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Alphageekgirl's - modo magic website \ Site search \ Post chronology (recent first)
Making your own tileable textures
Fine-tuning your color picking
Organic, low-poly built-in mesh presets
Creating Custom Sliders for Morph maps
Constraining Cameras and Lights using Locators
How to tell whether you're in Poly, Sub-D or P-Sub mode
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Post chronology (recent first)

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June 6, 2015 Posted by Debi Taylor in ANIMATION, Binding, Rigging

Animated walk cycles

For anyone who is not a full-time rigger or animator, but has tried to create a simple walk cycle, you'll no doubt remember all the time and effort you put in, only to have your character walk like a zombie. Well,  a fellow MODOnaut, Michael Gass, has created this animated walk-cycle script for ACS rigs that will help you out immensely. Even if it's not perfect, it will get you well on your way!

Tags: Michael Gass, script, walk cycle
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May 26, 2015 Posted by Debi in All Articles, Layouts, Neat tips, Texture Locators, Textures, Tutorial Video Index

Lining up texture locators

Most people think that Texture Locators are just those widgets that get in the way while you're trying to work on your scene, but James Darknell takes some time to explain how they work and offers a different way to quickly align them to your item's surface.

Related Images:

Mutant Pixel and Yoda @ ILM Jason Bickerstaff & James Darknell @ Pixar Rich, Mutant Pixel, Andrew Helmer @PIXAR
Read more
Tags: box, cube, Drop Action, James Darknell, Place & Align, planar, Projection Types, texture locator
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May 25, 2015 Posted by Debi Taylor in All Articles, Neat tips, USER INTERFACE & IO

Numeric Entry Field Tips

One of the handiest things you can use in your everyday workflow is the versatile way you can approach entering numbers into MODO. Here in this video, James Darknell explains a variety of ways that even many MODO experts are unaware of.

http://community.thefoundry.co.uk/tv/training/view.aspx?id=659

I particularly like the Gang Edit. 🙂

In addition to being able to edit the number fields by typing in numbers, users can gang edit all three fields simultaneously by LMB+Clicking the icon to the left of the mini-slider enabling the feature.

Gang-edit

 

INDEPENDENT - The default is i 'Independent', controls are edited independently.

COPY - The first click changes the field = 'Copy', will make whatever you type into the first field, the same in the other two fields.

PROPORTIONAL - The second click changes to ∞ (infinity) 'Proportional' where value changes are applied proportionally to all like controls.

RELATIVE - The third click changes to + 'Relative', the value change is added to all like controls. For instance if you divided the first field by /2 the other two fields would recalculate dividing by two as well.

When entering numeric values, you can use keyboard equivalents as well, such as;

'Ctrl'+'Alt'+'Enter'for Copy

'Ctrl'+'Enter' for Proportional

'Alt'+'Enter' for Relative

 

Related Images:

Mutant Pixel and Yoda @ ILM Jason Bickerstaff & James Darknell @ Pixar Rich, Mutant Pixel, Andrew Helmer @PIXAR
Tags: gang select, James Darknell, numbers
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February 20, 2013Posted by Debi in All Articles, Animating, Gradient Editor, Neat tips

Setting keys in the Gradient Editor

If I don't use the Gradient Editor for a while, something that I always forget is ... How do I create a new key again? So, assuming I'm not the only one, I thought I'd would share it here.

Key Creation

Keys can be added to the currently selected curve(s) by middle mouse-button (MMB) clicking either on the curve itself or anywhere on the background. Or if you don't have a 3-button mouse, you can Ctrl-Alt left-click.

Deleting Keys

Keys can be deleted from curves in two ways:

  • To delete only the currently selected keys press the 'Delete' key.

  • To delete the currently selected keys and keys at the same Input value on associated curves select 'Delete Key' from the RMB context menu.

