Animating wheels and rods with more than 8 + 1 frames

Hi all,I'm building a small narrow gauge steam loco. This was te time of building rods and animating them... I set to 0 to 8 the number of frames and did the trigonometrical calculations needed for putting things in the exact place in each one of the frames. But...When exported from gmax to MSTS I see the animation but the PISTON and the traction rod show some small oscillations or irregularities that doesn't please to me... I tried setting number of frames to 16 (0 to 16) but MSTS seems do not like the last 8 frames... I was looking for some line in the .eng file where I could notify MSTS that the number of frames is now 16... but no successs...Someone knows how make wheels and rod animations with more than the default 8 + 1 frames?Thanks a lot!

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RE: Animating wheels and rods with more than 8 + 1 fram, Captain Bazza, Apr-21-03, 10:28 PM, (1) RE: Animating wheels and rods with more than 8 + 1 fram, decapod, Apr-22-03, 04:33 AM, (4) RE: Animating wheels and rods with more than 8 + 1 fram, Hack, Apr-22-03, 00:11 AM, (2) RE: Animating wheels and rods with more than 8 + 1 fram, Jonatan, Apr-22-03, 02:51 AM, (3) RE: Animating wheels and rods with more than 8 + 1 fram, Captain Bazza, Apr-22-03, 04:49 AM, (5) RE: Animating wheels and rods with more than 8 + 1 fram, Hack, Apr-22-03, 07:37 AM, (6) RE: Animating wheels and rods with more than 8 + 1 fram, decapod, Apr-22-03, 07:46 AM, (7) RE: Animating wheels and rods with more than 8 + 1 fram, Hack, Apr-22-03, 03:09 PM, (8) RE: Animating wheels and rods with more than 8 + 1 fram, cromero, Apr-22-03, 05:04 PM, (9)

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Depending on your modelling program you can use more than 0-8 frames of animation. I have used 0-16 and 0-32. (0 is the key frame.) To match the rotation of the wheels to the forward speed you may have to tweak the wheel (drivers) radius/diameter in the ENG file.The oscillations seem to occur no matter what you try, perhaps it's a bug, or failing, in the conversion utility conv3ds. Another bug that occurs is some parts using 'position' animation (non-rotational), have a missing frame, which you can see in the animation section (end) of the shape (.S) text file. For example, an object, which is animated over 0-16 frames should show a total of 17 frames, and 0-16 lines of animation data. After processing, if you notice your 'position' part has jerky animation, check the uncompressed shape file in a unicode text editor, such as WordPad, that all 17 frames data lines are present. If the frame total shows 16, there is a frame line missing. Look at the frame numbers in the object's animation data. They should number from 0 through to 16 (total 17).There are two fixes, of sorts.
Keep processing the shape until the error corrects itself (it will).
Or try this: copy the first line (frame 0) and past it at the end, changing the copied frame number to 16, and change the frame total to 17, if it reads 16. Check all the frame lines are numbered correctly from 0 to 16. Sometimes this will cure the problem, until next time you process the shape. Maybe next time your animation will be okay, but it's a good idea to keep a copy of a correct animation shape file so you can copy and paste to a later faulty section.Sounds complicated, but it would not be a challenge otherwise. (Crap, I know, but shouting doesn't help at all.) LOL

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I have done a bit of research on this one... Oscillations are due to the linear algorithm used to interpolate between keyframes.
There may be a better solution using the adjusting parameters on TCB rotation, but gmax is the only tool that supports this.16 frames give better results than 8 for outside cylinder locos.NOTE - always use 8 for inside cylinders, 16 gives no benefit (unless you've used linear motion instead of reversing the rotation for the wheel link as some people do with TSM - TSM has several limitations with animation definition)When using 16 frames, do not alter the wheel size in the ENG file, this has other effects on the fuel consumption and play rate of sounds.
Instead you need to manually edit the S file to change the line:animation ( 16 30to animation ( 16 60This correctly adjusts the play back speed.Also, you do not have to define every key frame in the sequence (due to the interpolation algorithms used) - for a simple wheel rotation only, you only need to define 5 of the frames (at 90 degrees) for 8 or 16 frame animationsFinally, if you have 3D canvas, just use my Rod animator plugin which automatically and accurately builds the animations for you.

Paul
UK GWR Highworth Branch
http://www.highworth.freeuk.com

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There might be a problem with more than 8 frames if the wheels are set to 8, and rods, etc. are set higher for example. I believe MSTS wants it one way or another, and doesn't like to intermix animation speeds.BTW, the detail of the frame in the above pics are absolutely stunning! Please keep us posted on your progress. Cheers!
Marc - 3DTrains
http://www.3dtrains.comPro Series SuperPacks

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LAST EDITED ON Apr-22-03 AT 02:54 AM (EDT)

Wow, that looks realy good! I will download it when finished. Btw, what type will it be, Tender or Tank?/Jonatan

Steam rules!

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Marc, the trick is to 'stretch' the time from 0-8 frames, to 0-16 frames.

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But even when "stretching" time, is it not still 16 frames? BTW, I believe it's 0-7/0-15 instead of 0-8/0-16 - the former giving 8/16 frames, while the latter giving 9/17...Hmmmm, 9-17...9-17...9-17...Note to self: remind me to watch Le Mans video - again. Cheers!
Marc - 3DTrains
http://www.3dtrains.comPro Series SuperPacks

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Marc,it is 0-8 and 0-16 - the last key frame is the same as the first to provide interpolation back to the start position.
If you look in the S file under each controller section you'll see 9 or 17 frames defined.

Paul
UK GWR Highworth Branch
http://www.highworth.freeuk.com

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My bad - thanks for the clarification, Paul. Cheers!
Marc - 3DTrains
http://www.3dtrains.comPro Series SuperPacks

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A lot of thanks to all of you!I re-animated all the wheels, piston and rods to 16 frames. I put the time to double (thanks Paul-Decapod!) and now the set looks better than yesterday Jonathan:
>Btw, what type will it be, Tender or Tank?
It is a Tank loco from a large serie (in European standards! ) of them built by Krauss (Germany) since 1888, "Talleres Nuevo Vulcano", Barcelona, (1901) and "La Maquinista Terrestre y Marítima", Barcelona, since 1902. It seems that there weren't problems with copyright at this time!Again, thanks a lot!Carles

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