Plugins Silver Expression Tool

[ClockwiseSilver]

ClockwiseSilver submitted a new resource:

Silver Expression Tool - Bring characters to life with two independant series of expressions.

Silver Expression Tool cycles through 2 independent series of expressions in random order. Presets can be saved to quickly call up your favorite bank of expressions. Animating two different expressions on different timescales minimizes the obvious repetition of the same looks and makes for a bit more natural variety.

The download is available to supporters right now and will be free for all on 12/25/2020! ENJOY!!!

To use the script, add SilverExpressionTool.cslist to your character's...

Read more about this resource...

 

[ubermanhk]

so, how is this different from running two (or more) instances of expessionrandomizer?

 

[thanos]

how about a video demo

 

[ClockwiseSilver]

so, how is this different from running two (or more) instances of expessionrandomizer?

Aside from presets and only needing 1 instance? Expression Randomizer is great, so not knocking it, but it iterates through all morphs twice each fixed update (which is realistically not a huge deal, but VaM needs every spare resource it can get). I initially created this just for an efficiency gain, only iterating through selected morphs, but I ended up liking the interface better as well. That's just personal preference. The new-ish popup filters make finding expresisons easier (I have tons of them). The transitions are also eased curves, which looks a little more natural to me. Still, you definitely can use two instances of Expression Randomizer, this is just a different approach to the same problem.

 

[Nameless Vagabond]

I'll second a request for a demo video

 

[ClockwiseSilver]

ClockwiseSilver updated Silver Expression Tool with a new update entry:

Now Free!

The Early Access period has ended and Silver Expression Tool is now free on Hub. Have Fun!!!

Read the rest of this update entry...

 

[Gerald123]

Nice plugin, and I have some feedback here:
- when plugin is disabled in plugins tab, expressions still working
- sliders won't set to zero by dragging mouse, have to click decreasing buttons to set zero value
- checkboxs for disabling panels would be good (currently I have to set zero value to disable panel)
- why is this three-items minimum limit? As I understand, currently the only way to mix two expressions - is to add them to separate panels, so it could be only one expression in first panel, and one in second panel.

Anyway, good work!

 

[ClockwiseSilver]

Nice plugin, and I have some feedback here:
- when plugin is disabled in plugins tab, expressions still working
- sliders won't set to zero by dragging mouse, have to click decreasing buttons to set zero value
- checkboxs for disabling panels would be good (currently I have to set zero value to disable panel)
- why is this three-items minimum limit? As I understand, currently the only way to mix two expressions - is to add them to separate panels, so it could be only one expression in first panel, and one in second panel.

Anyway, good work!

Thank you for the feedback! I'll check out those items for sure! The requirement for 3 is just sort of a safety for how the random selection gets made. It should probably work fine with fewer, but I just need to find time to test and make sure everything behaves itself when fewer than 3 are added

 

[rweb]

After testing out this plugin let me say, #1: This is awesome! Great work and thank you. The plugin is already very usable.

#2: I have some requests, suggestions and questions.

-- I got confused at first when I was trying to save a profile, because I first had to back out of of my AddonPackages directory and go to my Saves directory. I don't know if that is a common problem for users but a note in your instructions might be helpful.

-- I noticed that some of my expression morphs do not load into the plugin, even morphs that are part of the same set as other expression morphs that *do* load into the plugin. Do you know why this might be? Do I just have too many?

Again great work, and thank you.

 

[ClockwiseSilver]

After testing out this plugin let me say, #1: This is awesome! Great work and thank you. The plugin is already very usable.

#2: I have some requests, suggestions and questions.

-- I got confused at first when I was trying to save a profile, because I first had to back out of of my AddonPackages directory and go to my Saves directory. I don't know if that is a common problem for users but a note in your instructions might be helpful.

-- I noticed that some of my expression morphs do not load into the plugin, even morphs that are part of the same set as other expression morphs that *do* load into the plugin. Do you know why this might be? Do I just have too many?

