Blender to Zappar workflow - tutorial request please!

I am sorry Wika I was away and then I forgot to check the forum again. Sorry for the delay. I hope Seb answered your question. Seb, it looks as I have learned something :-D.
Have you sorted it out your problem?
Please let me know.
Kind Regards
milenne

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I am kind of lost. I cannot find any tutorial nor guide on how to animate multiple 3D models as a sequence. I would be grateful for any tips on how to do it in Zapworks.

Can media file be set as animation frame?

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To animate the textures you can save your animation frame by frame using Jpgs or Pngs then import all these images in Zapstudio (Watch file size) then you create a timeline and add the images frame by frame.

Now for multiple 3D models… Hum. Again I don’t thing Zapstudio will be happy with multiple 3D models because of file sizes but I cannot see why you would have many 3D models to create an animation. Unless you are trying to bring a model that deforms (blend shapes) as studio doesn’t support it but I wouldn’t recommend this at all.
Depending on what you are animating (no deformations) you can bake the animation in your 3D software so it creates a frame by frame animation of that object that you can bring to studio as a complete animation.

I have just looked at your file. and By looking at the animated sequence texture that you posted, I imagine you are trying to replicate that by deforming the object? If it is the case, nope. It is not going to work. What you can do is to create one object only that has no holes and just apply the textures that you saved frame by frame and apply to the object and play the animation of the texture. What is going to look like I am not sure though? Do you need a 3D object? Sorry I cannot be more helpful but I don’t know the context of what you are trying to achieve.

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My ultimate goal is to have a 3D animation of crack propagation, so changing topology. This is output of numerical analysis. It is impossible to have it in one file animation in a classical sense since the mesh is changing for every step. I know that size could be an issue, but it would be nice if I could just show 20 snapshots, 300kB each.

But I guess this is not possible ;/

I think I will try with changing the textures, the propagating crack can be visible on a map/texture of stresses for example.
Thank you so much for the suggestions Milenne!

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Ok. Try to export 30 meshes then of the crack propagation. and put it one by one in a timeline.
30 frames will be a really fast thing though.But at least to see the result.

What you can have is the texture with opacity layers changing. I will try that too but I have not much time today but I am curious now

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Is there any smarter way than just having the the visibility of the mesh switched on and off?

I know it’s a pain. The other thing you could do is code it with a loop that changes it.

Steve

I did it! By hand and it works like a charm. Each mesh is only 4KB, so it is like nothing.
Can someone give any suggestions on how to automatise this process? I have over 200 mesh-frames.

How to load/access obj types as keyframes? I would be grateful for any code snippet or suggestion.

BONE.zpp (409.6 KB)

com-video-to-gif

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Fantastic Progress Wilka90. I am sure Steve will be able to tell you about the automation. He always helps me when it comes to coding. ;-). That is great to see that you are getting somewhere.

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I have been working on it today. Just about finished. I think…

Steve

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Ok here is a demo code you can try.
I took what you did and coded it to run a loop. You can add more OBJ files you just have to keep the naming scheme.
The main code is in the BONE2 under Script. Let me know if you have any question.

Use this for the tracking image.
tracking-image

Code:
Bone Help.zpp (1.2 MB)

Steve

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That is really great work! I cannot thank you enough.
com-optimize
When I added more frames, the animation starts flashing at some point.
This happens only at the first run, the next ones are normal. What can be causing this?

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Off hand not sure. Can you find out at what number OBJ file it starts?

Can you post your update code. I can take a look.

Steve

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animation_STL.zpp (2.3 MB)

Approximately 70-80. It might be some performance issue. ;/

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I’ll take a look. It could be. I think there is a way to edit frame rate.

I had a problem with the reset. It calls the off command for the loop but the next time you play it the loop start command would not fire. The fix was to call the loop at the end of the reset.

Steve

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Here is my workaround:
When the object is first time seen I run a loop over all types, it does not show them, just kind of preload, but then when I press play it works like a charm the first time! (maybe just one small flash at the end but I can live with that :slight_smile: )

Thank you so much for your help!

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I have been looking at the code and still deny know why it does it. Maybe @Seb can help?

Steve

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