Question Animations without timeline?

[Kexmonster]

I feel that I'm missing something crucial here. Many free scenes have buttons to change poses, erection and animations. These same scenes do not seem to be using Timeline, as far as I can tell. What I've learned from tutorials is that atoms need to be passing through animation pattern steps cog wheels, and along the line connecting them. But in these scenes there are animation patterns all over the place, and none anywhere near the atoms. I've also looked through all possible setting for the animation pattern controllers and steps, and cannot find anything regarding the actual animation that they perform. They are not linked to anything.

What am I missing here? Are these complex scenes made using animation patterns and variable triggers without Timeline? How can I make a person wave using an animation pattern, with the animation pattern atom being nowhere the person atom?

 

[C&G-STUDIO]

I feel that I'm missing something crucial here. Many free scenes have buttons to change poses, erection and animations. These same scenes do not seem to be using Timeline, as far as I can tell. What I've learned from tutorials is that atoms need to be passing through animation pattern steps cog wheels, and along the line connecting them. But in these scenes there are animation patterns all over the place, and none anywhere near the atoms. I've also looked through all possible setting for the animation pattern controllers and steps, and cannot find anything regarding the actual animation that they perform. They are not linked to anything.

What am I missing here? Are these complex scenes made using animation patterns and variable triggers without Timeline? How can I make a person wave using an animation pattern, with the animation pattern atom being nowhere the person atom?

Animation patterns don´t have to be close to it´s cog wheels. Those wheels are actually the "performing" unit moving the specific atom/node. The Animation pattern itself acts like a control pattern for speed, links and so on. Anyway I assume you knew this already.

So just a dumb question sorting out the obvious...Did you "unhide" all atoms in the scene? Click on the white mouse arrow on your main bar and checkbox "Show Hidden".

Using multiple animation pattern with a lot of single wheels often results in a total mess. So what creators like to do is to hide those wheels they´re not working with at the moment to have a better overview.

Gato

 

[MacGruber]

There are lots of possible ways to animate in VaM.

Possibly the scene is using IdlePoser? If the changes between poses are animated, it might be this:

IdlePoser - Plugins -

IdlePoser is a state-based idle animation solution. States are essentially poses, but they can be anchored to body parts or even other characters. This makes it possible for different instances of IdlePoser to interact with each other, creating...

hub.virtamate.com

Note that there is a thing called "Timeline" in VaM as well as a plugin called Timeline. Possibly you are confusing these.

Timeline - Plugins -

Timeline ? Do you like Timeline? Support me on Patreon and get early access to new features: https://www.patreon.com/posts/39197180 ? Need help creating animations or want to share your works of art? Join us on Discord...

hub.virtamate.com

Poses could also be changed by loading pose presets via triggers. There are also various animation plugins for specific purposes (blowjob, handjob, etc) instead of being generic like Timeline and IdlePoser.

 

[TToby]

Hi,
like MacGruber said, there are multiple methodes to do animations in VaM.
This situation has somewhat historical reasons... first there was methode A, then methode B, aso.
- Animations with animation patterns: you can set the position of a certain joint controller at a certain time along a custom path for every sub-step. The symbols of the main animation pattern have not to be close to the person.
- Recorded animation paths: if you go to the scene menue "animation"-tab and click on "show animation path", you will maybe see some complicated red lines appear. You can do this by recording the movement of body parts over a certain time span. While this is somewhat complicated to do by hand, MoCap recorded animations or imported BVH-animation files will use this, too.
- Timeline plugin: a legendary user-made tool to give you more control in a timeline-animation style way.
- Rhythm or cycle forces: This is IMHO the most easiest way to do some very simple "animations". Simply add it to your scene, select a person and joint controller, and the hand will go back and forth, for instance.
- Plugins that makes use of the above methodes, like sex-helper plugins, aso.
- The "new" build-on person animation tool, where you can put some ready made animation snippets in a row.

I don't know which methode you may find in your scene, but I think it is helpful to know every methode if you want to reverse-engeneering a scene.
Hope this will help a bit.

 

[ilovebasilm]

How do you arrange animation patterns in sequences? If I for instance have 3 animation patterns, and I want the first to run 3 loop cycles - the second one move the same atom for two loop cycles - and the third move the same atom for lets say one cycle - all this in one smooth animation, is this possible?
And how/where do I arrange this?

 

[ilovebasilm]

How do you arrange animation patterns in sequences? If I for instance have 3 animation patterns, and I want the first to run 3 loop cycles - the second one move the same atom for two loop cycles - and the third move the same atom for lets say one cycle - all this in one smooth animation, is this possible?
And how/where do I arrange this?

I'll answer my own question. I added several trigger tracks to a main animation and controlled everything else in my scene from there. Worked quite well.

I'm open for other suggestions though. It would be nice if you cold make one pattern transfer in to another. Think this is possible but can't find how to do it.

 

[ZRSX]

I'll answer my own question. I added several trigger tracks to a main animation and controlled everything else in my scene from there. Worked quite well.