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February 16, 2013Posted by Debi in All Articles, ANIMATION, Deformations, Morphs, Rigging, Step-by-Step

Importing animation MDDs from Maya to modo

David Stripinis, a 3D expert and avid modo user, has worked with James Cameron on Avatar and more recently Double Negative. In 2006 David wrote a script called modomotionApply.py that allowed users to import animations from Maya into modo as a mesh with MDD file. This was a freely available plug-in and unfortunately, after complaints from the community about it not being fully supported. Read more
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Tags: import, maya, MDD, modomotion, moma, Point Oven, Stripinis
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February 12, 2013Posted by Debi in All Articles, Neat tips, Render Outputs, RENDERING

Which Render Outputs combine to equal the Final Color output?

Ever wondered which render Outputs equate to the Final Color Output?
RenderOutputs

+ Diffuse Shading (Total)

+ Transparent Shading

+ Reflection Shading

+ Specular Shading

+ Subsurface Shading

+ Luminous Shading

= Final Color

Where each successive layer is added to the layer below in the composition

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Tags: Final Color Output
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February 8, 2013Posted by Debi in All Articles, ANIMATION, Binding, Neat tips, Rigging

How to scale your rigged character

Description

As a follow-up to last week's rigging article, I thought I'd share this tip I found in a forum post recently where someone asked;

"Hi guys I rigged a character in one file to have it clean, then I posed it for a test and took him to other scene where he is too big. I tried to scale him but it destroys the whole character (the skeleton resizes at diferent rate than the mesh does). I tried to scale the skeleton, the mesh, both, a group...and nothing works. Any ideas?"
Scale
Solution If you select the root joint of your skeleton, and then scale, everything else should go along for the ride. Make sure you do the scaling outside of Setup mode.
Source (Old Luxology Forums - no longer exists)
 
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Tags: root joint, scale, Setup mode, skeleton
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February 1, 2013Posted by Debi in All Articles, ANIMATION, Binding, Rigging, Step-by-Step

How to quickly rig a character

Description

With modo 601 came a video called Fireboy where Andy Brown rigs and animates one of Warner McGee's characters. The video is quite detailed, but if you just want to quickly jump in and rig a character, I've broken it down into simple steps below.

Once you are done though, you may find that you might need to use a different Binding type for your particular character, or you might need to adjust the vertex weights to enable your character to deform properly, which I'll try cover in another article later on. But until then you can always refer back to Andy's video - but this should get you on your way.
Step-by-Step
    Preparation
    • Make sure your character is a nice clean mesh without holes or flaws. Just to be sure, run > Geometry > Mesh Cleapup before you start.
    • Separate the components, such as body and eyes into separate layers.
    • Centre your character at X & Z, and zero on Y
     
    Create Skeleton
    • Click on the Setup tab along the top menu
    • Under Commands select > Setup > Skeleton
    • Then click on Tool Properties tab and make sure that Compensation and Intersection are turned on (2:20)
    • In Add-mode, create your skeleton. Be mindful of when to use symmetry, and when to turn it off.
    Align Bones
    • Double-click on the root bone (in the viewport, or from the Item List)
    • Adjust all joint locators so that the red line is pointing along the X-axis by selecting each joint individually, then clicking on the universal transform tool to move it. It's quicker if you have two viewports open side-by-side - one Front, and one Right to make seeing where you're at, easier. (5:55)
    Zero out transforms on all joints (Sets a resting position for deformations)
    • Go into Setup modo. A yellow border will apart around the viewport
    • Double-click on the root bone
    • Go to > Properties > Zero > All
    • Turn off the Setup mode toggle
    • Save
     
    Bind skeleton to Mesh
    • While in Item mode, select Setup mode
    • Double-Click on the root bone in the viewport, and then Shift-select the character mesh
    • Then under  > Commands > Deformers > Bind > Heat  (you can use any of the other options)
Source  Fireboy.mov which comes with modo 601
Author  Andy Brown
   
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Tags: Andy Brown, bind, bones, Fireboy, mesh, skeleton, transforms, Warner McGee, zero-out
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