[wgb14]

Hi all

I have been working with the Haptek engine for some time now. Lately i began to explore the possibility of adding animations to my characters through .bvh animation files. The haptek sdk mentioned clearly that these files should work on any haptek figure as long as the skeleton will be well-conditioned. I have exported the skeleton file from the alien bvh animation in the haptek test site and trying to map one of the several bvh animation files that i have in my library. However, no matter what this option does not seem to work. The character behaves randmoly likes it has no notion of keyframes. I tried to export each keyframe of the bvh animation and control it through script files and the clock commands and it seems to work nicely. However, this is a very expensive and time-consumign way! I also tried to email haptek but i didn't get any answers. If you can provide me any feedback on that or if you have any experience with haptek and bvh please let me know

Many thanks

[Freddy]

bhv was something I looked at a while ago but had more success using them in Blender.  I didn't get anywhere with Haptek bhv's and haven't gone back to them yet.  I'd try Haptek again, they do reply to enquiries but sometimes it takes a while.

[wgb14]

BVH can be the alternative solution to figuremaker in creating advanced haptek animations. However, i don't think thta it works correctly ont he Haptek characters. If you find anything let me know please!

[Freddy]

I most certainly will

[dan]

I started looking in to the BVH files quite awhile back, and noticed some I had downloaded from the net had different names for parts of the bodies, so of course they wouldn't work, but it definitely looks like the way to go if there were some software that would write it rather than having to go through it and manually change every detail.  It would take a long time to do very little, but like programming you could use modularity.  If you created small BVH's for little moves you could put them all together for various calls in a HAP.

[wgb14]

Hi all,

I've just uploaded The skeleton file of the alien Haptek figure in maya ASCII and two .bvh formats (one exported from Lifeforms studio and the other from MotionBuilder. I am also attaching 3 animation files, one created in Lifeforms Studio by importing the Lifeforms skeleton file (named alien2[Lifeforms_Anim]), one created again in Lifeforms but with the mapping of a full mocap file (named bannana_slip[Lifeforms_full_map]) and one in Maya (named bannana_slip[full_map_Maya]). The files work nicely on several aniamtion programs that I have tried but refuse to work with the Haptek characters. You are more than welcome to use the files and if you solve the mystery let me know!

Thanks

[wgb14]

Hi,

I don't think that the problem has to do with the names of the different body parts. The alien2_LifeForms_Anim.bvh that I have in my zip file demonstrates that this is not the problem. This file is basically the alien2.bvh file that I downloaded from the test section of the Haptek site. I opened the original alien2.bvh in Lifeforms and export it as a .bvh file without doing any modifications. Although the file should work with any Haptek character, unfortunately it doens't. The reason is that Lifeforms modifies the values that describe the entire motion of the character and the Haptek engine doen't really like that (if you compare the original alien2.bvh and my bvh file you will see what I mean). I tried the same processs with motionbuilder but i get the same result, the program modifies the values of the character motion and my character behaves like she suffers from electrocution. If you manage to solve this problem then the mapping of a bvh file onto the alien skeleton is an easy process (all you have to do is to match the names of the body parts). See my bannana_slip_Lifeform animation in my zip file.

Thanks

[dan]

`In the Haptek Guide it says you need one of their .prj files to use in Animation Master and they have the skeleton files for Animation Master and Maya 4.0 .ma project file (beta).  They talk about the skeletons having a single-degree-of-freedom joints vs. the normal three-degree.  "The skeletons provided by Haptek have joint-limits and DOF-limits included. As of this writing, the skeletons are bones-only, without the polygon-mesh representing the skin."  It also says, "one needs to use a skeleton file created from a Haptek character, or create a skeleton which matches the Haptek character. That is, if you make an arbitrary human skeleton and animate it, the resulting animation won't work."

So I guess, it's not as easy as just creating a BVH with any figure, but it's joints have to be limited.  I sort of noticed that when I tried to get one of the figure to sit cross-legged, I couldn't do it, the joints wouldn't allow it.

[dan]

I did finally download those, pretty cool.  Great stuff.  Slight differences, probably just enought though.  That banana_slip file has a lot of motion, did it take lots of work to do all of that animation?  Looks like the way to go for animating the characters though.

[wgb14]

Hi dan

Did you try the files on your characters? Are they working? As for the animation yes, it took me some time but it is not that hard. All you have to do is to match the names for the different body parts from the original bvh file to the body parts of the alien skeleton.

[ALADYBLOND]

iused the alien.bvh file and got my guy and girl both to do a little side to side head movement while moving their arms . it looks realc ute when applied with some dancing movement haps. ~~alady

[wgb14]

Hi

The original alien files are the ones that i downloaded from the haptek site. The question is if the ones that i modified are working! Please let me know if you get any results.

thanks

[Freddy]

This is what I got from trying them on the fullbodygirl:

ALIEN[skel_LifeForms].bvh - tips forward and extends left (her) arm

ALIEN[skel_Motionbuilder].bvh - flaps both arms

alien2[Lifeforms_Anim].bvh - left arm extends and she goes all wobbley

bannana_slip[Lifeforms_full_map].bvh - does all kinds of arm and leg movements, almost like she trying to balance on a tightrope or fell over the banana hehe

The original files worked too.