mcjAudioMation - Animations from audio files -- First version Released !

mCasual · October 2012

download and manual here ----> https://sites.google.com/site/mcasualsdazscripts2/mcjaudiomation

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History

Oct 8 2012
-- released

Oct 19 2012
-- added a key component ( mcjAudioMation.dsa ) that was missing in the initial release. Without this component the Daz script sproduced by the program don't work !

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mcjAudiomation is a small Windows/PC application which takes uncompressed audio (.wav) files

and create an animation script for Daz Studio 1,2,3,4

in the case shown here, the animation was applied to the "open mouth" morph of the EmotiGuy's head,

to the "PushPull" morph of the speaker

and to the YTranslate channel of the green ball.

an other use could be to shake a camera, rotate the needle on a meter.

it can also be used as visual cues when synchronizing an animation to an audio track

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added : it can also export the animations as Poser Pose files PZ2

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added : it can create sonograms/spectrograms which let you see sounds through time and across frequencies

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Video demos !

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SbAYrDQStwQ
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ylgCC_qx_bI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vL0SagfjLa0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A00IGswaR-g

mCasual · October 2012

here i applied the animation to the ZScale channel of a black primitive-plane that masks some of the LEDs
when the sound-level is near zero, the mask is scaled 260% and covers the whole column of LEDs
when the sound level is maximum, the mask is scaled 0% and doesnt cover any LED

the needles of the VU meters get their YRotate rotation animated between 42 degrees and -42 degrees

for now there's only 1 animation channel even if the music is stereo, but this will change in the release

mCasual · October 2012

now in stereo

so, first picture: i run the Windows app named mcjAudioMation

i select and load an audio file

i export the processed audio as a .dsa daz studio script

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second picture i select the VU Meter's needle

i run the script that was produced in step one

i adjust the multiplier and offset so that, the needle's YRotate angle will vary between +42 and - 42 degrees

the animation comes from the Left channel o f the audio

mCasual · October 2012

video demo : stereo animations

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ylgCC_qx_bI&feature=youtu.be

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Eustace Scrubb · October 2012

I don't do much animation, but I may have to try this out. It reminds me of the Player Piano .PY scripts from VanishingPoint, but more versatile.

mCasual · October 2012

the script will be able to export the animations as daz scripts, and, drum rolls, as Poser pz2 pose-animations

so it should be usable by Poser and Carrara users too !

the program is basically ready, i'm running some test and making a 30 seconds dance video, which of course took almost as long as writing the program :)

mCasual · October 2012

demonstration video !

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SbAYrDQStwQ

images attached

spectrogram or sonogram for the demonstration video

2nd image is the sonogram for a 6 seconds speech ( synthesized voice ) and uses a logarithmic scale for the power/brightness

3rd image is log-scaled sonogram for the demonstration video

CleverApe · October 2012

I'm very much looking forward to this release. It ought to save me a lot of headaches synchronising an animated bass drum to its music soundtrack. Plus it seems to offer plenty of scope for experimentation, especially with dual audio inputs from a stereo soundtrack.

mCasual · October 2012

CleverApe said:
I'm very much looking forward to this release. It ought to save me a lot of headaches synchronising an animated bass drum to its music soundtrack. Plus it seems to offer plenty of scope for experimentation, especially with dual audio inputs from a stereo soundtrack.

i'll release it today, hopefully before noon (eastern time)

if you watch the video : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SbAYrDQStwQ

the simplest thing is to animate the rotation of a needle ( it's in fact a primitives-cylinder )

then animate the drummer's stick with similar timings

mCasual · October 2012

the new look of the sonograms produced by mcjAudioMation

( this was rescaled using a paint program )

the user manual will contain instructions about including this "sonogram" in your Daz Studio scenes, and using it as a synchronization helper

mCasual · October 2012

i think the programming is completed here's the UI

not very cute but it should work on all Windows version since 1995

mCasual · October 2012

in case anyone's impatiently awaiting the release

the user manual's writing has begun

https://sites.google.com/site/mcasualsdazscripts2/mcjaudiomation

and after lunch the download link shall appear at the bottom of the page

( before posting the program, i just want to make sure it passes the tests done during the writing of the manual )

mCasual · October 2012

~ Delay News ~ ~ Delay News ~ ~ Delay News ~ ~ Delay News ~ ~ Delay News ~

well, while writing the manual i discovered that, the program was doing well for producing poser-pose files usable on props, but the poser-pose files dont work on figure morphs , and i need to fix that.

so .... tomorrow maybe you'll have the program :)

and the manual

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unrelated image to make the post less boring

mCasual · October 2012

first version is ready !

download and manual here——> https://sites.google.com/site/mcasualsdazscripts2/mcjaudiomation

i moved the Poser Export Settings to a dialog window, it's neater this way

later i may post an update with some speedups

Mustakettu85 · October 2012

Stunning. Thanks a lot!!

