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13/06/2016 11:44:32

ikesMuvizu mogul
ikes
Posts: 282 		Hi MrDrWho,

Thanks for your reply.

By a gizmo I mean for more precise movement and rotation control on axes. Scaling is not really necessary, but it would be nice to have a bigger scaling range than the sliders do.

I did try AVI as animated textures, but it gives me a kind of washed out look, no cristal clear images. I am sure I do something wrong with the codecs, it gave me all kinds of scrambled clips with different settings. What would be nice though is to be able to import translucent movies to overlay on the camera to orientate the scene camera to the movie.
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13/06/2016 11:46:35

MrDrWho13Muvizu mogulExperimental user
MrDrWho13
Posts: 2220 		It would probably be easier to do the overlay in an external video editor where you don't need to worry about codecs etc.
However, it is less direct which makes it slightly harder to line things up, and to see what it will look like.
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21/06/2016 09:22:54

primaveranz
primaveranz
Posts: 520 		And another thing!
Being able to apply transparent textures to the body to mask out limbs etc. It would make Muvizu far more useful to me in the medical sphere.
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21/06/2016 11:12:55

ziggy72Muvizu mogulExperimental user
ziggy72
Posts: 1988 		primaveranz wrote:
And another thing!
Being able to apply transparent textures to the body to mask out limbs etc. It would make Muvizu far more useful to me in the medical sphere.

You can do this with the 'new' characters (Mandy, Heroine, etc) but not the 'potato heads'. You just set their top to None, or legs, hands, etc.
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21/06/2016 11:39:29

primaveranz
primaveranz
Posts: 520 		ziggy72 wrote:
primaveranz wrote:
And another thing!
Being able to apply transparent textures to the body to mask out limbs etc. It would make Muvizu far more useful to me in the medical sphere.

You can do this with the 'new' characters (Mandy, Heroine, etc) but not the 'potato heads'. You just set their top to None, or legs, hands, etc.


You can't remove the head though?
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21/06/2016 12:22:08

PatMarrNCMuvizu mogul
PatMarrNC
Posts: 1738
"you can't remove the head?"

I wish! If the head could be made invisible while the legs were still visible, we could use the legs-only to create quadrapeds!
But, the answer to your question is: "no, the head's visibility can't be turned off"
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27/06/2016 07:29:51

primaveranz
primaveranz
Posts: 520 		It seems to me that given that Muvizu is built on the Unreal engine that it should be possible for us to create our own animations.

There are only two reasons I can see that would prevent this.
a). That the Muvizu architecture has made too many proprietary changes to allow this to work easily or
b). that Digimania don't want to allow us to do this.

If it is a). then Muvizu will just die of it's own accord like other movies softwares (or at least slip into a moribund coma) because serious users will eventually "hit the wall" of what they can achieve and start looking elsewhere. It is a self-fulfilling situation in that, less sales means less staff and less development so less sales etc.

However if it is b). Then they need to review their game plan.

Moviestorm hit the rocks due to a slightly different issue i.e. choosing the dying Cal3D file format as its base. It is possible to create animations for it but only really if you can afford 3ds Max (or are one of the huge number of people with an illegal "cracked" copy) and even then it is a tortuous process to get anything into MS.

However Unreal is modern and still well-supported and there is a free (if archane) tool available to create animations for it -Blender.

So I am begging Digimania (for their own good as well as ours) to allow us to create our own animations for use in-game. If they fear loss of sales let them look at the Reallusion approach which seems to be working pretty well for them.

Even sell us an in-game tool which allows us to keyframe animations. Anything. Just open the doors and let us in so we can get this Party started for real!

Would love to hear a Staff reply to this one!
edited by primaveranz on 27/06/2016
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27/06/2016 14:00:16

PatMarrNCMuvizu mogul
PatMarrNC
Posts: 1738 		I'd like to see a staff member's response to your question too.

