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Script to jiggle the camera?
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Script to jiggle the camera? // Roundtable
Post by RichLevy // Oct 4, 2008, 2:46pm
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RichLevy
Total Posts: 1140
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I need to animate a camera, I want the camera to be able to jiggle
1) as if the camera is moving along with a person in First person view
2) as if the camera is in a vehicle and is moving with the motion and from bumps (water,air or ground)
are there any scripts floating around that I can hool into the world transforms for the camera?
Thanks
Rich |
Post by mrbones // Oct 4, 2008, 3:01pm
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mrbones
Total Posts: 1280
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Ive experimented with this,
What Ive done is assign a phys prop to the camera,
Then record the camera moving by using the phys move tool.
I have attached a demo video of the results..
This is rated M for mature though, (strong language)
http://www.classiecriminals.com/classieVID1.zip
Let me know if that is the kind of moving camera effect you were looking for.
Cheers |
Post by RichLevy // Oct 4, 2008, 3:03pm
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RichLevy
Total Posts: 1140
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bad link Mr.Bones
Rich |
Post by RichLevy // Oct 4, 2008, 3:06pm
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RichLevy
Total Posts: 1140
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That is funny though, I just put physics properties on one of the cameras, started the simulation and it dropped like a boulder... can't even say how far down it went :) that was funny :D
Rich |
Post by mrbones // Oct 4, 2008, 3:09pm
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mrbones
Total Posts: 1280
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Try again, done uploading now.
Cheers
\\bad link Mr.Bones
Rich |
Post by RichLevy // Oct 4, 2008, 3:10pm
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RichLevy
Total Posts: 1140
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Is it posible to attach a camera to an animated character? That would work in some situations also.
Rich |
Post by mrbones // Oct 4, 2008, 3:12pm
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mrbones
Total Posts: 1280
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I think it is rich,
Use the attach skin tool or attach object to bone.
HTH
Would be cool if you could implement both animated character and look at tool,
Is it posible to attach a camera to an animated character? That would work in some situations also.
Rich |
Post by mrbones // Oct 4, 2008, 3:16pm
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mrbones
Total Posts: 1280
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You have to select any other object in scene for that not to happen,
I dont know why that happens, but camera will drop through floor with phys prop assigned,
select another object then run sim and it will bounce on floor, not go through,
Try to grab camera with phys sim tool before it hits ground though, or start camera very low to ground,
It will take a few trys to get it right, Its very finicky, but managable.
ALso it helps to normalize axes rotation and location on camera.
HTH
That is funny though, I just put physics properties on one of the cameras, started the simulation and it dropped like a boulder... can't even say how far down it went :) that was funny :D
Rich |
Post by RichLevy // Oct 4, 2008, 3:26pm
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RichLevy
Total Posts: 1140
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Yea, you have given me a whole bunch of different things to try now, not necessarily what I want, but very good camera ideas assuming I can get them to work...
I have to try if I can set a camera into a dolly and than animate them both also...
Thanks for the ideas!
:D
Rich |
Post by mrbones // Oct 4, 2008, 3:31pm
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mrbones
Total Posts: 1280
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Thanks Rich,
I think the shaky camera adds a considerable amount of realism and dramatic effect to otherwise mundane camera movements.
Ive also tryed using wind paramaters to make the camera float on cushions of air. That worked but was not as shaky as I desired.
Were you able to see the demo video?
Cheers
Yea, you have given me a whole bunch of different things to try now, not necessarily what I want, but very good camera ideas assuming I can get them to work...
I have to try if I can set a camera into a dolly and than animate them both also...
Thanks for the ideas!
:D
Rich |
Post by RichLevy // Oct 4, 2008, 3:44pm
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RichLevy
Total Posts: 1140
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Yea, I like the "consumer camcorder effect" it works well. That is definitely a good technique for many kinds of shots...
I am surprised there are not more camera shakingin scripts though. All of the 3D programs I have any experience with have at least a couple different ones...
We'll get ours too.
