Few ideas on improving user experience
Hi,
I've been using UMotion for about 2 months and so far it's been very usefull.
There are few things however that could be improved.
1. Interchanging background for each track in clip editor - sometime it's hard to tell which keys are from which properties.
2. After clicking 'Add Layer' button, the text could be selected, so I could name it (now I have to select the text on the popup). Also, the Enter button doesn't work as OK, so it needs to be pressed with a mouse.
3. Changing speed of parts of animation - now I need to delete every other key and manually move following keys to achieve that.
Thanks
Maciej
Hi,
thank you very much for your feedback. I really appreciate that.
1. I think this is a good idea. I've added this to my "ideas for future updates" list.
2. In the next update the name field is now selected by default.
Regarding confirming by pressing enter: This already works but you need to press enter twice (once to confirm the text field input and a second time to confirm the whole dialog). This is the same across the whole UMotion UI and I want to keep that behavior consistent.
3.What you are looking for is called "ripple"-edit. This feature was already introduced in UMotion V1.11 (see forum post).
Hold the [R] key while scaling/moving selected keys to move existing keys in such a way that they are not going to be overwritten (or leave a gap).
Please let me know in case you have any follow-up questions.
Best regards,
Peter
DYNAMIC BONE
I can´t figure out how to use dynamic bones with umotion...or umotion pro does not support dynamic bones?
Hi,
thank you very much for your support request.
As far as I know, dynamic bone is a run-time script. So you create your animation with UMotion (during edit-time) and when you enter play mode, you should see the dynamic bone script in action. The animations created with UMotion are "regular" animations (like created in any other software) so if you assign them to your character, they should incorporate nicely with dynamic bone.
Please let me know in case you have any follow-up questions.
Best regards,
Peter
fbx import scale change
Hi!
I Just have a quick question: I made a lot of Animations with Umotion for my character but then later on decided I needed to change the scale of the FBX in the import settings. Now the animations are broken and give me really scary looking results. Is there a way how I can fix this?
(I know I could just revert the import scale to the same it was when I first created the animations but I am going to use many different character models that are going to be sharing these animations and so I would really rather control all of their scales through the import settings than through different scales in the scene)
I would be very glad for any ideas! Thank you!
Hi,
thank you very much for your support request.
If you are using "humanoid", the following should work (please backup your UMotion project before you continue):
1) Apply the character with the new scaling to the Pose Editor.
2) Switch into Config Mode and click on "Apply Scene Pose" --> "Apply All"
3) Click on "Save Reference Pose"
Please note that your hips position curve would need to manually be scaled (you could do this in the curves view by selecting all keys and using the blue bars to scale the whole curve).
When you are working with "generic" you need to make sure that you have no keys generated for the scaling and for the position of your bones. So after applying the same steps as for humanoid, I recommend removing any scaling keys from the animation. Also remove any unnecessary position keys (i.e. a bone in real life usually doesn't translate, only rotate).
Or you could keep the small version of your character as "authoring" version, and then use the humanoid animation on your correctly scaled characters.
Please let me know in case you have any follow-up questions.
Best regards,
Peter
Override layer and FBX export issue
Hi,
First many thanks for this awesome plugin!
I have an issue when exporting an humanoid animation to FBX when using override layers. If I don't use any override layer, the hips orientation (red arrow in the Unity animation preview window) points in the expected direction. As soon as I add an override layer, even without any keyed frame, the red arrow always point forward, and the feet of the character start moving around. The effect is if the hip was still and the feet compensate the movement, loosing al the foot floor placement. The issue doesn't happen if I export to anim file. Many thanks
Using Layers
I am using the layers functionality in the Clip Editor to create variations of a single base animation. My base animation clip has 5 layers on it that modify the movement of some bones to add variety to the original motion. I would like to be able to Mute and un-Mute layers from my script.
My current workflow is to duplicate the current clip (with all the layers), then mute the specific layers differently on the different duplicate clips, then export them to create 5 modified animations. However, if I need to modify the base animation clip I have to delete all the duplicate clips, then re-duplicate them from the base clip, then mute the specific layers differently, then re-export them as separate animations.
