Body turn involved layer ordering and can't adjust layer ordering later in the main timeline.
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Body turn involved layer ordering and can't adjust layer ordering later in the main timeline.
Hi everyone, I have a question about doing the turning of characters like body turn. When doing the body turn using smart bone action and layer ordering is involved, we then can't adjust the layer order later one when the smart bone is rotating to the side where we set the turning side. For example, when we turn smart bone to 90 degree right, the body turns 90 degree to the right along with layer ordering in the bone layer. The point is that, in the main timeline, if we don't move the bone back to it 0 degree, we can't adjust layer order on when the smartbone is turning to the right. Please help share some tips. I get stuck with that thing. Thank you.
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MrMiracle77
- Posts: 181
- Joined: Mon Jun 24, 2019 2:30 am
Re: Body turn involved layer ordering and can't adjust layer ordering later in the main timeline.
Layer order is a discrete keyframe change, similar to selecting a switch layer. This makes a smartbone assigned to layer order very different from a smartbone assigned to a continuous change. Let's say you have two smartbones: one moves a layer's position to the left, the other moves it to the right. If you manipulate both smartbones at the same time, Moho simply adds change A + change B.
Layer order is a discrete keyframe, though. That means if you apply change A from a smartbone, then try to apply change B manually or from another smartbone, Moho doesn't know how to interpret A + B. It can prioritize one change over the other, but there's no way to combine the two together. It's possible to run into the same problem with Switch Layers, which also produce discrete keyframes. (Discrete keyframes produce bar-shaped keys in the timeline, instead of the circles indicating gradual keyframes. I don't know if 'discrete' is the technical term for this, but it's the term that makes sense to me).
The popular solution is to use switch layer visibility. If you're doing a body rotation, for example, and want an arm to move from the front of the body to the back of the body, you finish all of your arm related rigging and then make a copy of the arm that is placed beneath the body in the layer order. Set that second arm to 'invisible'. Now you can make an 'Arm Front/Back' smartbone that turns off the visibility of the front arm and turns on the visibility of the back arm. This also makes the arm visibility independent of the body rotation, which can be handy if you want both arms in front of or behind the body at the same time.
It's important to finish all of the arm rigging first in this example because any rigging will carry over to the replicated arm. If you don't, you'll have to replicate any new changes to both arms. Often, layer visibility will be the last step I'll perform in my workflow for a character rotation.
Layer order is a discrete keyframe, though. That means if you apply change A from a smartbone, then try to apply change B manually or from another smartbone, Moho doesn't know how to interpret A + B. It can prioritize one change over the other, but there's no way to combine the two together. It's possible to run into the same problem with Switch Layers, which also produce discrete keyframes. (Discrete keyframes produce bar-shaped keys in the timeline, instead of the circles indicating gradual keyframes. I don't know if 'discrete' is the technical term for this, but it's the term that makes sense to me).
The popular solution is to use switch layer visibility. If you're doing a body rotation, for example, and want an arm to move from the front of the body to the back of the body, you finish all of your arm related rigging and then make a copy of the arm that is placed beneath the body in the layer order. Set that second arm to 'invisible'. Now you can make an 'Arm Front/Back' smartbone that turns off the visibility of the front arm and turns on the visibility of the back arm. This also makes the arm visibility independent of the body rotation, which can be handy if you want both arms in front of or behind the body at the same time.
It's important to finish all of the arm rigging first in this example because any rigging will carry over to the replicated arm. If you don't, you'll have to replicate any new changes to both arms. Often, layer visibility will be the last step I'll perform in my workflow for a character rotation.
- Dave
(As Your GM)
(As Your GM)
Re: Body turn involved layer ordering and can't adjust layer ordering later in the main timeline.
Thank you for the tip. This tip is definitely new to me. I'll try it sometimes.MrMiracle77 wrote: ↑Wed Feb 07, 2024 6:49 pm The popular solution is to use switch layer visibility. If you're doing a body rotation, for example, and want an arm to move from the front of the body to the back of the body, you finish all of your arm related rigging and then make a copy of the arm that is placed beneath the body in the layer order. Set that second arm to 'invisible'. Now you can make an 'Arm Front/Back' smartbone that turns off the visibility of the front arm and turns on the visibility of the back arm. This also makes the arm visibility independent of the body rotation, which can be handy if you want both arms in front of or behind the body at the same time.
It's important to finish all of the arm rigging first in this example because any rigging will carry over to the replicated arm. If you don't, you'll have to replicate any new changes to both arms. Often, layer visibility will be the last step I'll perform in my workflow for a character rotation.
