Multi Parent Rigging
  • Josh SmithJosh Smith
    Isn't this the same thing as one of the new features that was released in DUIK Bassel? Granted it looks like there's more controls to aid, but it seems incredibly similar to what they just released, and for free
  • Sam CattSam Catt
    Joshua Smith said:

    Isn't this the same thing as one of the new features that was released in DUIK Bassel? Granted it looks like there's more controls to aid, but it seems incredibly similar to what they just released, and for free

    Hey Josh, thanks so much for inquiring.
    On the surface it may sound similar. But, in reality they do two different things. The duik tool that you are referring to, connects layers together adding to their own values to another’s layers values. This not only needs keyframes to work, but also comes with a host of bugs and issues.

    This tool on the other hand, gives you full flexibility to be able to connect and disconnect to multiple layers regardless of keyframes. It also allows you to control individual transform properties aswell as combines layer properties together. I.E you could use layer 1’s position X and also at the same time use layer 2’a position Y.

    You can also switch between parents at anytime, also combining two or more parents at 100% will center your layer to the middle of them.

    You can also use expressions on your layers at the same time as having multi parents and still control the values.

    Ontop of all of that it works with any parented layers.

    So in comparison it’s a whole different tool which is used for a slightly different purpose. Which works in a lot more scenarios.

    Download the trial, and give it a go. Then yourll see the power it has.

    All the best!

    And any more question please feel free to ask!

    Sam
  • Gayle WestGayle West
    Hi! Is this (and your Swing script) compatible with RubberHose? Thanks!
  • Sam CattSam Catt
    Gayle West said:

    Hi! Is this (and your Swing script) compatible with RubberHose? Thanks!

    Morning Gayle,

    Multi parent rigging is fully compatible with all scripts as you have the option to add a controller. Meaning, it doesn’t replace any expressions on the layer

    Character swing rigging does replace the rotation expression on the selected layers. I’m not sure if rubber hose has a rotation expression, if it does then you wouldn’t be able to make a swing on the hose itself. However, attach a swing rig to the hose will still work

    All the best

    Sam
  • Gayle WestGayle West
    Hi again, working through the tutorial, looks great. One question: is there any way to offset a target's animation, say for a walk cycle or secondary animations? Thanks, and sorry for all the questions!
  • Sam CattSam Catt
    Gayle West said:

    Hi again, working through the tutorial, looks great. One question: is there any way to offset a target's animation, say for a walk cycle or secondary animations? Thanks, and sorry for all the questions!

    Hey, Gayle,

    No problem at all! Ask as many questions as you need! So it depends on what you mean by “offset”:

    Offset in time is mainly controlled by the slider itself; if you to want to move at a different time simply keyframe the slider where you want.

    Offset on the actual animation is currently not supported. However, I’ll add it to the list of things to do! You could for now just use the slider at a different value, I.E 80% this will copy 80% of the layers movement and position

    All the best

    Sam
  • Mohammad SabriMohammad Sabri
    Wow,
    i think this will open the door for making a premade library animation for characters.
    imagine a plugin with a browser UI which shows the animation ..
    and with selecting the one u want ,it will create Nulls for the character which will animate offcourse

    Now here ur script magic comes , it will make it easy to transition between multi animation for the character
    Maybe (0-100) walk anim. (100-200) Running Anim, (200-300) Dancing ....etc

    it would be super great :D 

  • Sam CattSam Catt
    Mohammad Sabri said:

    Wow,

    i think this will open the door for making a premade library animation for characters.
    imagine a plugin with a browser UI which shows the animation ..
    and with selecting the one u want ,it will create Nulls for the character which will animate offcourse

    Now here ur script magic comes , it will make it easy to transition between multi animation for the character
    Maybe (0-100) walk anim. (100-200) Running Anim, (200-300) Dancing ....etc

    it would be super great :D 

    That’s basically what it does ;) haha though currently you have to make the animations yourself.

    What I can say though... is... coming soon
  • Sam CattSam Catt
    Seemed to of cut off half my message. Anyway;

    You can also set up object library’s. I.E create a bike asset, and set the peddles to rotate on an axis, now add a parent to each foot of your character and then use the slider to connect to the peddles at any time! You then have an asset which can work with any character on the fly~

    Also not to mention you can use this with essential graphics, to build the most advance rig possible for people to use who have no idea how to use AE. It’s a game changer when you start to think about it

    All the best

    Sam
  • script scriptoscript scripto
    This is really cool script thanks.
    But one things will be very cool, it's the capacity for rename each parent effect (exemple: Parent 1 to smile or parent 2 to sad...), because when you work with an animator after you rig your character, he can know what to do with each parent effect.
    May be I don't know how to do it, when i try to rename i have an error script on transform property.
    Thanks 
  • Sam CattSam Catt
    script scripto said:

    This is really cool script thanks.

