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How do I make part of a character follow part of another character?

Reality HackReality Hack Posts: 99
in Technical Help (nuts n bolts)

For instance, placing character A's hand on character B's shoulder, then moving B while A's hand remains on B's shoulder?
And how do I key-frame it so that I can turn A's hand 'on and off' from following B's shoulder?

Thanks in advance.

Comments

  • margravemargrave Posts: 1,822

    Create an IK chain on the hand, parent it to an empty, and then parent the empty to the other character's shoulder bone. The IK chain will follow wherever the empty goes.

    However, I find Daz's IK system subpar, especially when it comes to animation, so be prepared for some fiddling.

  • Faeryl WomynFaeryl Womyn Posts: 3,545

    mcjcasual created a script for this, you can find it on the freebies forum

  • Reality HackReality Hack Posts: 99

    Okay, so here's the deal. Yes, I parent the IK node to the shoulder, and then rotate the shoulder, and the IK node moves just fine.
    However, say I pose the character I want it to follow, then I advance the timeline and pose them again, that's where the disconnect happens. The IK node doesn't follow.

  • margravemargrave Posts: 1,822

    Reality Hack said:

    Okay, so here's the deal. Yes, I parent the IK node to the shoulder, and then rotate the shoulder, and the IK node moves just fine.
    However, say I pose the character I want it to follow, then I advance the timeline and pose them again, that's where the disconnect happens. The IK node doesn't follow.

    Welcome to animating in Daz.

    If you want a robust constraint system, where you can force nodes to copy another node's transforms over an animation, you have two options:

    1. Use the Diffeomorphic bridge to export to Blender.
    2. Use the official DazToBlender bridge to export to Blender.

    Choose carefully.

  • Reality HackReality Hack Posts: 99

    Yikes. But typical. When I couldn't find any tutorials on it, that should've been a big red flag to me.

    Alright, well, if the DazToBlender bridge is anything like the DazTo3dsMax bridge, then it won't work, like, at all. So should I just go with Diffeomorphic then? Is there any way you could briefly outline the differences? Remember, all I'd be looking to do is take two figures from Daz, move them into Blender for the sole pupose of animating them, then shoot the animation right back into Daz. I don't need to get proper materials on them or anything like that in Blender. Also, I've never used Blender.

    I'm off to look up some tutorials...

  • margravemargrave Posts: 1,822
    edited April 2021

    At the moment, the bridge is one-way. So you'd either need to render with Blender's own unbiased renderer, Cycles, or export each frame back into Daz as an *.obj file and reapply the materials.

    To explain briefly:

    1. Create an empty.
    2. Give the IK control bone of the first character a Copy Transforms Bone Constraint.
    3. Set the target to the empty.
    4. Set the mix type to "Replace".
    5. Give the empty a Copy Transforms Object constraint (different menu from Bone Constraints).
    6. Set the target to the second character's armature and the bone to which shoulder bone you want to follow.
    7. Set the mix type to "Before" or "After Original".

    The IK control bone will now rigidly follow the other character's shoulder bone. Animate the "Influence" property when you want it to stop following, and how abruptly.

    Post edited by margrave on
  • Reality HackReality Hack Posts: 99

    Oh. So I guess Blender's out then. (Unless I want to learn it, and switch my workflow to it completely.) My workflow actually goes into 3d Studio Max right now. It is an insane workflow that I would not wish upon my worst enemy. But there it is.

    Okay, let me try what you suggested there. That does seem like a long wait for a very short train ride, because Daz, but we'll see.

  • Reality HackReality Hack Posts: 99

    Okay, so just to clarify, there is no way to simply transfer the characters to Blender for animation, then export just that animation (without the characters) back to Daz and apply it to the characters? Like BVH or something?

  • margravemargrave Posts: 1,822

    Reality Hack said:

    Okay, so just to clarify, there is no way to simply transfer the characters to Blender for animation, then export just that animation (without the characters) back to Daz and apply it to the characters? Like BVH or something?

    Not sure. Never tried it.

    As I mentioned before, you could save the characters' material settings in Daz, export them from Blender as *.obj, and then import them back into Daz and re-apply the materials for rendering in Iray.

    You'll have to render the animation frame-by-frame instead of as one video file, but that's what you should be doing anyway, so it all works out.

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