[ART] Agonizing Animation Issues

[Vale]

Hey all, Need help with a *small problem.
I'm working on creating a small animation for something in my custom story.
I have had no riggin/animating experience other than what I've worked around with for this custom story recently.
So the problem is, as far as I'm aware, that One of the programs I'm using doesn't export the file as intended. i start off by giving a simple upper-body only skeleton to the statue_deformed_man in blender, and use the apply automatic weights tool for the parenting. The model moves fine in blender, and the animation I have created is it lifting its arms into a cross shape. This shows up fine in blender. After I get it working, I export it as a .dae into Maya, where the animation also plays fine. (If I do it directly into hpl from blender the model appears upside-down.) Then, I export it with the default settings as a dae_fbx from Maya. The model then displays itself correctly in hpl, but, when playing the animation, the skeleton moves correctly but the entire model gets bent into a nightmarish blob of terrible terribleness. (The wrong parts get moved and it becomes a stretched mess.) The same happens with the direct export from blender (except its upside down like I mentioned earlier.) When I reload the file I exported from Maya back into it, it has the same problem as hpl did, which Maya didnt have before. So I'm wondering if there is an obvious mistake here somewhere, or if I'll have to re-rig it and animate it in Maya, which I don't know how to do yet. So, please help? D:

*Major

[The chaser]

Have you applied location, rotation and scale to the model and the bones? Also, I suggest to stick to just one program if you want to keep things simple.

[Juras]

I'm surprised that you managed to even import the animation into HPL2 with the dae_fbx format (I'm guessing you're using the beta patch? And even if you are, isn't it ONLY dae format or FBX supported? I'm not completely sure). Anyway, I would advice using the original dae format but since you said that your mesh gets bent and messed up I'm guessing you haven't normalized your weights which you should. The option to do that is located in skin/edit smooth skin. Try that and see if it fixes the issue!

[MrBehemoth]

I would advise using either Blender or Maya, not both, just to keep things simple.

If your weights are messed up when you re-import, I'd guess it's a problem with the export process. Check you've got the latest callada exporter for Blender, and use weight paint mode to check your weights before exporting. Maybe try de-parenting your armature and clearing off all vertex groups before re-parenting it.

Also, might be a silly question, but have you got the 1.3 beta patch for Amnesia? Rigged blender models won't work without it.