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Animations stopped working

Messages
67
Country
us-washington
On my current project all animations stopped working a couple of days ago. I could find nothing wrong with any parts, animation tags, etc. Plus when I exported a simple animation test of a model with just a couple of animated parts, they didn't work either. So I uninstalled/reinstalled Blender and the Blender2FSX Toolset, after first reinstalling the FSX SDK per the directions here at FSDeveloper. Tried again. Animations still don't work in either my main project or the small animation test project. So my question is, with all the various versions of Blender, and Blender2FSX, is there a specific requirement that a certain version of Blender2FSX be used with Blender 2.79? I can't think of anything else that might be causing animations not to work. I get no errors on export, and there is nothing amiss when I review a "verbose" log. Very frustrating. Help! My FSX version is Acceleration. The version of Blender2FSX installed is 088.
 

Pyscen

Resource contributor
Messages
2,993
Country
us-texas
What you might need to do then... is give us what you did step by step.... just on 1 specific model. How were the animations step up to start with...
 
Messages
67
Country
us-washington
They all worked perfectly until I started working on mouserects in the virtual cockpit. I think those are what I had started working on when things went south, and I hadn't been making backups. In Blender the animations appear to work fine. I can hit play and all of them work as expected. To make an animated part I would create its mesh, assign its animation tag, and attachpoint tags where needed, and then do its animation keyframes. One other thing I did when I started working on the VC and mouserects was to move just the VC parts to a new layer. I don't think that was problematic, though. In an attempt to find the problem I deleted the layer and those parts, in order to test the majority of the model in one layer, and it did not solve the problem, animations are still porked.
 
Messages
67
Country
us-washington
Here's something interesting. I tried exporting my version of Krispy's "test plane", that I last worked on in October, where I had all of its animations working good. Now, none of them work, which sort of confirms that it's not a problem with either model, but more likely something that went wonky with my installation of Blender and Blender2FSX. But I haven't got a clue.
 

F747fly

Resource contributor
Messages
1,713
Country
netherlands
How are you testing your animations exactly? In the sim or via modelconverterx?
 

Ronald

Resource contributor
Messages
974
Where exactly did you animations stopped working?
- Inside the Blender viewport? ............................. (when you were working on it in Blender)?
- When viewing the exported model inside MCX . (after being exported from Blender)?
- Inside your flighsimlator? .................................. (after using/importing the model inside your flightsim)?


and I hadn't been making backups.
TIP1 - Develop a decent backup strategy... here is how I do it: (with multiple copies and versions_numbers in very descriptive filenames)
1 st file - basemodel_name_v1.blend
2nd file - basemodel_name_v2_with_wings.blend
3nd file - basemodel_name_v3_wings_with_flaps.blend
4th file - basemodel_name_v4_wings_with_flaps_animated.blend
Use the [Save As] function as soon as you have achieved a (minor/major) milestone when building your model so you never loose more work then the last feature
>
Backup all files daily to another partition, drive AND external storage medium( usb-stick, usb-dsikdrive) and not to any cloud-service!

TIP2: have you already tried and opened the projectfilename. BLEND1?
This is an automatically created backup of your project file, which was created when you opened it for the last time.
 
Messages
67
Country
us-washington
Good idea about testing the exported model inside MCX. I just did that, and the animations appear to work just fine, there, but not once the model is copied into its FSX model folder. The main model that was last exported on 1/12/18 still animates in FSX, but if I do a new export from Blender the animations will work in MCX, but not FSX. Makes me wonder if something in FSX got corrupted. Existing animations of other aircraft still work in FSX, though. Pretty weird. I'll keep at it.
 
Messages
45
If the mdl is working in MCX but not FSX, is it possible your model.cfg is pointing to a different mdl? How many .mdl files are in your model folder? Also, double check you model.cfg is actually calling the right .mdl file. I've done that before when testing different ides out models out before realizing I forgot to modify the cfg to point back to the actual model.
 
Messages
67
Country
us-washington
The model.cfg is still correct, as is the one for "testplane1", the Krispy1001 project I worked on in October, with working animations, etc., which have also stopped working now after a fresh export from Blender.
 

Pyscen

Resource contributor
Messages
2,993
Country
us-texas
Hello... What has changed on your system.. do you know of anything that has changed since 1/12 date?
 

Ronald

Resource contributor
Messages
974
Have you moved one (or more) of the necessary files? (XToMdl.exe, your modeldef file, FSX SDK Files)
Has your commandline / dos / windows / PATH variable become corrupted or altered (due tothe installation of other software or windows update cr*p)?

TIP: Is simply starting from scratch an option for you? Simple delete and start all over again (with the knowledge you now have)
Sometimes it is just quicker to through away the model, do a reinstall of blender , fsx and begin to move forward again (and make backups this time)
 

Pyscen

Resource contributor
Messages
2,993
Country
us-texas
The only other possibility that I can think of is not initialize before resaving....from using the previous tool-set.. which might of reset or corrupted it, the animations that is.
 
Messages
67
Country
us-washington
Thanks for all the ideas, guys. I'm too far along to consider starting over. Well nigh finished with a twin-jet version of the Bugatti 100P, using two of the same engine used on the SubSonex. Here's a short video clip from 1/16/18, when animations still worked.
<iframe width="560" height="315" src="
" frameborder="0" allow="autoplay; encrypted-media" allowfullscreen></iframe>
 
Messages
67
Country
us-washington
Maybe there's a clue here, that I don't understand! I used the FSX Verify Tool in Blender and got this error:

error.jpg
 

F747fly

Resource contributor
Messages
1,713
Country
netherlands
you have a curve in your export selection called fcurves? Either way that object is causing issues.
 
Messages
67
Country
us-washington
Thanks. I don't remember consciously adding a "curve". But if I did I've got to figure out how to locate it and remove it. I'll check the Blender online manual and read up on it.
 

F747fly

Resource contributor
Messages
1,713
Country
netherlands
you can find the object name fcurves in your object list I think.
 
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