Kitty Corp Meow Mix Forums

Help & Tutorials => A/A Tutorials => Topic started by: Eternal Yoshi on November 09, 2013, 12:28:12 AM



Title: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Eternal Yoshi on November 09, 2013, 12:28:12 AM
First off, I have to credit jiang and Haloedhero for developing this method, I'm generally just porting it into actual text form. Credit to Vaanrose for showing everyone how to get Brawl models into Maya intact too.

This Tutorial will still be expanded intermittently.

What you need
Maya 2014(Get the student version or whatever)
Brawlbox 0.68(Exporting the model only)
Brawlbox 0.69(For Animations)
Autodesk FBX Converter 2010.2(To convert the model)
Perseverance

Maya is a very powerful animation program with a high learning curve, but it's worth learning because it's tools and hotkeys mean better animations at much better efficiency. There will be a transitional phrase, but there's something very... magical about using these tools for the first time after using Brawlbox's animation assets.

First section needs to cover the right way to get the model into Brawlbox with the bones intact.
Second section covers the Control Rig tools and a few hotkeys.
Third Section We Bake the animation and learn a fast way of cleaning up keyframes in Maya
Fourth Section covers Exporting

Getting the model into Maya


So we basically follow Vaanrose's instructions on getting the model in to Maya from Brawlbox using Brawlbox 0.68....

For those that don't know what I'm talking about, I'll paraphrase.

Just pick the character(it could be any character, even a custom one like Simon Belmont) in Brawlbox 0.68d:
(http://i.imgur.com/EAkokLEl.png)
highlight the mdl0 and right click. Then select export and make sure you choose Collada Scene (.dae). Don't forget the textures
(http://i.imgur.com/X2HsnQFl.png)
Then you open the converter and just like with Vaan's tutorial, under "Source Files", click "Add..." and load the .DAE file; also make sure you have the destination format as "FBX201000 (Autodesk)"
(http://i.imgur.com/3yyD9sFl.png)
Then open the resulting .FBX file into Maya using Import.
(http://i.imgur.com/hLQU9lgl.png)

There now we have a model ready to animate(I have textures off in this scene).


Using Control Rigs and Hotkeys
First some Hotkeys for thought:

4 = Wireframe Mode
5 = Shaded mode
6 = Shaded + Textured Mode
Q = Select Tool
W = Move Tool
E = Rotate Tool
R = Scale Tool
Shift + W = Set Translation keyframe
Shift + E = Set Rotation keyframe
Shift + R = Set Scale keyframe
I  = Insert Key(Graph Editor)
S = Animate > Set Key(Use Wisely)
Z = Undo
Ctrl + Y = Redo

Learn these and love these like I am currently. There's a lot more so be careful what you type. :p

Edit: More here: http://www.keyxl.com/aaab24a/249/Autodesk-Maya-keyboard-shortcuts.htm (http://www.keyxl.com/aaab24a/249/Autodesk-Maya-keyboard-shortcuts.htm)

Anyway using a Control Rig has so many advantages that I can't really put into words, but it makes previously tedious things like making a character crouch,kneel, etc. a snap. So let's set one up.
First you need to open the Human IK Panel. Which should bring up a menu like this:
(http://i.imgur.com/K79akVLl.png)
Now we need to define the skeleton for the Control Rig to use(Don't worry this won't delete your rig if you do this right).
So Click define Skeleton and you'll see something like this:
(http://i.imgur.com/uLngqKdl.png)
Now we have to fill these in to use the control rig and tell which bone to use for which limb; just highlight the section and it'll tell you what limb it needs.
Let's start with the legs. So click the limb labeled LeftUpLeg:
(http://i.imgur.com/Kljkps7l.png)
Then Select LLegJ in your viewport either by clicking it in the viewport or using the Outliner, which is located in Window > Outliner.
(http://i.imgur.com/KSWhEmTl.png)
Then Right Click the LeftUpLeg Limb in the skeleton and select Assign Selected Bone. It'll turn Green. Do this for the rest of the Limbs using your best judgement and these guidelines.
LeftUpLeg  = LLegJ
LeftLeg      = LkneeJ
LeftFoot     = LFootJ
Reference  = TopN
Hips           = HipN
Spine         = WaistN/BodyN
LeftArm      = LShoulderJ
LeftForearm=LarmJ
LeftHand    = LHandN

Some are obvious and others aren't. Also note that there are arrows in there that let you zoom in to places where you have more to fill in like:

Neck             = NeckN
Spine1          = BustN
LeftShoulder = LShoulderN

and so on...

Do this for all the important areas and you'll eventually get a Green Circle letting you know it's ready for application.
(http://i.imgur.com/nnYvWNIl.png)

Now, click on source and select Control Rig! You'll notice your character's skeleton has taken on a different appearance. Don't be worried the bones are still there, but you now have the control rig tools to use in animation now.
(http://i.imgur.com/8fgWlMyl.png)

Now the red circles are areas that you can now move and rotate the body part and more. It's rather tricky to describe, but it's very handy since the Control Rig also applies bone pinning.

(http://i.imgur.com/nXHDFZg.gif)
Just a derpy looking example.

