Monday, February 16th, 2009 class #15

1. Grouping versus parenting: Joining together in a Group versus joining together in a hierarchical relationship (Parent/Child) - Comparing Edit menu > Group to Edit menu > Parent - a simple example that also helps familiarize you with the Hypergraph Hierarchy Window and the Outliner Window.
2. SDK - Set Driven Key was introduced today. The Set Driven Key method was used to animate the opening and closing curtains. What was the driver? What was the driven? Check your notes and try to answer these two questions.
3. Quiz two in fall of 2008 covered SDK. Can you make a guess as to what the four fill in the blank (circles) anwers would be for the quiz shown here?
4. More SDK and quiz two followup material.
5. 3Dbuzz.com Watch the Creating a Curtain video again, along with the Creating Hierarchies video. Also, the Simple Lamp Model illustrates the importance of Parent/Child hierarchical relationships for modeling a Luxo Lamp like you might use on your desk when you study over the notes you took in your classes or take further notes on the videos and readings.

6. Some of the other topics that were just briefly touched upon today:

   Custom attributes (to control the animation of the curtains), 
      
   Create menu > Locator (what in the world is a locator?), 
      
   Modify menu > Add Attribute..., 
      
   Storyboard planning out an animation (of the curtains opening and closing), 
      
   Animate menu > Set Driven Key (SDK), 
      
   View menu > Camera tools to get to Tumble, Track and Dolly tools 
                  in case you do NOT have a MMB (middle mouse button) 
                  or you want to Tumble or Dolly without having to use the Alt key and the mouse together.
     
   Using the MMB dragging to remove the curtain controls from their group in the Hierarchy window.
   
   

7. You are welcome to look at the following 3DBuzz.com tutorial videos if you wish to get further detailed background on where the Locator and SDK ideas came from and how they are applied to making the curtains. We are building up to makeing the curtains sway.

   Fundamentals Proj 1-2
     
      Set Driven Key
      Custom Attributes
      Editing Custom Attributes
      Creating Stage Controls
      Animating the Set