Replacing the lantern with something else?

[GraphicsKid]

So I had an idea for another one of my joke videos, and I was wanting to replace the lantern with... something else. How would I go about doing this? I looked at the files with the model viewer, and it seems to me that there are TWO components at work: the lantern, and the hand model... which I find a bit odd, but I guess it explains how the lantern can swing out wildly if you spin around real fast.

I assume it'll have to be one of those "full conversion" things to get this to work right. Anybody have any tips?

[Russ Money]

Converting your custom story to a full conversion:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=puIfVx0lslA

I suggest searching on replacing the hand model, it was done with the flashlight, start there.

[MrBigzy]

Basically, yea, it's two models, the hand and the lantern. The hand is just a hand with regular joints and animations, but it has a n extra joint called "attach" in the center of the hand. The lantern is just a model as well, but has no rigging at all (no joints). It just has two submeshes: the lantern, and the handle. The hand is made into a hands object using the model editor, and the lantern is a hand object object type. The thing that connects these two entities is the .ho file for the lantern. It does a few things, one is that it tells what submesh of the lantern to connect to what joint of the hands (handle to attach joint in this case). It also tellse the lantern how much translation, rotation, and scale offset it has from the hand. And it also gives it a sway property based on the connected submesh to the hands joint, which makes the rest of the lantern sway about the handle, based on the properties. So yea, you'll need a full conversion if you don't want to replace stuff.

[GraphicsKid]

Thanks for the replies guys!

This does sound like a lot more work than what it's worth. However, while in the shower (where all great ideas are discovered) I figured out a way to cheat it a little bit. Since it's just for a video, I'll just composite the new model on top of the footage. Tricky part will be getting the light to go on/off at the right times, but I think I can handle it.