Again great work, and thank you.

Hi rweb, thanks for the feedback! On the first point, I think you're right that a note in the instructions might be helpful. I'll investigate to see if there is a way to change the default save directory to something outside of the addon package, but that may just be the way it is. On the second point, it could be a ocuple of things. The plugin only loads morphs where the region contains the word "Expressions." Also, as you guessed, there is a limit to the number of entries that can be displayed in a filterable dropdown in VaM. If the latter is the issue, you can try using the Add Active function (I have a lot of expressions as well and prefer this method). To use it, apply some of the missing expressions in the Morphs tab (you can apply a bunch at once using small values just so you don't have to tab back and forth a lot). Then go back to the plugin and click "Add Active. If it recognizes the applied morphs as expressions, it will add them to the list (you'll want to reset expresisons after that to zero them out).

If that doesn't work, if you can let me know which expressions aren't showing I can see if I can recreate the issue on my end.

 

[rweb]

Cool, I will keep playing around with the plugin and my morph library.

Regarding the profile saving issue...I thought I had this figured out. But when I tried to load a saved profile yesterday, I found that I couldn't navigate to it in my Saves directory. The plugin opens to the Addon Packages directory, and it seems to be impossible to back out to the main VAM folder, at first. Strangely, I was able to work around this by *attempting* to save a new profile in the default Addon Packages directory. Saving the profile did not work (and there was some error messaging), but for some reason that changed my navigation options in the file browser and I was able to back out to VAM/Saves.

Just FYI! Thanks again

 

[ClockwiseSilver]

Cool, I will keep playing around with the plugin and my morph library.

Regarding the profile saving issue...I thought I had this figured out. But when I tried to load a saved profile yesterday, I found that I couldn't navigate to it in my Saves directory. The plugin opens to the Addon Packages directory, and it seems to be impossible to back out to the main VAM folder, at first. Strangely, I was able to work around this by *attempting* to save a new profile in the default Addon Packages directory. Saving the profile did not work (and there was some error messaging), but for some reason that changed my navigation options in the file browser and I was able to back out to VAM/Saves.

Just FYI! Thanks again

I've had that happen as well! I may need to submit a bug report, but it's possible I'm doing something wrong in the plugin. I'm glad you found a workaround! I've been doing something similar (selecting a new plugin and then backing out, I guess anything that sets the most recent location to something outside the addon package).

 

[ClockwiseSilver]

ClockwiseSilver updated Silver Expression Tool with a new update entry:

Fixed scene load issue, added default preset directory.

Fixed an issue that could cause the plugin to revert to default expressions on scene load.
Added a default preset directory. Hopefully this will resolve issues with the plugin using the addon package location.

Read the rest of this update entry...

 

[Dragontales]

HI. Would like to ask a question or two regarding how to use this. Does it cycle through group one and group 2 at the same time? Or does it ping pong back and forth from group 1 to 2? If it's the first, so like you could put main expression in the first group, and then some accent type morphs in the second?

 

[ClockwiseSilver]

HI. Would like to ask a question or two regarding how to use this. Does it cycle through group one and group 2 at the same time? Or does it ping pong back and forth from group 1 to 2? If it's the first, so like you could put main expression in the first group, and then some accent type morphs in the second?

Hello Dragontales! It cycles through both at the same time, so yep, you could do what you are describing. I like to put expressions that don’t affect the mouth much in the first group, and ones that have visemes or open mouth in the second, but there are a lot of different ways you could do it.

 

[Dragontales]

Gotcha. Thanks for the explanation. Can I ask one more question? when you set the max morph, will the morphs always go to that, or will they be able to do a percentage in between? It seems like they always go to the max you have set. I'm curious if you could also add a Minimum slider and have the plugin use some random number in between min and max for each morph it goes to, allowing for more variation.

