I have just uploaded my first-ever iClone tutorial.

I have learned a lot from other people's tutorials, and I am pleased to be able to contribute for a change.

Topic:  Smooth Camera Motion

This is something I've been working on again lately.  I was able to combine things I ready knew with some recent tips by other users.  The result was a greatly simplified way of getting smooth camera motions that looked a lot better to me.

iClone - Pointy Hat Tutorial 1 - Smooth Camera Movement from justaviking on Vimeo.

If you are in a hurry, the most important and valuable section runs from 2:24 to 4:48.

Let me know what you think.  What did you like?  What would make it better?  I know it's not perfect, but I do want to get back to working on my Pinhead project.

Ah, yes, good point.

In my experience it is more of a subtle fix.  Maybe it helps with "small jittery motions," I'm not sure, since I don't often have them.  Others have made similar comments that it might do some good, but doesn't help with the abruptness of the camera motions.

I would love to see a situation where it really helps.  If I notice one, I'll let you know.

I also did not mention about the "Auto Level Camera" option.  I didn't want to overwhelm either myself or my audience in my first tutorial  :unsure:

Thanks man

:cool: pete

@rampart - Your comments are good and I don't take them as negative comments at all.

I did consider making a "Part 1" and "Part 2" so the Look At Target part was separated.  But I was afraid I'd never get around to making Part 2.

In my announcement I did mention, "If you are in a hurry, the most important and valuable section runs from 2:24 to 4:48" but it was sort of buried near the end of my post, and wasn't stated in the instruction of the actual tutorial, though I did try to let people know when the main lesson ended.  (I'm not arguing with you, I'm pointing out that the communication was probably weak on my end.)

The tutorial does assume a certain knowledge of various aspects of iClone, so it's not exactly a click-by-click tutorial.  I didn't want to have it be a "Path" tutorial, but I did try to put in a few pointers along the way.  Same with the timeline.  I also left out stuff like what you can do if you turn off the Auto Level Camera feature.  Also not mentioned is what happens if you click on the "Follow Path" button.

Wow, there is still plenty of material left for future tutorials if anyone feels motivated.  (Viking nudges himself... but it won't happen soon.)

Thanks for the comments, I appreciate them.

D'oh!

I just noticed something I am missing, and that is stating up front that I'm using Paths.  In my intro narration, and on the title page, I should have said, "How to make smooth camera motion by using Paths."

I think

RELATED TOPICS:

Some little tips I learned (or re-learned) recently from others are:

• TIMELINE... Selecting all key frames
• Double-click on the name of a row to select all the key frames on that row.
• TIMELINE... Track List vs. Object Related Track
• It is embarrassing that I only now learned to understand the difference between those two buttons (in the top-left corner of the timeline)
• I often wondered how people made the timeline show the right object so easily
• I always used "Object Related Track" and was constantly navigating down that list of objects, and when the project started to have a lot of objects, it got really tiresome and annoying
• (I probably first tried it a year ago when I was only had a single prop in my project, didn't see a difference, and never thought about it again.)
• Recently someone's tutorial made a casual comment about clicking on it, and I played with it again, and suddenly the light bulb turned on.
• Wow, I love "Object Related Track."
• PATHS... "Pick Path" actually means "Pick a control point"
• I knew it, at least once upon a time, but hadn't used paths lately.
• Someone mentioned elsewhere and made it very clear, and I wanted to be sure I included that detail in my tutorial (even though it wasn't exactly a tutorial about paths).
• PATHS... Pick a start point, pick and end point.... or pick a point in between
• NOT IN MY TUTORIAL
• You can pick any path Control Point at any time.  You don't have to use them in order (but you will get an abrupt motion if you reverse direction)
• Most useful (to me) is you can pick a mid-control point at two different times, and your camera motion will pause there.
• This is probably easier shown that explained in writing

I've been yearning to do a beginner's guide to understanding UV maps.  I'm certain I could explain it well in a way a novice could understand.  But it would require more than doing a simple screen capture in iClone.  Maybe some day...

THE SHORT VERSION:

Move your timeline scrubber to the time at which you want to reach the top of the trench, and then attach your camera to a corresponding Path Control Point.

THE LONGER VERSION:

Initially, the motion will be a constant speed from one end of the path to the other.

Let's say you have a 10-second camera motion, and the path is 10 "units" long.  The camera will move one unit every second.

To slow it up at the beginning, you can move your scrubber to the 3-second point.  The camera will be sitting 3 units from the starting point.

Now right-click on the camera and do "Path --> Select Path," just like you did for the start and end points, only this time pick a Control Point closer to the beginning (maybe at 1 or 1.5 units from the start).

Now it will take 3 seconds to reach that first point.

Remember, now the second section will go faster, becuase you will still traverse the entire path in 10 seconds.

BONUS:

The same method can be used to pause your camera.  If you move your timeline scrubber to the 4-second point, and attach your camera to the same control point you used at 3 seconds, your camera will "pause" for a second (from the 3-second mark to the 4-second mark).

(Technically you could even reverse direction, but it reverses "abruptly," so now you have jarring camera movements again.  But, yeah, you could follow control points in this order: 1-4-3-10.)

ONE MORE THING (MAKE THAT "TWO"):

a) You can add and delete Path Control Points.

b) After you have set an "interior" Control Point using the metod described above, you will see it appearing in the Timeline panel (for the "CAMERA") under "Path."  You can move that point back and forth, just like a Key Frame for any other animated motion.

Confirmed.  Good tip.  Thanks.

Especially with "Ease in AND out" it becomes a nice, smooth reversal of direction.

(Note:  For those new to this, to get to this...  Highlight the camera or prop, and on the Timeline control panel (F3) you will find the Path under the "Constraint" button.  It is not a Transform function.)

TAKING THIS TO ANOTHER LEVEL:

You can Attach a path to a prop.

I want to have a camera circle around a moving vehicle.

With the vehicle stationary, I will work out my camera motion.  Then I will attach the path to the car.  Now I can drive the car down the road and around a corner, and I'll have nice smooth camera motion with the car in motion.

At least the theory sounds good.

@Larraby - Interesting tips.  Layers upon layers, eh?  Thanks.

@Doug (Dragon), Warlord, and everyone - I appreciate the kind words.  :)

I am really looking forward to making more tutorials.  It was fun.  But right now each passing day seems to find me two or three days farther behind on my Pinhead project.  I'm sure everyone can relate to that. 

@Peter,

I'm glad you enjoyed the tutorial.  I haven't tried it in iC6 yet.  Even though I've had 6 since it came out, and I've played around with it, I haven't done any real projects yet.  That's when I really learn stuff.

I'll take a look and see if I can find it.  Maybe you found a bug (or oversight) in 6.

ADDED...

Oooo, you were so close!  :pinch:

Do the double-click like you did to select all the camera's transforms, then right-click on one of the keyframes.  :)

I'm American, with Norwegian ancestry.

I don't know why the "Convert to Path" isn't working for you.  It sounds like you're doing everything right.

Have you applied any of the patches?  I'm running 6.0.1213.1 (Help --> About iClone 6).

Unless anyone can come up with other ideas, you might try posting in the iClone 6.1 "Issues" thread, and/or opening a case with Reallusion Support.

I'm sorry I can't think of anything better than that.

Which version, exactly, are you running?  (Patches?)

Thank you for the feedback.