IMPORTANT: Before you buy this product, be aware that I have a new PRO Edition Animator, with many more features than this one, for faster machines.

Make Poses and Animations!

This Flash sticker is surely like no other in the catalogue. In fact, it is not so much a sticker as a little program that allows you to create poses and animations for your avatar, and then sell them. While it is as easy to use as I could make it, creating quality poses and animations takes practice and patience (there are almost 80 bones to move and arrange in 3D space). After you play with it, I would really encourage you to read all the instructions below so you have a clear idea of all the features I've built into it. This product is for Content Creators only, since if you haven't yet signed up to be one, you cannot submit your poses and animations to the catalogue. The sticker has a semi-transparent background, all the better to fit in with your page design, and it should be used with your page set to 'preview' (i.e. not edit mode), since otherwise your mouse can't interact with it.
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Instructions for the impatient

Drag the bones around with your mouse. Click on 'Thingy' for greater precision. Click on 'Reset view' to reset the view whenever you like. When you are done, click 'save' and copy the contents of your clipboard into a plain text (notepad) file with a '.xaf' ending. Use this file in the previewer to see your pose.


Complete product description




1 - Name of the currently selected bone.

2 - Joint type for the current bone. These are established by default to help you move the bones in biologically reasonable ways. There are six types:
(i) Ball & socket (for example the hip joint that operates the thigh bone). This type of joint can be moved in 'trackball' fashion into any orientation.
(ii) Pivot (for example the wrist joints). The joints rotate around the bone's long axis.
(iii) Hinge Y and (iv) Hinge Z (elbows, knees etc.). These joints work like simple hinges.
(v) Saddle (such as first knuckle joints). These are more limited than ball & socket joints, in that the bone does not rotate along its long axis, but they allow more freedom than simple hinges.
(vi) Fixed. By default, the hips, clavicles and metacarpals are set to fixed, to help prevent squashed pelvises, hunched backs and skewed palms. If you really want to move them, change the joint type.
Note that this is a drop-down menu, so you can change the joint type for any bone if you wish. Changing to Pivot or Hinge may be useful to rotate a bone along one axis only. See also Thingy (24).

3 - Reset all. This will delete the current keyframe. If the current keyframe is zero it will return the avatar to the default pose. If you hold shift while clicking this, it will delete all your keyframes and reset everything.

4 - Reset bone. Returns the current bone to the default position. The reset will not be saved until you click on a bone (thus allowing you to undo the reset).

5 - Reset view. Returns the view to the default position.

6 - Help. Takes you to the forum. I will try to answer questions as time allows but cannot guarantee it. My heartfelt thanks go to others who also participate there to answer doubts.

7 - Toggle zoom. This toggles the way the scene responds to mouse-movement. In the 'off' position, dragging the mouse up and down on the scene background will rotate the avatar such that you can see it from above and below. In the 'on' position, you can zoom in on the selected bone - useful for small bones like those of the hands and neck. Moreover, the bone will automatically move to the centre of the window. In both positions, dragging the mouse left-right turns the avatar around horizontally.

8 - Duration. For poses, it sets the time that the posture will last. For animations, it sets the time the animation takes to run through all 188 frames, though note that on export your xaf will by default be truncated at the last keyframe. Reducing the duration has the effect of speeding up your animation, and vice versa.

9 - Load. Opens a window for you to paste in the xaf for a pose or an animation. If you load a pose (i.e. a xaf with one keyframe) it will load into the current frame. If you load an animation, all existing keyframes will be deleted before loading the file. Note that while poses saved as xaf files in any application should load perfectly, animations saved in other applications will probably not load correctly.

10 - Save. Copies the xaf for your pose or animation to the clipboard, allowing you to paste it into a file with a '.xaf' extension. If you do not know how to make a file with a xaf extension, make a regular text file (in notepad), paste the contents in, and click on 'Save as'. When you type in the file name, put the whole thing in "inverted commas", for example "myPose.xaf". The xaf file is the one you need to see the pose/animation in the previewer.
If you are making an animation (as opposed to a pose) please note:
(i) You can save any keyframe as a pose by selecting it as the current frame and clicking on save while holding down the 'control' key. This feature will allow you to use the same frame in different animations.
(ii) Just clicking on save will make a xaf animation that is appropriate for IMVU. However, if you wish to continue editing it another time or keep a ‘master’ copy, hold down shift while clicking on the save button. If you do not save master copies in this way, on re-loading, the animation will be stretched such that the last keyframe is number 187.

11 – Avatar. Move the bones with your mouse to create your pose or animation. Try both horizontal and vertical mouse movements, since after cumulative rotations and with different joint settings, the bone movement may not be intuitive. Change the joint type to Pivot or Hinge to rotate around one axis only or use the Thingy (24).

