Whenever I rotate something, then add a keyframe, no matter what direction I rotated it it, and no matter how many times, it ALWAYS takes the shortest path to there. And as someone who is trying to animate a rubix cube, this is just sad…
That’s the way Blender and all animation software works. It only knows the start and endpoints between keys - it doesn’t track what you did to get there and it can’t read your mind.
Something like a Rubik’s cube would work better rigged with an armature rather than with object rotations. Try it. Ask questions. Rinse and repeat.
u should be thankful the program does the tweens,. and u dont have to draw every single frame like in traditional animation
Hi,
You can modify the IPOs directly to ensure the rotation occurs in the direction you want if the shortest path isn’t the one you want.
all you have to do to fix this is do the rotation in several smaller steps, put a key fram in for be the middle of the motion too!
Not true. GMax does it, so that must mean 3dsmax does it too (unless they chucked it out for some reason…)
Lightwave3d does it…
Maya doesn’t though. (I might have been doing it wrong on the other hand)
I really don’t want to set the rotation to several smaller steps, because I shouldn’t have to! How many friggen ways can you think of to get to +90 degrees!!! Seriously, I rotate each object only 90 degrees at a time (but some have already been rotated prior to that, and those are the ones that freak out.)
If every bug report/feature request/angry bitching (<- that’s mine!) resolved to “you should be thankful for what you have” think of where computer animation would be!
I really don’t want to go in and reposition every single IPO keyframe. A rubix cube is made up of 26 little cubes (3 cubed, minus the nonexistent one in the middle). I’m trying to make an animation of solving a rubix cube, and I don’t know any short cuts, so the number of moves is going to be up in the 200+'s.
Using an armature? How would I do that? Not even the rubiks cube itself does that.
EDIT: Sorry about the flaming. I’m just sick, tired, I’ve got a headache, and I’m freezing my butt off even though it’s 74 degrees!
If you explicitly know what angle and axis you want to rotate on, perhaps you’ll have better luck explicitly entering the value in the Transform Properties panel (N-key in the 3D view). Once you set your keyframe, you can verify that the rotation is proper in the IPO window.
Actually, a rubic’s cube does have an armature. I used to take them apart and put them back together in color-coded order because I couldn’t solve the !@#$ thing 
Whether or not you use an armature or objects rotation is entirely up to you.
To make sure you have the correct rotation, your best bet is the IPO window.
If maya is the only piece of software that allows you to do just that, then by all means, go use that, no offence.
Here is how I would build an armature for a rubik’s cube. The 26 bones radiate out from the center. Each cube has one of the bones as a parent. You rotate 9 bones at a time to turn a side. Each cube is independent of the others. It takes some work to set up but it’s easier to animate this than with Object IPOs for the individual cubes.
I’m sure there is a way to improve this but it works for me.
Also for the freak out with animation… from what little experience I have, just animate half or even a quarter of the move at a time and even add some frames. if you make the spot your moving the object to the shortest possible way to get there itll simply go to it in that way.
What? No, I said Maya, like Blender, did the weird rotation thing. Gmax, lightwave, and 3ds max do it properly.
I’ll give that armature thing a shot.
If you break open a rubix cube, there are only 6 armatures, 1 for each center color, the other 20 cubes get pushed by your hands and the center piece, and are held together in a track formed by the other cubes. It’s really quite ingenious!
Ok the armature worked like a charm! Thanks!
One problem. I hit the dreaded ‘H’ key. Now everything is gone. Hotkey reference file is no help (as usual). Anyone know how to get it back (without reverting to the last save).
I had the same problem myself! alt+h is the shortcut key undo the ‘hide’ function!