Author Topic: Character Animations  (Read 6384 times)

Offline paulscode

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Character Animations
« on: April 11, 2008, 02:11:21 am »
This question is not about a particular problem, but more for some general advice.  I've gone through the tutorials in Autodesk 3DS Max for modeling biped humanoids and animating them, and I believe I now have a pretty good grasp on how to model and animate characters from within the Autodesk program.  My question now is, what is the next step?  How do I take this new knowledge and begin animating a 3D character in a jPCT program?  I'd like to start with something simple like a walking animation or waving or something like that.  I know that a few of you have character animation experience.  Do you happen to have any good pointers for someone like me who is just starting out?  Thanks in advance!

Offline fireside

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Re: Character Animations
« Reply #1 on: April 11, 2008, 04:30:56 am »
Well, you save key frames of the character and then use them to build an animation.  I'm not sure if your asking how to make a walk animation or how to save key frames or how to build them into an animation.  I use Blender so I'm afraid I can't be of much help with 3DS.  There are threads for building animations that should come up with a search. 
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Offline paulscode

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Re: Character Animations
« Reply #2 on: April 11, 2008, 12:14:44 pm »
Well, you save key frames of the character and then use them to build an animation.  I'm not sure if your asking how to make a walk animation or how to save key frames or how to build them into an animation.  I use Blender so I'm afraid I can't be of much help with 3DS.  There are threads for building animations that should come up with a search. 
I will look into saving key frames, and how to use that in jPCT.  This thread is not realy about a specific problem -- just asking for general advice before I get started.

Offline raft

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Re: Character Animations
« Reply #3 on: April 11, 2008, 09:18:43 pm »
i'm one of those who used character animations exported from 3d max to a series of files. there are a couple of threads i had posted details of process and even code of an Animater class which handles low level synchronization of character animation.

forum search is your friend ;)

Offline paulscode

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Re: Character Animations
« Reply #4 on: April 11, 2008, 11:04:20 pm »
i'm one of those who used character animations exported from 3d max to a series of files. there are a couple of threads i had posted details of process and even code of an Animater class which handles low level synchronization of character animation.

forum search is your friend ;)
Yes, I will definitely check the threads out, thanks!  Do you have any good advice for me (like anything you wish you had known before you started)?

Offline raft

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Re: Character Animations
« Reply #5 on: April 11, 2008, 11:23:23 pm »
not indeed. it's in all around those posts

Offline paulscode

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Re: Character Animations
« Reply #6 on: April 12, 2008, 12:06:39 am »
not indeed. it's in all around those posts
Ok, then.  Anyone else has advice, tips, resources, etc, let me know.  I am going to start doing some animations in jPCT next week after I finish my SoundManager.  Next step in developing my game.

Offline EgonOlsen

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Re: Character Animations
« Reply #7 on: April 12, 2008, 10:25:53 am »
Anyone else has advice, tips, resources, etc, let me know. 
Not regarding animations, but regarding the mentioned forum search: It stinks! I have to empty some tables manually all the time to keep it working, because it obviously tries to do something VERY clever for optimize searching which leads to bogus results most of the time. Consider to use Google's or Yahoo's or MSN's site search feature to search this forum as the build in search might disappoint you.