    But one things will be very cool, it's the capacity for rename each parent effect (exemple: Parent 1 to smile or parent 2 to sad...), because when you work with an animator after you rig your character, he can know what to do with each parent effect.
    May be I don't know how to do it, when i try to rename i have an error script on transform property.
    Thanks 
    Thanks so much for the support! Really means a lot!

    In its current form the name is important ( parent 1, 2, 3, etc ) however, I’m actually working on an update to fix exactly that! Along with a few extra features! I’m also planning to add a UI slider which can be named however you like. I think this should solve all the problems. So, please bare with me while I update it

    Enjoy the tool! And thanks again for supporting me as I develop everything!

    If you have any more questions please feel free to ask! And I’ll get back to you as soon as possible

    Happy parenting

    All the best

    Sam
  • Eli CooganEli Coogan
    This may be a stupid question, but after trying it out, I'm a bit confused. 

    Is there a straight forward way to parent Object A to Object B (an object that's moving), then unparent Object A in that new position? For example... 
    A ball is still on the ground. A hand reaches over, picks it up, moves it to the other side of the screen, places it down, lets go of it and animates off? 

  • Sam CattSam Catt
    Eli Coogan said:

    This may be a stupid question, but after trying it out, I'm a bit confused. 


    Is there a straight forward way to parent Object A to Object B (an object that's moving), then unparent Object A in that new position? For example... 
    A ball is still on the ground. A hand reaches over, picks it up, moves it to the other side of the screen, places it down, lets go of it and animates off? 

    Hey Eli,

    Sorry for the delay I was in South Korea on my honeymoon~ There are quite a few ways to do what you are trying to achieve. The easiest though as you requested would be

    Step 1: Animate your object.
    1: in animation
    2: character pick up movement
    3: out animation

    All these keyframes would be added onto the object itself not the character!

    Step 2: add multi parent to your hand controller
    1: select your hand controller for your character
    2: add a new parent using MPR
    3: set the target as the object
    4: animate the slider from 0% to 100% in time with the animation of the object
    5: animate the slider from 100% to 0% to reverse the grab

    Finished.

    Your characters hand will now automatically switch to your objects animation and move towards it :) this means even if your character has animated keyframes it doesn’t matter it will ignore them and move towards your object~ This saves all the time needed to create keyframes on your characters rig

    Let me know if you need any more help!

    Sam
  • Gael DentrevelGael Dentrevel
    Hi there,

    I've bought the product one month ago but was too busy to test it.
    I'm a bit disapointed about your last version of the tool. I'm using After Effects CC 2018 and in the User Interface, the counter of the slider for creating parents does not show more than 01 instance. So,I can't get the number of parents I am going to have. That's very incomfortable.
    For more, I would like to animate the rotation with targets but it seems to be not possible.
    And last, Could you post a tutorial with all the stages fromp scratch ? It will be very helpfull.
    Thank' for answering.
    Regards.
  • Sam CattSam Catt
    Gael Dentrevel said:
    Hi there,

    I've bought the product one month ago but was too busy to test it.
    I'm a bit disapointed about your last version of the tool. I'm using After Effects CC 2018 and in the User Interface, the counter of the slider for creating parents does not show more than 01 instance. So,I can't get the number of parents I am going to have. That's very incomfortable.
    For more, I would like to animate the rotation with targets but it seems to be not possible.
    And last, Could you post a tutorial with all the stages fromp scratch ? It will be very helpfull.
    Thank' for answering.
    Regards.
    Hi Gael,

    Thanks for the feedback and popping a message here. I've re-tested the script inside AE 2018 and none of the things you've mentioned are happening. Bit of a bizzare one.

    However, let's try to see what's going on.

    The slider should work regardless of your machine. So for this I would love for you to open a support ticket and send me a screengrab of whats going on with a list of other scripts you have installed. I'm sure there is an easy fix if it continues to happen. But, it shouldn't.

    The rotation property was recently updated to support parenting. So please make sure you are running the latest version 1.4.1 : if you are not running this version then download it and try again. If it's still not working kindly open a support ticket and we will try to deep dive into the problem.

    A new video is being created for each of my scripts. However as my wife has just gone into labour it may take awhile for me to get it out right away. In the meantime just pop me a message on instagram @bearstudios_ or open a support ticket and I can solve all the issues for you.

