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[RC2] Your feedback (update 07/01/2018)

Morganimator

Re: [Alpha5] Your feedback (update 02/18/2018)

Post by Morganimator » Tue Feb 20, 2018 8:51 pm

I'm having some trouble understanding how the "controllers" within the "Connector" are supposed to work. The angle controller for example, says: "Double click on handle to move the slider and use this angle control to connect the controller". I've connected the controller to a property "child" both with and without animation on it just using the "connect to properties" button, but nothing happens with I rotate the controller layer, and if I "double click" on the handle as it says in the instructions, it selects the black circle not the red "handle", and rotating that does nothing either. I also can't do anything with the "angle control" i'm supposed to "use to connect the controller", it just pops back to 0 when I try and adjust it. But I'm also not clear on what it's supposed to do anyway. :?
I also tried the 2D slider control, and it just seemed to create a basic parenting relationship between the x and y properties I attached it to even though I had animation on the "child" layers, which I thought it would drive.

I'm sure I'm just not using these correctly... Maybe a short video tutorial could clear this up? I know you're probably a ways away from creating full tutorials and/or instructions for everything, but I'd like to try these out if I can... :?:

Oh, and one more thing, maybe these "handles" should also have locked scale properties just like the other controllers.. ;)

PS - The "Connect to Opacities" is so great! I saw the short tutorial video posted in the connector thread on this. It works so well and makes setting up mouth/hand/eyelid selectors so much quicker. Love it... :D

Duduf
Posts: 915
Joined: Mon Jun 20, 2016 2:59 pm

Re: [Alpha6] Your feedback (update 03/10/2018)

Post by Duduf » Sat Mar 10, 2018 9:55 pm

I've just made available the 6th Alpha version!

Click here to download it!

Recently, I've been working on the Auto-Rig tool of Duik 16.

With the new structures in Duik 16 I had a unique opportunity to make it more versatile than ever, so I took it.

It can now rig all kinds of walking animals: plantigrades (humans, bears and rabbits), digitigrades (cats and dogs) and ungulates (cattle, sheeps..).
Versatility...

The Auto-rig now handles 20 different limb parts for these 3 kinds of walking animals.

This means there are 31 possible different combinations just for the human arm, plus 10 for other kinds of animals.

Out of curiosity, I read this page to calculate that there are 10.455 possible different combinations to create any animal with two identical arms and two identical legs.

But of course, your characters can have just one arm. Or three. With or without tails. Maybe 8 tails? You're free to try anything, I'm pretty confident the Autorig will handle the situation!
Yes, you can rig an octopus with just one head and 8 tails. Maybe I'll record a quick tutorial about this one ;)

There are other new things in this new Alpha test version of Duik 16, all the details are here.

As always, just unzip the .jsx file to the ScriptUI Panels folder of After Effects and you're good to go!

Morganimator

Re: [Alpha6] Your feedback (update 03/10/2018)

Post by Morganimator » Sun Mar 18, 2018 2:59 pm

Alpha 6 is working great! The auto-rigging is really fantastic especially for the feet with all the foot roll controls... super cool! 8-)
And the controllers scale values being "auto" locked is so great, thanks! ;)

A couple of small things I noticed:

- The bezier IK "Draw Guides" checkbox isn't turning off the two "dot" controllers as I think it's supposed to...? Although those "dots" work great for creating S curves in stuff like tails, if you don't need them - like for a simpler spine - it'd be nice to be able to turn them off.

- For some reason, the "curve" and "dot" controls on the bezier IK are defaulting to being really, really tiny, even if the controllers are set to "Large". The top "Spine" controller is the only one that is "Large" when the bezier IK is added. (see attached image) I can change the others manually of course, but it seems they should all be the same size as the controller setting...?
Screen Shot 2018-03-18 at 10.49.15 AM.png
- Finally, a humble request: Would you consider making a "chest"/rib cage controller icon? I personally like to rig torsos with both a pelvis and chest control (like a 3D rig). It's be awesome to have a controller icon for that to go with the pelvis and skull icons. :)

- FYI the "slider" "angle" and "position" icons work much better/easier with the new two layer setup! Good improvement.

I'm having so much fun with DUIK 16! Can't wait for the final version to be released. Everyone's going to love it!

