Multi-Moving Parts - need some help!

[Mike Thurman]

  I know how to make moving parts such as elevators, rudders, ailerons, etc, stock & non stock animations. My question is how can i make a part that has two functions. For example.

I dowloaded this Bell 47 G2 from Hover Control ( Framerate cerial killer!!!) And when the rotors are slowly spinning, you can see the movements you have in them, unlike the default choppies. Or for example the control stick, it is an aileron, and elevator the way it's animated. Can someone tell me how with Gmax i can make these sort of parts. I want to make moving ( as in pitch/bank ) rotors for a Gmax choppie i'm working on.



Thanks



Mike

[Felix/FFDS]

In principle, you want to create two parts, a small part, say a tiny box, that "hides" within the larger "visible" part.

Take a normal control stick, for example.

Create your normal stick, and tag it lever_stick_l_r -  this gives you your left/right (*aileron*) movement.  Note that you have to animate it - check the MakeMDL sdk for the extents.

Create small box (and this can start out as a clone of the aforementioned lever_stick_l_r) but call it lever_stick_fore_aft.  This is your elevator control movement.

Make the lever_stick_fore_aft a child of the lever_stick_l_r.  To "finish off" the effect, delete extra polygons, vertices, etc., and just leave a small box, scaled down around the pivot point.

What you have now is - visually - ONE stick with the appropriate animation that will look good.

That's the basic principle that you want in multiple part animation.

[Mike Thurman]

How do i make something a "Child" of another part??

[Milton]

Use the Link feature to establish relationships.

For example, a prop may be linked to a hub which is linked to a spinner.   The hierarchy looks like this in the relationship:
spinner
....hub  (child of spinner)
........prop  (child of hub)

If the spinner rotates, the hub and prop rotate with it.
You can then have separate animations for the hub or prop.

Example, you can have the prop pitch change with the lever in the cockpit or your yoke by using the proper tag for the props.



In this example picture, my spinner is called prop0_still.  The hub is called pitchsg01, and the prop is called  lever_prop_pitch0_01, etc.

This allows my props to turn with the spinner, and pitch with the movement of the prop condition lever.

Once this is setup, you can clone it for the second engine or for the prop0_slow set.  If you apply textures first, then when you clone, just use the Instance so any changes to the first will be reflected in all.

Hope this helps.
Milton

[Mike Thurman]

Ah, ok, just like when i used to use Animation master 99. Thanks