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˙uʍop ǝpᴉsdn ǝɹ,noʎ 'oN
#51 Old 24th Jan 2010 at 12:17 AM
Quote: Originally posted by orangemittens
How did your experiment work out?

Well, when I put my rig in MS, it works fine by itself. But with the demo mesh it looks fine until I play the animation. She turns into a mutant mess, but she still moves with the rig. *shuffles back to the drawing board*

"Part of being a mesher is being persistent through your own confusedness" - HystericalParoxysm
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Alchemist
Original Poster
#52 Old 24th Jan 2010 at 12:57 AM
Quote: Originally posted by orangemittens
I'm not sure which version is "right" but they aren't the same.


In the game, the interactions are managed by scripts (which is what the painting uses), and the script plays a "clip". The clips is what we are making here.

More than one animation can be played at one time, the game engine combines them. I suspect there is another animation that has facial expressions and the head turn in it that is playing with the dance animation. Of course, that would not be imported with the dance, because we only worked with a single file.

But I don't know the name of the other animation and have not ever loaded but a fraction of the animations included in the base game.

I don't think the head movements and the leg non-movements are the same issue.

If you like to say what you think, be sure you know which to do first.
Alchemist
#53 Old 24th Jan 2010 at 1:04 AM
Kk...that helps to understand what is going on.

But the thing is, this head movement thing can be a little problematic when it comes to wanting the Sim to hold completely still...say, as in a pose. Let me look through the test files I did...I know I have one where she was supposed to stay still...but her head still moved.

I can't remember if I used an EA one for that or if I tried to make it myself (which would introduce my potential animating errors into the mix). I did all of this several months ago and, although I can't blame anything but just a naturally poor memory, I need to refresh my brain on what I did.
Alchemist
#54 Old 24th Jan 2010 at 1:27 AM Last edited by orangemittens : 24th Jan 2010 at 3:38 AM.
and cmo, I hope you stick with working to get this to work. I'd definitely like to try Blender for animating with and it would also be good if there was someone besides me (with my beginner animation skills) who's willing to post their findings testing this.

ETA: I found one I made by taking the Hips Shake opening pose and making that into something that was supposed to hold completely still. While I had made several before this, this was the first "test" I made so who knows if the animation is the problem here or something else. I'll post the EA filmage below. You'll notice that, while everything else is holding still, her head moves around sort of randomly.

I can't understand how to check whether this is a keyframe issue or not. I bring the smd into MS and click Anim and then the next keyframe button but it wants me to select joints. I select joints and click again and it goes to another frame, click again and it goes to another frame, but the frames it goes to are sometimes higher frame numbers and sometimes lower frame numbers...it's like it skips keyframes and then goes back to ones before the one I'm at when I click the button. I don't know how that works.

http://jaue.com/om/Video-12.avi

I also made one of an EA pose but that one is crashing the game. Also, and this is sort of strange, the FullBuild has copied itself into my Mods folder twice today without me telling it to. This is a new thing...it doesn't do anything to my custom content but it makes it so that any animation I put in won't play. Odd. I have to delete this thing before I can play my animations and I have no idea why it keeps inserting itself into my Mods folder.

ETA2: do you think there will be any way of stopping these overlying scripts you described above? If someone makes an animation they're gonna want it to show as-is and not with some EA thing laid over the top of it.
Alchemist
Original Poster
#55 Old 24th Jan 2010 at 2:06 PM
Quote: Originally posted by orangemittens
...the FullBuild has copied itself into my Mods folder twice today without me telling it to.


This has nothing to do with my converter or MilkShape.

If you like to say what you think, be sure you know which to do first.
Alchemist
#56 Old 24th Jan 2010 at 3:00 PM
I wasn't trying to suggest that it did...sorry if it came across that way.
˙uʍop ǝpᴉsdn ǝɹ,noʎ 'oN
#57 Old 24th Jan 2010 at 5:41 PM
Still having problems. I believe part of it might be Blender screwing up the axis. I exported a one frame .smd of the standard pose and compared it to the original (pre-Blender). The values in the first frame wrong. I'm pretty sure its Blender, because I tried it without changing anything and it exported fine.The problem occurs when I change/add keyframes.
Attached files:
File Type: rar  rot_blenderdefault.rar (2.4 KB, 19 downloads) - View custom content

"Part of being a mesher is being persistent through your own confusedness" - HystericalParoxysm
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Alchemist
Original Poster
#58 Old 24th Jan 2010 at 7:36 PM
I can only add that I have to rotate the game animation root bone +90 X-axis to get them right.

