Skis part 2: Cycling the
skis
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PAGE TWO - Moving the heels
Place the timeslider at frame 0.
Place the character in its first step. Put the right leg in front and the right leg behind. To place them, use the ankle circles. The right leg should be fully extended (we will arrange this later). When you're satisfied, select them both and do Motion > SaveKey > Objects > Translation.
With the circles still selected, click with RMB on the timeslider and move to frame 30, and click with MMB on the SaveKey cell, to save keyframes. This will copy the same keyframes as frame 0.
Then move the timeslider to frame 20, and inverse the position of the legs. Put the right leg behind and the left leg in front. MMB on the SaveKey cell to save another translation keyframe.
Now do Motion > FcrvSelect > Object > Translation. This will bring the Fcurves window. You should have something like this:
Select each curve, click on Interp, and click on each point with MMB to make them linear.
Take a look in the Schematic View, under ski_topnul (under CONST). You'll notice that there is 2 new nodes: path1 and path2. These are the trajectories that the heel circles follow.
For now these path are Cardinal, but we need them to be Bézier. Multi-select those paths and do Model > Effect > Convert. Check Bezier and click OK. Now our paths are Bézier paths.
Single select one of these paths. In the right viewport, hold down M and click on the point at the left. Drag this point between the one that was under and the right one. You might have to pull the lines first. If you don't see them, do Show > Lines.
Then do Model > Draw > Open/Close, to close the curve.
Adjust the curve until you have something like the image below. When you're done, proceed with the other curve, but this time move the point at right.
Now, playback the animation. If cycle runs backward, select the paths and do Motion > Effect > Inverse. You'll notive that now the feet are synchronized, they move almost identically, the left leg is the problem. We will readjust this now.
Select the left path, and do Show > Edge Flag. You can see the edge flag (the point where the spline ends). We simply have to move this edge flag. To do so, do Model > Effect > Curve Control. Click on Shift U spinners to move the edge flag. It should be placed next the right point.
If you playback, everything should be fine. If not, access again the Curve Control function and shift one more time the edge flag.
Select the right heel circle, and do Motion > FcrvSelect > Objects > Translation. Change the perspective viewport to the right viewport, and zoom as close as possible on the back corner of the path. Go to frame 20. In the Fcurve window, tag the keyframe and tranlate it in Y axis, until the center of the heel circle comes exactly on the path's corner.
Do the same for the other heel circle. But this time you must adjust the center to make it as close as possible of the left corner.
So now we are done with the heels movement.
Previous:
Initial setup, Understanding the hierarchy and How it is keyframed.
Next: Rotating the skis - Animating CUBE