Tutorial Frame by frame animations in Orbiter

dgatsoulis

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In case you haven't seen any of these SC4 animations. here is the latest video:


Unfortunately my Orbiter allocated time wasn't enough to create a fully detailed tutorial.

What I can do, is give you an outline of the process and come back the soonest I have time, to include a more detailed version.

So here is the outline:

1. Create a humanoid mesh in .obj format, preferably with a single group and a single texture. (In the videos, I used a modified version of Kara.msh from the XR2Ravenstar addon). A "standard" T pose is perfect for this, but if you don't have one, it's fine.

2. Go to Mixamo https://www.mixamo.com/#/, sign up and upload the .obj file.

3. Go through the auto-rigger process. (it's quite simple and doesn't take long).

4. Select an animation for your mesh and download it. Make a note of the number of animation frames.

5. Import the .fbx file into blender 2.82 - Use scale 100 during the import.

6. Select the Start / End frames of the animation and export from blender as an .obj with the animation box ticked. This will create an .obj file for all the selected frames in the animation.

7. Install a batch obj import addon in blender and create a new project (File→New→General).
(Batch .obj import addon here: https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/5064/how-to-batch-import-wavefront-obj-files

8. Press File→Import→Wavefront Batch (.obj) and select all the obj files you exported in step 6. (not the .mtl files). This will import all the animation frames in a single file.

9. Export as .obj and run ObjToAn8.
(ObjToAn8 link here: https://github.com/jombo23/N64-Tools/tree/master/objtoan8

10. Import the .obj file from step 9 and export as .an8. You'll need to uncheck all the boxes.

11. Open the an8 file with a text editor and delete all the material entries, except the first.

12. Run the an8 file with anim8or, delete the remaining materials and create a new one with your original texture.

13. Select all the groups with CTRL-A and apply the new material. Export as an Orbiter mesh file.
(Orbiter mesh export addon for anim8or here: https://www.orbithangar.com/showAddon.php?id=5ce8e256-08bd-4410-a4cc-f5c5b3cad2d5. It works with the latest anim8or version and the previous ones up to 0.95b

14. Open the mesh file with a text editor. Press CTRL-H and replace all of the following
GEOM with MATERIAL 1\nTEXTURE 1\nGEOM
^LABEL.* with [blank]

15. Go to the top of the mesh file and delete the double MATERIAL 1 TEXTURE 1 entry (lines 3 and 4)

16. Finally Press Edit→Line Operations→Remove Empty Lines. Save the file wherever you want in your Orbiter\Meshes directory.

Whew! Done! You have an Orbiter mesh file with its texture UV preserved, with all the animation frames as separate groups.

[To be continued, in the mean time, I'll answer whatever questions might pop up here]
 

kuddel

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I'm pretty sure you might get contacted by AMSO- and/or NASSP-developer(s) to do something for them :thumbup:
 

Nikogori

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This is cool. In Japan, there is a huge demand for these dancing 3DCG figures... for… um… scientific purposes.

It would be nice if astronauts can perform some simple gestures (such as waving their hands, thumbs up, kneeling down and standing up, etc).
These simple body languages might add a little drama to my orbiter videos.
 

jedidia

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Uhm, what? I thought Orbiter had to split animations strictly into mesh groups, and vertex weighting wasn't possible. That's not what those animations look like at all, though.
Quick, somebody go tell Dan!

Oh, post is from July? How did I not see it earlier, and why did it crop up now?
 

Donamy

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Looks awesome. Would love to have my EVA astronauts move while space walking.
 
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