Bone Position
Visible: Sometimes. Position of bone with out motion.
Transform
Read-Only on Cache. Stores any motion for this bone, includes translate, scale and rotate. and cannot be set on the cache, but is visible so that relationships can be created that are controlled by it.
Roll-Method
Advanced, Default: Y-Poles-Singularity. Default Roll Behavior There are several situations in which a bone is given clues about where to aim, but no further information about what should happen with the roll handle. In a sense only two of the three degrees of freedom are clearly defined: an Aim At constraint, inverse kinematics, and grabbing the end of the simple bone manipulator are a few examples. When this occurs, a bone’s roll is determined by what is known as its “default roll behavior”: it tells the bone how it should be rolled at any given aim direction, and is intended to be the best in most situations. Occasionally you may rotate a bone and find this default behavior undesirable. To remedy it, simultaneously press [Ctrl] key on the keyboard ([Cmd] key on the Mac) to automatically compute a minimal visible roll, or use the Rotate manipulator, which defines all three degrees of freedom, or choose a different roll method. These roll behaviors do not occur between keyframes when using quaternion interpolation.
Z-Singularity: This is the default roll method for all geometry driving bones,
the default roll behavior is to try not to roll at all if in the same hemisphere as the bone was defined. This gives the bone a kind of “sweet spot “ in the shape of a hemisphere around the bone’s original creation direction.
Y-Poles-Singularity: This roll method is used for all bones except geometry
driving bones, such as lights, cameras, nulls, forces or models. Its behavior is not to roll unless pointed in the same or opposite direction as the roll handle. This creates the behavior of a camera that is mounted above a basketball court. It always tries to keep the top of the players heads up in the frame of the camera. This is clearly defined everywhere except directly underneath (or on top) of the camera. That is why it is called Y-Poles. This behavior is good for lights and cameras.
Roll-History: This method determines the roll direction based on where the
roll was before the bone was rotated. It essentially uses the history of the roll handle to determine where it should be. One downfall of this method is that given a certain direction for the bone, there is no definitive location that the roll handle will be. It depends on where it was before. However this technique has no singularities or odd rotating gimbal locations.
Euler Order
Advanced, Default: Automatic. This property controls the order which is
used to convert a rotation into three euler angles (x,y,z). This property will rarely ever need to be changed from its default. The euler angles are used for 1-D smartskin, roll-like constraints, as well as expressions based on just one of the three components of a rotation. Animation Master internally stores and calculates rotations as quaternions. However it if the angle came from a Euler rotation driver, it keeps the euler angles as well. It stores these unconverted raw euler angles for future use, and marks a flag that says the euler angles are valid. This serves two purposes; one is speed, why convert to an euler again, if we already have that answer. The second is to preserve large euler angles, so that they may be scaled up or down accurately by roll- like constraints or expressions. Many operations in AM can mess up this pre-computed euler angle state though. Any other kind of rotate driver, like a quaternion driver, or a vector driver, as well as all types of rotate constraints will store a quaternion, and tromp the carefully stored eulers. Even an additional Euler driver can mess it up, if the two are blended with add, since it is the quaternions which are added. The result is converted back to euler when needed. Rotation compensation applied by actions used on models whose bones are oriented differently than the one for which it was created will also invalidate the euler angles. When any of these invalidations occur, the euler angles are not available, so new euler angles are computed from the quaternion. This property controls how those euler angles are computed. The default is automatic. Occasionally this automatic behavior produces discontinuities in the resulting euler angle when the decision switches states. In this case, choosing one of the fixed euler orders is recommended.
YXZ: This is the same order used by the Euler Rotation Driver. It is the
primary order used by Animation Master. Z rotations are king, and can range from -180 to 180 degrees. X rotations are next and can also range from -180 to 180 degrees. Y is last, and can only range from 0 to 180 degrees.
XYZ: This is an alternative order, and usually would only be desired when
the returned Y rotation should have a broader range. Z rotations are still king, and can range from -180 to 180 degrees. Y rotations are next and can also range from -180 to 180 degrees. In this case X is last, and can only range from 0 to 180 degrees.
