can't export facial morph animation
by Julie Petrisot · in Artist Corner · 04/08/2009 (2:50 am) · 3 replies
Hello!
For the past 2 days I have been trying to export some facial expressions..
This is what I did:
1.The face mesh is originaly exported from facegen modeller 3.1 as an .obj file (lookes fine in 3ds max version 9). All the other meshes (happy,sad,..)are olso .obj files exported from facegen.
2. The next step I took was exporting (from max) the neutral face as a dts object to check if the form looks ok in show tool pro.Of course it wasn't (faces missing, faces sticking out as far as the eye can see, visible seems,...). After doing a vertex weld the shape was looking good and exported just fine.
3.now, the shape is an editable mesh, skinned (head bones added), put the morpher on top of this (lookes good and works fine in max)
4. Now I put all the emotions on a timeline to export them 1 by 1
I can't get this shape exported anymore for this error keeps coming up: assertion failed on skin object.so I look on the forum and found this solution in viewthread/62880 (add convert to edit mesh below the skin modifier, save skin modifier data,collapse mesh,reapply skin modifier data)
Now it is still not working and I only export empty files. I tried to scamble the order of the modifiers but no luck. And after this fix up
all morph deformation is lost (moving the timeline and nothing is happening)
It's a long story but I am getting lost myself in what seems to be a vicious circle of export problems... I can provide more information about my situation if necesery
If any one has tips or tricks...Or should I use vertex facial controller setup to create the emotions? I am so lost..
For the past 2 days I have been trying to export some facial expressions..
This is what I did:
1.The face mesh is originaly exported from facegen modeller 3.1 as an .obj file (lookes fine in 3ds max version 9). All the other meshes (happy,sad,..)are olso .obj files exported from facegen.
2. The next step I took was exporting (from max) the neutral face as a dts object to check if the form looks ok in show tool pro.Of course it wasn't (faces missing, faces sticking out as far as the eye can see, visible seems,...). After doing a vertex weld the shape was looking good and exported just fine.
3.now, the shape is an editable mesh, skinned (head bones added), put the morpher on top of this (lookes good and works fine in max)
4. Now I put all the emotions on a timeline to export them 1 by 1
I can't get this shape exported anymore for this error keeps coming up: assertion failed on skin object.so I look on the forum and found this solution in viewthread/62880 (add convert to edit mesh below the skin modifier, save skin modifier data,collapse mesh,reapply skin modifier data)
Now it is still not working and I only export empty files. I tried to scamble the order of the modifiers but no luck. And after this fix up
all morph deformation is lost (moving the timeline and nothing is happening)
It's a long story but I am getting lost myself in what seems to be a vicious circle of export problems... I can provide more information about my situation if necesery
If any one has tips or tricks...Or should I use vertex facial controller setup to create the emotions? I am so lost..
#2
You can't export any morph animation period.
The only way to do facial animations in torque is to create a facial bone structure. This means, you have to make a node for each part of the face and attach the mesh to those nodes. Then you animate those nodes to move around the face.
So take your base mesh, create your face bones, attach the mesh to those new nodes(and link those nodes to the head bone). Then you just animate away...
It does kind of suck that morph animations don't work in torque. I found out the hard way too. Wasted a good day and then found a forum post telling me the same thing i just posted... Good luck, hope this helps...
04/08/2009 (2:55 pm)
Unless something has changed, torque can't use morph animations...You can't export any morph animation period.
The only way to do facial animations in torque is to create a facial bone structure. This means, you have to make a node for each part of the face and attach the mesh to those nodes. Then you animate those nodes to move around the face.
So take your base mesh, create your face bones, attach the mesh to those new nodes(and link those nodes to the head bone). Then you just animate away...
It does kind of suck that morph animations don't work in torque. I found out the hard way too. Wasted a good day and then found a forum post telling me the same thing i just posted... Good luck, hope this helps...
#3
I had assumed since they worked in STP that they would work in game. ..how silly of me to expect things to work the same. :P
Perhaps we can get this sorted as I would like to use morph animations in upcoming projects.
04/09/2009 (12:56 pm)
I just tested a morph animated object and it appears properly in showtoolpro but not in game. ... . .. .?I had assumed since they worked in STP that they would work in game. ..how silly of me to expect things to work the same. :P
Perhaps we can get this sorted as I would like to use morph animations in upcoming projects.
Torque Owner TheGasMan
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