Rejoin Genesis 2 to universal tool?
Superdog
Posts: 765
I created a Genesis 2 walk sequence for a scene out of aniblocks. I then baked this and used Keymate to adjust keyframes to suit the scene. I then created a new aniblock from the keyframes and saved it. When I load the new aniblock into a scene the universal tool is in the correct position but Genesis 2 is in a completely different place far away from the correct position. I've created lots of new aniblocks and never come across this problem before. What is going wrong and how do I fix it? I think I somehow need to rejoin Genesis 2 to the universal tool.
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Ok, after a further online search I've read that the universal tool position can be moved using the joint editor. I also worked out that the universal tool is in the correct position for Genesis 2 (in the middle of G2 at the floor) on the first key frame but on the second keyframe it moves far away from Gen2. My question is how do I return the universal tool to exactly the same position it was in at the first keyframe? Is there a way to copy the exact joint editor parameters?
I tried moving the universal tool using the joint editor but there's no way to tell if I've moved it to the default Genesis 2 position. I moved it at the second keyframe but when I went back to the first keyframe Gen2 moved to a completely different position and the universal tool was far away from it. So now the first keyframe is messed up. Is there any way to zero the universal tool to the default Genesis 2 position?
I really don't understand what I'm doing wrong, why the Gen2 universal tool moved in the first place or how to fix it. I've never encountered this problem before so any help appreciated.
I assume you mean the posing widget for the figure? That is there because you moved the figure using the hip, so the figure node is now separated from it. If you want to have the movement handled by the figure node you will need to leave the Join Editor alone and copy the translations on the hip node onto the figure (Genesis 2 Female/Male) then zero the hip node translations.
Thanks for your reply. How do I copy the hip node translations to the figure? For example, in Keymate I highlighted all the hip xtranslate keyframes, pressed copy and then selected the figure xtranslate and pressed paste but the keyframes won't copy over from the hip to the figure. It seems that Keymate can only copy keyframes to the same parameter. If I can't copy the keyframes then the solution, it seems to me, is to leave the hip translations as they are and to zero the figures pose widget to the default Gen 2 setting.
I don't know how I ended up in this mess. All I did was load some aniblocks, move the figure to where I wanted it in the scene, baked the aniblocks to the timeline and then adjusted a few keyframes in Keymate. At no time do I recall moving Gen 2 using the hip.
First, it's not a mes really - in general poses should move the hip and not the figure, that way the figure node can still be used for placement within the scene independt of any posing or offsets for group poses. Since this is an aniamtion, are you moving the figure (by the hip) or is it walking in place (with a constant offset from the figure origin)? If the former then moving the origin to be visually right in one frame will make it wrong in others. The only benefit I can see in keeping the hip zeroed in x and z (other than any swaying during walking) is that it would make it simpler to stitch two walk cycles together. As for an efficient way to make the switch now you have the movement in the hip, I'm not sure how you should proceed.
According to Keymate, the hip translations also contain location info e.g. the first keyframe = xtranslate: 436.12; ytranslate: -646.34; xtranslate: 702.91 etc. (the terrain is very hilly) So each of the hip keyframes is a variation on these numbers depending on the movement of Gen2. The hip determines the figures location.
The scene I originally created was loaded with too many things for my system to display animation smoothly. I created a lighter scene by deleting the figures hair and clothing so that I could animate smoothly. The intention was to create an aniblock in the lighter scene and then transfer this to the heavier scene for rendering. I've done this before with other scenes without any problems.
The problem is that somehow the figure's pose/universal widget/tool has moved in the lighter scene and is no longer at the default Gen2 position. This means that when I save the keyframes from the lighter scene as an aniblock and then use this aniblock in the heavier scene, the position of Gen2 defaults to the figure pose widget position rather than the hip information position. Do I need to zero the figure's pose widget to the default G2 position in the lighter scene before saving the aniblock, or reset the figures position in the heavier scene, or an entirely differnet solution?
The widget has not moved - it is at the figure origin and that is where the figure loaded (the world origin presumably). If you copy its location to the other figure and apply the animation you should get the same result as in your light scene. if not then somethign else would appear to be going on.
How do I find out the location of the figure widget in the light scene so I can copy it to the figure widget in the other scene?
You could save a pose preset and include the figure node, and all frames. You could also just look at the numbers in the parameters pane with the figure selected (at least as long as it really iss tatic - if both hip and figure are moving that's going to be a bit of a pain though the pose preset should still transfer the animation).
Thanks for your advice Richard. In the end I couldn't figure out how to fix the problem. I think the scene had corrupted in some way or I wasn't experienced enough to solve it. Luckily I managed to merge all the objects I had deleted back into the lighter scene and could render straight from this scene without having to export the animation to the other scene. In future I'll switch off objects to reduce the load in a scene rather than delete them.
What's the best way to temporarily reduce the system load of a scene so that animatons play back smoothly? When I've tried switching off objects in a scene in the past, DAZ Studio still played back the animation very jerkily compared to if I deleted these objects. I'd like to know the best way(s) of reducing the system load of a scene without actually deleting any objects.
I'm not sure, possibly you would be ebst to save and then delete (DS doesn't have a reload/revert command in the file menu but reloading from the Recent Documnets list is nearly as good).