Get Your Self A Piece of the Action

I guess having said I wasn't going to reinvent the wheel, I do seem to be chipping it out of stone bit by bit..

Today we will have our little mannequin friend do some calisthenics. Who likes Jumping Jacks? Raise your hand! Yeah, me neither but our victim doesn't get a choice.

Open up your Basic Stand that we made before. Click on frame two and copy the pose. Now create a new file. The reason I prefer to do it that way is to ensure there is no extra data further down in the file I may not notice right away and then discover after I worked my pose. Unfortunately, QA doesn't support deleting particular frames although you can end your animation earlier and thus delete something from the end.

OK, paste your Basic Stand on frame two and save it as Jumping Jack.

In the first frame our friend starts in the Basic arms down.

Let's move the arms into the up position of our Jumping Jack. First we need to establish how many frames.  A good starting point - we can always add or subtract at the end - is say 100.

In the Frame window at the lower right hand, change the number to 100 where it says 2 of ___. Make sure you change Loop Out to 100 also.

This is a fast playing animation, it's exercise!!So move your cursor over to Frame 10 for the first movement. Holding down the Alt and left Mouse lets turn the camera a bit by moving the mouse left and right so we get a good angle - if you move in and out you can get closer or further away.

OK, everyone, get up from the computer and let's really do a jumping jack or two or twenty to get a feel of what our bodies do. See how when you get ready to jump you squat down a teensy bit? Is to wind up your muscles so the power of your thighs and feet pressing against the ground propel you upwards. Note the slight rotation of your shins and thighs as well. Yes, of course you know that but it's stuff we take for granted and in order for our animations to look realistic we need to add these subtleties. So with that in mind...

First changes we are going to make.

On Frame 10 - In the Rotation box click on a body part or select from the drop down box on the right hand side of your screen. set as follows:

Thighs -   X: 11     Y: 0      Z: 0

Shins: X: 28    Y: 0   X: 0

On the Position box:  change the Y to 36.

Note how our mannequin is now slightly under the floor. This is the lowering movement from where the jump takes place.

Move to Frame 20


Shoulders: (Left)     X: -96   Y: 17      Z: -97
                  (Right)    X: -96   Y:  -17   Z:  97

Thighs: (Left)    X: 1     Y: 0      Z: -26
             (Right)  X: 1     Y: 0      Z:  26

On the Position box:  change the Y to 49.

Last Frame - 30 - Copy Frame 2.

There! All set! Hit the play button and sit back while our friend gets in shape!

Save your animation, Export to SecondLife to get the .bvh file. Fire up your world and let's Upload!!!

Upload, Animation choose your Jumping Jacks .bvh File.  Make sure you check the Loop box, the Priority (I chose 4) and click! You are done. You can of course check how the animation plays in the Preview window and make sure you didn't skip any steps. Very important if uploading to SecondLife! Those $10 Lindens can start to add up. You can also try your animation in the beta grid where uploads won't cost you or on an Open Sim grid such as www.InWorldz.com where uploads are always free.

Next time:  What is Ease In and Ease Out?