I tried to make a animated crowd starting from a single animation cycle; and followed the example you can find in the tutorials 6.2_2, but only 2 of them are animated. Then I tried to do it with a smaler number of particles (5 instead of 20) ; no better.
I don't think the reason is that there's going on too much in my movie, because I used a verry simple character (an insect) that makes a few basic movements and a fixed background.
Anybody who knows how to do this right?
Problem with using particle effects for making a crowd
Moderators: Víctor Paredes, Belgarath, slowtiger
-
Kitsune Kowai
- Posts: 7
- Joined: Sun Jan 18, 2009 9:35 pm
- Location: Belgium
- Contact:
Go back and look closely at the tutorial file that DOES work. Look at all the settings for the particle layer. Look at how the keys are set for each character in the particle.
Are you using the cycle key frame interpolation on all of the character layers so the characters movements repeat? I turned it off on one of the layers in the tutorial file and it stopped moving like you described.
Need to see the file to figure out what you are doing wrong.
-vern
Are you using the cycle key frame interpolation on all of the character layers so the characters movements repeat? I turned it off on one of the layers in the tutorial file and it stopped moving like you described.
Need to see the file to figure out what you are doing wrong.
-vern
-
Kitsune Kowai
- Posts: 7
- Joined: Sun Jan 18, 2009 9:35 pm
- Location: Belgium
- Contact:
Indeed, apparently I didn't do the cycling correctly.
But now, after changing the cycling-settings, all characters move but bizarre things start to happen; not every movement cycles and some movements stop somewhere around frame 140 while the cycle is set to repeat after frame 300; strange...
Probably I should do some more study about-, and do some experimenting with- cycling first to get this part right, if necessary I'll redo the whole thing. We'll see..
BTW, I made the "crowd" based on one character-movement-cycle only; I wanted to animate a group of identical bees, primal there was no need to add duplicated character-layers with different colours/movements/clothes anyhow. Even so, in the tutorial there are only 4 character layers for 20 particles; so I don't assume that copying more layers with the same cycle could give a different result here, and it didn't when I tried it...
I'll keep you informed about my experiments . Thx for the quick reply!
K.K.
But now, after changing the cycling-settings, all characters move but bizarre things start to happen; not every movement cycles and some movements stop somewhere around frame 140 while the cycle is set to repeat after frame 300; strange...
Probably I should do some more study about-, and do some experimenting with- cycling first to get this part right, if necessary I'll redo the whole thing. We'll see..
BTW, I made the "crowd" based on one character-movement-cycle only; I wanted to animate a group of identical bees, primal there was no need to add duplicated character-layers with different colours/movements/clothes anyhow. Even so, in the tutorial there are only 4 character layers for 20 particles; so I don't assume that copying more layers with the same cycle could give a different result here, and it didn't when I tried it...
I'll keep you informed about my experiments . Thx for the quick reply!
K.K.
Last edited by Kitsune Kowai on Mon Jan 19, 2009 6:03 am, edited 1 time in total.
Look at the sample file. The animation for each character layer starts at frame 1. The last key frame cycles back to frame 1.
If you have one layer that is in the particle layer, it should have an animation that starts at frame 1 to however long it is. The last key frame should cycle back to frame 1. Also, if you have OTHER animation properties like bones AND points, or bones, points AND layer animation ALL the keys must be set to cycle the same way. If you only cycle one of the other then the other animated keys will stop on the first cycle.
-vern
If you have one layer that is in the particle layer, it should have an animation that starts at frame 1 to however long it is. The last key frame should cycle back to frame 1. Also, if you have OTHER animation properties like bones AND points, or bones, points AND layer animation ALL the keys must be set to cycle the same way. If you only cycle one of the other then the other animated keys will stop on the first cycle.
-vern
-
Kitsune Kowai
- Posts: 7
- Joined: Sun Jan 18, 2009 9:35 pm
- Location: Belgium
- Contact:
I didn't had ALL the keys set to cycle; that was my error in he first place.
Initially I thought it was sufficient to set a cycle to the group-layer, clearly it wasn't; but after setting a cycle on every last key back to frame 1, some did cycle, others didn't or stopped halfway; still don't understand why.
Tomorrow I'll restart from zero and see what happens.. (it's already 6.30 AM in Europe , have to get some sleep now
)
K.K.
Initially I thought it was sufficient to set a cycle to the group-layer, clearly it wasn't; but after setting a cycle on every last key back to frame 1, some did cycle, others didn't or stopped halfway; still don't understand why.
Tomorrow I'll restart from zero and see what happens.. (it's already 6.30 AM in Europe , have to get some sleep now
)K.K.