Automatic: This order analyzes the rotation, in an attempt to determine
which angle rotates more X or Y. It then chooses the YXZ or XYZ order depending on the result. This is the default way which Animation Master uses to determine Euler angles.
Attached to parent
Visible: Sometimes, Default: OFF. Set if this bone should form an IK chain with its parent.
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Hidden
Visible: Sometimes, Default: OFF. Hides this bone.
Manipulator Options
Visible: Sometimes, Advanced. See Manipulator Options property.
Lock IK
Visible: Sometimes, Default: OFF. Locks the joint so the Inverse Kinematic chain is broken in half at this bone's pivot.
Shortcut to
Visible: Sometimes. Sets which object under the Project's Objects folder this object is an instance of. This can be useful when animation has been made for an object in a choreography, but now you need to switch the object to a different one. If you were to delete the instance and put the new one in the choreography, all the animation would be lost. Switching which object the shortcut is an instance of using this property saves you from having to redo all that work. This can also be useful when using a low-density version of a model during the animation phase, and switching to the final high-density version once it is ready to render. This low-res version of a model is often called a "proxy model". You will only find this property on instances.
Active
Visible: Instance Only, Default: ON. This option is for objects that need to appear and/or disappear during the course of an animation. Inactive objects are not seen in real-time or final renderings. You can use this to speed up scenes when this object is off screen, or temporarily not needed.
Ignore Fog
Default: OFF. Turn this on if fog shouldn't be applied to this object.
Animate Mode
Default: ON. This property specifies whether keyframes should be created or not when the object is manipulated.
Type
Visible: Cache Only, Default: Perspective
Orthogonal:
A special kind of camera, used primarily for video game art creation, is the orthogonal camera. Orthogonal cameras don’t have perspective, so objects in the background are not automatically made smaller than those objects closer to the lens. Video game artists make background objects purposefully smaller to mimic perspective in their games but don’t have the endless number of different sized backgrounds that a true perspective camera would require.
Perspective:
The perspective camera operates like a camera in real life: objects farther away appear smaller due to perspective. The amount of perspective depends on the camera lens' focal length.
Background
When you build a complete choreography, such as a room with walls, where every part of the final image has something in it, you do not have to worry about Background color. However, if parts of the final image have nothing in them, then the Background color will appear. The default Background color is black (or light blue in the Default choreography), but you can change it by clicking on the Background color chip on the right part of the Background color property item in the Project Workspace. This will bring up a color palette where you can pick the appropriate color.
Focal Length
Default: 50, Min: 1. The Focal Length of the lens determines the amount of the scene the camera can see left and right, and up and down. Smaller focal length values see larger amounts of the scene, and larger values see smaller parts of the scene (a typical camera has a focal length of 35-50). Typical focal lengths range from 20 to 200.
Global Ambiance
Default: 0%, Percentage. To raise the light level of the entire rendered scene, increase the Global Ambiance value. Areas in shadow will become brighter as the ambiance value increases.
Render Options
See Render Options next.
Output Options
See Output Options next.
Camera Frame
Default: ON. The camera frame is a rectangular box drawn from the camera's point of view that shows what part of the view will be in a rendered image. If this is off TV Safe and Title Safe will be off too.
TV Safe
Default: Square. TV Safe is a rectangular box drawn from the camera's point of view that shows what will ultimately be visible on a home television.
OFF: No Safe Rectangle.
Square: The Safe Rectangle will have square corners. Rounded: The Safe Rectangle will have square corners. Title Safe
Advanced, Default: OFF. Title Safe is a rectangular box drawn form the camera's point of view that shows where titles will display correctly on a home television.
OFF: No Safe Rectangle.
Square: The Safe Rectangle will have square corners. Rounded: The Safe Rectangle will have square corners. Draw Camera Cone
Advanced, Default: ON. The camera cone is a visual representation of the pyramid through which the camera can see. This property controls the display of these lines.
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File Info
Visible: Cache Only. See File Info property.