Is there a way to mute and un-mute layers from script? If not is there a less manual workflow for creating many animations?
Thank you for the help!
Hi,
thank you very much for your feature request.
Currently the UMotion API doesn't provide access to the layers and their properties. I have taken a note to consider adding this in a future update.
I would say for the moment, the best manual approach is to duplicate the animation (one per modifying layer) and if you really need to change the base animation you would copy all keys of the modified base animation and then go through each duplication and replace the base layer keys their. Considering that modifying the base animation would probably not happen too often, this shouldn't take too much time.
Please let me know in case you have any follow-up questions.
Best regards,
Peter
UMA Models Not Working
I am trying to edit animations for a UMA character using UMotionPro. Whenever I try to drag in the UMA model I get the error same as this post: https://support.soxware.com/communities/1/topics/323-only-avatars-created-by-unity-model-importer-are-supported-umotion
I have tried the steps in that post and am still getting the same error message. Here are the exact steps I followed.
1. Installed Unity FBX Exporter
2. Exported the UMA character in runtime
3. Changed the "Avatar Definition" to "Create From This Model"
4. Added an animator component to the prefab
5. Attempted to drag the character into the post editor, getting the same error
Do I need to use Model Importer or something or how do I go about getting UMA characters to work with UMotion?
Thanks!
Hi,
thank you very much for your support request.
Ok so you've already exported your UMA character to *.FBX. That's perfect. Please make sure that the following steps are performed correctly:
Select the exported *.FBX and make sure that it is setup correctly --> Open the "Rig" tab in the Inspector and ensure that "Humanoid" is selected and that "Avatar Definition" is set to "Create From This Model". Click on "Configure..." and make sure that all bones are shown in green and the character is in a T-pose.
Now, drag & drop that *.FBX file into your scene. The created character instance should automatically have an animator component attached. Create a new UMotion project of type "humanoid" and assign the character to it. This should work without giving you a warning message.
The important part is that your character really is an instance of your exported *.FBX.
Please let me know if you need any further assistance.
Best regards,
Peter
How to make animations for fingers?
Thanks
Hi,
thank you very much for your support request.
You can animate finger bones just like any other bone. If you are using a "humanoid" character, you can even use the Muscle Groups Tool Assistant that offers some easy to use sliders for finger posing.
If you do not see the finger bones:
1) If you are using "humanoid", make sure that you have assigned the finger bones in the humanoid avatar configuration (select the character file, in the Inspector switch into the Rig Tab, click on "Configure...").
2) If you are using "generic" and you don't see finger bones, it's very likely that your character may not have separate finger bones. You can create some in a 3d modeling application.
Please let me know in case you have any follow-up questions.
Best regards,
Peter
Hip Ik controller
Hello How can I add an Ik controller on the hip to my Umotion rig currently its taking the hip as the parent, is there a way to add a hip ik controller so i dont need to adjust the legs and upper body each time like in advanced skeleton or any IK rig ?
thank you
Hi,
thank you very much for your support request.
I think what you are looking for is IK Pinning of the feet. When enabled, the feet stay at the same place even when moving the hips. When IK Pinning is disabled, the feet are moving with the hips.
When using the IK Setup Wizard, IK Pinning is automatically setup for you. For completeness, here are the related video tutorials:
Please let me know if you meant something different.
Best regards,
Peter
Split animations
I want to make an animation of reloading weapons, but I do not want all the bones of the weapon to be inside the player root, because the guns are placed dynamically in the hands. Is it possible to split the animation? or maybe there is another way?
Hi,
thank you very much for your support request.
Everything that is placed as a child of an Animator controller can be addressed by that controller. You can use animation clips that point to transforms that are not always available (but are added during runtime).
So while creating the animation (during edit time), place the weapon as a child of the hand. During runtime, use transform.SetParent() to make the gun a child of your hand.
Please let me know in case you have any follow-up questions.
Best regards,
Peter
Can i use unity ik after i made the animation?
Hello thi is especially important question for me because if i untic the IK in the unity animator it is fine but if i use other software like final ik just to handle the feets will it mess up anything? And also why this is happening?(Legs kind of just floating)
Customer support service by UserEcho
