Slider to interpolate between two combinations of sliders

elusivealbums

I'm working on a scene in which a character needs to slowly shrink between two forms. One, a normal human form and the second a miniature faerie version. The difference between the two is a number of different morph sliders: larger head and eyes, different body proportions, etc.

Both forms are solely derived from sliders--no need to go to an external modeling program and tweak them there.

I've been reading about full body morphs, which sounds like it will do the job. However, it sounds a bit like overkill for what I need to do.

Ideally, I just want to save the difference between the two forms into a single slider ranging from 0-100 (or whatever range.) 0 is the fully human form and 100 is the fully faerie form, and then I can set a master slider to smaller increments for subtle changes each frame. From a programming standpoint, this sounds like a pretty easy thing to do, just linear interpretation for any slider that is not set to its default value.

As a side note, I don't plan on releasing this or anything; the scope is limited to just my project.

Any tips or leads on how to go about doing this?

Thanks!

Richard Haseltine

You could fairly easily create a single master slider for each of the shapes using ERC Freeze, one that would set the components to their full values at 1 and have the base shape at 0, then turn one up as the other was turned down.

Save before you do this - some people have reported crashes using ERC Freeze though it was OK for me. Apply one set of morphs, open the Property Hierarchy pane, right-click on the figure and select ERC Freeze. Seelct your figure and the root (presumably), make sure your morphs are selected at the bottom, and uncheck Restore Rigging (it shouldn't hurt if you don't, but it's safer) then click the Create new button for property and give it a name, a path (where it will appear in the Parameters pane) and adjust settings (here I set the minimum value to 0, since you wouldn't want to go negative). Click Accept in both dialogues and you should now find that there's a single slider set, controlling all the morphs you sued to create the character. repeat for the other character.

elusivealbums

Thanks, I'll have to try this out when I get home.

I don't want to pass through a medium form. So I suppose I can try something like this for the scenes:

Faeire ------ Human
0% 100%
10% 90%
20% 80%
..... .....
90% 10%
100% 0%

But won't that give me elements of the base genesis morph? So at 50/50, it's both halfway between genesis base -> faerie and genesis base -> human?

Richard Haseltine

Yes, it will - but if a morph is used, to some extent, in both then it will always be at least partially present (faerie*f-morph+human*h-morph, where faerie and human are the values of the control morphs and f-morph and h-morph are the values of the morph in each version - so if there are basic shaping morphs that are set to the same in both those will stay constant as you make your transition).

elusivealbums

Just tried it out--seems to be exactly what I wanted, thanks!

Just a quick question to tack on: is it possible to have the second slider automatically adjust to slider A's value inversely, such that the two together never exceed 100%?

Thanks again!

Richard Haseltine

Yes, you'd need a hidden, locked property set to 1 - OneConst say - and then you'd set an ERC link (using the Parameter pane in Edit more and the Property Hierarchy) so that Faerie had as a controller OneConst (set to add) and Human (set to minus). You'd use the same Create New dialogue to set up the OneConst property, checking the hidden and locked and Use limits boxes and making min, max and value 1, then you'd right-click on the Parameter pane's tab, make sure Show Hidden was checked, and then again to enable Edit mode. Drag first the OneConst property, then the Human property onto Controllers under the Fairy property, then use the triangle next to the name to expand the options under human and right-click to change the type to Subtract.

elusivealbums

Allow me to ask one more question on this subject. Right now I'm working on creating some new expression presets, similar to the default Angry / Concentrate / Fear / Glare sliders in both Genesis/Pose Controls/Head/Expressions and Head/PoseControls/Head/Expressions.

When I save my morph, I set the path to Pose Controls/Head/Expressions. However, this means that I only ever see the option show up when I have the head selected directly--NOT if I click the Genesis figure as a whole and navigate to expressions that way.

How can I set my new expression up to be in both Head and Genesis objects?

Edit: Nevermind, I think I figured it out. Saving the morph asset from Head is a child of saving the morph from Genesis; I should have selected the expression to save from Genesis rather than Head when I was first freezing it, since Head inherits the Genesis morphs but not vice-versa... I think? :P

pwiecek

elusivealbums said:

Thanks, I'll have to try this out when I get home.

I don't want to pass through a medium form. So I suppose I can try something like this for the scenes:

Faeire ------ Human
0% 100%
10% 90%
20% 80%
..... .....
90% 10%
100% 0%

But won't that give me elements of the base genesis morph? So at 50/50, it's both halfway between genesis base -> faerie and genesis base -> human?

This doesn't apply because "Human" is the base you're working from. I.E. The model can't be 0% human.