Hi guys,
As I said in a recent mail I am interested in Character Animation and
animation.
Just wondering is the .MDD format factored in to future RS
development. If not how about it???
I would like to propose the possibility of adding the .MDD format to
Realsoft. This is a format that allows the import / export of vertice
position information between apps.
SO - in RS you model a character, export it out as OBJ. Import that
mesh into Lightwave OR Motionbuilder OR Messiah OR Blender [ all
support .MDD ], you animate / character animate with bones and the
various animation tools in these apps. You then save the animation
data, the movements as an .MDD file - thats all this file contains.
In Realsoft you then have the original mesh open, right click it and
add just the MDD deformation file data, set the timeline to the same
FPS and length as in the other app, play and render in RS.
Why propose this? Well its a way of accessing advanced animation
tools in other apps more tuned to Character Animation than RS is at
the moment. To allow inter operability between RS and other character
animation specialist apps like Messiah, Motionbuilder. Its useful as
an alternative to FBX.
Of course this may all be academic if FBX is fully implemented in RS
in the near future, not sure how far away we are from that. But by
using MDD their is no messing with the bones system in RS or try to
make them compatible with other bone systems in other app's - its
just point movement data.
I ended up creating a 5 part video tutorial set for the folks over at
Luxology - how to animate a previously created model done in Modo
inside Blender and add the created MDD to that model in Modo after.
Then render in Modo. Modo at the moment has a timeline, but no bone
system - yet!
Here are the vids for those with a general interest in the process,
in your mind, when you get to the last video imagine you see Realsoft
instead of Modo :)
http://www.tidalsound.com/blender/blender_interface/
http://www.tidalsound.com/blender/blender_boning/
http://www.tidalsound.com/blender/blender_skinning/
http://www.tidalsound.com/blender/blender_animate/
http://www.tidalsound.com/blender/blender_to_modo_mdd/
Blender graphic tutes mentioned:
http://www.tidalsound.com/blender/if1.jpg
http://www.tidalsound.com/blender/tbar1.jpg
Cheers
Aidan