If you like to say what you think, be sure you know which to do first.
Lab Assistant
#59 Old 25th Jan 2010 at 9:56 PM
I'm not sure if this has been discussed yet, but what would be the feasibility of importing TS2 body animations into TS3?

I know that it would be impossible to import facial animations, since TS2 uses blend geometries while TS3 uses the actual rigging.

However, in terms of the differences between TS2 skeletons and TS3 skeletons, would it just be a matter of matching joints and compensating for extra joints that weren't present in TS2?

Or are there joints in the TS2 skeletons that have no equivalents in the TS3 skeletons?
I believe this is highly unlikely but still possible given some of the other ludicrous steps backwards from TS2 to TS3.

I just have not had time to do a point-by-point comparison of the TS2 and TS3 sim riggings, and probably won't be able to any time soon.

It's just that the recent talk of TS2 to TS3 conversion for missed objects has me wondering how much of the objects we could bring in from TS2.
Alchemist
#60 Old 25th Jan 2010 at 11:06 PM
Hi ChaosMage. I have a quick question for you regarding the painting that you made.

I've noticed that when you play the looped animations the Sim's head gets a characteristic head movement that is the same pretty much the same whichever animation or type of animation you play.

Interestingly, this head movement can be altered to some degree by overriding it with a clip of that particular animation (exported from FullBuild) packaged and placed into the mods folder. (I posted some films from the game upthread)

There is always at least a hint of this characteristic head motion regardless of what clip you use to override the original (EA or user-made) and usually more than just a hint. It makes the animations look very odd. At least this has been my experience so far...I've tried many of the looped animation options but not every single one.

Anyway, do you think there is any way of making it so that the Sim's head movement will be governed by clips packaged to override the painting animations or is this characteristic head motion an issue that is inherent to Sims 3?
Alchemist
Original Poster
#61 Old 25th Jan 2010 at 11:28 PM
Quote: Originally posted by ChaosMageX
I'm not sure if this has been discussed yet, but what would be the feasibility of importing TS2 body animations into TS3?


While it would be possible to build such a tool, it would likely not be easy. TS2 meshes had a "T" bind pose, TS3 uses one with arms at 45 degrees, meaning all of the arms would be off... but I don't think the orientations of any of the joints are close.

Surely there are people who understand the math well enough to recalculate the rotations. If I knew any of those people, I would tap their expertise for some of the other things that are troublesome, including why the legs don't work properly in the game, even though they are exported using the very same code as all the other joints.

If you like to say what you think, be sure you know which to do first.
Lab Assistant
#62 Old 28th Jan 2010 at 2:17 AM
First, I'm sorry for not getting back to you on this sooner. College is in full swing now and I need some time to build up a homework buffer before allowing myself some free time to continue participating in the modding community.

Quote: Originally posted by orangemittens
Interestingly, this head movement can be altered to some degree by overriding it with a clip of that particular animation (exported from FullBuild) packaged and placed into the mods folder. (I posted some films from the game upthread)


Could you give me a link to these films so that I can see this head bobbing for myself.

Quote: Originally posted by orangemittens
There is always at least a hint of this characteristic head motion regardless of what clip you use to override the original (EA or user-made) and usually more than just a hint. It makes the animations look very odd. At least this has been my experience so far...I've tried many of the looped animation options but not every single one.

Anyway, do you think there is any way of making it so that the Sim's head movement will be governed by clips packaged to override the painting animations or is this characteristic head motion an issue that is inherent to Sims 3?


My theory is that this bobbing motion is due to an additional overlay animation that is being played by the JAZZ file governing the looping animations, which would be "single_looping_animation".

I'd have to look into the JAZZ file's code to confirm this, and I just don't have the time to do that right now.

