animation blending

i'm working on a pair of steleto thigh lenght boots and no matter how hard i try I am plauged by a problem where the bottom of the boots are penitrating the ground. I've asked in the scripting forum and i've been told the only "good" solution is to break down and use animations so I ask this question.

is there a way to "blend" animations where one part of the body is changed (the height of the hip from the ground for instance) and it still use the rest of the default animations?

is there a way to only animate the lower body indipendent of the upper body (like how gun gestures animate the upper body)

I'de really like to avoide re doing the stock animiations if i can help it. they may be simple animations but I'm working against the clock trying to make this before a friend of mine leaves the country for a few months...

Yes, but this probably wouldn't give the effect you want. If you set the hip height without an entire walk animation, then the character will have it's vertical movement frozen, whereas during a walk the av should bob up and down.

Regardless, applying animation to only certain parts of the body and not others is easy in SL. Basically, if you want the animation to only apply to the lower body and not the torso, only animate the lower body. Don't touch the upper body while animating; animations only control parts that you move in the animation tool.

cool that answers my question ^^.

I've seen and done some gestures with the animation rig and noticed it dosent have any primary mover joints (which it probibly should for this sort of thing) so i would end up tweeking those frames in myself.

As a user of Maya thats why they implimented Character Sets so you only key certain areas of the body.

One caveat to the ability to animate just one joint or part of the body is many animators upload their anims at too high a priority, thereby breaking this wonderful feature of SL!

One popular dance maker did this, uploaded their dances at priority four (for no benefit at all), so they break other animations the AV may be wearing (so drinks look like they spill, purses move through body parts instead of being held, etc.)

The stilettos I have and have seen use invisiprims. If you try to do what you describe through animation, there may be times it will be interrupted during movement (when the AV starts or stops walking, turns, etc.) especially during lag. Invisiprims have visual glitches on alpha dance floors, but everyone kind of accepts that limitation!

Are you making your boots taller than the standard high heels? I'm thinking you really only need to use special animations if your boot are really really really tall. Adjusting the shoe height sliders under the avatar appearance menu should allow you to have fairly high heels.

standart heels? (saying that as i log in and check apearance settings) I didnt know there was a setting for heels. I found it and apperently that does fix the problem. opps.

always the long/hard way lol

thank you everyone for your comments ^_^