Ok.
Here's something that has me stuck and i would welcome any thoughts on how to go about setting this up so it works.
I have an arm based on points (Not a shape, but a line). I need the back section of the arm to be at the rear shoulder of the character but would like the forearm to cross over the front of the body and rear sometimes. I tried splitting the arm up into 2 seperate parts but when i apply shading I get a nasty seperation between the two segments where they join up.
Any ideas on how i can go about this so I get a clean shading effect on the arm?
The best I can come up with quickly is a combination of masking and z-depth shuffling. Move the body minute amounts backward and forward to make the arm appear behind, then in front of the body. You'd need to mask out the top of the shoulder for the latter case.
You can't have everything. Where would you put it?
Thanks Jahnocli. I did try masking but it is a pain to fiddle with. I have a LOT of animation to do and I am trying to create a rig that is as auto function as much as possible. Worse comes to Worse I will just leave out the shading on the arms. WAIT!!!! I just thought...maybe I can use 2 seperate images for the arms that have been pre shaded??????
Wow....just throwing the thoughts out there on the forum helps so much!!!! Thanks!
Do the naked arm in one shape, and add a piece of body outline on top of that. The whole layer is in front of the body but appears to be behind. Point binding may be necessary to have that piece of outline follow the body.
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The back only needs to appear behind. Put everything in one layer in front. Use bone binding to keep things in place.
AS 9.5 MacPro Quadcore 3GHz 16GB OS 10.6.8 Quicktime 7.6.6
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Moho 14.1 Mac Mini Plus OS 13.5
I see what you're saying slow but i am after another way of doing this so that I can at least have half the arm from the elbow up available to work at the front of the body and when needed and switch it to the back using animated layer ordering. That way from the elbow I get a reasonable area to animate with rather than worrying about where patches start or finish.
Uhm, what about layer order animation? Just put the whole arm on top or bottom of the body when needed.
AS 9.5 MacPro Quadcore 3GHz 16GB OS 10.6.8 Quicktime 7.6.6
AS 11 MacPro 12core 3GHz 32GB OS 10.11 Quicktime 10.7.3
Moho 13.5 iMac Quadcore 2,9GHz 16GB OS 10.15
Moho 14.1 Mac Mini Plus OS 13.5
Hi Slow.
layer order will affect the whole arm so that the top of the arm will be on top of the body or below the body along with the front of the arm. I have tried to break the arm up so that there are two sections. This works fine as long as there is no shading effect applied to the two halves. The shading effect creates a shaded "Break" at the elbow where the front part of the arm starts. This is the problem. If i apply NO shading...it all looks good. Have a look at the pic above. I would like to apply shaded affect to the two halves but the rounded curve stroke causes a curved shading effect at the end of the arm. If I deselect the rounded ends and go with a straight end I get "Stroke End" artifacts when the points are bent using bones.
Hi Wes. Won't the shoulder layer patch still overlap the forearm if the forearm moves over the Shoulder patch? It does'nt sound like a full solution where a full forearm layer can move freely over an entire body to me? Maybe I am missing something?
EDIT: The problem lies in the shading. I can layer order an arm now no probs. It's the shading that makes the arm look like a "Piece".
Thought I should add...A shoulder piece or patch will not work with this rig as it has a moving texture layer for the body detail. A static piece or patch will not work.
The "body patch" will only consist of some piece of outline, not the fill. No problem at all. If the forearm will be in the same position, just point animate that thing to shorten - if it's necessary at all because I notice the hand is a separate shape anyway which will be in front.
AS 9.5 MacPro Quadcore 3GHz 16GB OS 10.6.8 Quicktime 7.6.6
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Moho 14.1 Mac Mini Plus OS 13.5
Ok....sorry slow.....but....you are addressing the part that is not the problem.
I have overcome the Back Arm and Front Arm over body problem: See movie below:
The problem is: When I add shading to the arm, the shading breaks th arm up into 2 x seperate parts visually.
I need a way to add shading to the arm so that is looks like one full shaded shape.
Please see the original posted pic.Probably my fault for not explaining the problem correctly