If you don't know how JAZZ files work, then you can try overriding the animation with something simple that would keep the same almost entirely still. If their head is still bobbing on through this animation, then it means that it isn't an optical illusion and most likely is a hidden overlay, possibly related to a breathe loop or something.
Alchemist
#63 Old 28th Jan 2010 at 2:46 AM
Thank you very much for your response CM.

Here are links:

http://jaue.com/om/Video-12.avi

this is an animation I made myself taking one frame from the FullBuild hips dance and using that to make the Sim not move. In the film everything holds still but her head which has this certain movement to it that you'll notice below in the other film I'll post a link to.

http://jaue.com/om/Video-10.avi

This is an animation showing the HandsAbove animation when you click on your painting with no attempt to override the clip the painting will play. You can see this odd head turning which is essentially the same in both.

I can make other films of the original painting Facial animations and the CEO pose which I know from viewing have the same head movement if you need to see those.

Trust me, I completely understand the college homework buffer thing and the time it all takes. So I appreciate whatever help you have time to give.

I guess one question I have is this: if this is an automatic overlay from EA then why is it always the same regardless of the animation or type of animation played? The EA animations don't all have this same head motion...if it were an automatic overlay wouldn't they all show the same thing?

And, whatever is causing it, do you think there could eventually be any way of makiing it so that the painting would automatically suppress this head movement? I know we're still in early stages here but I'm guessing that most people who want to animate Sims have no idea about JAZZ files...we're all just meshers and animators.

When you say, "If you don't know how JAZZ files work, then you can try overriding the animation with something simple that would keep the same almost entirely still..." do you have time to give me a hint or a link to explain what the something simple part means? I don't know how JAZZ files work...I'll try looking around to get a better idea.

Thanks again for your answer.
Alchemist
#64 Old 29th Jan 2010 at 12:44 AM Last edited by orangemittens : 29th Jan 2010 at 1:16 AM.
I tested your theory CM and it is the looping animation that's the problem with the head.

Here is an EA in-game film of the same package I showed above that was supposed to make the Sim hold still. In that one her head still moves but that was played using the looping animations.

This one is played by loading her to-do action queue with requests to perform the same animation but as "play specific animation". You can see that all head motion is gone and she holds completely still:

http://jaue.com/om/Video-15.avi

I'm not sure what difference it might make, but the Sims seem to have the same sort of head motion going on when they're switching from one activity to another or when they're standing there with no direction at all. Rather than a breathe motion it almost seems like this head movement might be a transition animation? Is it possible that a transition animation could be being added to the tail end of a clip being exported from FullBuild?

Also, the head motion thing isn't present in all clips that I've transitioned throught the AnimTool. This one, which has rigging unlike that of the rigging the dance motions have, came out fine in the game except for the legs:

http://jaue.com/om/Video-17.avi

This is the check self out bottom animation which skitters around in Milkshape indicating (from what I've been told) that the rigging is different than that provided in the AnimTool download. This one can be played using loop animation without the head movement.

ETA: Which of course, isn't to suggest that I think the rigging is at fault for the head motion. I'm just describing my fndings and wondering if the dance animations the rigging was made for all have some sort of attached transition or breathe animation that affects them but not other animations.
Lab Assistant
#65 Old 29th Jan 2010 at 5:26 PM
Oh, that's the kind of head movement you were talking about. I thought you were talking about a kind of repetitive bobbing that would come from a breathe loop, not a slow zombie-like neck turning. From the way her head was moving, and the fact that there was another sim nearby, I suspect that it may be a LOOK-AT animation overlay.

You see, sims often have the compelling need to look at other sims and sometimes objects around them, and this dates back to The Sims 2, sometimes even causing a stack overflow in NPCs.

This head movement looks eerily familiar to what I encountered when I used Squinge's Hula Mod in put sims into still camera poses in The Sims 2. I had to be careful, because whenever another sim would walk by, my still sims would turn their heads to look at them, but still keep every part of themselves, including their faces, motionless, and it would look really REALLY creepy.

Why don't you try testing these looping animations again in a doorless and windowless room completely devoid of other sims and objects and see what happens then. If it's still happening, then it might be one of the sim's personality traits that causes them to stare in random directions randomly.

