Small guide for creating animations for TS4 + tips and tricks.

[Simite]

On 8/14/2018 at 4:07 PM, Kevinharahap12 said:

so here's the thing that i dont understand

 

1. I opened up and use the rig_MaleBPC_Master_TesticlesPhysV1.blend

2. Now i want to use the rig_fem.blend to be second actor

3. and i must opened up the Object file right?

4. Now here what i dont understand? which file is needed to be append?

5. If i use the tutorial to append the rig and body parts (rig, head, top, bottom, feet) just like in tutorial, its gotta be this file right?

6. If i do that, this all file is separated and it cannot be move or edited. If i do it wrong?

 

You have done it correctly, when a new rig is appended it is automatically in object mode, just select the new rig and change the mode to pose mode and then you will be able to use it as normal. 

 

All the Extra shapes are from the control rigs, you can delete them but that will often make the controllers looks like normal bones again. Or you can select the shapes and use the M key to move them to another layer or use the H key to hide them on the current layer.

[Kevinharahap12]

8 hours ago, Simite said:

You have done it correctly, when a new rig is appended it is automatically in object mode, just select the new rig and change the mode to pose mode and then you will be able to use it as normal. 

 

All the Extra shapes are from the control rigs, you can delete them but that will often make the controllers looks like normal bones again. Or you can select the shapes and use the M key to move them to another layer or use the H key to hide them on the current layer.

thank you very much man. i already figured out that yet!! But now i getting annoyed with the Rig eyes, when i make a different position. the eyes keep missing (for example when i make the rig on kneeling position, the eyes when messed up very much

[Simite]

1 hour ago, Kevinharahap12 said:

thank you very much man. i already figured out that yet!! But now i getting annoyed with the Rig eyes, when i make a different position. the eyes keep missing (for example when i make the rig on kneeling position, the eyes when messed up very much

Go too the second layer for the face controls and eye target controller, you can see the layers in the Skeleton tab on the right side of your screen shots. (The finger controllers are also on layer 2.)

[Guest]

7 hours ago, Kevinharahap12 said:

thank you very much man. i already figured out that yet!! But now i getting annoyed with the Rig eyes, when i make a different position. the eyes keep missing (for example when i make the rig on kneeling position, the eyes when messed up very much

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[Kevinharahap12]

5 hours ago, Zheur said:

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thank you so much bro, you the best

[Kevinharahap12]

so what is the main purpose of baking the rig? i still dont get it

 

[Guest]

1 hour ago, Kevinharahap12 said:

so what is the main purpose of baking the rig? i still dont get it

 

The rig control just makes it easier to animate with, but the game will only recognize Ea's rig. The baking records all the action/keyframes you made with the rig control, into the Ea rig.

[qlx]

4 hours ago, Zheur said:

The rig control just makes it easier to animate with, but the game will only recognize Ea's rig. The baking records all the action/keyframes you made with the rig control, into the Ea rig.

I learned the hard way that you have to bake a pose onto the rig for it to actually save properly. my computer restarted due to a crash and i came to find out none of my work was actually saved because i was saving but not baking because i was trying to get the pose "just right" and wasn't done yet.

[Kevinharahap12]

15 hours ago, Zheur said:

The rig control just makes it easier to animate with, but the game will only recognize Ea's rig. The baking records all the action/keyframes you made with the rig control, into the Ea rig.

so all rig must be baked then?

[Kevinharahap12]

Thank you so much for everything you all do...here's a little peek for what i am doing, btw is there any idea how easily make the animation looks realistic, i found difficult of using blinking and eyes control, and is there any tips about face movement to become realistic?

[Simite]

Nope, the only way to make it more realistic is to spend more time practising and get better at imitating realistic looking movements. I've literally spent the last year practising and improving small bits and I'm still not at a point where my animations look completely natural. 

 

My best advice about this is to just keep working on them, you don't have to share what you make if your worried about people being critical about it. Also watch videos on you tube about the animation principles and anything else you can find about animating in blender.  There's literally too many things too explain and you're better just learning and discovering at your own pace.

[Crispu32]

When I use the rig on page 2, the animation works fine in blender but ingame they just stand in a T-pose. I bake action and use visual keying option, but still just a T-pose. Any help?

 

EDIT: for the record, i have no issues getting animations into the game when using the .blend files provided in the WickedWhims tutorial, which dont use controlrigs

[Kevinharahap12]

what do you think about this, i am already make the package, now i am confused about verify and set animation duration and then extract clip and clip header (i already download SP4E)

, its in http://wickedwhims.tumblr.com/post/147746192646/converting-blender-animations-to-clips

Point 3 and 4

 

feel free to watch my first try, but sorry its look ridiculous

Exa,.blend

[Simite]

22 hours ago, Crispu32 said:

When I use the rig on page 2, the animation works fine in blender but ingame they just stand in a T-pose. I bake action and use visual keying option, but still just a T-pose. Any help?