So yeah you can use these to animate the body AND set keyframes for these things, but before you animate we have to do a few things. We need to go to Window < Settings/Preferences < Preferences for a bit.
Now in the categories section select settings. We need to change the frame rate from Film(24fps) to NTSC field (60 fps). We can also change joint size by going into the Kinematics tab. Also on the Animation Category, we should set the Interlopation settings like so:
(http://i.imgur.com/P9UBwF5.png)
Lastly we need to go to the Time Slider category and make sure the animation will play back at 60 fps(which will be real time). Finally we can save and get with Animating.

You can control the frame total by modifying the numbers circled in the previous pic.

There are more controls with the Control Rig that you can modify to do different things. For example, the Gray Pin when checked, will highlight red and turn off all pinning. Try out different things for different results when moving/rotating.

Just try out animating for yourself and experiment. Keep in mind that a Red line will appear in the time slider when the selected thing has a keyframe.

Baking and The Graph Editor

For the Sake of pacing, let's assume you've finished your animation and are ready to put into Brawlbox. There's some requisite we have to fufill first. First off, we need to bake the animation to the Brawl bones.
The best way to do it is to first Bake the HipN bone by itself. Select HipN via the Outliner and then click Channel Box/Layer Editor on the right side of the screen to show what we need. Then Drag Click to Select all the Tranlsate/Rotation.
(http://i.imgur.com/35nR5D1l.png)
Next we need to go to Edit > Keys > Bake Simulator.

OK. Now on the time range, be sure to select Start/End and edit the numbers so that your entire animation is sampled. Now for the Smart Bake options....

For the HipN bone, it's advised that this be precise so make sure the Fidelity Keys Tolerance are set to 1.0000 and the other settings are like in my picture and then hit Bake.

(http://i.imgur.com/Z4rY8wsl.png)

It'll go through your animation and keyframe the HipN bone for you.

(http://i.imgur.com/g0pLmDAl.png)

Next we want to do the other bones.... which we can do simultaneously. What we need to do is select all the bones EXCEPT for HipN. and we can do that by selecting TopN and right click drag to Select Hiearchy. Then we deselect the HipN bone in the Outliner by Holding Ctrl + Left clicking the HipN bone.

(http://i.imgur.com/vN2oYFTl.png)

Now select ONLY ROTATION CHANNELS in the right section and return to the bake simulator. Now we need to change the Fidelity Keys Tolerance to something more than 1. While we can do 1, that'll keyframe way too much stuff. So Bake with the tolerance value between 5.00000 and 15.0000. Whichever you think works for you.

Check your animation by playing it after baking. If it looks to inaccurate from what it was before, then you may have to try a lower number.

Don't freak too much if you see Red Lines everywhere. (http://i.imgur.com/KqBjbiAl.png)This means we need to do some cleanup with the Graph Editor.

Now we open the Graph Editor by going to Window > Animation Editor > Graph Editor.
This visualizes our keyframes and interlopation. What we need to do is check for which bones have unecessary keyframes. More often than not, they tend to be baked bones that aren't moved or rotated in the animation. Here's an example.
(http://i.imgur.com/XACfsiFl.png)
See how flat the line is? That's a not moving Axis waste of keyframes. So we need to select all of those and Click Delete/Backspace to remove them. Rinse and repeat for all "flat lining" bones. Don't be shy about using the outliner to select the bones. This will take a little while to do at first, but you'll get used to it and do it faster. You can also use this Graph editor to cleverly save on keyframe space on bones that are used as well, but I won't cover that in this first draft.

Afterwards, you should have much less Red lines/Keyframes and have the animation look generally the same.
(http://i.imgur.com/Q9DQMOGl.png)
See doesn't this look much more sane?

Exporting the Animation the proper way for Brawlbox

One Final thing to do before the export: We must select ALL the bones, put the time Slider on the first frame, and then select the Translation Channels: (http://i.imgur.com/rJzXJo1l.png)

Then Right Click + Hold and hit Key Selected. This ensures that all translations will be in tact on the first frame. We can finally start exporting. Go To File > Export Selection's Little Settings box and change them like so. (http://i.imgur.com/jkvdSmrl.png) For the final time, make sure that the Start and End numbers match your animation length.

Now export it as an .anim file.

Time to import this thing into Brawlbox 0.69. However due to an odd bug, we can't do it when the Model viewer is open, so we need to open the motion file itself and import it that way. Be sure to Right Click > Import > Model Animation. DO NOT REPLACE with this Brawlbox version. Then save and check your animation with a different Brawlbox revision.
(http://i.imgur.com/POMl9rd.png)

I'm aware of how lenghty this is. This is as abridged as I could make it.

Any questions and concerns should go here.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: BlackJax96 on November 09, 2013, 06:28:57 AM
I can't try this out yet but looks good, nice job.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Pervyman Trigger on November 09, 2013, 07:27:46 AM
I've always liked animating in maya. This is going to make things alot easyer now


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Velen on November 09, 2013, 07:30:05 AM
Oh god yes....


