please help! Bones not working properly! Bug?

[wovenskin]

Help!
Ok, editing this post to hopefully get some help.
I've been working with this character for a week or two. Today I was adding bones and playing with smart bones to see how he would move, then erasing the bones and making corrections to the vectors in their respective layers. But it seems something has gone screwy. Now when I try to add bones and then offset them, I can't get some of the bones to influence their layers and also some layers are parented even when no bones are added. It's like the layers are binded to bones I have erased.

update: While waiting for some help, I've tried creating a new project, then I imported old project into new one. I then recreated all layers by copying vectors and pasting these into new layers. Then deleting old layers. So theoretically, there should be no information stored about paths or bones, etc. Unfortunately, this is not the case.
Here are a few photos:
in the above picture, I have just added a bone to the body and 2 to the arm layer and 1 to the hand.

now I select the offset tool and try moving the "shirt" bone. But not only does that bone move but the head layer, the pelvis layer and the neck layer. Even though I haven't even created bones for them yet in this project. Also the arm and hand bones move but do not influence their respective layers! (I have drawn arrows to show movement.)
I am hoping I am doing something wrong. Otherwise My only option now is to recreate each layer. Ok, so a few hours wasted.... but this is the sort of thing that leaves me very discouraged by this program. I would also gladly send this project file to anyone willing to help. Thank you in advance!
I am using ASP 9.1 and am on OS lion 10.7.5

and here is a youtube video showing problem too!
http://youtu.be/AHx4U1EdwoI

[wovenskin]

also, my timeline isn't visible in movie but I am on keyframe 0. And as suggested in other threads about bones problems, I have tried clearing all animation from document.

[oakesy]

I think your effect is to do with parent bone. When you deleted original set up did you start say head or body first. Have a look at the reparent function to see any misaligned arrows. If am wrong please feel free to shoot me.

[wovenskin]

parenting seems fine. Thanks for the input.

[oakesy]

Looks like the parent bone dominates the rest like a bubble effect. Does this do the same with flexible bones and bind to region too?

[wovenskin]

switching from region binding (which is what I would use) to flexible makes no change in behavior. Moving the first bone still moves layers without bones and child bones still do not influence layers under them. Remember, all this did work 2 days ago. It's only after deleting and recreating bone hierarchies did this start happening. It's like these shapes still remember old bones that don't exist anymore. Appreciate the brainstorming.

[oakesy]

Might be to with the parent. I quickly skimmed around my little trial and similar happen too. I think when you do all the bones and reparent all then you should be able to move each layer drawing. My brain is hurting now and needs a cup of tea to sooth.

[Animark]

Did you tried the following?

- select a layer
- got to the bone menue and select "Release Points" and/or "Release Layer".
- repeat with every other layer

I am not sure, but it's an idea.

[wovenskin]

thanks for the idea. I tried going to each layer, and releasing points and layers. Did not fix. Very strange. I can create just ONE bone and then when I try to offset it, it always drags a different part of the body with it. I definitely think this is a bug at this point.

Well, I have just gone and spent a few hours recreating my character now. Going forward, I will make sure to save a version before every major step of the process so if something screwy like this happens, I'll have the correct back up to start again at. As far as I am concerned, you should be able to delete all the bones and then draw in new ones and not have things behave like the old ones are still there!

I will save this file. If anyone cares to try to solve this. (if it's actually solvable) let me know.

[Animark]

If you can zip your file and upload it somewhere, post a link and I will have a look at.

[wovenskin]

here is the file. Thanks for looking.

http://www.mediafire.com/?xg9aq63qikh2n6g

[Animark]

OK, I didn't got big problems with your file and made a fast setup:
http://www.filedropper.com/bonesworking

1. Maybe the layers hold some informations about older, not longer existing bones
2. I selected a layer and selected every point in it (ctrl+a)
3. I have choosen "release layer" from the bone menue
4. I have choosen "flexi bind points" from the bone menue
5. I repeated with every layer

I am not sure if these steps where necessary, but however.

6. I moved the layers to positions wider from each other, so they don't get in trouble with their different bone influences.
7. I added every bone (after I added just a few, I had the same behaviour as you said, but think that doesn't matter)
8. I corrected the parenting and tweaked a little bit the strength of the bones
9. I binded the Head completely to his bone
10. I used the "offset bone" to bring the parts of the character together.

I think it works fine.

(Sorry for my bad english, I am too lazy at the moment to look at the dictionary)

[wovenskin]

good show! I will try to repeat your steps and see if I have the same luck. Like I said, I already recreated this rig. But would like to see how to get out of jams like this in the future! Thanks.

[oakesy]

Just a thought! Would taking the layer out of the bones folder then save Next re-enter the same layer back into bone folder to activate the bone movement. Because when he moves his parent or other bone they are not active on the layers. Seems an odd way Feel free to shoot the idea.

[wovenskin]

just a follow up:

as suggested by Animark, selecting all points in a layer and then clicking on "release points" in the bones menu corrected the unwanted "hidden bone" effect. In cases where layers were inside of bone layers, clicking on "release layer" in the bone menu corrected the problem.
Looking back at my posts, I claim to have tried this step but it didn't work, I must have done something wrong, oh well.

(Oaksey, I also tried taking the layers out of bones folder, saving, then putting back in but it did not correct problem)