 

EDIT: for the record, i have no issues getting animations into the game when using the .blend files provided in the WickedWhims tutorial, which dont use controlrigs

A t-pose could mean you have used the wrong animation name in the XML. It could also mean you did not bake the animation data onto the EA rig, or you might not be deleteing the control rig before exporting the animation data to S4S.

 

Yes using a control rig adds some additional steps but after you have figured it all out, the benefits from the control rig easily out weight the additional steps.

[Simite]

20 hours ago, Kevinharahap12 said:

what do you think about this, i am already make the package, now i am confused about verify and set animation duration and then extract clip and clip header (i already download SP4E)

, its in http://wickedwhims.tumblr.com/post/147746192646/converting-blender-animations-to-clips

Point 3 and 4

 

feel free to watch my first try, but sorry its look ridiculous

Exa,.blend

Hey, yeah you can kind-of ignore that part. I have never needed to change any numbers in the animation duration part. I could be wrong but I think that is something S4S manages automatically now.

 

After you import animation data to a package in S4S, you can then use S4PE to extract from that package the Clip and ClipHeader for importing into your animation package. (just keep reading it and do exactly as it says, eventually after you complete it more then 1 time it will start to make sense.

[Crispu32]

2 hours ago, Simite said:

you might not be deleteing the control rig before exporting the animation data to S4S.

Yep, that was it! Works great now, thanks a lot for this. Makes animating so much easier and fluid.

[Kevinharahap12]

http://wickedwhims.tumblr.com/post/147746195146/creating-wickedwhims-animation-xml-file

i dont get this step. I mean how to download the XML file?

[Simite]

On 8/20/2018 at 5:30 PM, Kevinharahap12 said:

http://wickedwhims.tumblr.com/post/147746195146/creating-wickedwhims-animation-xml-file

i dont get this step. I mean how to download the XML file?

TURBODRIVER provides 2 XML templates you can download at the top of the page, download the commented template so that it has information about each option written in the XML.

[coolycafe]

I would like to try my hand at animations. After reading through this thread I am a bit confused as to which rigs I should be using. Could anyone help please?

[R-Lo]

On 10/30/2018 at 11:54 PM, coolycafe said:

I would like to try my hand at animations. After reading through this thread I am a bit confused as to which rigs I should be using. Could anyone help please?

It's entirely your choice on the rigs!

Just make sure it's a Sims 4 compatible one,

Some are more complex than others but overall they all come with their own pros and cons,

The features vary from rig to rig but there's a lot of vids on YouTube that can better explain things in easier terms,

Some rigs will require a process called baking before being compatible with Sims 4 Studio but the one I'm using is not subject to this,

 

Personally I'm using the rig supplied on Turbodrivers Tumblr,

It has no targets or controllers but I'm stuck in a habit of doing things by hand and having fun trying to perfect it,

I find this rig gives me more freedom to add details and variations rather than being locked into positions or actions,

I do use something called IK constraints which allows the bones of the rig to follow like a chain and flex accordingly to certain transitions,

It's tricky to keep hands and feet in position at times though and that's why some prefer the other rigs where parts the body can be locked into specific places,

 

I'm tempted to check it out but I'm creature of habit and not quite ready to learn another rig just yet but if you're in an early stage of learning it's worth checking them all out for yourself and consider what setup suits the kink that interests you most,

 

 

[coolycafe]

Thanks for that info. The IK constraints sound sensible though as you suggest I'll look into the pros and cons of the different rigs.

I like the look of your animations and will give them a play.

[R-Lo]

10 hours ago, coolycafe said:

Thanks for that info. The IK constraints sound sensible though as you suggest I'll look into the pros and cons of the different rigs.

I like the look of your animations and will give them a play.

Thanks and I hope you enjoy them, I learned from scratch so the quality is varied and you may be able to spot some things I've learned that will help you and feel free to comment in my thread as I'm working on improving some of the older stuff,

 

It's worth having a look here too 

 

 

You'll be able to get some advice on the various types of rigs and their controls and some more insight

[Dark0s]

I have a problem with apending the rig

 

1. i opend rig_MaleBPC_Master_TesticlesPhysV1

2. i want to apend the rig_fem

3. i clicked all the files i need in Objects

4. The rig is importet but all the shapes (the handler) aren't in the right place and their not functionally

 

So is there any solution for this mess? I really want to use the extra shapes like in the male rig. Did i somthing wrong?

