Moho Forum

Dear guru,

Could you please tell me is it possible to create moving object WITH VISIBLE TRACE using Moho? For example, I want to have a car moving on a map. I understand how to move an object but I dont' know how to show the trace.

Thanks in advance,
Vadim

You're talking about the old movie newsreel / Indiana Jones thing where you see the line staying behind the path of whatever is moving along the map? If that's it, the wat to do it, in a word, is Masking.

I whipped up a little example file to show you how-to. The masking section of the tutorials covers it pretty well, but I always liked that effect, so here it is...
Map.Moho
Not all that hard to do in Moho. Keep an eye on the masking settings, and also note that the order of the layers in the masking group makes a difference. If it was something else you were looking to do, be a little more decriptive and I'm sure you'll get hooked up.

--Brian

Brian, thank you for the answer. Unfirtunatelly I am not able to download the example: file not found. Could you please help me?

Vadim

I can't see the file either. I'm curious how you used masking to achieve this effect, but there's another option too:

Use the included scripting command "Scripts->Other->Layer Trail". First animate the motion of your layer. When you've got the car moving how you want it to, use this script to add a trail behind it.

I don't want to steer you away from Moho just for this option but I suggest giving EditStudio a try http://puremotion.veriovps.co.uk/index.htm

If you're looking for a video editor anyway, this one has a great "Route-tracer" function just for this kind of technique. http://puremotion.veriovps.co.uk/forum/ ... php?t=2646

Good luck,

Reindert.
www.nobudgetvideo.com

Okay, I figured it out. I've usually been cut/pasting the address for the link, but I typed these in. And completely forgot that the server is case sensitive for filenames. Duh! All fixed.

I had forgotten about the Layer Trail script. But, because each line segment is defined as a separate shape, most line effects aren't much use. Still quite handy, and if I remembered it I would have used it to draw out a really proper guidline for drawing the final line. In my case I did it in a similar way to Tutorial 2.6-3. 2 things different. Instead of using point translation to expand the size of the mask, I make the mask large enough to cover everything it needs to right off the bat, and translate the whole layer. I also place that layer's origin on the masks leading edge, right at the position of the moving object. Then, on each layer translation, I also rotate the mask layer so the leading edge stayes perpendicular to the line. Thats needed if the line is curvy. If you don't (as I tried first) you'll get pointy bits of the line sticking out past the object at some points. If the line were to turn back on itself, I guess you would need to use several separate masks to get it to work.

--Brian