Is there away to attach a sub-model without it moving

[gavinc]

Hi,
I am trying to convert an FS9 model with "tick18" animations for the crew heads. MCX doesn't recognize this animation and defines it as "unknown". Thus when you compile the model for FSX it throws away the animation.
I have tried changing "unknown" to "Ambient" (the FSX equivalent which MCX understands) in the Hierarchy editor before compiling for FSX but with no success.

I have extracted the crew model components that have the animation and re-created the animation using Ambient in FSDS. This model then gets re-compiled.

The problem arises because the master model is an AI helicopter and it has a custom animation for a takeoff hover. Extracting the crew as and FSDS file loses all the animations and I can't recreate the hover takeoff feature.

I have tried attaching the crew to the main helicopter chassis part by moving the crew parts in Hierarchy Editor. Unfortunately this translates their location information and moves them in the model.

In the screen shot you can see the proper location for the crew (in the helicopter) and the translated location of the animated heads (above the helicopter). Is there any way to get the heads back in the proper location but still attached to the takeoff animation?

Thanks
Gavin

 

[arno]

Hi,

What you could try is move the animated heads in the hierarchy editor to be under the same node in the hierarchy as the original were. But might work.

 

[tgibson]

You might also be able to use the Translate feature in MCX to move them down?

 

[gavinc]

Hi,

What you could try is move the animated heads in the hierarchy editor to be under the same node in the hierarchy as the original were. But might work.

Thanks Arno, Just tried that and had exactly the same result. I have tried moving the heads to a number of different nodes and always get the same results.

 

[gavinc]

You might also be able to use the Translate feature in MCX to move them down?

Good thought, unfortunately even when I select the individual modelpart Translate-Move moves the whole model, not just the part.

Gavin

 

[tgibson]

Yeah, I forgot about that. You could try moving them first in the isolated file (where they are the only parts) so they are too low - when Merged they would move up to their correct positions.

 

[gavinc]

I've broken my head against this with no success. In the zip file there are three models. One is the base pilot body with the hover animation. One is the pilots heads with the hover animation. The 3rd is the pilots heads with the turning head animation but I have lost the hover animation. If anyone has the time / patience to try to figure out how to attach the turning heads to the body it would be greatly appreciated.

Gavin