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: SiLeNtDo0m on November 09, 2013, 01:28:56 PM
No one should ever need to animate in Brawlbox now

This here is the sex.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: jrush64 on November 09, 2013, 02:24:25 PM
This is a godsend. I love animating in Maya. Thanx a million.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: pikazz on November 11, 2013, 01:56:32 AM
so, this is basically dragging in the hand and it will affect the whole arm? SWEET!

I need to get my hands on maya! :srs:


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Mortimer on November 13, 2013, 03:37:16 PM
I have a small problem. I even managed to export the animation with Maya, but after importing it in Brawlbox, for some reason, every keyframe value is multiplied by 10^7. Did you encountered this problem on your tests?


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Eternal Yoshi on November 13, 2013, 04:13:23 PM
No I have not. What Maya version are you using?
The importer doesn't really support versions not 2014.

The more information on the situation you are in and what you do to bake and export, the more accurate my diagnosis will be.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: BlackJax96 on November 13, 2013, 04:26:35 PM
I have a small problem. I even managed to export the animation with Maya, but after importing it in Brawlbox, for some reason, every keyframe value is multiplied by 10^7. Did you encountered this problem on your tests?

Sounds like a different unit of measurement. I'll have a dialog in the next BB update that will let you apply a conversion factor.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Mortimer on November 14, 2013, 12:31:44 PM
No I have not. What Maya version are you using?
The importer doesn't really support versions not 2014.

The more information on the situation you are in and what you do to bake and export, the more accurate my diagnosis will be.


Yes, I'm using version 2014, and also the plugin that comes with it already. I followed the tutorial without any doubts until the "Baking and The Graph Editor". I made just a single translation on the TopN bone to see if it would work. It also changed the values on other bones, but then I tried again with this bone only.
I believe you said to select only the rotations for the other bones because we usually don't translate the model's body parts during animations. So, on this case, I didn't select the rotation values, as I just translated TopN.
I also checked the interpolation graphic and it seems fine.
On the exporting section, I put the time slider at the first frame, both on the frame bar on the bottom and on the Time Slider settings.

Important: I made more tests and realized that the values were not being multiplied by 10, but any numbers with commas, like 74,44, have their comma ignored and are imported with the value of 7444. I didn't find the reason of this, though, and doesn't seem to happen while importing the animation back into maya.


Sounds like a different unit of measurement. I'll have a dialog in the next BB update that will let you apply a conversion factor.

Thanks for sharing the info.  But still, if that's the solution for my problem I still would have a hard time fixing every key frame, as they don't have always the same amount of digits.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: BlackJax96 on November 14, 2013, 01:44:28 PM
Important: I made more tests and realized that the values were not being multiplied by 10, but any numbers with commas, like 74,44, have their comma ignored and are imported with the value of 7444. I didn't find the reason of this, though, and doesn't seem to happen while importing the animation back into maya.

Ok, I know exactly what the problem is then. Consider it fixed.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: masamune on November 16, 2013, 03:35:26 PM
Hello, is there some way to define the skeleton for a character once and for all ? Because it's a pain for me to always define it before starting animating.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Eternal Yoshi on November 16, 2013, 06:30:24 PM
Like it or not, it must be done at least once per Character/skeleton. Just make a scene with the skeleton already defined before you move anything so you have a scene to begin with when you start a new animation.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Hosernaut on November 16, 2013, 07:44:34 PM
I'm having trouble rotating my character so his whole body is facing the other direction. The rotate tool doesn't seem to rotate it in that manner. When I try, it seems to make the face 2D.

Anyone have suggestions?


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Eternal Yoshi on November 16, 2013, 08:16:39 PM
You need to use the the Hip Control without pinning (Click the Gray Pin and make sure it's glowing red)to rotate your character. Also check in the same row for the little skeleton button called "Full Body" is checked and active as well.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: masamune on November 16, 2013, 09:42:13 PM
Like it or not, it must be done at least once per Character/skeleton. Just make a scene with the skeleton already defined before you move anything so you have a scene to begin with when you start a new animation.
Ok. Thanks for answering.:)


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Mortimer on November 18, 2013, 03:41:51 PM
Ok, I know exactly what the problem is then. Consider it fixed.

Alright. Thanks for checking it out.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Hosernaut on November 19, 2013, 10:48:10 AM
Is it possible to import an existing brawl animation into maya to modify it?


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Eternal Yoshi on November 19, 2013, 11:35:45 AM
Not Yet. When it becomes possible I will add that to the tutorial.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Hosernaut on November 21, 2013, 06:12:57 PM
I'm using maya 2013 because my computer won't support 2014. As a result, some things don't quite match up.

For example, I can't find the Bake Simulator. Under Edit > Keys there is Bake Simulation, but it does not have options to change. It does it to some pre-set settings I can't seem to find. I also can't find translation channels.

Do you have experience with the 2013 version?


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Eternal Yoshi on November 21, 2013, 06:29:56 PM
For me all of the options in the bake simulator that are in 2014 are in 2013 as well under Edit > Keys> Bake Simulation. Also the Translation Channels should be in the Channel Box/Layer Editor on the left side just like in 2014.

