Exporting animation layers?

[mitchbraggart]

Hi everybody!

Currently i am trying to export a wakl cycle on a animation layer to transfer it on to the same rig just in a different scene.
This means: I have one animation layer with my finished walkcycle on it.
Every time i try to export and import this animation layer i end up with all the animations of the walk cycle, but without the animations of the custom attributes like "heel raise" or "toe raise".

It seems that tha export function of the animation layers won't include my custom attributes.

Is there any way arround that problem? How can i iniclude the animations of my custom attributes in the exported animation layer.

If you need more information on what i am trying to achieve here please say so. I would be happy to explain myself a little more!

Greetings Braggart

[mitchbraggart]

I have to say its pretty dissapointing if nobody has a solution to this problem!

So here my workaround!

I used zooXferAnim to safe the animation into a file which i then can import in a different file and then copy my keys on a seperate animation layer.

First of all i needed to delet my character set because zooxferAnim does not work with subcharacter sets.

After creating a new character set without subsets you can use that set to export the animation keys in a kind of xml file.

This file can then be imported in a different scene but only on the same rig with exactly the same controls and character set.

Also i needed to use an older version of zooxferAnim because the newest version didn't have an export function. (maybe it has but i couldn't find it!)

If someone has a better solution i would be happy to read about it.

Greetings Braggart

PS.: If you have any questions feel free to ask me.

[joojaa]

Thats because we dont use the animation layers fuctionality, its just sortof trax in disguise. It doent include stuff thast not part of the keyed set.

So in way iots trax with more nodes, easier gui. Some problems that Trax doesnt have some it does.

[mitchbraggart]

I never used Trax. i immediately started with animation layers.

Why don't you use animation layers? You said some problems trax doesn't have some new ones.

So what are the advantages of Trax compared to animation layers?

Is there a way to get the animation keys from a animation clip back in my timeslider.

That was the first Problem i had with Trax. Since i did not have this problem with animation Layers i used it instead.

Hence i never dealed with Trax.

Probably i will take a look at it soon!

[joojaa]

Why don't you use animation layers?

Because there are better ways of handling this. And offcourse everything you did now is trown out with the new workflow of maya 2011

Is there a way to get the animation keys from a animation clip back in my timeslider.

Yes offcourse, rmb on the clip and choose activate keys. Thing is this happens a lot good and better systems get discareded becase users are scared* to fidge atround for 2 seconds or horros read the manual.

Not particularry fond of either tough. Now if the sytems could merge keys a bit saner THEN they would be good.

*IN FACT this is the number one reason computer programs still to this day and age suck, example we are still using the event paradigm in GUI's because its easy to understand. Yeah well sure but its not more than 2% harder than the alternatives, but it basically makes all applications suck because everything becomes a single queue, and all our new shiny 8 core processors are now just 7 cores too much.

[seba-garcia]

Im having the same problem, and im limitated because the game developers create a model loader suit that cant suport animations made by clips... extrange but thats all i got... so  im loosing my time trying to export custome atributes in layers>??

[joojaa]

You can allways collapse clips to animation without clips. Just activate the keys and delete the clip. or for complex clip combinations bake and delete clips.

However whet esle it doent support is a queastion i cant answer. Oddsare a the exporter wont work with animation channels either since they would work tthe same way as the clips do. So if animation channels work and clips dont then it indeed a very weird situation.

[seba-garcia]

i saw in the Hypergraph that if i create a clip it brings a lot of information into the object that the game soft cant handel .. it weird like u said.. can u explain me how to do that collapse?? i feel that can be the answer... thanks for the really fast answer by the way