And finally, as I've said in previous posts, this is only theory, and could be incorrect.
Alchemist
#66 Old 30th Jan 2010 at 2:41 AM
My guess is that since your first theory was correct and selecting specific animation solved the issue that trying out this second theory by putting her in an empty and windowless/doorless room isn't going to make the loops work. I think it's the looping animations that are the issue as you first posted.

But my assumptions about this particular game are often wrong so I'll definitely take your advice and test it. If that doesn't work I'll move on to the personality traits theory and make some Sims to try that out.
Alchemist
#67 Old 30th Jan 2010 at 6:08 PM
Sorry to double post. I tried the windowless room with no objects in it and she *did* hold completely still. I'm glad I was wrong when I thought she wouldn't because I wasn't looking forward to having to create Sims to check out the personality trait issue.

I put a painting into the room with her and the other animation Wes mentioned above, what you called the "LOOK-AT animation overlay", kicked in and she turned her head toward it and then moved her head in a sort of viewing motion. She didn't stop the motion until I took the painting away.

I took the painting and the walls away and she continued to hold still. I had her facing a corner which apparently wasn't interesting enough to trigger a "look".

Strangely, when I then put the painting back where it had been she didn't look at it again. I added a chair and she looked at it briefly and then went back to holding still (innately less interesting than a painting?).

Is there a way of reliably suppressing these Look-At animations in the Play Looping Animation mode or is the only way to do it to bypass the game's overlays by choosing Play Specific Animation and loading the Sim's action queue with it? Not only is it annoying having her move when she isn't supposed to but you're right...it does look really creepy.
Lab Assistant
#68 Old 31st Jan 2010 at 10:25 PM Last edited by ChaosMageX : 31st Jan 2010 at 10:48 PM.
Ah, then that confirms it. Sims in TS3 have a compelling need to look at other sims and newly purchased objects, most likely from an invisible "come and look at me" jig object.

I think the only way to override these LOOK-AT overlay animations would be to create a core mod that replaces the LOOK-AT overlay CLIP file with an empty animation.

Actually, that would be a handy mod for machinima makers, as the look at animations tend to be annoying unless they are specifically needed for the scene.

What I'd do (if I had the time) is locate the CLIP and JAZZ files and core code that controls the look-at animation overlay, and then create a mod that replaces it to suppress it from happening autonomously in the game.

I'd also include a copy of the CLIP file with a different ID that I could use in a mod to command my sims to look at any other GameObject in the room on demand, for the sake of machinima!
Since you seem to be getting into animation, maybe you should do that mod.

Personally, I suck creating animations. The only way I could create a complex one that's decent is by covering myself with a ping-pong ball suit and getting some motion capture software for my web cam.

The only thing I could probably make manually is basic mouth and face animations for my script reading lexicon mod, if I ever get around to it.

EDIT:
You know me, I can't resist digging around in the core code to find out how something in the game works.

What I found is that in Sims3GameplaySystems, there is a class called
Sims3.Gameplay.ActorSystems.LookAtManager
And it has a public function called DisableLookAts()

In fact, I think there might even be a command console cheat to disable these look-at animations, but I'm not entirely sure since I don't play the game often enough.

Digging deeper, the code behind Look-At overlays is quite interesting, as it seems to have bone filters for different levels of overlays depending on the intensity of the reaction.
Code:
public enum LookAtJointFilter
{
    EyeBones = 4,
    HeadBones = 2,
    TorsoBones = 1
}


Digging further into the code, unfortunately it leads back into the ScriptCore class through an AppDomain reference, and into the game engine from there.

That's all the exploring I'm willing to do before getting back to my college work, but you're more than welcome to use Reflector to peruse the core code yourself.

Most of the stuff having to do with LookAt are found in Sims3.Gameplay.ActorSystems, Sims3.SimIFace, and ScriptCore.

