Questions regarding animation

[jewbacca]

Hello there
Something keeps bothering me. I haven't seen many new animations added to mb2.
Might that be beacuse there's some technical restriction in place on how many animations mb2 can handle?
Like, I'm talking about that huge ass file which stores most of the animation frames (_humanoid.gla).

I mean... if mb2 already reached this limit then it would explain why we haven't had any new cool animations in a quite a while


P.S
I'm just trying to figure out animation process for jka/mb2. Nothing fancy.
P.P.S
_humanoid.gla is a total mess :-/ Why would anyone keep every single animation in one file?

 

[prejudicedroid]

It mite b nimations requiyr tons uv tirn tstn. It hapenid 2 me ai tried run normol jedi academy aftur instaln move batls caracturs wure glichid sayn it lightli hds lokn in rong direcshun limbs strechn.

if we made n nimashun 4 eksempel an shield 4 mndo, wod we hav 2 maek an separaet nimashun 4 c clas, c gun, c explosive? no id, bat ai tink is an lot uv efort 2 acomomplish.

 

[Shenghai]

Hello there
Something keeps bothering me. I haven't seen many new animations added to mb2.
Might that be beacuse there's some technical restriction in place on how many animations mb2 can handle?
Like, I'm talking about that huge ass file which stores most of the animation frames (_humanoid.gla).

I mean... if mb2 already reached this limit then it would explain why we haven't had any new cool animations in a quite a while


P.S
I'm just trying to figure out animation process for jka/mb2. Nothing fancy.
P.P.S
_humanoid.gla is a total mess :-/ Why would anyone keep every single animation in one file?

I can't help you too much on the animation front, (I would check the modding discord for JKA and ask a few questions there), but the animations are stored in the .gla file simply because that's the format that the quake engine (the engine jka and mb2 run off of) used. They are stored in a single file because it makes it easier for modders and I would assume developers to test models for animation breaks. A great example of this would be to run Modview, pick a character, and run through all of the animations with that character, looking for tearing and the like.

TLR; Stored that way for simplicity in the modeling department.

 

[jewbacca]

Umm... somewhere on my quest of studying the ways of animation for mb2 it went really wrong :-/

I just wanted to see how my brand new animation would look like in the game, so I replaced some unused animation in _humanoid.gla with my new one, and included reference to it it in saber file for FA map.
So to test animation I have to load FA version of cmp_endor map, pick ewok fighter with wooden stick (since that's the character with modified saber file) and use taunt as him. In the end it looks kinda unnatural and hilarious. Ewww...

I know, im not forced to use ewoks, but replacing fur bastards with someone else doesn't add any elegance to this solution.

I have a question, sir, please!
Is there any way to do it easier? Like through the console or something. Poor ewoks suffer.

 

[jewbacca]

Another question
Is it possible to loop only a sertain part of animation but not the whole thing?

Example:
Lets's say there's a BOTH_STAND11 animation (which is idle animation of a player just standing), and BOTH_STAND12, which is stance (player holds block).
So, in BOTH_STAND12 couple of first frames are transition from BOTH_STAND11 to BOTH_STAND12, and other frames are just stance loop

I want transition frames to only occur once (on player starting hold block), and then loop stance frames. (you know, breathing, slight hand movement and other stuff)
Is it possible? I can see a lot of applications to this.

Should I maybe just make them separate animations? The problem is, I had seen some anims like BOTH_STAND1TOSTAND2, but I'm not sure mb2 even using them, so that's why I want my stance to contain transition. Otherwise not possible to test properly.

 

[Shenghai]

Umm... somewhere on my quest of studying the ways of animation for mb2 it went really wrong :-/

I just wanted to see how my brand new animation would look like in the game, so I replaced some unused animation in _humanoid.gla with my new one, and included reference to it it in saber file for FA map.
So to test animation I have to load FA version of cmp_endor map, pick ewok fighter with wooden stick (since that's the character with modified saber file) and use taunt as him. In the end it looks kinda unnatural and hilarious. Ewww...

I know, im not forced to use ewoks, but replacing fur bastards with someone else doesn't add any elegance to this solution.

I have a question, sir, please!
Is there any way to do it easier? Like through the console or something. Poor ewoks suffer.

Well, I'm not entirely sure, but I think that modview has a functionality like this. You would only have to put your modified .gla in the base/models/players/ path, and make sure it's named _humanoid.

Another question
Is it possible to loop only a sertain part of animation but not the whole thing?

Example:
Lets's say there's a BOTH_STAND11 animation (which is idle animation of a player just standing), and BOTH_STAND12, which is stance (player holds block).
So, in BOTH_STAND12 couple of first frames are transition from BOTH_STAND11 to BOTH_STAND12, and other frames are just stance loop

I want transition frames to only occur once (on player starting hold block), and then loop stance frames. (you know, breathing, slight hand movement and other stuff)
Is it possible? I can see a lot of applications to this.

Should I maybe just make them separate animations? The problem is, I had seen some anims like BOTH_STAND1TOSTAND2, but I'm not sure mb2 even using them, so that's why I want my stance to contain transition. Otherwise not possible to test properly.

As far as I'm aware, MB2 doesn't use transition frames.

I suppose you COULD loop the stance frames, but I'm not quite sure how you could implement that. Maybe best to ask eezstreet or someone else in here: Discord - Free voice and text chat for gamers

 

[jewbacca]

Well, thanks

I guess it's really not the right place to ask those things. I'll move to discord next time then, thanks for answers ^^