Animation of character root node (Bip01)

#1 When you make a model using biped you don't assign the bip01 node to any meshes or vertex weights. It's not a bone that you should export. If you want to animate the player going to the ground you would animate the head, the torso, the arms, etc... but not the parent node bip01.

#2 Thanks for the reply. I have no meshes or vertices assigned to Bip01, only to the other bones.

Now to make the player go to the ground while leaving Bip01 in place wouldn't I have to move i.e. Bip01 Pelvis away from Bip01 - something that Character Studio won't let me do? Even if I manually unlink the pelvis from Bip01 I cannot move or rotate it without moving Bip01.

Do I have to disassemble the Biped IK structure or detach joints or something like that?

#3 Well the Bip01 will be moved... but it should matter... since the bip01 isnt used for animations... doesn't matter where you put the bip01 it should affect any vertices or animations.

#4 Well, thing is, that with a backflip or death sequence I *do want* the animation that Bip01 has in max to appear in the engine.

Bip01 is the node that in a backflip carries out the actual rotation of the whole body and that animation cannot be applied to any other Biped bone instead, since Character Studio won't let you rotate or move the Pelvis against Bip01.

So now because the engine ignores Bip01 animation, in the backflip sequence the character just moves arms and legs but stays upright all the while.

I'll see if I can find a workaround for this.

#5 I stumbled upon this post while wondering about the same issue: how do you export animations where the bip01 node is animated, yet the cfg file says not to export bip01?

Answer (AFAIK): it doesn't matter. The animations applied to bip01 get exported anyway. Like a character that bobs up and down (through animation of bip01) does so in the -show window, even with bip01 in the 'NeverExport' list. Not sure *how* that works, but it does apparently.

I welcome corrections from people who know better...

-Spencer

#6 Has anybody arrived to some conclusion about Bip01 node?
I'm having troubles with this node, in my root animation character's feet are sliding side to side (this is in first person mode,not happening in 3rd person mode).

maybe you want to take a look to my post for details on this
problem

http://www.garagegames.com/mg/forums/result.thread.php?qt=17084

thanks

#7 I think that the bip01 animations is passed directly down hierarchy, it means that when you animate your bip01 (and it's in ignore list) you are in fact animating the pelvis and legs together.

About the bobbing problem, be sure that you aren't moving the bounds or together with the bip01, set it to only inherit the animation at the Y axis (in case of a walk forward or backward).

Im not sure you you must do it with the eye and cam node also.

#8 I agree with Marcelo...I've been playing with the Biped exporting to various 3rd parties ve come to a precursor conclusion, that the Bip data is passed onto the Pelvis...I've gotten exported Biped's that arrive with and without a Pelvis...?? Depending on what type of animation is applied to the Biped. If I unlink the Biped export from the Pelvis Node, the structure does a X rotation and Z elevation...meaning to me that the Biped0 Node is used for the objects transform coordinate reference postion?? that sounded a bit weird...but I love to tinker and observe...:)

#9 Hi, well, the problem is with "player_ root.dsq" animation,
The thing is that actually I've unlinked the Bbox(bounds)and any possible nodes (Unlink, cam..) from Bip01 so these helpers should'nt be affected by Bip01 animation and also I've unchecked all the options(move,rotate,etc) in the link info rollout too.
any ideas?

if anybody is interested this is another post where I explain the problem

http://www.garagegames.com/mg/forums/result.thread.php?qt=16970

#10 I'm having this same problem. Guess I'll keep reading, doesn't look like any concrete solutions here. :(

#11 Don't give up hope! There is NOTHING WRONG with the EXPORTER and your animation is NOT BEING LOST.

The reason why you think there is no z movement is because THE CAMERA YOU'RE SEEING THE CHARACTER THROUGH MOVES UP AND DOWN WITH BIPED01! All you need to do is make sure the CAM node DOES NOT INHERIT ANYTHING from its parent and EVERYTHING WILL BE OKAY!

Open the file you exported the forward animation from. Select "cam". Make sure it's parented under Bip01->unlink. The third person camera will not behave correctly unless it's parented under a dummy named "unlink". The "cam" node should have been put under an "unlink" node already but, if not, put the cam under Bip01->unlink and make sure the .dts file you exported was exported with the same setup.

Once it's clear that the "cam" node is under an "unlink" node, click the "hierarchy" panel tab while "cam" is selected. That's the third panel tab from the left, right next to the "modify" panel tab.

Once the hierarchy panel is open, click on the "Link Info" button. That's the one on the right. You should see a bunch of checked boxes under the "inherit" rollout below. There are "move", "rotate", and "scale" catagories and each of them have x, y, & z check boxes for a total of nine.

UNCHECK ALL CHECK BOXES and export your .dsq file.

Now open your other animation files and do the same. You may want to open the file you exported your .dts from and save it with the check boxes turned off as well. You don't need to re-export the .dts but it will save you from constantly having to turn off the inherits every time you start a new animation clip from the base pose.

That should fix the "no z translate" problem during third person mode. You'll however notice that the head bob still exists if you switch to first person view. If you want the first person view to be "solid", move the "eye" node under Bip01->unlink and turn off all its inherits then re-export everything.