12 – PelvisNode. This is a special bone that rotates the entire avatar. For instance, if you need to make a pose in which the avatar is lying down, use the PelvisNode to rotate the avatar into this position. See also (18 )– Floor.

13 – Background. Drag your mouse to change your viewpoint. The viewpoint will change according to the setting you have on the Toggle zoom button (7).

14 – Play. Plays the animation.

15 – Stop. Stops the animation.

16 – Copy. This will copy a keyframe into the current frame. It is useful, for example, in animations that you wish to loop, since it is an easy way of making the first and last frames identical.

17 – Current frame. Indicates the current frame.

18 – Floor. To raise or lower your avatar, raise or lower the floor. In other words, to make a ‘lying down pose’, rotate the avatar into a horizontal position using the PelvisNode (12) and then raise the floor to make the avatar lie on it. To displace the avatar horizontally, hold down shift while dragging the floor.

19 – Keyframe zero. This is the only frame used for poses, or the first frame of an animation.

20 – Frames. There are 188 frames numbered 0 to 187, each of which can either be empty (transparent grey) or contain a pose. If it contains a pose it is a keyframe, and is marked red. A frame becomes a keyframe as soon as you move a bone in it. If you place the current frame marker in a frame that is not a keyframe, the avatar will asume an appropriate pose intermediate between the previous and next keyframes (or equal to the last keyframe is there is no next keyframe).

21 – Keyframes. Keyframes are frames which contain a pose. An animation is made up of a series of keyframes, which blend into one another on playback.

22 – Current frame marker. Shows the position of the current frame, which may or may not be a keyframe.

23 - Toggle Thingy. Shows or hides the Thingy (24).

24 - Thingy. The Thingy is useful for rotating bones. It is comprised of three rings aligned with the X, Y and Z axis of the bone. One, two or three rings may be displayed according the joint type (or no rings if the joint is set to 'Fixed'). You can click on a ring and move your mouse left-right to rotate a bone along one axis only, as an alternative to dragging your mouse on the bone directly.


KEYBOARD SHORTCUTS
There are a few keyboard shortcuts, which are as follows:

To change the view:
Shift + L - View the avatar from the Left
Shift + R - View the avatar from the Right
Shift + A - View the avatar from Above
Shift + U - View the avatar from Underneath
Shift + F - View the avatar from the Front (same as clicking 'reset view')
Shift + B - View the avatar from the Back

To change the joint type:
Shift + X - Hinge X (or Shift + P - Pivot)
Shift + Y - Hinge Y
Shift + Z - Hinge Z
Shift + O - Ball & socket

Toggles:
Shift + M - Toggle the zoom on and off
Shift + T - Toggle the Thingy on and off


HOW TO MAKE A POSE
To make a pose, ignore the controls at the bottom of the window.
Move the avatar’s bones to create the pose. Set the duration of the pose (8). Click save (10), and paste the code that's now in your clipboard into a file with a ‘.xaf’ extension. Use this file in the previewer.

HOW TO MAKE AN ANIMATION
Select a frame and make a pose in it to represent the form the avatar should make at that point in the animation. Do this for as many frames as you need. Hit play (14) to preview the animation. Adjust duration as necessary. When you are happy hit save (10) to copy the xaf to your clipboard. Paste it into a ‘.xaf’ file to use in the previewer. If you want to keep a ‘master’ copy of your animation for later editing, hold shift down while clicking save.

QUICK GUIDE TO TRIGGERED ANIMATIONS AND POSES
(i) In the previewer, derive from something (such as the Empty Clothing product).
(ii) Click on the ‘Actions’ tab.
(iii) In the ‘Actions’ box, click on ‘Add’.
(iv) Next to where it says ‘Trigger:’ type in the trigger word.
(v) Where it says ‘.xaf’, browse to your xaf file.
(vi) Where it says ‘Composition’, select ‘Replace’.
(vii) Activate the box that says ‘Disable Gaze’.
(viii) Click 'Apply Changes'.
(ix) Click the ‘Play Action’ button to preview your animation.


POSE-SPOT TUTORIAL
Please see this thread.


This product is fully working on the day that I uploaded it, 17th February 2009, and I put it here in good faith, having every reason to believe it will work in perpetuity. However, if IMVU should happen to change something about the way Flash stickers work, or anything else should occur (such as but not limited to updates in the Flash player or web browsers) to break this program in a way that I cannot fix, by buying or gifting this item you agree that I am not responsible for that eventuality.

Have fun!
((hugs))

To all those who report that it works on others' pages but not on their own: As stated above, you have to have your page in preview mode in order to use it.