I'm open for other suggestions though. It would be nice if you cold make one pattern transfer in to another. Think this is possible but can't find how to do it.

Seeing that you're talking about trigger tracks in an animation, I'm guessing you're using Timeline to manage AnimationPatterns.

Well, you could use Timeline on your other atoms too, instead of AnimationPatterns.
To do that, set the atom having the main animation as "Master", so it would control the others.
Then you just have to use exactly the same animation names in all your atoms: when the Master atom will play a specific animation, all the atoms having this specific animation will play it.
You can define how many times an animation will loop in Timeline. And you could sequence your animations as you will (from the Master or from the various atoms depending on what you're trying to do). I think that is what you're meaning when you're asking to "transfer in to another"?
All that can be done without a single trigger.

 

[ilovebasilm]

Seeing that you're talking about trigger tracks in an animation, I'm guessing you're using Timeline to manage AnimationPatterns.

Well, you could use Timeline on your other atoms too, instead of AnimationPatterns.
To do that, set the atom having the main animation as "Master", so it would control the others.
Then you just have to use exactly the same animation names in all your atoms: when the Master atom will play a specific animation, all the atoms having this specific animation will play it.
You can define how many times an animation will loop in Timeline. And you could sequence your animations as you will (from the Master or from the various atoms depending on what you're trying to do). I think that is what you're meaning when you're asking to "transfer in to another"?
All that can be done without a single trigger.

That's right - it was in the timeline-plugin.

What I really meant was to make one Animation pattern seamlessly transfer into the next animation pattern. Simplest example: Lets say I have a hand writing the letter L from top to bottom in the air. Then I have another pattern writing the letter N from bottom left to top right. How could i make the hand go smoothly from the L-pattern directly to the N-pattern?

 

[ZRSX]

Simplest example: Lets say I have a hand writing the letter L from top to bottom in the air. Then I have another pattern writing the letter N from bottom left to top right. How could i make the hand go smoothly from the L-pattern directly to the N-pattern?

I don't get why you're not animating the hand using Timeline. It would be the easiest solution.
If you want to have it animated separately from the rest, take a look at Timeline's layers.


But to answer your question: you can't have 2 AnimationPattern targeting the same node. But there is a way to bypass that: one animation must be animating the other.
So:

1. Set the Receiver of "Animation L" to be the hand
2. Your "Animation N" has to animate your "Animation L" (to indirectly animate the hand). To do that, set its Receiver to the "Animation L"'s control:
   
   
3. Make sure the last step of "Animation L" is at the exact same position as the 1st step of "Animation N"
4. Add a trigger on the last step of "Animation L" to start "Animation N" (or anywhere else if you want to trigger it independently).
   
   
   
   Done!

If you want to add a transition between the 2 animations, you can add a 3rd animation in-between, to go from L to N. Set the receivers accordingly (each animation except the 1st one should be controlling the one before).


Another way (a more elegant one) of doing that with AnimationPattern is to use only 1 Animation, and pause it at some key points.
To add a pause, go to the step you want the animation to pause at, and add a "Pause" trigger like that:

Then you can trigger it to continue (use the "Play" or "Unpause" triggers): it'll play the next steps until it meets a "Pause" trigger again.
So: the 1st part of the animation will do the "L" then pause when done. When triggered, the 2nd part will do the transition then pause. And finally, when triggered, the last part will play.

 

[ilovebasilm]

I don't get why you're not animating the hand using Timeline. It would be the easiest solution.
If you want to have it animated separately from the rest, take a look at Timeline's layers.


But to answer your question: you can't have 2 AnimationPattern targeting the same node. But there is a way to bypass that: one animation must be animating the other.
So:

1. Set the Receiver of "Animation L" to be the hand
2. Your "Animation N" has to animate your "Animation L" (to indirectly animate the hand). To do that, set its Receiver to the "Animation L"'s control:
   View attachment 98882
3. Make sure the last step of "Animation L" is at the exact same position as the 1st step of "Animation N"
4. Add a trigger on the last step of "Animation L" to start "Animation N" (or anywhere else if you want to trigger it independently).
   View attachment 98883
   Done!

If you want to add a transition between the 2 animations, you can add a 3rd animation in-between, to go from L to N. Set the receivers accordingly (each animation except the 1st one should be controlling the one before).


Another way (a more elegant one) of doing that with AnimationPattern is to use only 1 Animation, and pause it at some key points.
To add a pause, go to the step you want the animation to pause at, and add a "Pause" trigger like that:
View attachment 98892
Then you can trigger it to continue (use the "Play" or "Unpause" triggers): it'll play the next steps until it meets a "Pause" trigger again.
So: the 1st part of the animation will do the "L" then pause when done. When triggered, the 2nd part will do the transition then pause. And finally, when triggered, the last part will play.

Thank you! Animation patterns is really good sometimes to animate repeating motions, and to make some motions look natural. That's why I do not always prefer the timeline. (Though I like that plugin very much). I actually did exactly as your last example, so I was on the right track then. Nice of you to answer so thoroghly!