Visualizing motion in 3D window

Hi folks,

Is it possible to let Blender visualize the animation of an object in the 3D view? I’m looking for something that resembles the “Draw Key” option, except that I’d like to see the motion as a curve, and also for non-selected objects. Here is an example:

The image is a screenshot from Vicon IQ, a motion capture system.

I really hope Blender can do something like this too.

Greetings,
Sybren

press K and outlines of the object will be shown for its Keyframes. http://wiki.blender.org/index.php/Manual/Ipo_Curves_and_Keyframes#Onion_Skinning_and_Ghosting

Thanks PapaSmurf for the reply. Pressing the K button has the same effect as the “Draw Key” button, which I already described as not being what I want. Maybe I should explain a little more. What I’m looking for is a way to:

  • Visualize movement of the centre points of objects as a curve
  • It would be nice if the curve has a configurable length, for example showing the movement from 100 frames before and 100 frames after the current frame.
  • The visualization would ideally remain visible if the object is deselected.

I found this way of visualizing movement quite useful. It’s used in Lightwave as well as Vigor IQ, so I’m clearly not the only one that feels this way.

I think what you are looking for is in the VisualizationPanel of the PoseMode EditButtons.
There you can set PathDrawing for Bones.To enable it, you have to Press the Calculate Paths Button.
Then you can choose to show keys on the path as points and framenumbers.
To change the length of the path use the Around Current Frame Button.

Pat

You need to active motion path through a script. Go to scripts window - animation category and choose “Trajectory”. Just enable “Space Handlers” to edit the path in the viewport; Active “Always Draw”; “Past” values use 900; “Futur” values use 900; width 1 is better in my opinion…

Done this… you need to active the script now!

Go to - view - Space Handler Scipts (on top of list) - Trajectory!
Done!
Your animated objects now will show the trajectory of the animation!

I hope this help you!