The process should be the same for 2013 and 2014, just keep in mind that certain options are in different locations, but did BJ update the .anim importer to even support 2013 .anim files?


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Flowteau on November 27, 2013, 10:12:16 PM
For some reason, making inbetween frames with the graph editor isn't working with Marth's arms and legs at the same time. I would have the arms animated fine, but once I move the legs and redo the graph curve to make the animation smooth, the smoothness goes to the legs but is lost from the arms. Any ideas?

Edit: Huh, that's weird. I tried selecting and using the graph editor with the marker earlier in the timeline. Now the transition with the arms animated fine looking alright (it's over just two key frames), yet the rest of the arm aniamtion is still choppy. What's the pattern?

Edit 2: Also, what do I do with Captain Falcon? Supposedly his hands in T-stance aren't good enough.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Gamma Ridley on December 14, 2013, 10:02:46 PM
Is there any way to make a control rig for less-than-humanoid characters to accommodate for things like wings or tails? I imagine there's a way to do it manually but I haven't messed with bone hierarchy or anything related to IK in years, and even then I wasn't that great at it, haha.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Eternal Yoshi on December 15, 2013, 01:39:55 AM
There may be a way to do so, but I do not know of such a thing yet. I would love to make a control rig for Simon's whip, but alas I have to animate it the old way....

Lemme check for a moment.....
Creating an FK Tail Rig in Maya on Vimeo (http://vimeo.com/35205556)

Maybe this can help?



Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Gamma Ridley on December 15, 2013, 11:14:33 AM
Hm, yeah, that may work. The only issue I see is that it seems to be restricted to one axis, unless you can connect multiple axes of rotation at a time...? I guess I'll just look into that more later as I familiarize myself with Maya, thanks.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: masamune on December 15, 2013, 07:39:38 PM
I got a question, but i don't know how to formulate it so i'll try to tell you what i want to do:
I've imported one of the dragons in Skyward Sword, who would act as a background model. I've managed to rip it's wait animation. So i was thinking if it would be possible to import it in Brawl with Maya. The animation is in psa format, and the model in psk format, but you can use scripts to import them in 3ds Max and Maya.

Edit: Nevermind, found another way.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Pervyman Trigger on December 17, 2013, 07:08:53 AM
slight issue on my side. Everything works fine, but all the translations are lost when imported to brawlbox


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Eternal Yoshi on December 17, 2013, 12:26:15 PM
Strange.... After baking, did you remember to check the Translation keyframes for HipN and keyframe the Translation values for all the bones on the first frame before Exporting to .anim?


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Pervyman Trigger on December 21, 2013, 09:22:51 PM
After messing some more i found out it's key translations that [censored] up. if I don't key them there fine when imported. Which is an issue :/


EDIT: All right yoshi looking closer I found out the translations arnt lost, but the decimal point on the numbers are moved over by two. Any idea?


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Eternal Yoshi on December 22, 2013, 07:16:57 AM
That's a very strange issue that I have never encountered while working on Simon...

I'm not exactly sure what to do in this situation other than maybe bring up a scene with the animation unbaked and try baking again.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: KingJigglypuff on January 16, 2014, 09:57:51 AM
I'll be setting this thread to Sticky now. I should have done this earlier.

Since this thread is Stickied, Necroposting is allowed. So don't be afraid to post something is this thread is dead.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Eternal Yoshi on January 17, 2014, 04:29:32 PM
Thanks.

Word on the street has it that the dkAnim script allows you to import .anim files that Brawlbox outputs.......................


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: KingJigglypuff on January 17, 2014, 04:31:30 PM
Word on the street has it that the dkAnim script allows you to import .anim files that Brawlbox outputs.......................
Woah.

So does that mean importing Animations to give them the Maya Touch could be possible?


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Eternal Yoshi on January 17, 2014, 05:18:15 PM
Actually it means you may be able to import wait and fall animations which will be important for making new animations for characters that have existing falls and wait animations, allowing for your new stuff to have seamless transitions.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Gamma Ridley on January 27, 2014, 04:36:28 PM
Question about bone pinning: how does it... work.

Like, I know how to turn it on and such, but I can't get it seem to work for hands. It does work sometimes, though, so I'm guessing there's a certain threshold of bending and when it's exceeded, the pinned bone follows anyway....? Either way, what's the proper procedure for pinning?

Edit:

JK

Turns out you have to make sure Full Body is selected rather than Body Part when you pin it.

Like so:

(http://i40.tinypic.com/24159nb.png)

Thanks a lot Maya Online Help for not specifying. GG


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Eternal Yoshi on February 08, 2014, 08:54:11 AM
http://youtu.be/BNCH5bjS5i8 (http://youtu.be/BNCH5bjS5i8)


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Sammi Husky on February 08, 2014, 12:53:50 PM
woah wait is that importing The existing Brawlbox animations? :O


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Eternal Yoshi on February 08, 2014, 02:57:04 PM
Why yes it is. Let's see where it goes.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Sammi Husky on February 08, 2014, 03:14:58 PM
AWESOME! Would by chance be updating the tutorial with a dinky little part describing how to do this for people who don't know what dkAnim is? i've found it..but some people may not know how to google things lol

EDIT: also, must this be used with maya 2014? or is it compatable with 2013?


