How to Create Animation Sequences
Use ChoreoHUD to make an animation sequence
What exactly is a choreography sequence?
When we talk about a "choreography sequence", this typically refers to the body movements of an avatar over a period of time. "Body Movements" in this case are manipulations of an avatar's skeleton such as leg bends, hip rotations, arm extensions, etc. In Second Life, body movements of an avatar are accomplished by playing pre-recorded "animation" objects. By playing specific animations in specific orders at specific times, we can create a graceful, continuous story.
Building an animation sequence with ChoreoHUD Solo
There are a few different ways to compose sequences of animations together. In this section we'll describe one of the simplest methods, using the "ChoreoHUD Solo" tool included in the MetaHarper Show Tools package. This tool can be used to create an animation sequence suitable for a single avatar at a time.
You might ask what if wish to compose sequences for more than one avatar at a time? Or try out other methods? We'll come back to this later.
Load your Animations
- Go to a place where you can rez objects. You will need about 70 prims free.
- Drag the "MST Choreo HUD SOLO" from your unpacked MetaHarper Show Tools folder onto the ground nearby.
- Copy some animations from your avatar’s inventory and paste them into the HUD’s inventory on the ground. For best results copy less than 40 animations per copy-paste. If you have a very large number of animations to import from another device see the FAQ documentation for a fast method. TIP: Don’t use no-copy animations
- Pick up your MST Choreo HUD off the ground and attach it to your avatar
Select a few animations in particular to work with
Click the blue button at the bottom of the ChoreoHUD. The display should change to "Sequence Builder Mode"". This mode can be used for quickly assembling a list of timed animations that flow together to create an effect or tell a story. This is often the first step in creating a larger performance that involves dances or animations.
To build a sequence, first click the ‘list’ button in the lower right area of the HUD. This will slide out an window on the right showing all of your loaded animations. Browse and click animations on this right panel to see them play on your avatar. If you like the way an animation looks and want to use it in your sequence, Click the the “left arrow” button at the top of the right-hand window bar to move the currently-playing animation onto the left sequence panel. When you add an animation to the left sequence panel, the name of the animation you selected will be shown in nearby chat (only visible to you). This can be handy if you need to copy and paste the name of an animation for any reason later.
Edit Timing and Order
Once you’ve added a a few animations to the left selection panel you can click lines on this panel to fine-tune the sequence. When you click a line, additional buttons will appear at the top of the left-panel.
- The “(x)” button will remove this line from your sequence
- The “up/down” button will move a line up or down in the sequence order depending on which part of the button you click. Note that sequences begin from the top and work towards the bottom.
- The “pencil” button will allow you change how long the animation should play. The default play time is 20.00 seconds.
- The (>) button will start playing the sequence starting from the currently selected line, so you can see what it looks like.
(Optional) use 'Record Mode' to help find timings.
If you click the stopwatch icon on the right panel, it will toggle ‘record mode’ on and off. When record mode is active, clicking an animation will play it immediately. As soon as you click a second animation, you will get a printout of how long the previous animation played, and its name. This will be printed both in local chat and additionally in red text at the bottom of the right hand panel. You can use this get quickly get timings for a sequence. Toggle record mode off again to allow selecting animations and bringing them to the left-hand panel.
Testing / Playing a Sequence
You can test your sequence at any time by using the solid-black triangle “Play” button in the lower right corner. When you click Play, animations will start playing from the top to the bottom, in the order and timing that you have selected. The actively playing animation will be highlighted in green. You can stop the sequence from playing at any time by using the square “stop” button at the bottom of the panel. If you desire to start the sequence playing from somewhere in the middle, you may select the line you wish to start from and click the circle-play icon at the far-right of that selected line.
When you are playing back sequences, you may click the ‘list’ button to close the animation browser slide out panel to save screen space. The slide out panel is only used when designing a sequence, and not for playback.
If you have previously invited other avatars to share your animations (for example, in the Browse Animations Mode), they will also be animated when you play a sequence. Save your Sequence
When you are happy with your sequence in the right panel, you can click the “Print” icon in the bottom of the sequence panel. Lines will be printed to your nearby chat window (only visible to you). Copy and paste these lines to a notecard, give it a short name, and add this notecard to the MST Choreo HUD.
At any point in the future you can click the “Load” icon that looks like a file box at the bottom of the sequence panel, and then choose your notecard from the popup list. Smart Caching
When you click the “Cache” button (looks like a cloud with an arrow inside) at the bottom of the sequence panel, your avatar will rapidly play through the animations used in your sequence in order to upload these animations to the viewer cache of avatars nearby. This will ensure when you play them back later, the animations will appear to start immediately and will prevent ‘freezes’ while a viewer waits for an animation to be downloaded.
This cache button is ‘smart’ because it will only upload animations used by your sequence, instead of every animation in the HUD’s inventory. This is much more efficient and polite to the sim and to the avatars around you.