<opinion>

Although I agree with most of what you said, I think predicting the demise of Muvizu for the reason above fails to account for a lot of other factors that I believe will keep it alive for quite some time.

Whereas it may be true that Professional animators (and even serious amateurs) will hit a dead end eventually with Muvizu and move on to other solutions, it's worth noting that they aren't Muvizu's core demographic. There are already a bunch of high end animation packages competing for the business of a handful of pros... but there's a whole WORLD full of amateurs on a limited budget who want to try their hand at animation, and Muvizu is head and shoulders above anybody else in terms of "bang for the buck"

The companies at most risk of going under are those who have invested deeply in the pro market, because there is already too much supply for the demand. At the entry level, where Muvizu excels, the sheer number of people passing through and buying it for under $50 to try for a while before moving on could be a never ending stream if it's marketed correctly.

It's easier to find ten customers for a reasonably priced product than it is to find one customer for a product that costs ten times more.

I say all this because I've incorrectly predicted the demise of several products and services through the years, and in each case the factor I failed to consider was that the product or service appealed to a HUGE entry level demographic. At that level it doesn't matter if its the BEST product... what matters is accessibility, ease of learning and enough functionality to keep people interested for at least a year. Muvizu has all that.

During the year of interest, people will buy accessories , keep the forum active etc. The trick is to keep new people flowing through the cycle.

</opinion>
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27/06/2016 18:52:15

primaveranz
primaveranz
Posts: 520 		Good points Pat, But I just hope that if we visit this thread in 12 months I will be proved wrong and the staff will be all over this forum like they used to be. The Moviestorm forums used to be very active (and occasionally wild) but the first two questions that often came up were "Where do I get children actors?" and (for some reason that I never fathomed) "How do I put my own face on a puppet?". The latter question was (partially) addressed years too late and the first never question never was (despite the repeated cries of many of the oldies) which meant newbs often left after a couple of posts.
I see a lot of newbs asking "How do I get my own animations into Muvizu" and it just reminds me.

I do hope the staff answer about the possibility of an animation building tool.
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27/06/2016 19:29:33

PatMarrNCMuvizu mogul
PatMarrNC
Posts: 1738 		primaveranz wrote:

I do hope the staff answer about the possibility of an animation building tool.


that would indeed be cool! You'll be everybody's hero if you manage to talk the Muvizu dev team into adding that feature!
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10/07/2016 14:59:46

unlimitedmagic
unlimitedmagic
Posts: 53 		I'd love to see an incremental MOVE / ROTATE function. This would work with the arrow keys or some other set of keys instead of having to use the mouse to position objects. OR have I just missed this somewhere?
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31/07/2016 04:59:38

primaveranz
primaveranz
Posts: 520 		Latest on my wish list - more "Begin" "Loop" and "End" animations
e.g. Begin using Mobile phone - Actor stays with phone to his ear, then you can use "Loop" to show some related natural movements and finally "End" when the call is over.
This ability to start and end animations would make up for the crucial missing functionality in Muvizu, to stretch or cut animation blocks on the timeline.
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31/07/2016 05:22:47

Rocque
Rocque
Posts: 359 		primaveranz wrote:
Latest on my wish list - more "Begin" "Loop" and "End" animations
e.g. Begin using Mobile phone - Actor stays with phone to his ear, then you can use "Loop" to show some related natural movements and finally "End" when the call is over.
This ability to start and end animations would make up for the crucial missing functionality in Muvizu, to stretch or cut animation blocks on the timeline.



That would be so nice. I like the variety of actions, but being able to set the duration in Muvizu would be a real benefit. Only when you look frame by frame can you see some of the parts of the action and to set the duration you have to use the off site editors, and that lengthens the time it takes to create the animation and the possibility of really messing up your animation. I start over a whole lot when film editing.
edited by Rocque on 31/07/2016
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01/08/2016 05:01:02

PatMarrNCMuvizu mogul
PatMarrNC
Posts: 1738 		after beating my head against a wall for most of the weekend, I finally have a feature that I want added badly enough to make a pest of myself in order to get it: a snap function for backdrops.

