Skeleton animation

Animation

Bend the objects.

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Racer v0.8.6 is beginning to support skeleton animation. Still a bit in alpha. Here's a document on the various parts of animation. It is based on v0.8.6 of Racer.

Navigate in explorer to:
'C:\Documents and Settings\Username\Local Settings\Application Data\Autodesk\3dsmax\2009 - 32bit\enu\UI\usermacros'
copy the macroscript to this folder.

startup 3d studio max
go to 'customize'->'customize user interface' and select the 'toolbars' tab.
Create a new toolbar by clicking the 'New...' button, make up a name.
Now you will have a floating new toolbar that is gonna hold the new button.
In the 'Category' List select 'Skeleton Exporter' .
In the list below you will see a selectable with a similar name.
Drag that 'Action' in the new Toolbar.

Now you will have a 'Exp. Skeleton' button, you can ancker it by dragging it on the max main toolbar, or where needed.

How to export skeletons using the skeleton exporter:

Create your skinned mesh with 3d studio max, with animation if needed.
The mesh is like any other mesh that you model for use in racer only with skinning.
Select the model, go to 'File'->'Export Selected' and export the file in the 'ASE' format like you would when exporting any other racer model.

Now click the “Exp. Skeleton” button and give the skeleton file the same name as the ASE file. Save!

Now the skinned mesh should be ready for import in modeler.

Notes:
- 'Physique' is not supported, only the 'Skin' modifier is.
- You can also use the bipeds from character studio, combined with motion capturing!

Open the exported ASE file.
Click on the animation radio button.
Click on the “Load Skeleton” button and open your exported .DSkeleton file.
Press the “B” button if you want to see the bones.

You can play the exported animation by pressing space or the play button.
Use the arrow keys for ‘per frame’ forwarding or rewinding.
If you want to cut the animation into smaller pieces, click the add button and input range and name.

Export to dof when ready, The exported dof should have a accompanied “.anim” file.

First, let’s take a look at the new radio button ‘Animated objects’ by clicking it, or pressing F7.

Let’s briefly go over the tabs:
- Groups: Groups are a way to talk to movables in racer, it makes things more easy if you can send a command to a whole collection of movables, rather than sending commands to each single movable.
- Creation: Here, you can load dof’s and give them a position and rotation on your track. There is also a possibility to save presets for a particular dof.
- Physics: Create collision shapes for a mesh or the bones in that mesh.
- Joint: Add a joint to a physics body.
- Bone Anim.: Enable the bone animations.

The movables are stored in geometry.ini, and saved when you save whole the track.

A group is a collection of movables. When you want a selection of movables to do the same thing, you put them in the same group and address the group.

There is one group by default, you can add a group by clicking the add button.

Here, you can load dof’s and give them a position and rotation on your track.
Load a dof by clicking the “Load dof” button, browse to your track folder and select the desired dof to load.
Note that you can only load a dof when it’s in your track folder.

When you have placed a mesh on the track and added physics, joints, … you can save the settings of that particular dof by clocking the “save settings for active dof” button. This can be useful, for cones, for example.

By clicking the “View anim’s” button, you can see the names of any possible animations stored in the accompanied .’anim’ file.

By clicking the create button, you can create an instance of the dof on the track, on the position of your spline-point. When you have presets saved for the created dof, they will be loaded automatically.

You can edit the position and rotation with the sliders if needed.

Meshes with collision shapes are a great way to bring some more animo in Racer. Here, you can add a collision shape to a mesh and edit the collision body.

When the mesh has bones, you can click on the “Bonephysics” check button and edit the collision body’s per bone.

Click on the “Create col. Shape” button if you want to create the collision shape.
If you remove a collision shape, you also remove each joint linked to that physics body, so be carefull.

Shape: This spinner controls the shape of the physics body, primitives are more performance friendly.
Size: Control the size of the physics body.
Offset: You can offset the physics body from the mesh. Note that the center of gravity will still be in the center of the mesh.
Rot: Control the rotation relative to the mesh.
Inertia: Body inertia.
Weight: Weight in kg.
Freeze Initially: A frozen body can hang in midair, and will be unfrozen when a force acts upon the body.
Every physics body is frozen by default for performance reasons.

A joint is a way to connect two collision body’s. Think of a hose that has 5 bones, every bone has its own physics body, and those physics body are connected by a joint, with the pivot points in between the collision bodys.

if you want to add a joint to a collision body, select the desired parent from the list. You can also have the world as parent.

The pivot point can be controlled by the spinners.

by clicking the check button, you enable the animations that are linked to the bones in the mesh for use in racer.

The movables can be controlled by sending commands via console.

The commands must begin with ‘anicmd’.

available general commands:
- ‘reset’: reset’s all the movables to their initial state
Available bone animated commands:
- ‘play’ : play an animation
- ‘stop’ : stops an animation
- ‘sequence n’ : set a animation sequence, n is a number

An example:
I want to set sequence ‘5’ in group 1.
‘anicmd 1 sequence 5’
The first number stands for the group that should receive the command. Followed by the specific command that the group should execute.

The reset command does not need a group number, it’s optional.

These commands can be used in triggerlines or scripts.

Triggerlines are a way to trigger console commands when a car passes that trigger. You can create a trigger the same way you create a timeline. Make a spline, and click the “Declare triggerline” button in the “Positions” tab. Then enter the console command that the triggerline should use when triggered.

This alternative way of moving around in tracked’s 3D space is very useful when editing movables for example.

Press ‘O’ or click on the checkbox in the bottomleft corner. Now you can navigate around a virtual point in 3D space. Press the ‘E’ button to do a ‘zoom extents’ on a object.

You can zoom use the scrollwheel to zoom. Move around by using the default combinations of buttons used in default navigation mode. Hold the ctrl button for smaller movements.

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(last updated November 4, 2009 )