easier, no matter what comes.

And yes, I heard they use Maya. I'm a Lightwave & modo guy myself.



I just tested the z depth techniques, and sadly it does not function as I had hoped. The layer position is a lower order effect, and then z position within that layer is the next higher abstraction... shame.

Ryder
Ryder
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Post by Ryder »

sbtamu wrote:Ryder,

Off topic a second. Do you happen to have A degree in Industrial Engineering? You speak the same way I do when I am teaching or consulting a company about work flow or JIT Inventory and managing assets etc.

Stephen
Hey Stephen... pretty good call on your part... Production Systems Engineering.
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slowtiger
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Post by slowtiger »

can the bone be bound to those layers in advance in order to save a step?
No - because bucket and head (or whatever you want to out inside) have to be within the same bone layer.

I don't think that this way is one step too many. After all you'll be doing it only once per scene, and, if the bucket is used in several scenes, once per template (and duplicate from that on). I have worked with scene templates which had dozens of props inside the rigs, leftovers from other episodes. Wasn't much of a hassle since these were done in switch layers, or I just simply erased them.
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