TAFA-Point Proxy

TAFA (Timothy Albee's Facial Animation studio) written by Mac Reiter currently does not render points or single point poly's. This plugin allows the user to automatically create layers with proxied objects to your single points. In addition it allows you to automatically add the proxied object(s) as new morphs to a predetermined base object (which this plugin helps to create as well.) 

- Shape - Allows you to choose the object to act as the proxy object for your points.

- Size - The over all size of your object based on your default units setting.

- Create in new layer - Creates your proxy cloned objects in new layer(s) else they will be created in the selected background layer(s).

- Set as Base Object - Turns the selected background layer into the base layer for future morph(s) to be added. NOTE - you can only have one background layer selected for this selection and the 'Create Morph' selection will become de-activated.

- Base Layer name - Lets you select the layer name for your base object layer. NOTE - you must have a name entered else Base_Object will be added automatically.

- Create Morph - Lets you automatically create your proxy objects and then set them as a new morph Vmap. When this is selected and you hit OK a new requestor dialog will pop up for each new morph created, based on the number of background layers you have selected, asking for the base object layer and the new name for the morph being created.

- Delete proxied layer(s) - Deletes the proxy cloned layer after the new morph VMap is created.

- Auto-Increment Morph name - Will ask for you morph name the first time and then for each morph after it adds an incremental suffix to the morph name without asking for the morph name each time through.

- Base Layer - Lets you choose which layer will be the base to which your morphs will be added. NOTE: if you have problems running this plugin its mostly caused by not having a proper base layer setup.

- Morph Name - This is the name of the morph(s) which you are going to have created. This name must follow normal Endomorph naming rules in that it needs a Group name followed by the morph name with a '.' separating them and with no spaces.

- NOTE: If you plan on automatically creating morphs you need to run this plugin twice. The first time for setting the base object layer. Then after that you can select all of background layers you desire to create new proxied objects or proxied morphs to the base object.";

- Info Tab - Provides basic information on this plugin and a button which will taken you to instructions on this plugin similar to what's on this page.

- First and most important of all is to save your work BEFORE you run the plugin. There's alot of nasty things that can happen that you may not be able to undo if you don't have your work saved to fall back to. I have tested this plugin heavily, very heavily in fact. But its a program and how many programs do you know that run flawlessly? Don't fear the plugin, just be smart in your work. Save and save often regardless of what you do.

- The idea behind TAFA-Point Proxy is that you can take an object made of single points, create new layers based on those points and add proxied objects to those points. On top of that you can add those new layers as morphs to a base object(layer). To do this you need to first create your base object in a layer and the future morph objects in new separate layers. You then run TAFA-Point Proxy to first create your proxied base object layer and then a second time for the morph layer conversion and addition.

- To do this select a free layer as your foreground layer.

- Select your desired base object layer as the background layer.

- Select the TAFA-Point Proxy plugin. Check on 'Set as Base object' to activate it. This will deactivate all morph creations functions. Give your base layer a name and select the type of shape and it size. One thing to note on the size is that you want to make sure that it is small enough  that later when you come back to merge all the points that create your new proxied object layer that they are not overlapping neighboring proxies. When done simply hit OK

- You now have your base layer all ready to go. The next step is to create your morphs. To do this select a free layer as your foreground layer and all of the layers that you desire to add to your base object. From here there are three trains of thought on creating your morphs. One you can have the plugin automatically add incrementing suffix's to a morph name of your choosing thus putting all your morphs into one group. Or you could select all your morphs and not let the plugin auto name the morphs for you, meaning that when the plugin is ready to add the morph to your base it will ask you for the name you want to call your new morph each time. The third way is to select morphs individually or in small groups for each group of morphs you which to create. The choice is yours. Always remember you can always come back and rename them later if you so desire.

- So now with your layers all selected run TAFA-Point Proxy again. This time uncheck 'Set as Base object' and check on 'Create Morph'. You can now choose whether you want to create your proxied layers in the original layers, or new layers by selecting 'Create in new layer'. You can choose to delete the proxied layers, whether in the original layer or a new layer with 'Delete proxied layer(s)'. Plus if you want to have the plugin auto-name your morphs select 'Auto-Increment Morph name'.

- One thing you must note is that you really need to keep the proxy shape and size the same for the base and all its morphs. Failure to heed this warning will result in anything from nasty warnings to crashes. Hey, sorry that's just the way morphing works. Its kinda like breathing, you don't have to do it, but life gets a little iffy if you choose not to :)

- Once you have your selections made hit OK. In a second or two you will get a new panel opening asking you to select the Base Layer. This is the base layer you created the first time you ran TAFA-Point Proxy. Find it in your drop down of available active layers. It also asks you to name your morph. Here you must use the normal LW naming convention of 'MorphGroupName.MorphName'. Note you must have the name of the group these morphs will reside together in followed by a '.' followed by the morph name. If you choose to have the plugin to auto-increment the name then it will not bring this panel back up again. Instead it will just add a '_X', where X = a whole number (1,2,3...). 

- That's pretty much all there is to using this plugin. Play around with the tutorials I have written on using TAFA for particle effects and you'll see why this plugin is so nice. The only thing I ask is that you don't go experimenting on the breathing and life thingy, that would not be good, not good at all!

Please feel free to contact me with any question or comments and/or most importantly bugs: aurora@auroragrafx.com