Rich |
Post by mrbones // Oct 4, 2008, 3:47pm
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mrbones
Total Posts: 1280
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If we could just effectively hold the camera and record the movement in realtime,... Maybee if we could implement both mouse keys, for all way movement as well...
Looking forward to developments on this one..
Yea, I like the "consumer camcorder effect" it works well. That is definitely a good technique for many kinds of shots...
I am surprised there are not more camera shakingin scripts though. All of the 3D programs I have any experience with have at least a couple different ones...
We'll get ours too.
Rich |
Post by RichLevy // Oct 4, 2008, 4:49pm
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RichLevy
Total Posts: 1140
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I watched a couple of videos on youtube from a guy making a 3D mouse from a WII controller. With it he could make movements in realtime as he stood there and the movements were recorded on the screen. Something like that would be awesome for realtime 3D animations :) We are getting very close to the point where almost anything will be possible to create and become part of the 3D creations.
Rich |
Post by W!ZARD // Oct 4, 2008, 9:28pm
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W!ZARD
Total Posts: 2603
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You can actually build a camera crane system quite easily. Build a simple base and an arm out of appropriately sized cubes, add a cam to the end of the arm and make qa simple skeleton to operate the crane and you can keyframe the camera arm motions like you would any other object. You can get some really nice cam moves using this approach.
HTH
~W~ |
Post by Délé // Oct 4, 2008, 11:17pm
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Délé
Total Posts: 1374
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It shouldn't be too hard to write a camera shake script. I'm working on a lot of stuff right now but I'll try to whip something up quick. The "shake" math could always be tweaked more later. |
Post by RichLevy // Oct 5, 2008, 12:00am
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RichLevy
Total Posts: 1140
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The ability to adjust the shake would be a terrific feature :)
Wizard... not sure if you have ever seen Hollywood Camera Work, The Master Series...http://www.hollywoodcamerawork.us/?s=gmain&gclid=CPzm_pLoj5YCFQOuFQodlCTmFA I bought the series some years back at a discount because I am a member of a club that is involved in digital media.
In the series they do mock up for all types of TV, Film, indie camera shooting situations. PArt of the training is learning to make and setup these scenes...
I have a ton of things to experiment with the next few days to week... I have a ton to learn before I can feel comfortable with the lighting and cameras in TS...
Thanks for the responses and help guys, very much appreciated, lots of great ideas in this thread :)
rich |
Post by Norm // Oct 6, 2008, 6:26am
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Norm
Total Posts: 862
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The Link Editor is handy for this type scenario. If you use an object's World Matrix and hook that up to the Owner Matrix of the camera, the camera will follow the object. Once that basic connection is made, you can further refine camera movements with a script to do the random motion or such.
I took a sphere, gave it physics properties, changed it's COG, then ran 10 seconds of animation. Afterwards, I hooked up the Link Editor connections between sphere and camera, and ran the anim.
If you wanted to reverse engineer the scenario, you could hook the Camera's World Matrix to the object's Owner Matrix and have the object follow the Camera. So if a character was in a walk cycle, you could have the camera filming character as he walks through/down a street or such.
Lot of possibilites :) |
Post by RichLevy // Oct 6, 2008, 7:03am
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RichLevy
Total Posts: 1140
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Hey Norm
Thanks Norm, I think as you mention there is more available for this than you think... TS seems to have the ability for what appears to be near endless cmaera movement and effects... A bit clumsy to get a hold of at first (as seen in one other thread here by me :) )...
I'll be checking this out in the next few days.
Rich |
Post by frank // Oct 6, 2008, 10:23am
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frank
Total Posts: 709
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I wanted to add a couple of quick tips...
Remember that any object can act as a camera. Just apply an invisible shader and render from it. This may work better in cases of physics simulation, as opposed to a regular camera object.
In some instances real-life camera operators use devices to shake/jitter the lens. This may have been more to keep the film camera mechanisms from damage due to jarring, but it may work well in a physics simulation, so long as you can constrain the lens object to the front of the camera. The lens itself will have to be shaded appropriately.
