Motion Effects of a Group...

[jamills706]

I must be doing something wrong because what I am seeing makes no sense to me at all.

I have many pixels on eaves, minitreess, 6 foot trees, wrapped tree trunks, etc.

I have created groups which contain what I call rows of pixel props...for example all of the house, all of a line of trees near the back of the yard, all of the minitreess, etc.

I have called them Row 01 through Row 06, and I have assigned them all one motion effects row for each group.

It would seem to me the point of making the group is so that I can apply a motion effect to the entire group. Yet, when I assign the motion effect it only appears on the very first item in the group...to get it to work on all of them I have to open the group (little plus in a square) until I see all the individual items, then paste the effect on all of the individual props. That seems to defeat the purpose of the group.

So...what am I doing wrong?

[PhilMassey]

This may not be the best or only way to do it, but I think this is what I did, if I am understanding your issue.

Firstly backup your Preview in case you muck it up.

Open your preview and click on Add Item.

In the dropdown select create new group.......

Give it a name and check the props you want in the group. 

I think you can add motion rows here but  you might have to do it afterwards from the grid, I don't recall and I don't want to mess up my preview testing.

On the left check, use Preview, and Hi Res.

You should get a new group with the name, containing the member props. Add motion rows if they are not there. You can right click on the collapsed member rows and hide them so only the motion rows are visible.

You also might want to consider pre-grouping some of the elements of your props first to simplify things, depending on what you already have in preview groups.

Besides a Whole house group, I also have groups of each prop containing the individual elements, such as the pixel tree strings in Pixel Tree All, but you get the idea.

My Whole house group has two motion rows for overlapping effects, and hidden member props.

Once you get your grid the way you want it, Export it so you can import it into your other sequences.

[jamills706]

6 minutes ago, PhilMassey said:

This may not be the best or only way to do it, but I think this is what I did, if I am understanding your issue.

Firstly backup your Preview in case you muck it up.

Open your preview and click on Add Item.

In the dropdown select create new group.......

Give it a name and check the props you want in the group. 

I think you can add motion rows here but  you might have to do it afterwards from the grid, I don't recall and I don't want to mess up my preview testing.

On the left check, use Preview, and Hi Res.

You should get a new group with the name, containing the member props. Add motion rows if they are not there. You can right click on the collapsed member rows and hide them so only the motion rows are visible.

You also might want to consider pre-grouping some of the elements of your props first to simplify things, depending on what you already have in preview groups.

Besides a Whole house group, I also have groups of each prop containing the individual elements, such as the pixel tree strings in Pixel Tree All, but you get the idea.

My Whole house group has two motion rows for overlapping effects, and hidden member props.

Once you get your grid the way you want it, Export it so you can import it into your other sequences.

Thanks for that --- That's exactly the procedure I followed to create my groups. The issue is not with creating the groups, but with applying motion effects to the entire group in one step. I have to copy and paste the effect on each individual prop within the group as placing it on the ground "header" or name only applies it to the first prop - leaving all of the rest without effects.

 

[stevehoyt]

you should be able to apply it to the row for the groups motion effect. I am doing it all the time. A couple things I noticed.

1) If you have an effect in a row for one of the props in the group, it will override what is is the group, so be sure all the member props don't have anything in them. Also check other views, if you have them, as for some reason they don't always show up in every view for the same prop.

2) Effects don't always turn out the way you might think when applied to a group. It depends on the effect. I have some where I applied the effect and certain props did not light up. You should see this however in the preview.

 

[PhilMassey]

Well I just did it. Lets try again.

Open Your preview Add Item, Enter a name, Choose create group.

Check All the props you need in the group. Check Use preview, and Hi res.Save.

In the preview you  should nor have a listing for the group you just created. Selecting it should highlight everything in there.

Save the Preview.

In the grid choose show all items and find the name you just created.

It should have one motion row, and all the member props collapsed. You don't need those, right click and hide them, leaving ONE motion row for all the props. Adding a motion effect to the one row will cover all the items in the motion row group. If you need a second duplicate Motion row, right click, add motion row.

 

[jamills706]

1 hour ago, stevehoyt said:

you should be able to apply it to the row for the groups motion effect. I am doing it all the time. A couple things I noticed.

1) If you have an effect in a row for one of the props in the group, it will override what is is the group, so be sure all the member props don't have anything in them. Also check other views, if you have them, as for some reason they don't always show up in every view for the same prop.

2) Effects don't always turn out the way you might think when applied to a group. It depends on the effect. I have some where I applied the effect and certain props did not light up. You should see this however in the preview.

 

Completely blank sequencing grid (at least for the area I want to apply an effect). I clicked in one square for the single row labeled as the Row 01 group. I right clicked and added a motion effect (Color Wash - simply want to turn it all to a specific color for one timing block). Then I elect the region containing that block and hit the play selection button - it play but only lights on the first prop in the group...and if I open the group and look at all of the props I see that the effect only exists on the first item in the group.

 

[default]

jamills,

If you can't sort all this out. Create a new animations (no music) you can add some effects if you want, it's not necessary. Save it and post it here. By doing this, anyone can download your preview and run it ourselves to help you trouble shoot the issue. Sometimes different eyes on the problem help a lot.

If you don't have the space to post it here I will send my email.address and you can send it to me and I will post it.

Alan...

Edited November 2, 2019 by default

[jamills706]

I think i've confused myself further, Alan.... I created a new animation 40 second long....

All the groups are "grey" hatch marks and I have to open the to see the props and motion effect rows in order to place an effect on them. I didn't expect to have to open them, just use the line with the "RGB Row 01" label on it (or whatever group).

[default]

jamills,

You sent me your Preview file. I was after a sample animation file (the .loredit file) This is fine, I imported it into S5 and created a sample .loredit file shown below. If anyone is interested they can d/l this file, load it into thier S5 and see what you have going on.

After a quick glance, I was able to add Motion Effects as I would expect to. Although there are a few things that are way different from the way I create Previews. That doesn't mean it's wrong, just different. I am busy with my backhoe at the kids house next door. I will make a video later today and go thru what I see as different.

Can you also create another sample Animation file and put some effects into it. This will show me what you are doing and help me understand your issue a little clearer. Email me the Sample .loredit you create.

Thanks,

Alan...

JAMILLS SAMPLE SEQ.loredit

[stevehoyt]

jamills

 

I imported the preview and created an animation file.  as I had some free time this morning. The groups worked as I would expect. I'll be interested to see what default finds when you send him the file. He's the expert here.

[default]

To add closure to this thread. I could not duplicate the issue of only the first prop in a group lighting. This Preview is very organised and the OP has a good handle on how to create and use groups and props.

Most of the discussion on this issue happened in emails. The OP updated S5 to ver 5.3.10 and the issue resolved itself. I saw nothing in the Preview that would/should have caused this issue. Things happen.

Alan...