Blender, Babylon, Animation Questions

[gryff]

After the "Blue Lady" which was a large babylon file due mainly to the number of bones and the number of frames in the animation, I have been looking at how I might be able control the impact of animations on file size.

 

So I have created a simple book animation - open and close. It has three bones - only two of which are actually animated - and I created 5 key frames over a 240 frame period.

 

So this leads to the first two questions:

 

1. Even though there are only 5 key frames the exporter includes values for all 240 frames. Is it not possible to interpolate between key frames within the babylon framework?

 

2. The master bone - which is not animated is included in the babylon file - 240 frames values where nothing happens to that bone. Is there a way to indicate that rather than produce file bloat ?

 

Here is part of my current babylon file:

{"name":"book spine","index":1,"matrix":[0.0008,0.0000,-1.0000,0.0000,0.0007,1.0000,0.0000,0.0000,1.0000,-0.0007,0.0008,0.0000,0.0000,0.8161,-0.0000,1.0000],"parentBoneIndex":0,"animation": {"dataType":3,"framePerSecond":30,"keys":[{"frame":1,"values":[0.0008,0.0000,-1.0000,0.0000,0.0007,1.0000,0.0000,0.0000,1.0000,-0.0007,0.0008,0.0000,0.0000,0.8161,-0.0000,1.0000]}

Frame 1 for the "book spine" bone - 16 "values"

 

Appended below is an image of my Blender "Action Editor". Note the two bones that are being animated. Each one has 7 invididual values - w,y,z for "Location" and w,x,y,z for "Quaternion Rotation". How do 7 values in Blender end up as 16 values in babylon?

 

Hopes questions don't seem stupid

 

cheers, gryff

 

 

[GameMonetize]

Quaternions/positions are exported as matrices for bones' animations (more convenient for babylon.js)

 

BTW, the exporter for Blender is a bit lazy and does not try to optimize output size at all. I'm looking for help on this topic clearly:)

[GameMonetize]

Hey Gryff,

 

can you try this one:

http://www.babylonjs.com/forumPics/io_export_babylon.zip

 

I tried a more "clever" way of exporting bones animations

[gryff]

I'm looking for help on this topic clearly:)

can you try this one:

 

Sure. Will give it a go tomorrow. Anything to help reduce the babylon file size.

 

cheers, gryff

 

PS I see you are online at 9.40 EST(my time)  - must be late in France. Do you ever sleep? g

[GameMonetize]

I live in Seattle:)

[gryff]

Ok DK, I tried the new exporter and it reduced the file size by 40% for my little test set up - unfortunately all I get is a white canvas when I try to view a scene with the newly exported  babylon file

 

This is the code I am using to load :

BABYLON.SceneLoader.Load("", "newbook4_4a1.babylon", engine, function (newScene) { newScene.executeWhenReady(function () { console.log("ready");...});

Here is what I get in the web console:

GET http://127.0.0.1/webgl/site6/ [HTTP/1.1 304 Not Modified 0ms]GET http://127.0.0.1/webgl/hand.js [HTTP/1.1 304 Not Modified 0ms]GET http://127.0.0.1/webgl/babylon.1.12-beta.js [HTTP/1.1 304 Not Modified 0ms]GET http://127.0.0.1/webgl/howler.js [HTTP/1.1 304 Not Modified 0ms]GET http://127.0.0.1/webgl/site6/newbook4_4a1.babylon.manifest [HTTP/1.1 404 Not Found 0ms]GET http://127.0.0.1/webgl/site6/newbook4_4a1.babylon [HTTP/1.1 304 Not Modified 0ms]GET http://127.0.0.1/webgl/site6/book_open.mp3 [HTTP/1.1 304 Not Modified 0ms]"Valid manifest file not found. Scene & textures will be loaded directly from the web server." babylon.1.12-beta.js:8GET http://127.0.0.1/webgl/site6/book_new1_anim1c_text1x1024%20copy.jpg [HTTP/1.1 304 Not Modified 0ms]

If I change the babylon file to "newbook4_4a.babylon" - created with the old exporter - and view that it shows properly. Here is the web console output for the old file:

GET http://127.0.0.1/webgl/site6/ [HTTP/1.1 200 OK 0ms]GET http://127.0.0.1/webgl/hand.js [HTTP/1.1 304 Not Modified 15ms]GET http://127.0.0.1/webgl/babylon.1.12-beta.js [HTTP/1.1 304 Not Modified 0ms]GET http://127.0.0.1/webgl/howler.js [HTTP/1.1 304 Not Modified 0ms]GET http://127.0.0.1/webgl/site6/newbook4_4a.babylon.manifest [HTTP/1.1 404 Not Found 0ms]GET http://127.0.0.1/webgl/site6/newbook4_4a.babylon [HTTP/1.1 304 Not Modified 0ms]GET http://127.0.0.1/webgl/site6/book_open.mp3 [HTTP/1.1 304 Not Modified 0ms]"Valid manifest file not found. Scene & textures will be loaded directly from the web server." babylon.1.12-beta.js:8GET http://127.0.0.1/webgl/site6/book_new1_anim1c_text1x1024_old13.jpg [HTTP/1.1 304 Not Modified 0ms]"ready" site6:104

Note it prints "ready" in the web console - the first instruction in "newScene.executeWhenReady". - is this where it breaks down with the new exporter?