CleverApe · October 2012

The pz2 file method seems to work very well. I haven't been able to use the dsa method, because the pop-up that's supposed to appear hasn''t made an appearance. I don't know if it's the software, of just a foible of my computer (XP SP3, Daz 3). The content of the dsa files created are lists of numbers, with nothing else at the end of the file. I hope that helps.

Thanks for this Casual. Like your other software - especially the spline smoother, and the materials animator - this stuff will come in very useful.

mCasual · October 2012

CleverApe said:
The pz2 file method seems to work very well. I haven't been able to use the dsa method, because the pop-up that's supposed to appear hasn''t made an appearance. I don't know if it's the software, of just a foible of my computer (XP SP3, Daz 3). The content of the dsa files created are lists of numbers, with nothing else at the end of the file. I hope that helps.
Thanks for this Casual. Like your other software - especially the spline smoother, and the materials animator - this stuff will come in very useful.

my mistake ! the zip file was supposed to contain the program, plus a script named mcjAudioMation.dsa.

The program appends this code to the script it produces for you.

( i included another script by mistake )

so. right now ... i uploaded a new zip package that includes mcjAudioMation.dsa.

https://sites.google.com/site/mcasualsdazscripts2/mcjaudiomation/mcjAudioMation.zip?attredirects=0&d=1

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btw i found out that when i run DS3 then run DS4.5, crashes are almost guaranteed, but if i run DS4.5 after a fresh reboot, i can work without crashing too quickly

mCasual · October 2012

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ update ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ update ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ update ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ update ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ update ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

i uploaded a new version that includes a key component missing in the initial release

without this component the Daz scripts produced by mcjAudioMation don't work !

thanks to CleverApe fpr telling me

CleverApe · October 2012

Thanks Casual. I've given the new dsa package a quick try, and it seems fine.

Sadly I seem to have jumped the gun a bit when I said the Pz2 method was working well. I've only been able to animate props. Actor Pz2's don't have any inpact. I managed to animate M4's limbs okay using the Props setting & targeting "rotationY yrot" etc, but it doesn't seem to work for abdomen, chest, neck etc. No joy with morphs either.

Any suggestions?

mCasual · October 2012

CleverApe said:
Thanks Casual. I've given the new dsa package a quick try, and it seems fine.
Sadly I seem to have jumped the gun a bit when I said the Pz2 method was working well. I've only been able to animate props. Actor Pz2's don't have any inpact. I managed to animate M4's limbs okay using the Props setting & targeting "rotationY yrot" etc, but it doesn't seem to work for abdomen, chest, neck etc. No joy with morphs either.

Any suggestions?

for the pz2s, i did very few tests and only in Daz Studio
a while ago i remember i made figures that worked in Daz Studio but crashed poser

so maybe the pz2s i produce in mcjAudioMation are not standard enough for Poser's tastes

i should get around to fixing that soon

in poser, if you animate a character's abdomen, then save this as a pz2

then using notepad you compare it with the pz2 produced by mcjAudioMation, you should be able to figure what's the problem

for example, maybe the proper name is "rotationY Twist" instead of "rotationY yrot"

CleverApe · October 2012

Thanks for the advice. By the way, I’m using DAZ 3, so I used the Poser Format Exporter to create a short animated pz2 of an abdomen Twist.

The M4 abdomen movement problem seems to have been solved by using "rotateY yrot" rather than "rotationY yrot".

I've got the head morphs to work by preceding them with three letters. e.g. The head morph "MouthSmilerOpen" needs to be "PHMMouthSmilerOpen". I guess PHM means Poser Head Morph. I suspect body morphs will require the suffix PBM (though I haven’t tested it).

Just one other very minor cosmetic issue I ought to mention: I notice that your program displays the WAV waveform with the left channel at the bottom. In my experience software usually displays the left channel at the top, and the right channel at the bottom. Not a vital issue, but it was enough to make me check that the channel info itself hadn’t been swapped (it’s okay).

mCasual · October 2012

CleverApe said:
Thanks for the advice. By the way, I’m using DAZ 3, so I used the Poser Format Exporter to create a short animated pz2 of an abdomen Twist.
The M4 abdomen movement problem seems to have been solved by using "rotateY yrot" rather than "rotationY yrot".

