Anim8or is a great program Steve
. I worked with this tool for the past couple months. I love it, but also wish it had some more features. So I just wanted to let you know what I think would make it better for me. Some of these items others already mentioned, in that case, just add my vote to their wishes. Other items may be hard or impossible to implement, I understand. Yet others may have easy workarounds. If so, please let me know. Thanks for letting me try Anim8or for free.
>>General:
1. It would be nice to have an option to automatically load a project from (and save a project to) individual files.
- For example. Create an object that is used in multiple projects. Each time the object is changed in one project, the changes automatically get reflected in the other projects.
- This should also improve autosave performance, as only the file of the item being changed needs be updated. - I have to turn autosave off for large projects, as it annoyingly freezes my environment while saving.
2. It would be nice to have the ability to export and import materials to .an8 files.
- For example, I create two objects with a particular material. Then I want to change the material for the two objects in the same way. Not easily done - easiest way now is to copy and paste the material in the exported objects’ files.
3. It would be nice if only user-friendly information is stored in the .an8 files. In particular, store actual angle information like that used in the UI, rather than the little understood quaternion information which is not used in the UI.
4. It would be nice if the viewpoints could be saved and restored when the application is closed and restarted for each item in all modes.
5. It would be nice to be able to save some "User" viewpoints so they can be recalled as desired.
6. Maybe an option to "lock" the Grid when the viewpoint is changed to user so the grid does not rotate along with the object (grid often interferes with what needs to be seen). Otherwise, have a button to easily turn Grid on/off.
7. When rotating the viewpoint (User viewpoint), the axis orientation indicator (Lower left corner) disappears. It would be nice if the indicator would remain visible in the corner, rotating there to reflect the current orientation.
8. Hover over button "help".
9. More short-cut keys and buttons.
>>Object Editor:
10. It would be nice if a singly selected point's coordinates be shown in the status line (Rather than double clicking a point to get that information). In general, just more status line information would be nice.
11. The ability to duplicate a morph target (With a different name) so it is easy to create branches of morph targets.
12. The ability to change any particular morph target to be the default object.
13. Mirror morph targets along with a mirrored mesh.
14. Warn user if an action would result in morph targets getting corrupted/lost.
15. The Pivot Adjustment feature (Object/Axis) fails to snap to grid when Snap to Grid is selected.
17. Would be nice to have a mode where the multi-selection tool does not deselect previously selected items.
18. Would be nice to have an option to hide points/edges/faces that are behind others.
>>Figure Editor:
19. When the bone creation button is selected in Figure editor, it does not stay selected to add multiple bones. User always has to reselect the button for each additional bone created.
20. It would be nice for the bones in the Figure editor to move freely by default.
21. Bone mirroring.
>>Sequence Editor:
22. When changes are "undone" (using undo button) to bone movements in Sequence editor, the bone gets unselected. Usually, the same bone needs be moved again, thus needs to be reselected.
23. It would be nice to be able to easily "Select All" bones in sequence editor to "Copy" all keys for all the bones of a figure. This would be handy when a particular figure's position is desired in multiple frames. It seems like "Select All" does nothing here.
24. It would be nice (if possible) for the Gimbal Lock issue to be resolved in Sequence editor like it is in the Figure editor.
25. There is also another bone rotating issue in Sequence editor that has nothing to do with Gimbal Lock that I think has already been hacked to death in these forums.
>>Scene Editor:
26. It would be nice if the "world" line of the hierarchy list indicates if keys are used for a particular frame. If the list has many elements, the only way to determine if no keys are used for a particular frame is to scroll through the list. As such, it is easy to miss and delete frames where keys did exist.
27. When switching between modes, often things get unselected.
- For example, I try to coordinate bone movement in a particular scene frame with a particular sequence frame. When I switch back and forth between the Scene editor and Sequence editor, I always have to reselect the bone and push the Key button.
- When trying to coordinate object parameters like size/position to fit scenes, the object is always unselected when switching back to the Object editors.
28. It would be nice to see more control over the Scene mode's Graph Editor's Scaling parameters. If I want to adjust the values for a short period of time of a lengthy animation, It would be nice if I could just show that short period of time in the Graph Editor. This way, the Graph Editor's size can be reduced to see better how the animated objects are affected as the parameters are changed in the Graph Editor.
29. It would be nice to see an option for the Graph Editor to automatically update the animation's current frame depending on the point that is currently selected in the Graph editor.
30. Maybe be able to adjust the radius of a Panorama Background? – I am thinking that could improve rendering performance and/or resolution of the image?
>>Script Editor:
31. Add a Function to allow launching external programs (like morphenvy, etc...). That way, popular external programs could be setup to act as if they were integrated with Anim8or.
32. Add Functions to convert quaternion info to and from just angle information (not really necessary if quaternion information is not visible to end users like it is now in the .an8 files).
Let me know if I should elaborate on any of these items.
Thanks again,
Harry
Author
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