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Eternal Yoshi on February 08, 2014, 04:26:02 PM
This isn't done by dkAnim, but something else.

Let's say that this is still in a testing phase ATM. I'll let you know when things proceed.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Sammi Husky on February 08, 2014, 07:15:07 PM
ahh i see. mkay then, sounds great


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Large Leader on April 28, 2014, 11:22:09 AM
As has been suggested by EY and KJP, I'll start animating in Maya.

It took forever to find out that S was to make keyframes and such.

What I'm curious to know is that are the feet bones set to be pinned to the ground at the start?

I don't even know if Pinned is the right word, but that's the only word that's coming to mind at the moment.

Great tut, EY. Between your ExtGFX tut and this one, you've been able to get me through in one piece :P

Post Merge: April 27, 2014, 09:51:31 PM
HOLY CRAP!

I just animated two steps (literally, left foot forward and right foot forward) and it...

It just did everything for me...

EY, can I marry you?

And I figured out the pinning thing (or at least I believe so)



Okay, I got another question.

How would I animate a forward translation?

Would I do that after I import it into BBox or is there a good way to do it in Maya after I've already made a keyframe?


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: pikazz on April 28, 2014, 01:59:30 PM
How would I animate a forward translation?

Would I do that after I import it into BBox or is there a good way to do it in Maya after I've already made a keyframe?
you mean how to animate so it moves forward (with the TransN bone?)

either editing directly with Maya on the TransN bone or remove all the Z translation and give it to TransN in brawlbox


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Large Leader on April 28, 2014, 02:50:02 PM
Yeah, the biggest problem I was having was that when I set a keyframe, that if I wanted to animate it forward, that I'd have to either animate every few frames forward, or to do it as I went through it.

I guess I'll just give it TransN movement when I've put it in Brawlbox.

Is there a way to only set keyframes to the rotations that are done? I tried the shift w (or e, was it?) and it didn't set the rotations.

Post Merge: April 28, 2014, 07:11:41 PM
Alright, a couple of problems:

First, when I tried to go to Edit>Key>Bake Simulator

I wasn't able to find the options for the Bake Simulator. Instead, it just ran through the animation itself without giving me any options to change.

And also, when I tried to export it, I couldn't find "animExport" (which is what I believe is the setting in your export setting pic).

I am using Maya 2014.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Eternal Yoshi on April 28, 2014, 08:29:07 PM
Alright, a couple of problems:

First, when I tried to go to Edit>Key>Bake Simulator

I wasn't able to find the options for the Bake Simulator. Instead, it just ran through the animation itself without giving me any options to change.

Click the Box next to the Bake Simulator text in that menu.

And also, when I tried to export it, I couldn't find "animExport" (which is what I believe is the setting in your export setting pic).

I am using Maya 2014.
You need to enable the AnimExport plugin in the Plugin manager.
Window > Settings/Preferences > Plug-in Manager - enable the AnimImportExport and make sure load and auto-load is checked.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Large Leader on April 28, 2014, 09:42:05 PM
Click the Box next to the Bake Simulator text in that menu.
You need to enable the AnimExport plugin in the Plugin manager.
Window > Settings/Preferences > Plug-in Manager - enable the AnimImportExport and make sure load and auto-load is checked.

Thanks for the response.

Also, when you are taking out the extra bones that flatline on the graph thingy, they disappear from the Outliner window, correct?


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: KingJigglypuff on April 30, 2014, 03:51:17 PM
Well this is embarrassing...

I'm telling people who want to animate to use Maya, but I can't even figure out how to do simple rotations...

I'm trying to copy and paste the rotations/translations/scales from a character's Wait1, but the edits don't apply properly.

Do I pose before applying a control rig?


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Eternal Yoshi on April 30, 2014, 05:30:48 PM
You aren't supposed to move or rotate the boneset before you apply the control rig; for the control rig to work properly, the model and boneset need to be in the bind pose, AKA T-stance.

Copy pasta values from Brawlbox isn't going to give you the exact same pose.

Thanks for the response.

Also, when you are taking out the extra bones that flatline on the graph thingy, they disappear from the Outliner window, correct?

No the bone doesn't disappear, just it's keyframes.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: KingJigglypuff on April 30, 2014, 05:43:50 PM
You aren't supposed to move or rotate the boneset before you apply the control rig; for the control rig to work properly, the model and boneset need to be in the bind pose, AKA T-stance.

Copy pasta values from Brawlbox isn't going to give you the exact same pose.
I see.

Also, when selecting a bone (that's in the IK Control Rig) from the Outlier, the rotation is messed up. Am I only supposed to select Control Rig bones from the IK Definition? If you don't understand what I'm saying, then I can take a screencap.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Eternal Yoshi on April 30, 2014, 06:01:21 PM
Don't touch any of the original model bones when the Control Rig is active until AFTER baking.
If you're going to choose something to rotate in the control rig, I recommend choosing the control rig objects from the Character Control tab on the right side of the screen.

