Using BVH, BIP, CSM files in Maya

[motalgo]

Can someone please guide me how to make use of files type *.bip, *.bvh, *.csm in maya for character animation?

Is there any tutorial also for this ? Could not find any thing about it in Maya help.

Thanks.

Zeni

[gmask]

*.bip, *.bvh, *.csm

The problem is if you just have these files and don't have the skeletons that went with them you are going to have a hard time getting them into Maya. You could of course write some kind of script to attempt to parse them but I imagine that is not what you were hoping to hear and you will need to know the Skeletal setup to do this correctly or at all.

These formats seem to be more MAX/Character Studio centric whereas AMC is better for Maya. You could use software like www.lambsoft.com Promotion & Movetools or Polytrans from www.okino.com to port the motion from Max to Maya.

I found somme plugins for Mmaya which may be helpful for some formats :

http://www.toolsinmotion.com/plugins.html VROOM plugin for Maya supports i/o for Acclaim asf/amc, Biovision bvh, and Motion Analysis htr and is only $349.

http://www.moveshack.com/dom/index.html Dominatrix supports import/export of the Acclaim (ASF/AMC) and C3D file formats, Dominatrix has recently added support for TRC and HTR formats.

g

[motalgo]

Hi gmask

Thanks a lot for your answer. In fact I searched about the subject in Highend archive before posting. The situation seemed quite disheartening. But your answer is the most encouraging of those all. Thanks for mentioning the links . As Movetools is still for Maya3 only I will try to get Polytrans. But will I still have to set all the animation in CS and then import it in Maya, or polytrans will import these formats directly ?

Yes I am coming from MAX/CS environment and exploring Maya for my present project of a character animation, because I have heard so much about its capabilities in this field. I am expecting Maya facial animation tools to be better than others. But the thought of loosing all those ready made motion files and ease of using those in CS is making my heart sink and pulling me constantly back to CS. I do hope to find something of the kind in Maya.That means capability to re use a motion file again and again (otherwise I am doomed). I think Trax Editor will be the tool.
You have mentioned AMC files. Can you please tell me where I can get more information about these files?

Zeni

[gmask]

But will I still have to set all the animation in CS and then import it in Maya, or polytrans will import these formats directly ?

http://okino.com/conv/filefrmt.htm

According to this page it imports the files directly without having to use a plugin in Max like you do with Movetools. They ahve a demo version so try it out.

g

[kubba]

http://www.biomechanics-inc.com/software/
one link is worth of thousand words
enjoy mocap cleaning

[motalgo]

Thanks gmask, thanks KUBBA for your help. It really solved a big problem for me.
Thanks again.

Zeni