 

 

 

[Simite]

On 11/11/2018 at 2:03 AM, Dark0s said:

I have a problem with apending the rig

 

1. i opend rig_MaleBPC_Master_TesticlesPhysV1

2. i want to apend the rig_fem

3. i clicked all the files i need in Objects

4. The rig is importet but all the shapes (the handler) aren't in the right place and their not functionally

 

So is there any solution for this mess? I really want to use the extra shapes like in the male rig. Did i somthing wrong?

You havn't done anything wrong, I'm not sure why the shapes go all crazy but there is a fairly simple way to clean it all up.

First delete all the shapes from the scene in the tab on the right side, when they are all gone move the rig you appended so that its in a different position to the rig you began with.

Then every bone that should have a shape will now be the normal bone shape for blender, you then select each bone and in the bone tab on the right there is a drop down box called shape(with a little bone next to it to signal this is to set a bone shape), here you can select the shapes from the rig you began with, the shapes are usually named after the body part they are applied to so its really not that difficult to set them back up. (all the shapes from the first rig you opened are still in the scene so they are all available to be selected in the drop-down for any other rigs you append.)

 

If someone smarter then me would like to tell me how I can make it so the shapes never do this, I'd be happy to fix them and re-share them. But this is what I have to do also, I personally made some blend files where I have already appended multiple actors and fixed the shapes so that I don't have to do it each time I animate. 

For example I have blend file with 1 male 1 female, 1 male 2 female, 1 male 3 female, 2 males, 3 males, etc etc. You get the idea.

Then I just open the blend file that has the number of actors I want for my animation and I have already previously fixed the appended rigs so that the shapes are on all the parts correctly.

[Catisse]

Hi guys, I've been trying to use this newest rigs to make an animation and am doing a trial to see if it works but when I try to import the .blend file into Sims4Studio, it shows me an error.

 

Spoiler

The Sims 4 Studio - Version 3.1.2.1
System.AggregateException: One or more errors occurred. ---> S4Studio.Blender.BlenderException: 
  File "<string>", line 1, in <module>
  File "<string>", line 23, in <module>
  File "C:\Users\[UserName]\AppData\Roaming\Blender Foundation\Blender\2.70\scripts\addons\s4studio\animation\blender.py", line 199, in save_clip
    set_context('POSE', skeleton)
  File "C:\Users\[UserName]\AppData\Roaming\Blender Foundation\Blender\2.70\scripts\addons\s4studio\blender\__init__.py", line 152, in set_context
    bpy.ops.object.mode_set(mode=mode)
  File "C:\Program Files\Blender Foundation\Blender\2.70\scripts\modules\bpy\ops.py", line 188, in __call__
    ret = op_call(self.idname_py(), None, kw)
RuntimeError: Operator bpy.ops.object.mode_set.poll() failed, context is incorrect

   at S4Studio.Blender.BlenderUtilities.RunBlender(String script, String blend, Boolean background, Boolean check_version)
   at S4Studio.Blender.BlenderUtilities.ImportClip(String custom_blend, String custom_clip, String prefix)
   at S4Studio.ViewModels.Animation.AnimationPackCustomContent.<>c__DisplayClass155_0.<ExecuteImportAnimation>b__0()
   at System.Threading.Tasks.Task.InnerInvoke()
   at System.Threading.Tasks.Task.Execute()
   --- End of inner exception stack trace ---
---> (Inner Exception #0) S4Studio.Blender.BlenderException: 
  File "<string>", line 1, in <module>
  File "<string>", line 23, in <module>
  File "C:\Users\[UserName]\AppData\Roaming\Blender Foundation\Blender\2.70\scripts\addons\s4studio\animation\blender.py", line 199, in save_clip
    set_context('POSE', skeleton)
  File "C:\Users\[UserName]\AppData\Roaming\Blender Foundation\Blender\2.70\scripts\addons\s4studio\blender\__init__.py", line 152, in set_context
    bpy.ops.object.mode_set(mode=mode)
  File "C:\Program Files\Blender Foundation\Blender\2.70\scripts\modules\bpy\ops.py", line 188, in __call__
    ret = op_call(self.idname_py(), None, kw)
RuntimeError: Operator bpy.ops.object.mode_set.poll() failed, context is incorrect

   at S4Studio.Blender.BlenderUtilities.RunBlender(String script, String blend, Boolean background, Boolean check_version)
   at S4Studio.Blender.BlenderUtilities.ImportClip(String custom_blend, String custom_clip, String prefix)
   at S4Studio.ViewModels.Animation.AnimationPackCustomContent.<>c__DisplayClass155_0.<ExecuteImportAnimation>b__0()
   at System.Threading.Tasks.Task.InnerInvoke()
   at System.Threading.Tasks.Task.Execute()<---

 

Any idea what's the reason or what I'm doing wrong and what I can do to make it work? 

 

Thanks!

 

EDIT: Appears that it concerns only the female rig. If I remove the female rig and leave only male, it gets loaded to the S4S fine.