Morganimator

Re: [Alpha6] Your feedback (update 03/10/2018)

Post by Morganimator » Sun Mar 18, 2018 3:09 pm

Oh, wait, a couple more things I forgot:

- The "foot roll" controls and the leg auto-rig are really awesome, but is there any way there could be individual control over the toe as well? Nice to be able to animate that toe for drag/overlap and followthrough stuff, etc...

- This one's really nit-picky; but on the "Handle In" and "Handle Out" (the "Dot") controllers on the Bezier IK curve control, I noticed that the x property is "zero'ed" out, but the y property is not. Any way to make both properties "neutral" value zero?

Thanks again!

Duduf
Posts: 915
Joined: Mon Jun 20, 2016 2:59 pm

Re: [Alpha6] Your feedback (update 03/10/2018)

Post by Duduf » Mon Mar 19, 2018 8:01 pm

Many thanks for this feedback, very useful!

I'll check all of this ASAP and let you know what I can fix and improve thanks to you!

Morganimator

Re: [Alpha6] Your feedback (update 03/10/2018)

Post by Morganimator » Thu Mar 22, 2018 12:18 pm

Just found another small issue: The "snapping" option for the sliders when using the Connector seems to have stopped working. It was working with - I think - the first Alpha version, I don't think I tested it with Alpha 5, but it's definitely not working on Alpha 6. Really great feature BTW!

I've also run into a little IK issue that's hard to describe in words, so I'll record a video for you demonstrating it in the next couple days...

Glad I can help prefect and improve v16! :)

Morganimator

Re: [Alpha6] Your feedback (update 03/10/2018)

Post by Morganimator » Thu Mar 22, 2018 9:33 pm

Oops, BTW, I don't think the "use limits" is working either with the Connector's "Connector Options"...

Duduf
Posts: 915
Joined: Mon Jun 20, 2016 2:59 pm

Re: [Alpha8] Your feedback (update 03/31/2018)

Post by Duduf » Sat Mar 31, 2018 2:12 pm

I've just made available the 8th Alpha version!

Click here to download it
!

Some you may wonder why these versions are called Alpha and not Beta as usual when we ask people to test software. I'm just waiting to have implemented all features to call the versions Beta. This means when we will be in Beta test, we're going to just fix bugs but not change features. While we're in Alpha, we can still change a lot of stuff...
But it's nearly over! There are just a few more features to implement (and some to re-implement from Duik 15 which have not been transfered yet)...


There are three important new features since the latest Alpha I shared here:


Rookie mode: in previous versions, there were the expert mode (smaller UI), and the standard mode (all features and nice buttons). I've added a Rookie mode (which is the one enabled by default) in which the most advanced tools are hidden. This makes the UI smaller than the standard mode, but still very functionnal, as a great amount of work has been done to make the tools smarter and easier to use.


fk-overlap-and-spring.gif


FK Overlap in the rigging tools, which you can see in action in the animation above (combined with the well-known Spring tool).
This is going to be a very useful tool for rigging tails and ropes... Let's watch what it can do.

Basic use:

overlap.gif
FK-Overlaop.gif


With a shape and bones (this was done quickly with just some parenting, I think the tangents could be rigged to obtain a better curve):

FK-Overlaop-shape.gif


And the third great new feature is the IK/FK Switch tool (in the animation panel/Tools).

ikfk.gif


Be careful, this tool won't work with IK created with a previous version. Actually, you may encounter some bugs when opening a project rigged with an older version of Duik 16, in this case, you may have to restart After Effects. This is just because those are Alpha versions, and the version management of the effects used by Duik has not been implemented yet. Of course, this will be done in the Beta and public release.

Let me know what you think of all these tools, this month I should have more time to work on Duik, and I hope to have implemented all the remaining features in the upcoming weeks.

Cheers!

Morganimator

Re: [Alpha8] Your feedback (update 03/31/2018)

Post by Morganimator » Thu Apr 05, 2018 2:34 pm

:shock:
That auto overlap and followthrough it so awesome!!

Can't wait to try it out... I haven't had a chance to download Alpha 8 just yet, but I'll be playing with it soon... :)

Morganimator

Re: [Alpha8] Your feedback (update 03/31/2018)

Post by Morganimator » Fri Apr 06, 2018 6:21 pm

First off, the FK Overlap in Alpha 8 is AWESOME! :shock:

However, I'm getting 4 persistent expression errors in Alpha 8 creating basic IK on any arm or leg, etc.
Right now I'm using CC2017 here at the school. I'll try it on CC2018 at home this weekend. Here's a screencap of the four errors:
Alpha8Error2.png

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