I've got the head morphs to work by preceding them with three letters. e.g. The head morph "MouthSmilerOpen" needs to be "PHMMouthSmilerOpen". I guess PHM means Poser Head Morph. I suspect body morphs will require the suffix PBM (though I haven’t tested it).

Just one other very minor cosmetic issue I ought to mention: I notice that your program displays the WAV waveform with the left channel at the bottom. In my experience software usually displays the left channel at the top, and the right channel at the bottom. Not a vital issue, but it was enough to make me check that the channel info itself hadn’t been swapped (it’s okay).

i added the pz2 files mostly for Poser users and was thinking, eventually i may make it similar to the daz-script files, so when you're in Poser you could select which character/body part or morph gets the mcjAudiomation data, but that will have to wait until i seriously look into Poser-python programming

in a next version i could add the possibility to select target channel names from lists.

Keiron · February 2015

Hi

Does anyone know of a MIDI file to Animation Script or add on for DAZ Studio .

I found a good one for Blender

Imago · July 2015

Hi, Casual!
Any chance to update Audiomation?
The program works fine and the scripts are fabulous on DAZ Studio, but it crashes when I try to listen to the WAV file before saving as PZ2. I'm on Windows 8.1, maybe depends on my OS.

Keep the great work! ^.^

mCasual · July 2015

ImagoPictures said:
Hi, Casual!
Any chance to update Audiomation?
The program works fine and the scripts are fabulous on DAZ Studio, but it crashes when I try to listen to the WAV file before saving as PZ2. I'm on Windows 8.1, maybe depends on my OS.
Keep the great work! ^.^
i didn't use it in a long time ... it's a standalone exe i think, no ... lets see ... yes
well it still works with Windows 7
maybe your wav files use compression ( some wav files are in fact MP3s )
so maybe it would be less crash-prone if you used very standard PCM uncompressed wav files

i see in the source code that it's quite touchy and accepts only some

the sound playing is simply using the PlaySound function which is probably part of the mmsystem windows/sdk
PlaySound( szBuff, NULL, SND_FILENAME | SND_ASYNC );
ah ha! it's in the manual
mcjAudioMation only accepts to load very standard .wav files.
meaning, 8bit or 16 bit PCM (uncompressed ) .wav files ,
mp3-encoded wav files wont load

the program directly accesses the .wav file, it doesn't use the safer high-level windows services,
so it only works if everything is very very according to plan - if the wav file contains
labels or even album cover images, there's good chances mcjAudioMation will be confused

Imago · July 2015

Casual said:
ImagoPictures said:
Hi, Casual!
Any chance to update Audiomation?
The program works fine and the scripts are fabulous on DAZ Studio, but it crashes when I try to listen to the WAV file before saving as PZ2. I'm on Windows 8.1, maybe depends on my OS.
Keep the great work! ^.^
i didn't use it in a long time ... it's a standalone exe i think, no ... lets see ... yes
well it still works with Windows 7
maybe your wav files use compression ( some wav files are in fact MP3s )
so maybe it would be less crash-prone if you used very standard PCM uncompressed wav files

i see in the source code that it's quite touchy and accepts only some

the sound playing is simply using the PlaySound function which is probably part of the mmsystem windows/sdk
PlaySound( szBuff, NULL, SND_FILENAME | SND_ASYNC );
ah ha! it's in the manual
mcjAudioMation only accepts to load very standard .wav files.
meaning, 8bit or 16 bit PCM (uncompressed ) .wav files ,
mp3-encoded wav files wont load

the program directly accesses the .wav file, it doesn't use the safer high-level windows services,
so it only works if everything is very very according to plan - if the wav file contains
labels or even album cover images, there's good chances mcjAudioMation will be confused

So I just have to "decompress" the wav files?
Ok, I'll try! Thanks!

Imago · July 2015

Nothing to do...
The WAVs are alredy 16bit PCM and even if I decrease the to 8bit, the software crashes.
Is always the BEX error and the trick with the Windows' DEP doesn't work...

ancich · September 2015

Crashes like a bitch in version 4.8 32 bit Daz. Too bad, because I really needed something like this.

mCasual · September 2015

what crashes is the exe app? or when you load the pz2 or when you load the .dsa?

i'll do some tests on DS4.8 64 bit i'm on windows10 64bit

i have ds 4.7 32 bit ( maybe ds 4.8 32 bit too not sure )

ancich said:

Crashes like a bitch in version 4.8 32 bit Daz. Too bad, because I really needed something like this.

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mcjAudioMation - Animations from audio files -- First version Released !

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