wrapping grid addittions

[malcooning]

I work ALOT with the wrapping grid. I love this tool. but it would be really nice to make the work with it with more flowing, by adding:

1. undo option (so we can undo grid points moves)

2. B-splines (or another solution) so we can have more control over the shape of the grid, and assign curve behaviour to each point seperately. so one can be sharp curved, an another smooth. (I usually wrap the whole grid around the object I want to manipulate.)

3. rotate function, so we could rotate the whole grid at once.

4. resize, same as the rotate advantage

I'd kiss you if you implemented those!

[Peter Wassink]

I love it too!

and i'll second that undo request!
but 2, 3 and 4 are already there! (or am i misunderstanding you)

so i think you can already start kissing Herve and the gang


if you work alot with it you should try these:(see image)

[fabrice_]

3. rotate function, so we could rotate the whole grid at once.
4. resize, same as the rotate advantage

those two points are already available
see TVPaint Animation Pro user-manual (Lesson 13 / page 14)

[fabrice_]

ahhh ... Peter explained it before me !!

[malcooning]

damn you're right. I completely went in an un-explorer fashion and overlooked those buttons!
I guess I'm coming across a bit ...
thanks for pointing these out.

as for point 2, splines do exist (you're right again) but I always find myself shortening the handles when wrapping small objects, and it's very time consuming if you have many points. How about giving each INDIVIDUAL grip point a different behavior? so if I right click a point, I can set it to linear, or smooth, or spline, and if I select a few points, or all at once, I can right click and choose again one of the behaviors for all the chosen points.

or, better still, is it possible that instead of the grid, (in which we always have to move the points to wrap the object that we want to distort) we could actually BUILD the spline around the object? for example, with the new spline tools that we now have for the healing tracker we are building a very accurate spline, and have alot of control over it. So, in the same vein, maybe we can build a spline around an object, set the spline as the SOURCE, and then on the DESTINATION spline we move the points and distort. this will provide a SERIOUSLY sharp distortion tool!

One last suggestion for now,
In the Progress Profile grid, is it possible to add colored lines (or any other marker) to represent the keyframes that are used in the FX stack?

cheers again!

[Peter Wassink]

... I always find myself shortening the handles when wrapping small objects, and it's very time consuming if you have many points.

i know this problem, its very annoying.
a workaround is to scale while in linear or smooth mode
and only switch to spline after scaling now the spline handles will be the right size

or, better still, is it possible that instead of the grid, (in which we always have to move the points to wrap the object that we want to distort) we could actually BUILD the spline around the object? for example, with the new spline tools that we now have for the healing tracker we are building a very accurate spline, and have alot of control over it. So, in the same vein, maybe we can build a spline around an object, set the spline as the SOURCE, and then on the DESTINATION spline we move the points and distort. this will provide a SERIOUSLY sharp distortion tool!

i would love this!
sometimes , because the grid is square, you have a corner to much...or you could use an extra one,
a custom grid would be definately very powerfull to do morphs and stuff..!!!

One last suggestion for now,
In the Progress Profile grid, is it possible to add colored lines (or any other marker) to represent the keyframes that are used in the FX stack?

cheers again!

Good idea.
maybe the tag's are good for this purpose

[malcooning]

The new After Effects CS3 added the feature of having 'pins', with which you can pin different parts of an image (i.e. a character), and then animate the pins whilst they behave like joints. Of course it is not a new invention, as a few programs already have this option. But in after effects it hugely increases the possibility to animate characters (this feature is indeed called "puppet tool" in AE).
The way it works, once you put down one pin, it creates a mesh (hidden) of the image, which then becomes animatable. Same way that the wrapping grid works, but more complex poligonal structure, and the creation of the grid is automated by the program (yet you can choose the level of mesh complexity). So with the addition of the pins as control points, the animation becomes much easier.

is there any chance of taking the wrapping grid in a similar direction (or at least just the automatic creation of the grid/mesh with control of the amount of triangles/squares)?

[D.T. Nethery]

I would also like to request UNDO command for the Wrapping Grid.

[lapprenti roi des singes]

I join the forces of all the wrapping grid lovers who would LOVE an undo command for this amazing tool. It is just the only missing step to make it perfect.
Besides, Malcooning's suggestions are also very interesting. Hope that we could see it in a future version ov TVP ?