Motion Path With Keyframe Animation?

[segmoria]

Hi,
I was wondering what would be the best thing to do if you have an object that is attached on a motion path but you also want to add some keyframe animation on top of that.

My model is a fish-like object that is not only attached to the path but uses it as a splineIK curve so using an external locator to follow the path and parent my object on to it, isn't really an option
I would imagine that this could be worked out using the Trax Editor, yet I'm having problems with it and I dont see how you can succesfully use paths in there.
Any help on this?

Thanks!

[joojaa]

QUOTE(Segmoria @ 08/26/05, 02:35 AM)
My model is a fish-like object that is not only attached to the path but uses it as a splineIK curve so using an external locator to follow the path and parent my object on to it, isn't really an option

Does not compute... if you refeer to this making double transforms then your wrong. It can be set up so it does not have double transforms. Its by far the cleanest solution. BUt yeah ist possibble to do this in other ways too.

Just explain in a bit more detail why one extra transform is off limits (again if its just taht thsi blows the rig in pieces than you need to be a bit smarter about WHAT in particular need to be parentted) and yes ive done this effect before on snakes fish and so on.

On fish in particular the one extra tarnsform works like a charm.

on the otherhand if you use spline ik on the path too then dont, its not a smart thing to do. What you do is use curve flow to deform the fish along the path and then animate the spline ik separately.

[segmoria]

Thanks for replying

The reason I say that I cannot use an extra locator an parent my fish model to it, is because my fish is using the motion path curve as an IKspline curve, too!
So as soon as I try to move it away from the motion path the IK doesn't follow.
To understand better what I'm talking about have a look at a simplified pic I made for you

The reason I'm using the motion path as an IKspline curve for my bone hierarchy is because I want the fish to follow the path and be "deformed" by it. If it wasnt for this, parenting to a locator would work perfect, but its not what I need this time.

So you say there is an another way to do this?

[joojaa]

QUOTE(Segmoria @ 08/26/05, 11:47 AM)
So you say there is an another way to do this?

Yes and it actualy makes everyhing even simpler, there are 2 was for you to think yourself out of this situation...

in terms of stacking animation on top of eachother:

A ) Fisrt think in terms of bone structure animate it. Then attach the BOUND surface to the path anim and use a flow path to make the object deform along the curve. now if you animate the fiish wigling it wiggles along the curve. This works well if the arc is big enough.

B ) make a separate spline thats the spline your fish spine gets attached to Now attach this SPLINE and only the spline to your path anim And apply a flow path on top of the curve. NOW your free to manipulate the points that compromoise of the spline within the path anim tunnel. (this is a bit better solution but also MUCH more confusing to set up)

theres a few variations on both of theese themes.

NOTE in both above techniques you need to adjust the fffd base to avcomodate the movemment of your anim.

Then theres the hadcore methood wiich uses blen keyframe nodes to manipulate the incomming connections so that you can feed a keyframe summed with the spline connections, NOTE a bit depending on your maya version this mifht be straightforward and optimal or pure hell.

Again theres a few variation son this theme too. Some of wich includes extra transform in between joints.

[segmoria]

I followed the second method you mentioned and it works fine.

Thank you for spending the time to explain all this to me!