Simply Maya User Community - Some Newbie, Some not-so Questions

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- - Some Newbie, Some not-so Questions (https://simplymaya.com/forum/showthread.php?t=13661)

3 Keyframing Questions

1) (Newbie Questions) How would you go abouts turning an emitter (especially fire which appears to have a fixed emitting speed) on or off at various keyframes.

2) (Newbie Question) How would you go about creating and destroying (or showing and hiding) an object in a maya scene throughout various keyframes. (without keyframing the object to appear from behind the camera)

3) (IMO: Not newbie Question) How would you go about keyframing shader-changes in a Maya scene?

Say you have a beaker model in Maya, and you drop an object in it. A particle emitter turns on at that point to create a cloud raising upwards, the object disappears, and the fluid in the beaker changes from a blue to a red color. (Example which covers all 3 questions -- not the animation I'm using it for though :b)

For those who played the game Halo, I'm doing a fan-animation which involves a character turning Active Camoflagued. That requires an average skinned character slowly shifting to a clear refractive (and slightly reflective with a bit of glare) mesh which (when raytraced) will yield an object that kind-of warps the objects behind it. Those of you who have seen Die Another Day, the Aston Marton "Vanish" does the same effect (with Q's foot), only in Halo its a smooth transition, where in the Bond flick it kinda flickers out before becoming visible.

Re: 3 Keyframing Questions

Quote:

Originally posted by Phopojijo
1) (Newbie Questions) How would you go abouts turning an emitter (especially fire which appears to have a fixed emitting speed) on or off at various keyframes.

2) (Newbie Question) How would you go about creating and destroying (or showing and hiding) an object in a maya scene throughout various keyframes. (without keyframing the object to appear from behind the camera)

3) (IMO: Not newbie Question) How would you go about keyframing shader-changes in a Maya scene?

Say you have a beaker model in Maya, and you drop an object in it. A particle emitter turns on at that point to create a cloud raising upwards, the object disappears, and the fluid in the beaker changes from a blue to a red color. (Example which covers all 3 questions -- not the animation I'm using it for though :b)

Hi,

1. I would keyframe the emitter rate.
2. I would keyframe the visibility of the object.
3. I would keyframe the shader's values.

Seems like you know what to do, so I'm not sure what you're looking for.

sj

1) Agreed.
2) Yep. Or, keyframe the transparancy of the object's material.
3) Agreed.

How do you keyframe shader values? The "S" key doesn't seem to work :b

Also -- how do you freeze particles in time for X frames... say I want fire to be emitted from an object, and when it reaches one point, I want to do swirl the camera around that point in time without the particles being emitted, moved, or destroyed.

Right click on the attribute and choose "Set Key" from the drop down menu.

Don't know of an easy way to do the freezing thing.