If you're concerned about TransN, that can wait until AFTER baking. What I would do is move the Hip control like you would HipN, bake, then cut and paste the values from HipN to TransN. Just remember to key the axis when you do so.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: KingJigglypuff on April 30, 2014, 06:06:16 PM
Don't touch any of the original model bones when the Control Rig is active until AFTER baking.
If you're going to choose something to rotate in the control rig, I recommend choosing the control rig objects from the Character Control tab on the right side of the screen.
Alright. Thanks for the input.

One last question for now...

I know there's a Control Rig tutorial for tails that was posted a few pages ago, but is it possible to have a Control Rig for wings?


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Large Leader on April 30, 2014, 06:38:02 PM
No the bone doesn't disappear, just it's keyframes.

That's odd. I pressed backspace in the graph window (with the bone selected) and it removed it from the Outliner...


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Eternal Yoshi on April 30, 2014, 07:16:20 PM
Check your selection. You may have accidentally selected more than you think.

Alright. Thanks for the input.

One last question for now...

I know there's a Control Rig tutorial for tails that was posted a few pages ago, but is it possible to have a Control Rig for wings?


I'm sorry but I don't know of a definite way to make a control rig for wings at this time....
I KNOW it's possible though.

http://www.paulneale.com/technical/bellaSara/bellaSara.htm (http://www.paulneale.com/technical/bellaSara/bellaSara.htm)

Maybe this link can help?


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Gamma Ridley on April 30, 2014, 07:19:18 PM
That's odd. I pressed backspace in the graph window (with the bone selected) and it removed it from the Outliner...

Instead of hitting backspace or delete, select Edit in the top left of the graph editor and hit Delete in the drop-down. That should do it. Maybe.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Large Leader on May 01, 2014, 01:12:40 PM
Instead of hitting backspace or delete, select Edit in the top left of the graph editor and hit Delete in the drop-down. That should do it. Maybe.

Perfect, it worked.

Now only one more problem.

I animated Tidus going into the squat wait animation. It exported fine and plays in BrawlBox fine, but I think I might have taken out too many of the bones during the "delete it if it has no translation"

Should I remove the LShoulderN bone if LShoulderJ has rotations/translations/etc?

I have a feeling I shouldn't (I'm assuming that the rotations would go back to the original T-pose rotation).

Is my assumption correct?


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: KingJigglypuff on May 01, 2014, 02:20:36 PM
The animExport isn't showing up for me (it's not in the dropdown menu) when I go to the export selected settings. I have Maya 2014. Is there a script that's needed?

Edit: Never mind. I found it.

But now that I exported it, the rotations of certain bones are off. It only exported the X Rotations for my character's tail and wing bones.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Large Leader on May 02, 2014, 10:03:07 AM
I animated Tidus going into the squat wait animation. It exported fine and plays in BrawlBox fine, but I think I might have taken out too many of the bones during the "delete it if it has no translation"

Should I remove the LShoulderN bone if LShoulderJ has rotations/translations/etc?

I have a feeling I shouldn't (I'm assuming that the rotations would go back to the original T-pose rotation).

Is my assumption correct?

Just tested, and this seems to be the case.

Man, I'm totally loving Maya


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Large Leader on May 05, 2014, 05:33:57 PM
Okay, I'm having a problem when trying to animate flips.

I want to animate the person doing a backflip. So, to test it, I made the first key frame the squat. Then 10 frames later, I animated a complete 360 degree turn in the x-axis direction. Key framed that, and played the animation.

But for some reason, the person doesn't move at all. I checked the attribute setting (or wherever the Translation and Rotations are) and there is no Rotation Change in the hip bone.

Is there any way to enter in rotations manually for bones? I've been trying to and it never seems to work for me.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Eternal Yoshi on May 05, 2014, 08:43:58 PM
The thing about those Control Rigs is that with the when you rotate something past 180, it'll snap to -180 and then back to 0 when you do a 360 instead of it passing 180. If you want a 360 spin, you need to have some in between keyframes on the control rig with rotations like 90/180/270 and then 360.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Large Leader on May 05, 2014, 10:31:52 PM
I've tried animating this:
-Start at standing position
-Lying back in the air (going into back flip)
-Complete the spin and land

But it seems to do this:
-Start at standing position
-Lying back in the air
-Go back to frame one, by swinging in the same direction that you went up (like a seesaw)

Also, where would I add Swords or other projectiles/items to the control rig?


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: KingJigglypuff on May 06, 2014, 07:48:31 AM
But now that I exported it, the rotations of certain bones are off. It only exported the X Rotations for my character's tail and wing bones.

Hoping I can get some help with this. Since it's a huge pain to have to manually animate the wings and tail again in BrawlBox.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Eternal Yoshi on May 06, 2014, 08:56:01 AM
Very weird. Have you checked those bones in the graph editor to see if the other Axis' are keyed properly?


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: KingJigglypuff on May 06, 2014, 09:11:39 AM
Very weird. Have you checked those bones in the graph editor to see if the other Axis' are keyed properly?
I was checking to make sure I had everything set, but then my Maya crashed (and I forgot to save), so I lost the Animation. :\

But I'll try making another Animation and doing that in the future.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Eternal Yoshi on May 06, 2014, 11:49:28 AM
I was checking to make sure I had everything set, but then my Maya crashed (and I forgot to save), so I lost the Animation. :\

But I'll try making another Animation and doing that in the future.

