Shape Morphing

[Lost Marble]

Hey, I discovered a feature I didn't know I added to Anime Studio Pro 6. OK, I guess I knew I added it, but I hadn't tried it for this specific thing yet. Shape morphing:

http://lostmarble.com/misc/ShapeMorphing.mov

I used the new Blend Morphs command. I can provide a more detailed tutorial if anyone's interested.

-Mike

[Víctor Paredes]

Hey, how did you do that??
I want a tutorial!
Uhm, I'll explore by myself meanwhile

PD: I just discovered a new hidden feature too, please, take a look on http://lostmarble.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=79942

[ulrik]

Hey, I discovered a feature I didn't know I added to Anime Studio Pro 6.

You didn't?
It looks cool, yes please provide a tutorial, that would be kind.

[DK]

Hi Mike. A tutorial would be fantastic!!! It looks like the perfect solution to body and head turns.

Cheers
D.K

[arfa]

As ever I am delighted, amazed, surprised by what this program can do.

But...

how??????

Yes - a tutorial would be gratefully received.

cheers - arfa

[J. Baker]

That's pretty cool Mike. Looking forward for a tutorial myself.

[DK]

Mike.
Is this new shape morphing feature restricted to vectors or can images be shape morphed?

Cheers
D.K

[madrobot]

Whoah. THAT'S interesting.
I would love to know how that works.

[Blue]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe Mike's example is the new Blend Morph feature in ASP6. Look carefully, he is using three shapes with all the same points, so three vector shapes on one layer...maybe each vector could be on it own layer...but anyway download this test:

http://www.joelcardinal.com/ASP/Blend_test1.anme

Yes, you can do point animation and change the color of vector shapes set up for Blend Morphs!

--EDIT--

All vector shapes for morphing like this need to be on the same layer (or at least for this kinda thing its easier). Which I think is a bummer. Actions are per layer only. What I mean is, you can't be in the Action scene view and start clicking on different layers--you get booted back to the MAIN TIMELINE if you do that.

I suppose you could set up an action for each vector layer, but you would have no reference for what the other vector layers were doing in their Actions.

[Genete]

All vector shapes for morphing like this need to be on the same layer (or at least for this kinda thing its easier). Which I think is a bummer. Actions are per layer only. What I mean is, you can't be in the Action scene view and start clicking on different layers--you get booted back to the MAIN TIMELINE if you do that.

I suppose you could set up an action for each vector layer, but you would have no reference for what the other vector layers were doing in their Actions.

Actions performed in the group layer are spread to all the child layers if they have one action with the same name. Before do anything create the action in the group folder, then edit each action in the child layer. Calling the root folder will call the child ones. Unfortunately, moving the root action frame position DOESN'T move the child actions.
So you can have that cool feature with shapes at different layers. Even more, you can alter the layer's z depth in the root action, so you can "hide" or "reveal" some shapes in some poses, just by puting them behind others

It is certainly the way Rudiger did the head turn demo with the script morph bones dial.

-G

[Blue]

Come to think of it, any version of AS should be able to do this as long as you can do point animation on frames other than 0 and animate vector fills. I'm not sure what the limitations of v5 are.

Even if v5 could do the above, the Blend Morph sliders sure do make life easy and you can have a bunch of different actions set up and use a little of each to influence the vector deform.

[Blue]

Genete, THANK YOU!

I never would have tried that and I don't think it was in the manual...anyway YEY!!! Problem solved!

-Minor Note-
When in the Action view, do not click "Animation/Blend Morphs..." *CRASH*

[Lost Marble]

OK, here's the "Tutorial", kind of brief:

To do this, I created one shape (the initial circle), and then created actions for each of the additional shapes. For each action, I just moved the points around, changed colors, point curvature, etc. This isn't just for point movement - anything that can be animated can be used with the "Blend Morphs" command.

Let's try it. First, download my source file, unzip, and open it in Anime Studio Pro:

http://www.lostmarble.com/misc/ShapeMorphing.zip

1. Open the Actions window, and create a new action. Name it with whatever shape you plan to create.
2. Select the Draw->Reset All Points menu command (* see below)
3. Now use the Translate Points tool to move the points around into a new shape.
4. When you're done, double-click "Mainline" in the Actions window to go back to the main timeline.
5. Set the time to something other than frame 0, and choose the Animation->Blend Morphs command. Your new action should appear among the others, and you can blend them in any combination.

* Note about step 2:
Step 2 is important. Normally, when you blend morphs (or single-frame actions), only the elements that are unique to each action are blended. For example, if you had a face with two actions, blink and smile, you could blend those two together. If the blink action had no influence on the mouth then those two could blend with no interference.

But in this case, you want the entire shape to change. So all the points need to be tagged with a keyframe. I'm having a little trouble finding the words to use - you can either trust me on this, or I can try to come back and explain it a little more.

[meltedtoons]

does this mean we can lip sync morph?

[da2tha3]

Why wouldn't you just use interpolated mouth shapes for lip sync?