Chariots taking me for a ride!

[Bwian]

'Tie it up' is easy enough .... things go wrong when you start messing about with bone positions to a large degree. The animations on the horse started to go very badly wrong.

I can give it a go with some camels as a base, and see if it works better.

Elephants ... same. Need to test.

I went for the horse base, since that way I do not have to re-do all the animations for horse movements as well as adding those for the chariot!

[KnightErrant]

@Bwian,

This is going to be one of those weasely posts that people having
actual problems hate. Alletun has sent me his orc files, descr_skeleton.txt
battle_models etc. I haven't put them in game or anything but it seems
that this is not a bug in the mechanics of animations but something
we don't understand. (Not trying to weasel out on this, of course )
Remember the dwarves and trying to get their feet on the ground?
This seems to be like that. I've checked and Alletun does have the
basepose files transformed in descr_skeletons so it isn't that easy.
From what he described, the problem gets worse the more you depart
from a vanilla skeleton, even if it is a skeleton using the standard
bone names like the dwarf.

Scaling should not be a problem because that is only applied to bone_pelvis
(and the deltas but they are small). Already tried the tools->zero joints
but even though that changed things a little for Alletun it doesn't change the
basic problem. I know you always do the zero joints thing from the dwarves
so no easy answers to this one. I wish I could say I'll be on it but external
things have my time spoken for for awhile. (Plumbing problems, I'm told the
store that has what I need is where "the density of muggers and prostitutes
will exceed your comfort zone". My comfort zone cuts off at 1 so Saturday
should be interesting.)

If I can get the orcs in game at least I'll be looking at the same problem.
Maybe imagination will strike (or fire and brimstone, depending on the
GPU settings.)

KE

[Bwian]

I noticed the same thing as Alletun when I was doing my Orcs first time around. I say first time because I haven't gone back to them yet ...

What I noticed was far less extme than Alletun's and only really seemd to affect theweapon. This was moved away from the hand by some distance. I cured it easily enough by making the vertices of the weapon linked to the hand, not the weapon bone.

Alletun pm'd me about the issues he was having, and I explained what I knew to him, and told him what I did to sort it. Doesn't sound like it worked!

The error does seem to be related to how far away you have actually moved the bone from it's original start position. I would assume that the animation converter has to take each translation and apply it to the new animation to fit the bone as it now is. Logically, knowing how the skeleton is built up, you start with the root, nd work outwards down the tree....with each bone being dependant on the prevous one for it's actual location in virtual space.

So...the further you move the bone from it's start point, the more you would multiply any rounding off type errors. If you moved a bone a long way AND there were multiple bones dependant on it, the errors wouldcarry over into the start numbers for the next set of calculations.

Mf Orc and Chariot issues both seemed to be worst at the ends of the 'tree' with the Orc weapon and the horse front hooves. These pieces both move the most and are furthest from the root. Alletun seems to have a similar issue with the arms being wonky for him. All the rest looked fine in the pics he showed me.

Same was true of my chariot. The basic mesh and the body/head/neck areas were fine. Then as you progressed outwards, things went wrong.

Now...when we were testing this stuff, we worked on Dwarf skeletons. These had the dimensions REDUCED in terms of height, so this might actually serve to hide some issues with the calculations.

Confession here though.... several of my Dwarves also suffered from 'floating weapons' ... the Thunderer's especially.... and these guys have the gun attached to the hand bone, not the weapon one.

That aside...I have plenty of experimental experience playing with the tools, and have gone through Alletun's stuff as well, so I don't think there is anything glaring in what he has done to create the odd effect. I think we are looking at something that has been hidden under Dwarfishness, and is starting to rear it's head now we are doing other things.

Phew...

Oh yes.....and make sure you keep the doors locked and the windows up when you go shopping! Bring a friend and keep the motor running while you buy the stuff... and have the right money ready! Otherwise...while he rummages for change, your car loses it's wheels!

And ...yes ... I have lived in that kind of neighbourhood before

[Alletun]

Now...when we were testing this stuff, we worked on Dwarf skeletons. These had the dimensions REDUCED in terms of height, so this might actually serve to hide some issues with the calculations.

now thats pretty interesting. im doing a goblin with a smaller skeleton right now so im gonna experiment with it.

[KnightErrant]

Actually, not so scary. No muggers or pros at that time of
thie morning, just some homeless who actually got me to the right
place for some cigarettes. Sort of a Frick and Frack thing though,
"sorry have to buy the whole faucet for a replacement", "maa'm the
faucet is cemented into a brick wall on the side of my house", "not
my problem, would you like to talk to a manager", "unless he's a mason
I don't see how that would help", and it went downhill from there.

Yes, I think as well, this is something that was hidden under the dwarfishness.
The basepose problem came out clearly about the feet but with the larger
than normal skeletons something else is happening and I don't know what it
is. If worst comes to worst we can post to the powers that be (Caliban) and
see if that elicits some aid.

Alletun's experiment with a smaller goblin might help with quantifying the
problem size with the skeleton size.

KE

[Bwian]

Ahh....the joys of customer service! IF you had stayed longer, I am sure the manager would have tried to sell you a new wall as well!

Ahh...you want the X27914 wall mounted faucet. Yes...comes complete with it's own wall...only $970.00 plus tax. No...it's not available seperately. Oh and don't forget the fixing kit...and delivery charge. And the washer in the tap is extra.

It's all one big conspiracy to stop us doing it ourselves, and force us to pay tradesmen. Me...I blame the Masons

[GrumpyOldMan]

Hi Guys

Just passing through and I thought I'd add my two washers worth (in keeping with the plumbing theme). The strangeness in the bones seems to be a problem with the matrices we're applying. I've been totally immersing myself in dx9 and shaders at the moment but to get back to animation - each bone requires three matrices for successful animation. First a global matrix ie it's position in world coordinates, this is used (as an inverse) to find the local position of the vertex in relation to the bone. Next we have a local matrix, which is an offset matrix from the parent bone. Last is the transformation matrix for that frame ( and of course the final transformation matrix for the parent bone).

So , to correctly move a vertex to it's new location :-

new.vector = pose.vector * M.inverse.global.bone * M.offset.bone * M.current.frame.bone * M.final.parent

I haven't gone through anything yet but I'm just wondering if the strangeness is being caused by applying a M.global.bone instead of M.offset.bone. This would cause strange behaviour and placement.

Cheers

GrumpyOldMan