If you're really desperate to try to find the CLIP and JAZZ files behind it (if they aren't inside the game engine as well ), you could try doing a brute force search through the key name maps in the packages, but I don't know how to do that myself.
Alchemist
#69 Old 31st Jan 2010 at 10:35 PM Last edited by orangemittens : 1st Feb 2010 at 1:26 AM.
Me?...do a mod?...I wouldn't have the first clue how to go about it to be honest. But now that you've thrown out some ideas maybe someone with programming/modding experience will give the idea a look-see. It definitely seems like something a lot of people could use. Not only machinima makers either...all the people who would like models for their clothes, deco-ads, and etc. could use that too.

Thanks for looking into this though. I appreciate knowing that the problems I was having with my Sim's head animations weren't because of what I was doing and I can also do limited in-game testing now that I know what the problem with them is.

ETA: Thank you for finding more information on the issue. But...er...shouldn't you be studying?...lol. Seriously though, all this will still be here when you're on break. If it isn't this particular issue it'll be another that no one has solved.
Field Researcher
#70 Old 9th Feb 2010 at 12:55 AM
Anyway to make a object that call an "new" animation? Like all the posebox that we have on TS2?

I started to mod in TS3 but only in XML... I don't now if it's posible to add new interactions on a new objects already.

It's alright to make mistakes you're only human. Inside everybody's hiding something. Take time to catch your breath and choose your moment. Don't slide.
Lab Assistant
#71 Old 9th Feb 2010 at 1:26 AM
Quote: Originally posted by eletrodj
Anyway to make a object that call an "new" animation? Like all the posebox that we have on TS2?

I started to mod in TS3 but only in XML... I don't now if it's posible to add new interactions on a new objects already.
I think (and I'm no exert on it) in order to create an object that would be able to call new animations or poses, you would have to create a new object-script/scripted object. The script would then have to call a new Jazz file, which in turn would call the individual animation elements.

As Wes mentioned in an above post, the best places to look for methods/info on this would be the Chaos painting and Tiger's Jazz tool.
Alchemist
#72 Old 9th Feb 2010 at 1:48 AM
Here is what CM said when I asked about objects and animations in another thread. Maybe it will be of some help.

Quote: Originally posted by ChaosMageX
Animations can be connected to anything, but it takes more than just the clip files.

The act of playing animations, attaching accessories, playing sounds, creating effect swarms, etc, is a combination of the clip files themselves, and jazz state machines, and the MSIL game code.
It's not nearly as simple as TS2, but that just means that it's a lot more versatile.

The code that I used in my painting for the animations came from copied and edited animation interactions hidden within the game code. These interactions were among the many useful "cheat interactions" in the game found on certain objects, but nearly impossible to access without core modding.
I just copied their code, tweaked it to work with my painting, and then released it to the public.

These interactions were very versatile because they used a simple jazz state machine that could play any animation by just giving it the name of the clip file and the actor to play the animations.

The game already has several other generalized state machines for playing animations, but using them involves a delicate dance between the game code and state machine. I'm still having trouble getting my code to use the jazz file for reactions, in order to get sims to cry on demand, something many have been wanting.

My point is that at the moment we can't exactly create a new animation and slap it into the game, because we also need to create a new jazz file to control that animation and write game code to enter, set the parameters, and exit that jazz file's state machine.
Field Researcher
#73 Old 9th Feb 2010 at 8:35 PM
Welll... just thinking on it:

"My point is that at the moment we can't exactly create a new animation and slap it into the game, because we also need to create a new jazz file to control that animation and write game code to enter, set the parameters, and exit that jazz file's state machine."

So, right now, not possible yet? Dumb question.

Did "we" know how to create/edit jazz files already?

It's alright to make mistakes you're only human. Inside everybody's hiding something. Take time to catch your breath and choose your moment. Don't slide.
Test Subject
#74 Old 9th Feb 2010 at 8:59 PM Last edited by mesher : 9th Feb 2010 at 8:59 PM. Reason: typo
Quote: Originally posted by eletrodj
Did "we" know how to create/edit jazz files already?


TigerM's Smooth Jazz animation script editor is here

and some jazz mods were created using this tool, Stop Hydrophobia and Stop Cough when eating.
Field Researcher
#75 Old 9th Feb 2010 at 11:18 PM
Thanks! I'll see.

It's alright to make mistakes you're only human. Inside everybody's hiding something. Take time to catch your breath and choose your moment. Don't slide.
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