I’ve been using Blender for about two weeks now, and am most impressed with it’s functionality. I am currently working on a fairly brief promotional demonstration of one of our companies products, and just have a couple of simple questions.
(I have read the Wiki Blender Noob->Pro tutorial, but saw nothing related.)
Anyway, here’s the questions:
I have an existing test animation done in blender, and am interested in the possibility of changing the speed it plays at; without resorting to slowing down the framerate. Is this possible without re-doing it?
Is it possible to copy an existing animated object, and removing the actual animation from it? At the moment when I copy it, and delete all of the animation curves from the chart, it still animates. This of course means that it simply goes to it’s original position with the base object I copied from, so it may aswell not be there.
Is it possible to copy the animation from one object onto another, so it follows the same series of movements but starting from a different location?
Thanks in advance for any help, and I do hope my questions aren’t too basic.
Much appreciated.
Regards,
Dan
(P.S. Love the forum, have been browsing for a while.)
What many people do when animating is save the rendered results as png images (not jpg - they’re lossy). This enables you to do all kinds of things - just rerender a few frames but keeping the rest of the animation, for example.
Once you have your png images, you can then use the Sequence Editor to do loads of stuff to your images. You can change the framerate, for example.
As a semi-aside, you’ll find a ‘time’ IPO for each object. Usually this runs as 1 frame per frame, as it were, but if you edit it you can individually slow down things without resorting to changing all the IPOs.
By default, when you copy something in Blender, the new object has the same IPO as the original. Not a copy - it’s exactly the same IPO and editing it in one object will edit it in the other!
To make them separate IPOs, click the number next to the IPO name in the menu bar of the IPO window - this will create an UNlinked copy.
You’ll also find you can change this to create a duplicate IPO instead of a linked one in the User Preferences.
So, to sum it up,
duplicate an object with Shift-D
Make sure its IPO is separate by clicking the number in the IPO window
delete the IPO curves and have fun!
Absolutely. First, in the IPO window of your second object, use the drop-down bar to select the IPO of the original object. Once you’ve done this, press the number button to make a copy rather than a link.
Now either displace the location IPO curves of your object into the right place or use the DLoc IPO curves to add an additional location.
Hope that helps - it’s really difficult to describe!
One more question, I do apologise for turning this into my personal tutorial thread…
I am currently trying to animate the rotatation of an object around a central axis, but Blender seems to want to use some pre-defined axis a small distance away from the object. This means that as it rotates the model swings around a large area, which I am trying to avoid. Any tips on how to get round this? (no pun intended)
Thanks again, I very much appreciate the continued assistance.
Try clicking Center New in the mesh buttons (F9). This will move the objects center point to the center of the object, which is what Blender goes by when rotating.
First question:
You can re-map the animation. Press the scene button (F10) then the animation button (squiggly arrow, looks like a snake). Play with the map old and map new numbers to understand it. Basically, if you leave Map Old at 100 and set Map New to 200, your animation will play at half speed. Don’t forget to duble the frame count “End” value or you’ll only render half the animation.
Middle questions already answered. Delta IPOs (dLoc, dRot,…) are your friend These apply the IPO transforms “relative to” the object start position. You can copy the existing IPOs to the corresponding delta channels if you like.
Last question:
You may have moved the object centre (usually happens if you move the mesh in Edit Mode). Just select the object in Object Mode and press F9 then click the “Centre New” button to put the centre of rotation in the logical cnetre of the mesh. Or, you can put the cursor where you would like the rotation point to be and press “Centre Cursor” to move the rotation point to there.
These apply the IPO transforms “relative to” the object start position. You can copy the existing IPOs to the corresponding delta channels if you like.