Moho Animation Forum

I recently bought AS Pro and masking is driving me crazy. I see from the forum topics that I am not alone in this regard.

I would like to make an animation that is very similar in principle to the tutorial file "Tutorial 2.6_3.moho". I have overlooked some very simple point, I suspect, and the problem might be "unmasked" by an answer to this dilemma, discovered as I was trying to manipulate a copy of the tutorial so I could figure out how to change the shape of the mask:

Find the rectangle that acts as a mask in Tutorial 2.6_3.moho. Select the shape and delete the points. Then put back a rectangle just like it. and make it expand across the text through the animation. If yours behaves like mine the new shape does not act as a mask and the text is not revealed as the rectangle expands- once you do this you never see the text again. I have made no other change and the settings for each layer remain as in the original file throughout the animation. This happens in the immediate playback and in a rendered movie.

Is there a way to define the shape in some way so it knows it is a mask? I have not been able to find that in the settings or in the help file. I think if I knew what was going wrong with this I could move on to the confusion that stumps everyone else. So far, however, I cannot get past this initial step.

Thanks!

Ted

Well, open the Layer Settings (double-click) / Masking-Tab / and check:
“Add to mask, but keep invisible”.

Cheers
Nolan

Masking did my head in initially.
I read about it a lot but it didn't really make sense to me.

So I set aside a few hours at work, went through
This Thread
making notes, writing it out as step by step instructions for
myself to
- use masking to hide everything and then show parts as you define
- show everything and hide parts you define

Then I dived in to masking, only used the notes the first time,
and now I've got my head around it.

It's worth noting that when you mask out a shape you also mask out its
outline. I use mesh instancing a lot to make a dup layer of the mask shape (an eyeball for example) to put in the outline, no fill.

And as Nolan pointed out you can have invisible or visible masks.
So a visible eyeball can mask eyelids which are larger than it, showing only the areas which overlap the eyeball. Or an invisible shape can cut a mask hole in a face to show teeth etc behind.

Remember to activate masking for the group in the group (or bone layer) properties.
You can have layers which ignore masking, make sure it's turned on for those layers you want masked.

Pardon the waffle but I think an understanding of masking is constructive in the long run. I was finding solutions on a case by case basis but was still in the dark when attempting a masking setup from scratch. If you can get a handle on it, it's a great function.

Good luck, let us know how you get on.

The way the masking works in AS really does my head in too, so, I do anything to avoid it.
I think it could be simplified, for the sake of common sense over accurate correlation to the way the programming works.
At least a change in the language in the layer palette.
That's my two roubles anyway.

DoctorTed,

You delete the rectangle in the 'Mask' layer, right? If so, when you make your new one you need to a) release its points from the 'text distortion' bones, b) redo the expanding animation, and c) make sure you create a fill shape in that new rectangle. It is the filled part that is 'added' to the mask to show the layer above it.

Here's my masking tutorials, but I'm still not sure how helpful they really are.
viewtopic.php?t=11430&highlight=masking+tutorial

synthsin75 wrote:
...when you make your new one you need to a) release its points from the 'text distortion' bones, b) redo the expanding animation, and c) make sure you create a fill shape in that new rectangle. It is the filled part that is 'added' to the mask to show the layer above it.

Thanks to all who have contributed. I have not been back to this since I posted last night but I will look carefully at all the great ideas. The quoted one looks most likely to answer the immediate question, but I will look carefully at all the suggestions.

As soon as I figure out how to do step a and then make sure I have done b and c I will let you know how it worked!

Ted

For step (a), just select all of the bones on the bone layer (ctrl-A, with select bone tool), go to the mask layer and select all of those points, and then select Bone>Release Points from the main menu.

synthsin75 wrote:For step (a), just select all of the bones on the bone layer (ctrl-A, with select bone tool), go to the mask layer and select all of those points, and then select Bone>Release Points from the main menu.

Thanks, Sinthsin75. Your advice has put me on the right track. I got the new mask to work once I remembered to fill it! Now I am ready to tackle the mask problems that everyone has!

Ted