That should make your first person view "solid" as well but you may not want to do this if you've got multiple positions like crouch and prone set up in your game. I guess if you had to you could rig it so the "eye" is moved down to the proper height through code as well.

#12 MAX doesn't want to let me move the BIP01/Pelvis node up and down - eg for "flipping" the chr over or in my case, to move the entire model up and down during a walk or run sequence - anybody know how to allow this?

#13 This might sound stupid but try creating a biped, start a new file(go under file->new). Once the new file starts up create a new biped and try animating it. I'm not sure why but that seems to work at my end.

phong.

#14 Update: I've noticed that if you lay down a key for BIP01, THEN you can move it.. but it also will create track keys if you move it.. but it wouldn't move before.. so I'm more than a little confused.

Also, my animations are getting messed up because the BIP01 node doesn't ALWAYS seem to lay down tracks when its moved, or copied, nor do they always show up. Examples:
- I have lain down at least 50 explicit keyframes for BIP01 but sometimes when I click on BIP01 I see: .. 3. Other times I can see the 50.
- When I select BIP01 and copy from a "neutral" frame to another, it doesn't copy rotation, only position. Why?
- When I select BIP01+children and copy all to another keyframe, it doesn't always copy the bip, so can SERIOUSLY mess up an animation if the BIP01 has been rotated in any way.

#15 I take it you must be new to character studio. It's very powerful but it has many "flaws", biggest one being that it expects you to play by it's rules. The price one pays for not spending weeks setting up a character I guess.

Anyway, I tried putting down keys too but that didn't always work for me. Creating a biped(I'm thinking it forces certain things to be loaded in to memory) and starting a new file seems to do the trick for me every time. Sometimes I may even get a situation where I load a file with biped already in it and I can't move it. Again, I create a biped, reload the file and it works, for me.

-Also, my animations are getting messed up because the BIP01 node -doesn't ALWAYS seem to lay down tracks when its moved, or copied, -nor do they always show up.

This is because the BIP node is a special node that has it's own way of keeping track of key frames. The "up and down" component and the "side to side/forward and back" component, as well as the rotation component of a BIP are separate tracks that exist independent of each other. You may have 50 keyframes in the "up and down" component and 3 in the "side to side" component. Depending on which mode you're in max will show different numbers of keyframes on the timeline. You have to keep track of which mode you're in and which component you're keying. Simply moving the bidep with autokey on won't do. As a matter of fact I tend not to use autokey when using biped to animate. Always use the buttons under "key info" in the biped's "motion panel" controls to key the animation. That way you'll save yourself a lot of confusion.

- When I select BIP01 and copy from a "neutral" frame to another, it -doesn't copy rotation, only position. Why?
The same problem as above. You can think of it this way. Translation along z(I use z up.) is a track. Translation along x and y is another track. AND rotation is yet another track. I take it you must be copying tracks and pasting it. Well, you can't copy the tranlation and the rotation in one shot if you're copying and pasting tracks because they are not on the same track. Make sure you have the right track you want to copy under "track selection" before pasting it. Better yet, don't copy/paste tracks, copy/paste postures and poses.

- When I select BIP01+children and copy all to another keyframe, it -doesn't always copy the bip, so can SERIOUSLY mess up an
- animation if the BIP01 has been rotated in any way.
Again, you have to play by character studio's rules. Don't copy tracks. Copy poses and postures. This will make sure that all the pertinent information that make up the "pose" that is invisible to you will also be copied and pasted properly.

I should warn you there will be times when you literally won't be able to get what you want because you've animated yourself in to a corner and character studio just will not do what you think it should do without you tearing apart half the work you just did and mangle the animation you've worked so hard on.

This of course is the biggest pain in the world but hang in there. Don't fuss about how you think character studio should work. Be patient and try to figure out how character studio does things. You'll soon figure out how you can get what you want.

#16 No, not new - I've used it many times before, but always had these "bizarre" problems. Frustration, but not unworkable. Weeks? Heh I can set down the bones for a chr in an hour :) (no fancy stuff course)

So you mean start a new file, with a biped, and then bring IN all the game objects on top of that? I'll give it a go.

-The same problem as above. You can think of it this way. Translation along z(I use z up.) is a track. Translation along x and y is another track. AND rotation is yet another track. I take it you must be copying tracks and pasting it.
I'm saying (on the main animation line) copy from frame 50 to frame 100 (with the bip01 selected)

I'll try all these, thanks very much for the detailed reply.

#17 Hi, i'm new member here..i had encounter the exported problem. i had success export my model with .dts and .dsq. Then i put the .dts and .dsq inside the Show Tool. At there, i can see the animation of the model, but after i put inside the Torque Game Engine, the model does not have any animation. i'm using 3d studio max 6. is it when i export the model, i had skip a step already??

#18 @Samloh
Did you associate the dsq animation to its animation name (root, standjump, etc) for the model in its script file (i.e player.cs)?

#19 Yes...the dsq model i have name it as root. so,any idea?thanks for helo, Todd...

#20 Did anyone solve this problem? In 3ds max you have to set animation on bip01. When you put the model into the game the animation on bip01 doesn't play. Is there any way to set another bone or biped bone to move the whole character up and down?