    Hope this helps. But, if problems precceed like I said just send me a direct message on instagram.

    All the best

    Sam
  • AUSTIN HILLAUSTIN HILL
    I know this isn't listed as compatible with 2019 but is it possible it will work?

    I'm trying to test it out and I'm getting errors and would like to verify it's even compatible before going down a rabbit hole or tweaking.  Thanks!

    EDIT: welp, I opened it up in 2018 and not getting the same errors.  Indeed it seems that it's not compatible.  I learn this of course RIGHT after updating.  how unfortunate.

    EDIT 2: I take it back!  I was doing something wrong apparently...I've gotten it to work in my most basic of tests.

    I have one very quick questions aside from if this if fully compatible with 2019:

    Is there a way to make a layer move RELATIVE to a parent?

    In other words to not have the layer move to the other layers exact position but rather relative to it.  Sort of like let's say I make a null somewhere in a comp and then I make a layer somewhere else in a comp.  Now lets say I connect that layer to that null and then I move the null position the layer position doesn't snap to the position of the null but rather moves relative.

    I ask because lets say I had a thing that bobs up and down, like say something in the water, and lets say that thing will move around the comp at various times but I just want to vary that bob motion occasionally while keeping it in its current spot.

    Anyways, that was a bit of a ramble...I hope it made sense!  I haven't watched through all of your videos yet so I apologize if that's already been answered. 
  • Sam CattSam Catt
    AUSTIN HILL said:
    I know this isn't listed as compatible with 2019 but is it possible it will work?

    I'm trying to test it out and I'm getting errors and would like to verify it's even compatible before going down a rabbit hole or tweaking.  Thanks!

    EDIT: welp, I opened it up in 2018 and not getting the same errors.  Indeed it seems that it's not compatible.  I learn this of course RIGHT after updating.  how unfortunate.

    EDIT 2: I take it back!  I was doing something wrong apparently...I've gotten it to work in my most basic of tests.

    I have one very quick questions aside from if this if fully compatible with 2019:

    Is there a way to make a layer move RELATIVE to a parent?

    In other words to not have the layer move to the other layers exact position but rather relative to it.  Sort of like let's say I make a null somewhere in a comp and then I make a layer somewhere else in a comp.  Now lets say I connect that layer to that null and then I move the null position the layer position doesn't snap to the position of the null but rather moves relative.

    I ask because lets say I had a thing that bobs up and down, like say something in the water, and lets say that thing will move around the comp at various times but I just want to vary that bob motion occasionally while keeping it in its current spot.

    Anyways, that was a bit of a ramble...I hope it made sense!  I haven't watched through all of your videos yet so I apologize if that's already been answered. 
    Hey Austin,

    Thanks for getting in touch! haha 

    So it is compatible in 2019 but it takes advantage of the new expression engine and won't work using the legacy expression engine in AE 2019. To switch this just head over to your project window, click the little rocket at the bottom and change the expression engine from legacy to javascript and it'll work without any problems.

    For the positional data it moves it to the parents position << you can combine multiple parents together to get a different effect. Remember parents will work on any layer and even if that target layer is parented. an example to make something move relevant would be.

    your comp:
    "object A" = the object that you want to parent to something different
    "target A" = the parent target for object A
    "layer A" = a random layer

    parent "target A" to "layer A" and set the "object A"'s parent target to "target A" now your object will follow relative to layer A when needed ^^. You can get more complex by adding expression into "target A" ~~ but that's all up to you :)

    Your water example that you talk about above is slightly different, as I'm guessing the object floating on water would be powered by an expression. You could simply add a different type of expression to be able to control when the object floats or doesn't float. If it is water you're dealing with the script "wave-o-matic" deals with exactly that. and allows you to precisely control the on and off timing of the movement.

    let me know if that helped at all!

    and sorry for the delay in replying

    all the best

    Sam
  • Wouter DijkstraWouter Dijkstra
    Hi I'm trying to parent a layer without it moving to the exact location of the layer (it's anchorpoint).

    I just want it to copy the motion and stay in it's original place (and of course move afterwards in the direction the parent moves). It seems simple, but I don't get the result. It always does this "magnet" thing and moves to the anchorpoint of the parent. 


    Please help me :)

    (just read the description below, is this seriously the easiest?)



    UPDATE:

    Sam Catt was so nice to explain me a way to receive the result I want: 

    by  using the advance multi parent rigging you are able to move the X value while my character makes the jump! Thanks Sam!