 

[ClockwiseSilver]

Gotcha. Thanks for the explanation. Can I ask one more question? when you set the max morph, will the morphs always go to that, or will they be able to do a percentage in between? It seems like they always go to the max you have set. I'm curious if you could also add a Minimum slider and have the plugin use some random number in between min and max for each morph it goes to, allowing for more variation.

It currently always goes up to the set number, but I could look into setting a min-max value instead. It's a good idea, I'll give it some thought!

 

[Mopze]

Hey Clockwise,
i got a little problem with your plugin. i have a scene where your plugin is used 3 times. They'll get enabled and disabled on some events, it works pretty well. But when i reload the scene the groups are totally disordered. I saved all Presets, but i have to load the presets manualy on every start. For Example, i use 3 Expressions in 1.Group and 3 in 2.Group. After reload there are only two expressions left, 1 in 1.Group and 1, sometimes 2 in 2.Group but its multiple times in it. After i reload the preset manualy it works again. Any Idea whats causing this? And i wanted to ask, if its possible to add Finger Poses to it.

 

[ClockwiseSilver]

Hey Clockwise,
i got a little problem with your plugin. i have a scene where your plugin is used 3 times. They'll get enabled and disabled on some events, it works pretty well. But when i reload the scene the groups are totally disordered. I saved all Presets, but i have to load the presets manualy on every start. For Example, i use 3 Expressions in 1.Group and 3 in 2.Group. After reload there are only two expressions left, 1 in 1.Group and 1, sometimes 2 in 2.Group but its multiple times in it. After i reload the preset manualy it works again. Any Idea whats causing this? And i wanted to ask, if its possible to add Finger Poses to it.

Hi Mopze! That’s weird! Thanks for the heads up, I’ll look into it . It would be pretty easy to modify the script to do hands/fingers instead of expressions, I’ll keep it in mind for future updates.

 

[zoidberg]

Nice plugin, but had the problem that it was disabled after loading the scene (when saved), and the expressions I did save it with were not all in its
queue (even though the savefile json still lists them).
Solution was: making sure to set the epression 1 and 2 selectors to "None" before saving the scene !
Now it works like a charm

 

[motorcityclimber]

Nice plugin, but had the problem that it was disabled after loading the scene (when saved), and the expressions I did save it with were not all in its
queue (even though the savefile json still lists them).
Solution was: making sure to set the epression 1 and 2 selectors to "None" before saving the scene !
Now it works like a charm

thank u for this tip.

 

[ClockwiseSilver]

Nice plugin, but had the problem that it was disabled after loading the scene (when saved), and the expressions I did save it with were not all in its
queue (even though the savefile json still lists them).
Solution was: making sure to set the epression 1 and 2 selectors to "None" before saving the scene !
Now it works like a charm

Thank you for this, Zoidberg! Very strange it's happening, but your finding might help point me toward the cause

 

[sdfg3456]

can you please explain why there are two boxes to add expressions to? What's the significance of the second box?

 

[ClockwiseSilver]

can you please explain why there are two boxes to add expressions to? What's the significance of the second box?

Hello! The plugin cycles through two different sets of morphs at the same time to create more variety. When cycling through a single set of morphs, it starts to look pretty obvious that the same facial expressions are turning up repeatedly. By blending two sets of morphs at different time scales, the repetition is much less obvious. I tend to put morphs that focus on the eyes and brows in one box, and morphs with a lot of mouth movement in the other. But it's best just to tinker and see what works for your character.

 

[ClockwiseSilver]

ClockwiseSilver updated Silver Expression Tool with a new update entry:

Fixes and Randomization

I've cleaned up and rewritten big chunks of SilverExpressionTool. There should now be fewer issues with saved parameters failing to load correctly when a scene loads. I've also added randomization to the morph values. Now each bank features a min and max morph value. Each time a new expression is trigger, it will dial up to a random value between min and max.

ENJOY!!!

Read the rest of this update entry...