In fact, there should be a toggle for it so snap can be turned off if you don't want it. But basically, if you get two backdrops within a certain distance from one another, I want the edges to connect and stay there.

I'd also like the backdrops to stop acting like a 4 year old who's being tickled when you try to move them.
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01/08/2016 10:03:44

MrDrWho13Muvizu mogulExperimental user
MrDrWho13
Posts: 2220 		PatMarrNC wrote:
after beating my head against a wall for most of the weekend, I finally have a feature that I want added badly enough to make a pest of myself in order to get it: a snap function for backdrops.

In fact, there should be a toggle for it so snap can be turned off if you don't want it. But basically, if you get two backdrops within a certain distance from one another, I want the edges to connect and stay there.

I'd also like the backdrops to stop acting like a 4 year old who's being tickled when you try to move them.

And the snapping should have an option to align the walls in a straight line.
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01/08/2016 13:43:37

PatMarrNCMuvizu mogul
PatMarrNC
Posts: 1738
And the snapping should have an option to align the walls in a straight line.

EXACTLY! Now that you mention it, an angle parameter would make it really useful.

zero degrees would connect them in a straight line, +/- 90 degrees would connect them as a corner

Plus, there should be another option that lets you win the lottery if you have it checked, because that's about the same likelihood as getting a snap function for backdrops. ;-)
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02/08/2016 23:28:13

PatMarrNCMuvizu mogul
PatMarrNC
Posts: 1738 		if a utility character can't be provided (one that can be invisible while its attachments are not, and which preferably has attachment points for all the major bones ..so we can attach models to thigh, lower leg, feet, forearm, upper arm etc)

... then the next best thing would be a new action that forces the characters arms against its body so they don't swing outside any attachments while walking. Ikes has already pointed out the OBJECT restricts the movement, but it still requires space and the arms could stick out of some attachments
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02/08/2016 23:38:32

ikesMuvizu mogul
ikes
Posts: 282 		PatMarrNC wrote:
if a utility character can't be provided (one that can be invisible while its attachments are not, and which preferably has attachment points for all the major bones ..so we can attach models to thigh, lower leg, feet, forearm, upper arm etc)

... then the next best thing would be a new action that forces the characters arms against its body so they don't swing outside any attachments while walking. Ikes has already pointed out the OBJECT restricts the movement, but it still requires space and the arms could stick out of some attachments


Well, there is also the handcuffed action, wich puts his arms along the side. You can actually get quite some bizar (arm) movements, if you do certain actions before a walk. Try the falling or dancing actions. Quite funny.
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03/08/2016 01:04:21

ziggy72Muvizu mogulExperimental user
ziggy72
Posts: 1988 		Hey, I just posted about the same action before I saw this (but in relation to chickens).
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03/08/2016 02:22:11

PatMarrNCMuvizu mogul
PatMarrNC
Posts: 1738 		ikes wrote:
PatMarrNC wrote:
if a utility character can't be provided (one that can be invisible while its attachments are not, and which preferably has attachment points for all the major bones ..so we can attach models to thigh, lower leg, feet, forearm, upper arm etc)

... then the next best thing would be a new action that forces the characters arms against its body so they don't swing outside any attachments while walking. Ikes has already pointed out the OBJECT restricts the movement, but it still requires space and the arms could stick out of some attachments


Well, there is also the handcuffed action, wich puts his arms along the side. You can actually get quite some bizar (arm) movements, if you do certain actions before a walk. Try the falling or dancing actions. Quite funny.


thanks again Ikes! That's useful knowledge!
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Muvizu is easy to use 3D animation software that allows anyone to create high quality animations quickly and easily. Muvizu’s animation engine is ideal for storytellers, animators, teachers and businesses looking to engage, enchant and delight audiences with animated content.