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Head Issues


Domarius

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I don't think it's nailed down yet, I'd say whatever arrangement caused the following image (in springheel's post)

http://forums.thedarkmod.com/index.php?s=&am...st&p=179369

would be the one to go with, since it seems just 90 degrees off, which is what you showed in your screenshot.

 

How many heads are there? When I changed the rig, for some reason, exporting the weight maps and re-importing them didn't seem to work this time, although it did last time. If we decide there are too many heads to change then we need some way of modifying the skeleton without having to manually weight the mesh verts back on again.

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I've been updating heads for a while now to use the builder guard head skeleton (and adding a shadowmesh and fixing bad weights as I go). I haven't done the proguard's head, so I'm not sure what state it is in. There are about eight that I've already done.

 

If all we did was keep the builder guard head skeleton, but rotate it, that would not be a big deal...I could easily rotate the head meshes to match. We've been having some problems with the head animations, however (specifically the death animation) so maybe the skeleton needs some adjusting as well, I don't know. As long as the joint names don't change it shouldn't cause me any problems.

 

But first of all on which joint does the head get attached to on the rig? is it the Head joint? and loneckcontrol or Head joint on the separate head model?

 

It's the head joint on the main skeleton. I'm not 100% sure which joint it is on the head.

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i don't know how you exactly do the switching between heads. I've followed this tutorial which worked for the proguard skeleton for certain heads(including the builder guard)

http://wiki.thedarkmod.com/index.php/...ds_on_AI_Models

 

how can i recreate and test the problem your seeing?

 

Domarius did you also add the new joints to the def file?

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i don't know how you exactly do the switching between heads.

 

This is the page you want: http://wiki.thedarkmod.com/index.php/...vailable_for_AI

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I've been updating heads for a while now to use the builder guard head skeleton (and adding a shadowmesh and fixing bad weights as I go). I haven't done the proguard's head, so I'm not sure what state it is in. There are about eight that I've already done.
I thought I used the same head skeleton for all AI?

 

If all we did was keep the builder guard head skeleton, but rotate it, that would not be a big deal...I could easily rotate the head meshes to match. We've been having some problems with the head animations, however (specifically the death animation) so maybe the skeleton needs some adjusting as well, I don't know. As long as the joint names don't change it shouldn't cause me any problems.
Part of the problem with the head anims are that oDD's meshes were not designed to take advantage of facial animations. The mouths are sealed, the eye is built into the mesh (if we want blinking AI, this'll be a problem), etc. I did my best to modify them so they could take advantage of facial animations.

 

It's the head joint on the main skeleton. I'm not 100% sure which joint it is on the head.
Here's what I gathered from D3:

 

"def_head"						"head_campbell"
"head_joint"					"Shoulders"
...
"copy_joint neckcontrol"		"neckcontrol"
"copy_joint headcontrol"		"headcontrol"
"copy_joint_world eyecontrol"		 "eyecontrol"

I looked at campbell and the attachment is the equivalent of Spine2 on our new rig. But I think any attachment would work and the neckcontrol & headcontrol joints would already talk to each other. This is essentially treating the head rig and body rig as the same entity.

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I thought I used the same head skeleton for all AI?

 

That's probably true. They all had their own individual md5anim files though. The ones I've adjusted (and the new ones I've made) all use the builder guard md5anim files.

 

Part of the problem with the head anims are that oDD's meshes were not designed to take advantage of facial animations.

 

Yes, that's true. Though we don't have any real plans for complex facial animations for the forseeable future. We really just need the talk animation, blinking, and closed eyes. I've had to add some extra polys to the eyes for the latter. Oh yeah, none of the heads had an inside to the mouth either, so you could see right through them when they talk. That was a pain to deal with.

 

Here's what I gathered from D3:

 

It's the "head_joint" "Shoulders" line that determines what joint the head gets attached to. I presume that it's the origin of the head mesh itself that is the attachment point, but I don't know for sure.

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I also found that if the anim decls have similar names then the head anims will complement the body anims. So if the AI goes into the pain anim, then that'll trigger a similar anim in the head.

 

Should we break up this thread into different parts? I'm with squill on this since this no longer deals with the citywatch rig.

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I also found that if the anim decls have similar names then the head anims will complement the body anims. So if the AI goes into the pain anim, then that'll trigger a similar anim in the head.

 

Ah, that's good to know.

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Well, I made some progress. The rotations on the head joint match the new body rig. But:

post-476-1240033603_thumb.jpg

The head is translated forward.

 

In Maya you have to pay attention to the joint orientations. So here are the orientations for the body rig's Neck:

post-476-1240033615_thumb.jpg

 

Here are the orientations for the neckcontrol in the head:

post-476-1240033626_thumb.jpg

 

I matched the same rotations for the Head/headcontrol joints too.

