So basically I want to create a third or first person shooter with a character that can aim a gun (obviously). I have a character that my artist made in Maya and I will import via MD5 with the MD5Importer. There is this feature in Maya that you can orient bones about a specific point, so that when the point moves the character orients to that point. This is useful for aim a gun because to find that point all I have to do is cast a ray from the camera (behind my character in my TPS or FPS game) through the crosshairs onscreen 10 units forward to find my point. Then change the animation so the character aims his gun that direction. I've used MD5Importer for awhile, but I'm wondering if it would be possible to do this?
this doesnt have much to do with the impoter or the default animator provided. but this doesnt sound difficult. u should be create a custom animator that performs the proper collision detection and animation swith.
Thanks neakor that was a little helpful. Since you created a MD5Importer I thought you could help, not for the importer's sake, but because MD5Importer is practically the JME Animation API. What I was trying to ask seemed really hard to explain, but is it possible to orientate (aim) a group of bones (say the left and right arms, and the head) which aren't connected to each other toward a point, but still animated (so they match-up with the walk cycle of the character)?
SomethingNew said:
Thanks neakor that was a little helpful. Since you created a MD5Importer I thought you could help, not for the importer's sake, but because MD5Importer is practically the JME Animation API. What I was trying to ask seemed really hard to explain, but is it possible to orientate (aim) a group of bones (say the left and right arms, and the head) which aren't connected to each other toward a point, but still animated (so they match-up with the walk cycle of the character)?
u should be trying to rotate the node not the bones.
hmm well how does jME play with IK solving if not i was planning on creating a class to control the upper joints, but why not import the upper half and lower half as two separate Nodes like Neakor does in his test classes and control them separately or would their be drawbacks?
Bonechilla said:
hmm well how does jME play with IK solving if not i was planning on creating a class to control the upper joints, but why not import the upper half and lower half as two separate Nodes like Neakor does in his test classes and control them separately or would their be drawbacks?
if u r using the concurrent version, there will be draw backs. this cause the concurrent version will update the two skeletons in a separate thread from the rendering one, when the first skeleton is updated, the result is immediately reflected to the rendering thread then onto the display. however, the second skeleton has not been updated yet. so ull c that the second skeleton seems to be lagging behind.
Bonechilla said:
hmm well how does jME play with IK solving if not i was planning on creating a class to control the upper joints, but why not import the upper half and lower half as two separate Nodes like Neakor does in his test classes and control them separately or would their be drawbacks?
u mean like md3s, yuck, depending on what u a trying to accomplish sometimes the results are just plain ugly............the hunter model in quake 3 comes to mind, it would be nice to override/clear animation on specific bones instead, in doom3 its called "bone channels", I think something similar was employed in RTCW as well, the only seperated piece is the head
So your saying it's not a good idea to make a character into two separate nodes (upper half, and lower half) for the concurrent version?
mcbeth said:
u mean like md3s, yuck, depending on what u a trying to accomplish sometimes the results are just plain ugly............the hunter model in quake 3 comes to mind, it would be nice to override/clear animation on specific bones instead, in doom3 its called "bone channels", I think something similar was employed in RTCW as well, the only seperated piece is the head
I'm planning to mess around with BoneTracks in the ogreLoader :D well once i get past some other things anyway
SomethingNew said:
So your saying it's not a good idea to make a character into two separate nodes (upper half, and lower half) for the concurrent version?
if you are referring to my comment, I mean from a visual standpoint, if your model design doesn't allow for the "separation" points to be well hidden or hidden at all for that matter, a scantly clad female model (hunter) for example
What's a better way to do it instead of two top and bottom nodes?
SomethingNew said:
What's a better way to do it instead of two top and bottom nodes?
as has been said before boneTracks/channels basically during blending, only specific bones are influenced by a particular animation, its been around for a while as a technique