Non-humanoid animation, multi-actor animation

I've downloaded Avimator and Qavimator and worked a little with it, but as far as I can see it is purely aimed at humanoid animation. If I would like to animate something like a naga (half-human, half-snake) how might I go about doing this?

Would I have to bite the bullet at upgrade to one of the more powerful tools like Poser or Max? Does SL even sport non-human rigs in animation?

I am also thinking about doing a paired animation for a sparring katta, and while I could do this in Avimator by building the animations for each fighter seperately I am wondering if there is a way to work on two bipeds at the same time? That way I could use the movements of one as a reference for the other. I know I can do this in something like Max - I suppose its out of Avimator's scope though?

SL at the current moment doesn't really support altering the default biped's skeleton; you can't add/subtract bones, so you're limited to what you can squeeze out of what's there.

I haven't explored Qavimator enough to know if you can set up for paired animations. I know you can create "props" which you might be able to use as a reference point, though really a more powerful tool is in order.


Obligatory Rant: The current state of animations (avatars in general) in SL is very, very primitive. Getting avatars to do what you want is sometimes difficult as you have to contend with the various default animations. The lack of an event for change of animation state means that you have to poll with timer() and llGetAnimation/llGetAnimationList to figure out what the avatar is doing at any given moment. Its not a wonder that most animations in SL are either static sits, or max priority rigid unnatural "dance" loops.

An avatar named Alt Voltaire once made a pretty good Naga. The half snake part was prims, like a long dress with a train dragging behind. To make it work, it helped to make the human legs as small as possible. I suppose you could wrap them in invisiprims, too, maybe.

I have one of Voltaire's Nagas. I wore it once at a dance. IM me in world if you would like to see it.

Thank you both. I'm sorry but not surprised to hear that non-humanoid animation is out. I suppose I will just have to go for a tool with more punch for group animations, since I can only imagine how hellish it would be to have to guestimate where the other avatar is at any one point.

Thanks again though!

tyann you might want to look at some various avatars. While Sl only uses default human if you take a different look at things you can rework the avatar shape with the actual shapes and animations. Tinies, robots, Macros, Dragons, ferals (4 legged animal avatars/furries), and many more all use the same human animation system but thier shape and a little planning have helped them be sculpted.

For an animal-style animation, using Avimator, I would simply put the human figure on the ground and fold back the legs so that the ankles are embedded into the buttocks. If you uncheck the restrict limbs radio button from the drop down you should be able to get a close proximity to a four legged creation.

For a Naga-style animation, using Avimator, I would simply bend the knees slightly (according to how tall you want your Naga to be) then cross the angles and point the feet.

Of course this will not work unless you uncheck that restrict limbs radio button.

Interesting ideas... perhaps combined with seriously warping the avatars you apply them to? Although given how many new things I am learning, I think I will shelve this little project for a while^^

Thanks to everyone for the input, though!!

You are absolutly right with the warping. That's how it is done. I think a "tiny is done by first making the avatar as small as possible and then braking him literally in half at the waist. LOL

For the Naga / tiny / feral examples given above, do you change frame 1 from the default T pose?

No, never change the default T-pose in frame one.

While avimator can't, qavimator can have multiple figures in one scene. It's a little non-obvious how that's done, and I don't use qavimator so I can't explain, but I know it can. Poser is a better animation tool for a variety of reasons, but allowing multiple characters is not one of those reasons.


Well there isn't an event for change of animation state directly, but there is an event for button presses and the animation state changes on button presses. The gotcha there is you need to put a brief llSleep between the button press and state check because SL doesn't update the latter immediately.