 

I have tried it with babylon.js 1.9.0, babylon.1.11.js and babylon.1.12-beta.js

 

I am using Firefox 29.0.1 and EasyPHP as my server.

 

Looks like there could be substantial savings in file size if it can be made to work

 

cheers, gryff

 

 

 

 

[GameMonetize]

I think I had a bug. Could you try again? I uploaded a new version 

[gryff]

Seems to work fine now DK. New file size is 58% of file produced with the old exporter

 

Will start a new thread with viewable examples as I use another feature of babylon.js which has not recieved a lot of attention.

 

Looking quickly at the babylon file from the new exporter, it really seems to deal with with my second question above - the bone that is not animated.

 

from the original old file:

"skeletons":[{"name":"the_book","id":0,"bones":[{"name":"book base","index":0,"matrix":[-0.0007,1.0000,0.0008,0.0000,-1.0000,-0.0007,-0.0000,0.0000,-0.0000,0.0008,-1.0000,0.0000,0.8471,0.0010,-0.0000,1.0000],"parentBoneIndex":-1,"animation": {"dataType":3,"framePerSecond":30,"keys":[{"frame":1,"values":[-0.0007,1.0000,0.0008,0.0000,-1.0000,-0.0007,-0.0000,0.0000,-0.0000,0.0008,-1.0000,0.0000,0.8471,0.0010,-0.0000,1.0000]},{"frame":2,"values":[-0.0007,1.0000,0.0008,0.0000,-1.0000,-0.0007,-0.0000,0.0000,-0.0000,0.0008,-1.0000,0.0000,0.8471,0.0010,-0.0000,1.0000]},{"frame":3,"values":[-0.0007,1.0000,0.0008,0.0000,-1.0000,-0.0007,-0.0000,0.0000,-0.0000,0.0008,-1.0000,0.0000,0.8471,0.0010,-0.0000,1.0000]},{"frame":4,"values":[-0.0007,1.0000,0.0008,0.0000,-1.0000,-0.0007,-0.0000,0.0000,-0.0000,0.0008,-1.0000,0.0000,0.8471,0.0010,-0.0000,1.0000]},.... data for all the remaing 235 frames{"frame":240,"values":[-0.0007,1.0000,0.0008,0.0000,-1.0000,-0.0007,-0.0000,0.0000,-0.0000,0.0008,-1.0000,0.0000,0.8471,0.0010,-0.0000,1.0000]}],

The new exporter reduces that to:

"skeletons":[{"name":"the_book","id":0,"bones":[{"name":"book base","index":0,"matrix":[-0.0007,1.0000,0.0008,0.0000,-1.0000,-0.0007,-0.0000,0.0000,-0.0000,0.0008,-1.0000,0.0000,0.8471,0.0010,-0.0000,1.0000],"parentBoneIndex":-1,"animation": {"dataType":3,"framePerSecond":30,"keys":[{"frame":1,"values":[-0.0007,1.0000,0.0008,0.0000,-1.0000,-0.0007,-0.0000,0.0000,-0.0000,0.0008,-1.0000,0.0000,0.8471,0.0010,-0.0000,1.0000]},{"frame":240,"values":[-0.0007,1.0000,0.0008,0.0000,-1.0000,-0.0007,-0.0000,0.0000,-0.0000,0.0008,-1.0000,0.0000,0.8471,0.0010,-0.0000,1.0000]}],

An obvious improvement

 

cheers, gryff

 

[GameMonetize]

Cool:)

[gryff]

I also notice that the exporter produces for the camera "rotation":[0.7854,-0.0000,0.0000] instead  of "target":[0.0000,0.0,0.0], (values for my files). Any other changes to the way data is handled? and what version of babylon.js should be used 1.11 or the 1.12 beta?

 

I also notice from the lights thread that :

 

Babylon.js 1.12 will introduce range for lights: This will be use to attenuate lights over distance.

 

Looks like another big improvement, though I'm not sure "range" and "attenuation" are the same thing.

 

cheers, gryff

[GameMonetize]

The light will attenuate linearly along the range

 

For camera I do not change anything (It was already like this)

 

you could use this exporter with bjs 1.11