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Offset clip channels

Manipulate clips

Create and edit time warps

 

User Guide > Animation > Animation > Nonlinear Animation > Manipulate clips > 

Create and edit blends

You can create a blend between two animation clips that share common attributes and are part of the same character set. A blend creates a smooth transition from the motion of one clip to another.

When blending animation clips, you will get the best results if you blend clips that have similar motion. For example, creating a blend between a Walk animation clip and a Run animation clip. In comparison, blending dissimilar motion may not produce desirable results. For example, creating a blend between a Run animation clip and a Tumble animation clip may create an awkward transition.

You can create the following types of blends:

• For blends between overlapping clips, Maya blends only the animation in the overlapping clip regions.

  

• For blends between non-overlapping clips, Maya interpolates the animation in the space between the clips from the last frame of the first clip to the first frame of the second clip.

After creating a blend, you can edit its blend curve and weight value. The Weight attribute on the blend determines the amount of influence each clip has during the blend. For example, when a blend’s weight is 0.0, the first clip in the blend has all of the influence and when a blend’s weight is 1.0, the second clip in the blend has all the influence.

To blend animation clips

1. Select the clips you want to blend.

   The clips must have one or more common attributes or the blend operation will fail.

2. Do one of the following:
   • In the Trax toolbar, click the Create Blend button.
   • In the Trax menu bar, select Create > Blend > .

   The Blend Clip Options window appears. See Blend.

3. If the Blend Clip Options window is open, set the options and click Create Blend.

   The blend is created, and a green arrow representing the blend appears between the selected clips.

For overlapping clips, make adjustments to the clip positions in the track view area so that the animation transitions smoothly from one clip to the other.

To select a blend region

1. Select the blend’s green arrow.

   

To delete a blend

1. Select the blend that you want to remove. See the above procedure.
2. Press .

To edit a blend’s values

1. Select the blend region that you want to edit.
2. In the Maya main menu, select Window > Attribute Editor or press +a.

   The Attribute Editor appears, displaying the attributes of the selected blend.

3. Set the blend’s Weight attribute and select a rotation interpolation type from the Rotation Blend drop-down list.

   See Rotation Blend.

To edit a blend’s weighting

1. Select the blend whose curve you want to open in the Graph Editor.
2. Do one of the following:
   • In the Trax toolbar, click Graph Anim Curves button.
   • In the Trax menu bar, select View > Graph Anim Curves.

   The Graph Editor appears with the weight curve for the selected animation blend present and framed in its graph view.

   

   By default, the blend’s weight curve has a range from 0-1 and is linear. See Blend.

   At the first frame where clips overlap, the top clip controls the motion 100% and the bottom clip controls the motion 0%. At the last frame where clips overlap, the bottom clip controls the motion 100% while the top clip controls the motion 0%.

   During playback, the control of the first clip in a blend decreases as the second clip’s control increases.

3. Before you can add keys to the blend weight curve, you must first turn off Time and Value snap in the Graph Editor’s toolbar (Edit > Snap > ).

   Otherwise, Maya will not allow keys on the blend weight curve to have floating point values.

4. Adjust the shape of the curve to alter the percentage of control each clip has during the blend by doing one of the following:
   • Move the keys or the key’s tangents.

   Select the weight curve’s keys or tangents, select the Move Tool from the Maya toolbox, and -drag the keys or their tangents to change the shape of the curve. For example, you can reshape the default blend weight curve to make it resemble the following:

   

   With this curve, the first clip in the blend starts with 100% control at the start of the blend, decreases to 0% at the middle, then increases to 100% control at the end of the blend. The bottom clip changes correspondingly from 0% to 100% to 0% control during the blend.

   • Add keys to the blend curve.

   Select the Insert Keys Tool or Add Keys Tool from the Graph Editor’s toolbar, and -click the curve to add additional keys to the curve. You can then use these new keys to alter the shape of the weight curve.

   • If you want to change the weight curve’s type, delete the blend and add a new blend of the desired type.
   • If the blend doesn’t provide the exact transition you want, add motion warping to fine tune the transition. See Key on top of clips.