Forum-posted idea reprinted here for posterior. Um, I mean: posterity!
It would be nice if, in Second Life iteself, you could go into a Position Editing mode where your avatar freezes and “handles” appear at each joint. Selecting a handle brings up the normal rotaion edit locus we use to rotate prims, but it rotates that joint instead. Once done editing all the joints you want, and your own actual avatar is in the position you desire you can save this pose as an animation.
This would just be a one-frame pose, but with the addition of a window to track multiple frames, I can see the possibility of doing full animations. All we lose this way is reverse kinematics, but that usually causes more problems for new animators than it helps them. (But it could still be added, as a toggle option later.)
If you are playing a moddable animation when you trigger this Position Editing mode, you are editing that animation (but like the Appearance Editing mode, you can Save… or Save As… when done).
If it’s no mod, or you aren’t playing anything, the avatar reverts to the standard starting pose before you start to edit. (And you can only Save As…)
3 Comments
I think this is a great idea. We desperately need an in-world animation editor.
We do.
Just playing with Vince Plunkett’s Avimator lately has made me realize what a disconnect there’s been, an uncomfortable asynchronous gap between thinking of an animation, and actually making it. Unlike building with prims, which can be very spontaneous, animations have traditionally been very painful to make. A clunky, cumbersome, multistep process that KILLS the joy of motion. I’ve rediscovered that joy through Avimator, and I think LL’s own inworld integration of such a feature would be delish.
Avimator is terrific, but has the problem that there are still slight differences in the animation from the upload, which means you have to preview it and check that it works properly and often go back and re-edit it, which can be annoying. And you never quite know precisely what your avatar is going to look like while doing it until you’ve finally uploaded. Particularly if it involves an attachment.
An in-world animation editor would be much more the thing. It would be a whole new avenue opened up for people.