How would I create Traffic in a DAZ movie using various vehicles?

nokoteb99

All i want to do is two way traffic( One lane per way). But animating this manually using the time line just will give me a couple of cars to drive by. What if i want a shot that last 8 seconds or something? Is there no way to make them loop?  LIke i would make cars go from point A to point B in a straight line. Is there a way to loop that motion?

i'm kind of thinking aniblocks., but aren't aniblocks just for human figures?

wolf359

PM user  IVY

She has alot of experience with animating vehicles in DAZ studio

 

 

 

Ivy

Hi nokoteb99 & Wolf

I donno how much help I can be . But Vehicle motion is a lot of trial and error.    when creating motions for Auto's and trucks everything has to be done by hand. Start on keyframe one.  and advance your  scroller  or scubber to the keyframe ahead for how ever long you want your animation scene to go. and then slide your cars accordingly into proposition on the timeline. , when making a turn you will need to do the length of the motions first starting at point A to Point B  and then as you scroll back your  scrubbe ryou will need to reposition by hand your cars  pre keyframe during the turn in order to make them look realistic its just takes a little practice.   .  I found when passing traffic at a high rate of speed its best to leave your traffic static or use very  little moment and make the motion go to the attention of the car that is passing the traffic at  high speed  for the best effect. Timing( advancing your keyframes) is another thing that you will need to practice with because if you make your animation to long on the timeline your car will appear to be going to slow.

Moving vehicles is a little tricky at first so it all has to be done by hand keyframing.. Unfortunately  Saving finished motions files for vehicles to aniblocks  does not to work right Because the next time you  try to use them they tend to not match how you need them. Other wise I would have had tons of them to share with people.

And one last hint .. when it comes time to animate the wheels so they look like they are spinning. I really suggest for each wheel being seen in the film that your creating motion for,  that you go in the perimeters tabs  for the wheel l and uncheck "use limits",  I found if you don't do this some wheels on vehicles tend to reverse themselves during the motions cycle.  I leaned that Mistake in my last street race film I did .  As I said its a lot of trial and error so I'll try to help if i can . just post your questions here . Good luck :)

This was my last Animated film I did

Epic Street Race (Animated)

 

 

kaotkbliss

Ivy said:

And one last hint .. when it comes time to animate the wheels so they look like they are spinning. I really suggest for each wheel being seen in the film that your creating motion for,  that you go in the perimeters tabs  for the wheel l and uncheck "use limits",  I found if you don't do this some wheels on vehicles tend to reverse themselves during the motions cycle. 

I've noticed watching movies, sometimes if the vehicle is moving fast enough, it actually appears that the wheels start spinning backwards for a second. I don't know if it's real life or movie magic, but it can work. LOL

nokoteb99

Ivy, excellent movie. Wow. You're so talented.   By the way what is the kind of like catwalk you used on your female character. Is it one you bought here or other site?

Yeah i guess like you said i have to keyframe all the cars that i want to drive. Like i'm doing  a busy driving area with two lanes of traffic each in opposing directions. My idea is to first just line up the cars and then start them off with a key frame each alittle bit later than the other

SpottedKitty

kaotkbliss said:

I've noticed watching movies, sometimes if the vehicle is moving fast enough, it actually appears that the wheels start spinning backwards for a second. I don't know if it's real life or movie magic, but it can work. LOL

It's not quite "moving fast enough", it's just that the revs/second speed of the wheels can come close to or further away from some simple multiple of the movie frame rate. It's an optical illusion that goes right back to the very first silent movies, and it can't really be done away with unless you deliberately choose a speed that doesn't do this.