 

Here's part of the def file:

"copy_joint Neck"		"neckcontrol"
"copy_joint Head"		"headcontrol"

 

& I modified the head rig even further.The new head has 23 joints while the old head has 42 joints. I wondered if less joints could be as expressive so I made a few poses:

 

post-476-1240034080_thumb.jpg

post-476-1240034117_thumb.jpg

post-476-1240034150_thumb.jpg

 

It can be as expressive as a fuller skeleton. Just gotta be creative with translations as well as rotations, not to mention scaling the joint.

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Problem solved:

post-476-1240105689_thumb.jpg

post-476-1240105706_thumb.jpg

I made a special idle animation to test it . . .

 

The problem was the joint orientation (lower half of those maya dialogs). I matched the Neck/neckconnect and Head/headconnect joint orientation. I later had to match the origin orientation or the translation/rotation would be off.

 

A new head rig (from scratch might I add) with 25 joints. Nice and clearly labled & I added joints for the side of the nose and cheeks.

post-476-1240105742_thumb.jpg

post-476-1240105772_thumb.jpg

 

EDIT: It now connects to the Spine2 joints like D3's:

"head_joint"			"Spine2"
"offsetHeadModel"			"0 0 -3"		// defaultvalue if set
"copy_joint Neck"		"neckcontrol"
"copy_joint Head"		"headcontrol"

 

EDIT2: Now on svn (model_src/ai_parts_mb/head_rig_new.mb)

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That's a positive development.

 

A new head rig (from scratch might I add) with 25 joints. Nice and clearly labled & I added joints for the side of the nose and cheeks.

 

Yay, more re-rigging fun! :P

 

EDIT: It now connects to the Spine2 joints like D3's:

 

What's the benefit of using the Spine2 joint, out of curiosity?

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Yay, more re-rigging fun! :P
At least there are less joints to work with :D We would've had to rerig anyway.

 

What's the benefit of using the Spine2 joint, out of curiosity?
If the neck or head was used for attachment purposes then we should leave them out of the copy_joint decl. That might have been part of the problem.

 

Oh, this new head rig is for the new proguard rig. I'm just making that clear in case it wasn't implied or even mentioned by me . . .

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Oh, this new head rig is for the new proguard rig. I'm just making that clear in case it wasn't implied or even mentioned by me . . .

 

So heads will not be swappable between characters using the old and new skeletons?

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So heads will not be swappable between characters using the old and new skeletons?

 

that was what i was thinking. It's cool to have less joints and get the same results but i was afraid it's going to add some more tweaks to get this to work with every character that is using the new skeleton.

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I didn't follow everything about joint orientations, but from what I'm gathering, the fix to make the head_control variables work requires that the new head mesh is saved at a different rotation than the old head meshes. If that's correct (and I may have it wrong), then bodies set up to use the new heads won't be able to use the old heads, and vice versa. That's not a major issue, as ultimately we don't want to use the old skeleton anymore anyway, but it could cause a few minor headaches in the meantime.

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So heads will not be swappable between characters using the old and new skeletons?
That can be but without the copy_joint decls & using the Spine2 attachment point.

 

 

that was what i was thinking. It's cool to have less joints and get the same results but i was afraid it's going to add some more tweaks to get this to work with every character that is using the new skeleton.

 

 

I didn't follow everything about joint orientations, but from what I'm gathering, the fix to make the head_control variables work requires that the new head mesh is saved at a different rotation than the old head meshes. If that's correct (and I may have it wrong), then bodies set up to use the new heads won't be able to use the old heads, and vice versa. That's not a major issue, as ultimately we don't want to use the old skeleton anymore anyway, but it could cause a few minor headaches in the meantime.
The mesh is not touched, only the head rig & here's a screen of swapping new head rig with old:

post-476-1240160460_thumb.jpg

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Ah, so the orientation of the heads is the same? That's the best of both worlds then.

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Ah, so the orientation of the heads is the same? That's the best of both worlds then.
Yes & No <_< It's how Maya handles angles & orientations. When you look at a joint in Maya, the attribute editor shows Transform Attributes in the upper area of the editor & I assume that info for animation. Below that is the Joint area with "Joint Orient" values & I assume that's for the default rotations. Those are the values I had to match in order to get the copy_joint thing to work.

 

I posted pics of the attribute editor here:

http://forums.thedarkmod.com/index.php?s=&am...st&p=182433

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joint orientations can also be seen as 2 separate things. One is the orientation values of the joint and two the local orientation axis, which is the way orientation axis are setup when you create a joint (Joint Orient options).

 

so it's not only values of the rotation axis that need to match but also the way the orientation axis are setup which i pointed out earlier. If i'm correct Ascottk has setup the orientation of the new head rig joints the same as the latest body rig joints.

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