Agghh. That sucks.
Take it from me, when you finish an animation, save the scene as a backup BEFORE you bake it, then bake it and save that as a separate scene. It's always good to have a backup of your animation in case things like this happen.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: KingJigglypuff on May 06, 2014, 12:06:34 PM
Agghh. That sucks.
Take it from me, when you finish an animation, save the scene as a backup BEFORE you bake it, then bake it and save that as a separate scene. It's always good to have a backup of your animation in case things like this happen.
Though something I should specify is that I animated the tail and wings though the Outlier, since they weren't used in the IK Control Rig at all.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Eternal Yoshi on May 06, 2014, 12:33:22 PM
If the wing and tail bones weren't used in the IK Rig, then it's meaningless to bake those bones.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: KingJigglypuff on May 06, 2014, 12:44:38 PM
If the wing and tail bones weren't used in the IK Rig, then it's meaningless to bake those bones.
Oh.

Alright.

I'll give that a go then.

Would I also not bake the TopN, TransN, XRotN, YRotN, HaveN, and ThrowN bones?


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Spex130 on May 06, 2014, 03:16:39 PM
Generally speaking, if you didn't touch the bone you don't need to bake it.

More specifically, all of those bones are of the type that you will never need to bake, excepting the TransN. If you did movement using the TransN, bake it. Otherwise, you're good.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Large Leader on May 12, 2014, 08:31:24 AM
Quick question (or long question...)

How would I make the last frame of the animation I made, the first frame of a new animation I want to make?

I tried selecting the whole model's joints ik thingy and deleting all the keyframes before the last frame, but that ended up doing... something. Which made it so I couldn't rotate/translate/scale/do anything with the IK skeleton thing.

So what exactly would I do to solve my problem?


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: KingJigglypuff on May 12, 2014, 08:49:01 AM
Quick question (or long question...)

How would I make the last frame of the animation I made, the first frame of a new animation I want to make?

I tried selecting the whole model's joints ik thingy and deleting all the keyframes before the last frame, but that ended up doing... something. Which made it so I couldn't rotate/translate/scale/do anything with the IK skeleton thing.

So what exactly would I do to solve my problem?
Copy the keyframe of the last Frame, then paste it over the first Frame. Then delete all keyframes in between.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Large Leader on May 12, 2014, 09:30:00 AM
Copy the keyframe of the last Frame, then paste it over the first Frame. Then delete all keyframes in between.

That's what I did.

The aforementioned problem still occurred.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: KingJigglypuff on May 12, 2014, 09:38:57 AM
That's what I did.

The aforementioned problem still occurred.
Don't select all the bones. Just select one bone from the IK rig.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Large Leader on May 12, 2014, 10:37:02 AM
Don't select all the bones. Just select one bone from the IK rig.

Awesome that worked.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: yadayada on May 13, 2014, 04:31:48 PM
Simple question: Do we actually need Brawlbox v.68 and v.69, or will the latest version suffice for what is needed in this tutorial?


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: KingJigglypuff on May 13, 2014, 04:40:28 PM
Besides using the Clean Function in BB, how can I lower the file size of an Animation?

I know there's deleting things from the Graph Editor in Maya, but are there any other methods of reducing the file size of an Animation?

Simple question: Do we actually need Brawlbox v.68 and v.69, or will the latest version suffice for what is needed in this tutorial?
You can use the recent version.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Large Leader on May 13, 2014, 06:05:26 PM
Besides using the Clean Function in BB, how can I lower the file size of an Animation?

I know there's deleting things from the Graph Editor in Maya, but are there any other methods of reducing the file size of an Animation?

I'm also curious about this. EY mentioned in his tut that there was a way to reduce filesize/something even with bones that had movement, but he didn't include it because it wasn't necessarily relevant.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Gamma Ridley on May 22, 2014, 06:50:09 PM
Is there any way to have multiple animations in one scene? I'm looking at animation layers, but I can't tell if that's what I need.

I'm looking for a set up similar to how the typical MotionEtc is set up, where you can select different animations for playback and editing in one scene? Is that possible, or am I asking for too much?


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Large Leader on May 22, 2014, 07:09:26 PM
Maybe this will help?

http://forum.unity3d.com/threads/167985-MAYA-2013-Animation-Question-Multiple-poses-animations-in-single-fbx-export (http://forum.unity3d.com/threads/167985-MAYA-2013-Animation-Question-Multiple-poses-animations-in-single-fbx-export)

Not really sure, though. Haven't tried it myself.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Gamma Ridley on May 22, 2014, 07:13:20 PM
Yeah, I found something similar, the Trax editor, specifically. Though I haven't figured out yet if it exports just clips of the animation or the actual .anim, and how.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: TheShyGuy on May 22, 2014, 09:24:18 PM
Does BB support importing multiple animations from a single .anim file?  If not then, someone's gotta write one. 



Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Eternal Yoshi on June 20, 2014, 04:50:45 PM
I do not think it does. It's 1 animation in there or errors IIRC.

Gee, I wonder if we can use this for wings and tails....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ghuD5Po6BS4


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: TheShyGuy on June 20, 2014, 05:29:17 PM
I don't see why not.  There's nothing special about the HumanIK that makes it work.  As long as you don't change the base bones, I don't see why anykind of rig wouldn't work.  In the end, the base bones need to be animated. How you do that doesn't matter (IK rigs, scripts, w/e).


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: Eternal Yoshi on June 20, 2014, 08:34:50 PM
Well I got this working with Charizard's tail, but sadly not the wings. When I try to do anything involving IK with the wings, they become..... dislocated and trying to go to the bind pose doesn't do any good when it comes to animating time.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: pikazz on June 27, 2014, 02:45:59 AM
okay, I finally got my time to get Maya. but I encounter some problems

I tried the human IK with jigglypuff, but I get sometimes "Yellow" colored bones and the "ready for IK" is yellow, saying the hip bone is not facing the right way. putting it on control rig on source will make it disappear!

also, when I get a common problem with a custom model. the model will be thrice as big as the skeleton! but it still rigged to it! when I move the arms, it will move the thrice big model there the skeleton is on! making it a bizarr model animations!


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: King Draco on January 27, 2015, 11:32:41 AM
Both FBX Converter and Maya only like paths with simple ASCII letters, so if a folder has any "é" or any other "strange" letter, both programs will give you problems. You won't be able to import/export/load/etc anything in Maya and FBX won't convert any file.

While for FBX the solution is pretty simple (just move the file you wanted to convert to something like "C:\fileforfbx"), for Maya is a bit more complex.

Maya will create a "maya" folder in your Documents folder that will be used for the program to save config and more. If your user folder has one or more "strange" letters, like I previously said, you won't be able to import, export, etc anything. The thing is, you can't change the name of said folder. Even if you change your user account name, that folder will keep the same name.

In order to solve this you need to change the folder used by Maya:
- First create the folder that will be used by Maya. For example, "C:\maya", and copy the path (remember not to use "strange" letters).
- Right click on "My Computer" and click on properties. That would bring up the System Properties window.
- Then go to Advanced Config and click on Environment Variables.
- Create a new user variable and use as name "MAYA_APP_DIR" and paste the path of your folder in "value".

Now open Maya and try to import the file you were trying to import previously. Voilà!



Since this is a minor thing I don't think it deserves to get a thread, but it was big enough to drive me crazy for some hours, so I felt like sharing this. It could be added to the OP.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: EnKaYea on September 14, 2015, 10:51:24 AM
Hi. I'm having issues exporting the animation into to brawlbox, I've baked it and used graph editor and now when trying to export it as an .anim file Maya tells me it is unable to export it as an .anim file and saves it a blank file. Trying it again it tells me that there is nothing selected. Is there something that I am missing, looking through your tutorial it says nothing about selecting a part of the animation then exporting so is there a reason I am having this problem.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: R̢i҉̴̛͜d̷̕҉̴l̨̧͠͡e͘͜͠y̴̶͡͠͞ on September 21, 2015, 04:13:31 PM
So, i tried using this method. Got through most of it and finished the animation, so, i decided to export it and...turns out animExport or anything like that is not an option. Doesn't matters if i try to save or export. It just doesn't appears. What the hell? Im using 2013 32-bit/86x version. I installed nothing else.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: KingJigglypuff on September 21, 2015, 05:02:19 PM
It says in the OP to use at least Maya 2014.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: R̢i҉̴̛͜d̷̕҉̴l̨̧͠͡e͘͜͠y̴̶͡͠͞ on September 21, 2015, 08:23:47 PM
It says in the OP to use at least Maya 2014.
Well, then im screwed. Surprised that you can't export animations in program like this until 2014 though.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: ABloodyCanadian on December 31, 2015, 02:04:27 PM
I'm getting back into Moveset Mods, and I'm trying to get my Baked Animations working into BrawlBox... Sadly, the images in the tutorial went broken... Any possibilities of getting this fixed?


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: KingJigglypuff on December 31, 2015, 02:36:52 PM
There's only two broken images on my end. All the other images show up just fine.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: windhunter7 on June 10, 2017, 08:16:45 PM
I'm stuck on something; I'm attempting to convert a test animation that I made in Blender to Brawlbox using Maya for the conversion, by importing a .dae exported from Blender, importing that into Maya, following in detail all the steps from Baking to the exporting and importing into BrawlBox, and everything looks like the pictures in the tutorial, with the red lines and everything meaning that the stuff is baked, but when I import the .anim file into BrawlBox, if I expand the CHR0, it only shows TopN, which means the other bone edits for the animation aren't exporting. What am I doing wrong? I'm using Maya 2015 Student Version. And yes, I used the same export settings as in the picture, as well. If you need me to, I can email you the Maya file.


Title: Re: Animating in Maya with Control Rigs, Baking, and Exporting into Brawlbox
Post by: windhunter7 on June 13, 2017, 03:59:32 PM
Nvm, got it solved! :)