Graphmate

jaebea

I love this plugin and have moved away from animating with aniblocks and prefer using the timeline with graphmate.  However, I really wish there was more written up about how to go a little deeper into it's features.  For example, there are 3 boxes at the bottom left with values, Tension, Continuity and Bias.  Does anyone know what these are for?  I do want to add that I haven't given up on Animate altogether.  I save out what I do in the timeline to aniblocks.  Very handy!

mikael-aronsson

Here is a good explanation of what it does with images:

http://docs.toonboom.com/help/animate/Content/HAR/Stage/016_Animation_Paths/039_H3_Adjusting_the_Tension_Bias_and_Continuity_.html

 

jaebea

Interesting read, thank you!  Now, how do I do it?  I tried selecting areas of my curves and adding a value but there was no change.

Also, if there a way I can look at more than one curve?  It would be helpful to see all three transforms or rotations in the graph.

 

mikael-aronsson

You need to set it to TCB type, this video explains most of it:

jaebea

I had watched that video when it first came out but didn't understand what he was talking about.  Now that I have been using Graphmate for a while, I totally understand!  And see, I didn't remember that by selecting the transforms in Keymate, they would all show up in Graphmate!!  Thank you for the reminder about this tutorial!

Tobor

Hopefully, not off-topic...

Is there a way to use GraphMate to allow for single-frame keyframes that do NOT interpolate? I got KeyMate and AniMate thinking they'd help, but I still can't use the timeline to store keyframes that don't disturb previous keyframes. I can get it to work within the current session, but once I save the file and close D|S, when I return only the last frame is correct, and all the others have become horribly interpolated based on the movement of the last frame.

I realize this isn't the intention of the animation timeline, but I'm trying to figure out a reliable way to set up render individual poses that I can then render unattended in a sequence. Since scenes can be very large files, I'd rather not go the individual file route for each frame. That's not as straightforward for unattended rendering, either.

mikael-aronsson

Not sure what you mean here, do you mean changing the key frame type to "constant" (usually called stepped in other software) ?

 

Tobor

The Constant setting, which KeyMate also supports, doesn't seem to do any good. I'm not sure what happens or why, but the inconstancy of the frames -- and the application of interpolation -- seems to occur after closing out D|S and reopening the scene. Things are fine if you don't do that, but obviously, being able to reopen a saved scene is part of the process.

KeyMate doesn't show the actual interpolation curves so I'm not sure what's being saved, but I've wondered if some of the settings weren't "sticking." Some of the frames use canned poses where the creator of that pose improperly applied a hip translation, sometimes by huge amounts (I prefer them not to use hip rotation, either, but you can't have everything). Poses with hip offsets tend to make the problem worse.

It's also possible I'm setting the keyframe and Constant interpolation wrong. I've tried it multiple ways, both before and after making an actual change to the new frame. Results are the same either way.

marble

Tobor said:

 

Some of the frames use canned poses where the creator of that pose improperly applied a hip translation, sometimes by huge amounts (I prefer them not to use hip rotation, either, but you can't have everything). Poses with hip offsets tend to make the problem worse.

 

Not to derail the thread but I just have to agree with this. I occasionally get to the point where the whole figure spins 360 deg. about the hip and I have to abandon the animation and start over.

chapterhawk_276dcefd2e

marble said:

 

Some of the frames use canned poses where the creator of that pose improperly applied a hip translation, sometimes by huge amounts (I prefer them not to use hip rotation, either, but you can't have everything). Poses with hip offsets tend to make the problem worse.

 

Not to derail the thread but I just have to agree with this. I occasionally get to the point where the whole figure spins 360 deg. about the hip and I have to abandon the animation and start over.

So, I know it is unlikely the original poster will see this. However, if it can help someone else then it's worth it. I had the exact same problem with the figure spinning 180 degrees in the opposite direction in animations and having to start over. Good news. You don't ever have to do that. Here's the secret. Highlight the keyframe before it goes bad and highlight all the messed up keyframes after it. It is important that the first keyframe is a non--broken keyframe (i.e. the figure or limb or whatever is where it is supposed to be). Now that you have them highlighted, note the little wave button just to the left of TCB: at the bottom. When you hover over it, it will highlight and say "Interpolation Type". Change it to linear. Your animation is no longer screwed up. Kapow!! Just like that. Once it is fixed, you can go back and reselect TCB interpolation by clicking on the same button again. This is a known bug that still hasn't been fixed in 4.12, but this little magic fix makes it so you don't have to weep after doing hours of messing with the Timeline if you suddenly get the 180 degree spin bug.