    Thanks, cool script anyway, but this is actually the option I bought it for :p
  • Ben ParkerBen Parker
    Hi I am having an issue in cc18 where in certain comps when I add the effect, I have to manually click on the add parent button each time (so if set it to 3 I need to click it 3 times to get all the parents) unfortunately it doesn't stop there as the effects do not work and while the effect is added to the layer the expressions are not.

    This only happens in some comps? any ideas?

  • jim cascarinajim cascarina
    Hi, will this be updated to work in cc2020? 

    as it currently doesn't appear to. 

    Cheers
  • Sam CattSam Catt
    jim cascarina said:
    Hi, will this be updated to work in cc2020? 

    as it currently doesn't appear to. 

    Cheers
    Hey Jim,

    if you can open a support ticket I'll happily help! as it should work for AE2020 without any problems
  • Sam CattSam Catt
    Ben Parker said:
    Hi I am having an issue in cc18 where in certain comps when I add the effect, I have to manually click on the add parent button each time (so if set it to 3 I need to click it 3 times to get all the parents) unfortunately it doesn't stop there as the effects do not work and while the effect is added to the layer the expressions are not.

    This only happens in some comps? any ideas?

    hmmm this sort rather interesting. But, I'm not entirely sure why it would be happening. I can say however there is an update in the works that changes everything. and should fix any of these bugs
  • Thor SarupThor Sarup
    Hi,

    I wanted to test the trial version - but it won't open... "Unable to execute script at line 57. settings is undefined"

    I am on windows, tried AE 2017 and 2019 but no luck.
  • Abraham DieckmanAbraham Dieckman
    Hi! I've installed Multi Parent rigging into AE 2020. So far so good. Networking is turned on.

    However, when I attempt to use the script to create a new parent, and make sure that parent is selected in the target field, and make sure POSITION and ROTATION are checked, and move/rotate the new parent null, and then drag the "Connection" slider left and right...

    Nothing happens. The position or rotation of the original layer the script is applied to does not change in any way.

    What am I not understanding? Would love some help here.
  • Mattias LindbergMattias Lindberg
    Damnit... Thought it would follow parents in 3D as well. It didn't... Update? 
  • Jeff HansonJeff Hanson
    Working in AE 2022?
  • sebastian Azzsebastian Azz
    Well, my bad, i didn read the compability before  i bought all 3 plugins (Swing,Wave,parent) but does this plugin work with versions above 2020?
    (Now 2022). and if so will there be a update soon to fix that problem ?

    Cause i cant get i to work, have been folowing all the toturials of the setup, but but still a orphan! ;-(
  • Sam CattSam Catt
    Abraham Dieckman said:
    Hi! I've installed Multi Parent rigging into AE 2020. So far so good. Networking is turned on.

    However, when I attempt to use the script to create a new parent, and make sure that parent is selected in the target field, and make sure POSITION and ROTATION are checked, and move/rotate the new parent null, and then drag the "Connection" slider left and right...

    Nothing happens. The position or rotation of the original layer the script is applied to does not change in any way.

    What am I not understanding? Would love some help here.
    Hey~ so I believe this to be an issue with the expression engine After Effects is using. You can change this follow this tutorial: https://help.pixflow.net/portal/en/kb/articles/after-effect-change-expression-engin
  • Sam CattSam Catt
    Jeff Hanson said:
    Working in AE 2022?
    Yes, however you will need to switch the expression engine to "JavaScript" you can do so here: https://help.pixflow.net/portal/en/kb/articles/after-effect-change-expression-engin
  • Sam CattSam Catt
    sebastian Azz said:
    Well, my bad, i didn read the compability before  i bought all 3 plugins (Swing,Wave,parent) but does this plugin work with versions above 2020?
    (Now 2022). and if so will there be a update soon to fix that problem ?

    Cause i cant get i to work, have been folowing all the toturials of the setup, but but still a orphan! ;-(
    Hey, you need to switch the JavaScript Expression engine to "JavaScript" to do so you can follow this Tutorial: https://help.pixflow.net/portal/en/kb/articles/after-effect-change-expression-engin
  • Sam CattSam Catt
    Mattias Lindberg said:
    Damnit... Thought it would follow parents in 3D as well. It didn't... Update? 
    This is something we are working on improving for the next round of updates.
  • Rick YaegerRick Yaeger
    Is it possible to add more than 10 parents?

    I tried creating multiple Multi Parent Control layers and having those controlled by a Master Multi Parent Control layer, but preview times took a massive hit.
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