Need Slower Blackjack Animation

[Ishtvan]

In order to test physical collision in more detal over the blackjack's arc, we need a blackjack animation that takes place over more frames, i.e., is slowed down in the animation (we can speed it back up when it's played). The game can only run at 60 fps, and the animation is playing at 24 fps, meaning we could just slow down the current animation by 2x and then speed it up ingame by 2x so that it plays at 48 fps.

 

Alternatively, we could adjust just the speed of the swing down to make it slightly slower. I'm not sure if making it 2x slower is too much though. If so, we could make it maybe 1.5x slower relative to the rest of the animation, then slow down the whole animation the rest of the way to make the swing 2x slower overall.

 

See this thread for more detail:

 

http://forums.thedarkmod.com/index.php?showtopic=9175

[Springheel]

Any takers here? The animation doesn't need any adjustment, as I understand it, just adding more frames so that it plays slower. This would go a long way towards solving our blackjack-hitting-ceiling problem.

[Noisycricket]

I'll make it 2x slower and i assume you'll be able to then fine tune it to your needs.

 

Is there a Maya file for this animation? I only see sword combat animations.

[Noisycricket]

I can't seem to find the animation, anyone know which it is?

 

EDIT: found it, i'll have it uploaded in about 5 minutes.

 

Hmm, i'm counting 8 frames in the current version, not 4 (im assuming its swing.md5anim). I extended it to 16 frames, but im having a problem exporting it. It complained about not finding a mesh. I could never get anything but skeletons into Maya8.5 so i didn't bother even trying with 2010. But i tried and its actually going farther than 8.5 did with other files. But now another hurtle to overcome. When trying to import the animation, using the "skeleton and mesh" option, the "building baseframe" window goes to 100% and asks for mesh file. I tried opening blackjack.md5mesh and Maya hangs (like 8.5 used to).

 

If someone with maya can try importing it, converting it to a .mb file, then upload that, I can use that. I'll keep trying for a bit on this end, but i think someone is going to have to do that conversion, if im going to do it.

 

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I'll also explain how to extend the animation for those that can import it, its very very easy. Once the objects are in Maya:

 

-Extend the visible range of the timeslider to 20. Which you can do my entering a value of 20 into the first box to the right and under the scale.

 

-select all of the scene elements by right click in the window and selecting "select all".

 

-select all of the keys in the timeslider by shift+drag selecting along the timeslider window. Leave part of the timeslider near the end un-selected.

 

-extend the selected keys by dragging the arrow at the end of the [red] selected region. Move it so that the last key is now near 16. While it is still selected, right click in the selection and choose snap.

 

-Change the timeslider window back so it again shows only 16 frames.

 

-save the file and its ready for export.

[Springheel]

Hmm, I've got Oddity's original mb files, but I'm not sure if they are the most recent or not. I can't seem to find any in the models_src file.

 

I'll upload Odd's to the FTP so you can check them out: blacjackMBs.rar

[Noisycricket]

ok

[Springheel]

This one:

 

http://forums.thedarkmod.com/topic/8990-new-ftp/

[Noisycricket]

I guess im not set up yet. I couldn't get in using your name or greebo's either nor with puting a 0 at the end of the name as seemingly indicated by the directions.

[Noisycricket]

Can you extend the animation on your end following the directions i gave? (assuming that is the correct arm skeleton and mesh.) Or Greebo or Squill?

[Springheel]

I guess im not set up yet. I couldn't get in using your name or greebo's either nor with puting a 0 at the end of the name as seemingly indicated by the direction

 

Huh? It's not an individual login. You just type exactly what's there:

 

Username: "darkmod"

Password: "-TeamMember0-"

[Noisycricket]

Oh... Ok, i'll be uploading this shortly.

[Noisycricket]

What an f'ing pita. Ok, its uploaded.

 

 

Do we need both the blackjack AND the blackjack_view folders btw?

[Springheel]

No idea, sorry.

[New Horizon]

Should only need the 'view' folders since I believe the 'blackjack' folder is just the blackjack alone.

[Ishtvan]

Okay, great, I will take a look when I get some time. The 4 frames was referring to just the actual swing down itself (I think it's really only 3 frames over which we want it to hit things). But slowing down the whole animation and then later speeding it up in the code is indeed what I wanted, since we seemed to feel good about the relative time spent raising/swinging and don't want to change that. Now over the swing itself we should have 6 or 8 frames, which is a lot easier to work with and fine tune than jumping through it in 3-4 frames.

 

Hopefully this will be good, but there's a chance we may also need re-animating to make it more ceiling-friendly. I'll let you know.

[New Horizon]

Fingers crossed.

[Ishtvan]

Hmm, it looks like we should have used the "blackjack" folder instead of "blackjack_view", because the existing animation it's using is in the "blackjack" folder.

 

I'm not sure how it ended up this way, I guess Domarius originally set it up? Usually one is the 3rd person animation and one is the 1st person. I thought view was 1st person, but the blackjack def has always been using animations in the blackjack directory, not blackjack_view.

 

I'll try moving the 16 frame version to the other direction, but my guess is if it was created from blackjack_view/swing instead of blackjack/swing, it may not work and we will need a doubled-frames version of blackjack/swing.

[Ishtvan]

Wait, the md5 animations are all the same between blackjack and blackjack_view. So the good news is the modified swing should work. The bad news is we should probably get rid of one of these if we're not going to have 3rd person blackjack animations (for mirrors, etc), and the def file should probably be changed to point at blackjack_view instead of blackjack... Anyway, good enough to test for now.

[Tels]

Wait, the md5 animations are all the same between blackjack and blackjack_view. So the good news is the modified swing should work. The bad news is we should probably get rid of one of these if we're not going to have 3rd person blackjack animations (for mirrors, etc), and the def file should probably be changed to point at blackjack_view instead of blackjack... Anyway, good enough to test for now.

 

I wouldn't remove the thirdperson version, it can be useful for cutscenes. And it is easier repaired then recreated from scratch in a few months when someone actually needs it.

[Ishtvan]

I wouldn't remove the thirdperson version, it can be useful for cutscenes. And it is easier repaired then recreated from scratch in a few months when someone actually needs it.

But as far as I know, those anims aren't actually being used for 3rd person right now. I don't think anything happens when you swing a blackjack in front of a mirror. The animation files in the 3rd person directory are just copies of those in the 1st person directory, pretty sure they're supposed to be different, since the coordinates of the zero point are different, right?

[Tels]

But as far as I know, those anims aren't actually being used for 3rd person right now. I don't think anything happens when you swing a blackjack in front of a mirror. The animation files in the 3rd person directory are just copies of those in the 1st person directory, pretty sure they're supposed to be different, since the coordinates of the zero point are different, right?

 

Hm, I know nearly nothing about animations, sorry. Maybe looking at the bow anims could shed some light on it?