Alienmotion - An animation middleware

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nec
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Alienmotion - An animation middleware

Post by nec »

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Latest version : 2012-10-19

Hello everyone,

I would like to introduce my new project, Alienmotion, it's an animation middleware inspired from tecnofreak that some of you may know.
When I made Arachnophobia, I used tecnofreak to manage my animations, but I encountered some little problems and misses with it, and as
novaumas (the tecnofreak lead prog) is too busy to maintain it as it should (because it is a great tool ;)), I decided to try to make a more
"professional" one (maintained, with regular releases,...etc).

Image

>>>Think to disable HD if your connection is weak.<<<



Have fun ;)
Last edited by nec on Sat Oct 20, 2012 2:00 pm, edited 44 times in total.
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Re: Alienmotion - An animation middleware

Post by Brocan »

Impressive and nice work!!!

What kind of API are you using to make the GUI? Qt? wxWidgets?

Congrats! :D
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Re: Alienmotion - An animation middleware

Post by nec »

I used C# with .net 4.0 (wpf).
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Re: Alienmotion - An animation middleware

Post by Sauce »

This looks like a really great tool!

What license is it released under?
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Re: Alienmotion - An animation middleware

Post by nec »

I don't know exactly, i think to something like ogremax, a limited version for non-commercial product and a full version for the commercial products.
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Re: Alienmotion - An animation middleware

Post by almondega »

Amazing result when you mix one of the best API's technology with Ogre.

Congratz.

Suggestion for the download page of Alienmotion: Make the download link more visible, like a "Download" button, took me a few seconds to identify where do I click do get this amazing software.
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Re: Alienmotion - An animation middleware

Post by jacmoe »

Is this your code, or did you steal from Novaumas' code? :)
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Re: Alienmotion - An animation middleware

Post by nec »

Thank you, it is still buggy but with time, i hope this tool will fill a hole in the Ogre ecosystem.
I have many ideas for the futur and i think this tool will really help the gameplay programmers.
It's not Morpheme or Emotionfx but it's simple to use and it will be greatly cheaper.

You can follow the short term roadmap here (I plan to make a release every 15 days).

In a near futur you will be able to follow the nodes activation in step by step mode, activate sounds on event to better feel the result,
activate a complete set of settings by pressing a single button, there will be more nodes...etc

(btw the download button has changed ;)
Last edited by nec on Mon Oct 31, 2011 5:01 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Alienmotion - An animation middleware

Post by nec »

jacmoe wrote:Is this your code, or did you steal from Novaumas' code? :)
:) no i didn't stole anything, i recoded everything by myself. there is not a single word of Tecnofreak in Alienmotion.
First because it's made with WPF and second because the runtime as it was in Tecnofreak was not organized to support lod and bone settings without a huge refactoring. (lod is not supported yet by the editor but the runtime is ready for it).
I had to take different ways than Technofreak to solve some problems. Alienmotion do not work like tecnofreak it is inspired by it, the similarities are still visible but with time the two solutions will take different ways.
Last edited by nec on Wed May 04, 2011 11:24 am, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: Alienmotion - An animation middleware

Post by jacmoe »

Thanks for clarifying. And forgive me for sounding brash.
I had to ask, you know.
The similarities made me do it. :wink:

I sincerely wish you success with both your game and your tool. :)
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Re: Alienmotion - An animation middleware

Post by nec »

No problems thx ;)
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Re: Alienmotion - An animation middleware

Post by nec »

There is a major bug in the version 30-04-2001 so i plan to make a release tonight.

New feature :
- follow the tree activity in step by step mode.

Issue
- Fixed issue #28
- Fixed issue #29
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Re: Alienmotion - An animation middleware

Post by nec »

the last release is available 02-05-2011
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Re: Alienmotion - An animation middleware

Post by nec »

Another major bug is appeared since the last fix so there will be another release very soon...

Issue :
The bug is in the graph node. The radiobuttons are disabled when no adjuster is plugged to the "Active State" property and enabled when an adjuster is plugged. The normal behavior should do the opposite. (this is a regression)

New feature :
It will be possible to play sound on event to have an auditive feedback and better set the events.
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Re: Alienmotion - An animation middleware

Post by nec »

A new release is available. (release note)
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Re: Alienmotion - An animation middleware

Post by almondega »

Hi Nec!

I have some models that doesn't display in the 3D viewport for some reason, like wrong camera position..
Will Alienmotion support zooming / rotating / navigation in the 3D viewport, so I can manually focus my model?

Suggestion: Load the last model path in the "New tree" panel Load button, will improve usability.

Thanks.

ps: I just read the roadmap and you talk about rotating only, but can Alien also have zomming and fly navigation (WASD) ?
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Re: Alienmotion - An animation middleware

Post by nec »

Hi,

The camera is currently hardcoded to (200,150,200) so it's possible your character is offscreen, this will change in the next release as you saw. (try to resize with meshmagick to be sure).
In a first time you will be able to zoom in/out and spherically rotate the camera around the mesh, navigation not planned yet, may be in a near future if it would have to be required. :)

For the path i'll add this in the next release ;)
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Re: Alienmotion - An animation middleware

Post by al2950 »

Hi Nec

Its looking really good :D, it would be really nice to have a "professional" version of novaumas animation system which is maintained properly. Having said that I have been talking to novaumas about improving technofreak and adding a number of features which I will probably try and do this summer(although everytime I give a date, it gets later and later!), but i, like novaumas, will not have much time to maintain it.

**EDIT**
By the way I was the one who added bone masks to technofreak!
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Re: Alienmotion - An animation middleware

Post by nec »

Hi al,

The job you did novaumas and you is really cool. (This is why i try to push it further ;))
With quality tools Ogre will be used more and more and as you know the more the user the more the quality tools (this is a virtuous circle) :)

Look at Alienmotion and pick ideas if you need some for tecnofreak, many of them are already exposed on tecnofreak thread but you will see them in action ;)
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Re: Alienmotion - An animation middleware

Post by al2950 »

With quality tools Ogre will be used more and more and as you know the more the user the more the quality tools (this is a virtuous circle)
Could not agree more! We (novaumas and I) have been discussing some of your ideas from the technofreak thread for a while but just have not had the time to implement them yet! I promised novaumas that I would create a wiki page for it, but that was about 6 months ago :oops: . However when I do I hope you take a look at and get some ideas for alienmotion.

**Edit**
How have you done you graph node stuff, it looks really good, did you use a similar design to technofreaks one?
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Re: Alienmotion - An animation middleware

Post by nec »

The whole application is done with WPF, Tecnofreak was done with winform if i remember correctly, so no, the design method is completly different and you will not achieve this rendering without massive pain with winform. ( so spend your time on features rather than look ;))
Tell me when your wiki will be ready and i'll be happy to take a look at it.
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Re: Alienmotion - An animation middleware

Post by cdoty »

The interface reminds me of Illumination Software Creator (http://radicalbreeze.com/)
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Re: Alienmotion - An animation middleware

Post by nec »

A new release is available : 15-05-2011 (release note)

main features :
- camera can be moved/zoomed
- the speed of the animation nodes can be modulated through float property node.

Have fun :)
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Re: Alienmotion - An animation middleware

Post by almondega »

Thanks for the update!

'll try later.
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Re: Alienmotion - An animation middleware

Post by mono2k »

nice work!
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