Hrm... I may try to work something up to illustrate this. I've wanted to do a "physical camera" for a while anyhow. ;-) |
Post by trueBlue // Oct 6, 2008, 11:04am
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trueBlue
Total Posts: 1761
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Here is my attempt:
http://forums1.caligari.com/truespace/showthread.php?p=83166#post83166 |
Post by frank // Oct 6, 2008, 11:05am
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frank
Total Posts: 709
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Well, using physics is a bit tough. At best you may be able to get a "dangling" effect, if you attach the camera object via links or something. But overall I don't think it's what you are after.
I normally keyframe handheld camera movements manually, so that I get full control. The technique I use is simple...
First I would add any camera movement/translation (trucking, dolly, etc) from point A to point B.
Then I would start at the beginning with this:
- advance 5 frames
- add slight rotation to camera
- set (rotation) key
- repeat
As a final step I'd go back through and add slight rotation and keyframe between some of those, for subtle jitter. Often I'd add a camera zoom as well, always adding a 5+ frame slow crawl (right when the zoom starts, as if the zoom rocker isn't pushed down all the way yet) and then zip in pretty fast for 5 or 7 frames... and maybe pad it at the end with more frames for a slow-out, as if the rocker/button was almost released but not quite yet. That's better for the camcorder effect.
So if all else fails, you can give that a try. ;-) |
Post by RichLevy // Oct 6, 2008, 11:13am
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RichLevy
Total Posts: 1140
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TS crashed when I put physics properties on a camera than rested it on a board (flat cube)... I will play around later to further test it. The scene was very slow though, I was hoping to get a reasonably complex scenery scene together... I don't think physics would do it.
Rich |
Post by Délé // Oct 6, 2008, 11:56am
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Délé
Total Posts: 1374
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I haven't had much time to work on this yet, but I have played around a little bit. Consider the video proof of concept. Now I just have to mess around with the math a bit and set up some good user controls. ;) |
Post by RichLevy // Oct 6, 2008, 12:15pm
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RichLevy
Total Posts: 1140
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That is one bumpy ride! :D
Rich |
Post by Norm // Oct 7, 2008, 5:27am
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Norm
Total Posts: 862
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Camera not intended for physical properties. Try dropping a sphere and recording its bounces. Once finished, attach camera to the sphere via Link Editor and the sphere's world matrix to the camera's owner matrix. At this point you can select the camera and center it on sphere, set sphere to invisible and then run the anim. Camera will follow the location info of the sphere and seem to bounce up and down.
It is also possible (through scripting) to for instance create a plane with lots of verts along an edge. You can set each vert (point edit its position) so along the edge of the plane it looks like a bumpy road. You then remove all the other non essential vertices and are basically left with a "path" of vertices. A script could read each vertex's location information on a frame by frame basis. The location info for the "z" direction can be grabbed and set for the camera's "z" location. In the end, you have a camera's z local being fed to it across the animation. At 30 frames a second though, you may be using vertex info from the plane every 30 frames and the animation editor would tween the in-between frames for you. |
Post by mrbones // Oct 20, 2008, 7:59am
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mrbones
Total Posts: 1280
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Here is a better link to view my shakycam realtime camera try.
http://fr.youtube.com/watch?v=MUVAvxEn7no&feature=user
I used physim on camera during the second part.(right click holding camera in air with phys move tool)
and manual keyframes in the beggining.
what do you think of the results? |
Post by mrbones // Oct 31, 2008, 7:49pm
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mrbones
Total Posts: 1280
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Hmmm
No comments or suggestions on my shaky camera result using phys move tool and physics?
Starts at 31 second mark....
What do you think? |
Post by RichLevy // Nov 1, 2008, 3:11am
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RichLevy
Total Posts: 1140
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Not bad.
Subtle, yet enough for it to come across as real footage from someone walking and holding a camera.
Rich |
Post by frootee // Nov 1, 2008, 3:18am
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frootee
Total Posts: 2667
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pretty cool bones.
I would suggest slightly less noticeable movement.
I like the approach. |
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