I got this bvh file from the ohio state motion capture online repository... (http://accad.osu.edu/research/mocap/mocap_data.htm)

And if you load it up in BVHacker or Motion Builder PLE or pretty much any other program that I can find, it works wonderfully. Looks perfect. But as soon as you try to load it up in Poser, your character turns into a pretzel. (mainly contorting the hips to a 90 degree position and twisting up the top half of the body.)

I've tried importing it -- and then exporting it again from various programs to no avail. I've purchased BVH Helper from PhilC and gone through the various options with that... I've tried editing the original file, but apart from renaming the bone parts to work with poser I've really got very little understanding of the BVH structure.

So, I thought I'd try here. Any poser BVH experts out there with a few moments to spare? I'm attaching the poser ready version of the file (with the bones renamed) in the hopes that someone might be able to fix it... Again -- it works perfectly with every other program I've tried -- but poser just can't seem to get it right...

I've renamed the file with a txt extension in order to upload it here... just rename it back to WalkToCrouch.bvh...

I don't know anything about BVH files because I've never used them.

But what figure are you using the BVH file on?  Have you tried it on another figure to see if it's the same result?  Are you sure you have IK turned off  for the legs?  Are you applying the pose to the actual body part or a specific part of the body?

The main difficulty is that some (all?) of the rotations don't work. To explain that let us examine the hip.

In the image above the pretzel figure on the left has your BVH applied. The hip rotations are:-
Bend -59
Side-side 43
Twist -71

I copied these hip rotations to the figure on the right.

Now whichever way you transpose those rotations I do not think there is a combination that works.

Sometimes you'll find that the rotations have been transposed, the BVH has the up-down axis as Z whereas Poser uses Y. Then its relatively easy to edit the BVH file to transpose the values. However here I do not see any combination of reordering that will work.

I am willing to be wrong but to my best understanding that is what I see.

Acadia-

I've tried applying the pose to regular stock figures (james) and the sick man figure (under character->additional figures.) Usually I have the character body selected. But BVH import seems to do the same thing no matter what body part is selected.

PhilC-

I'm in agreement with you -- I just don't understand how every other program I try seems to be able to translate the BVH properly... In other words the correct motion data (including the hip rotation) does exist in the BVH file -- the way poser interprets it seems to be the problem.

What exactly is Poser doing differently than all the other programs I've tried? That's the question...  Something like BVHacker (http://davedub.co.uk/bvhacker/) gives you a constant readout of all the various joint rotations -- it lists the initial hip rotations at about X:-39 Y:-22 and Z: 60... Different from Poser's import of that same file -- Bend: -59 Side-side: 43 and Twist -71.

It's also strange that most of the other BVH files from that ohio motion study site actually work perfectly with poser (once you change the bone names). It's just that one set (the MALE2 set on the site) that all fail to work with poser.

I'm totally stumped.

Possibly the actor was Brahms & List when the motion capture was recorded. You know how these students are sometimes :rolleyes:

I've found the Ohio repository works poorly in Poser.

mocapdata.com has a ton of BVH files that work very well in Poser.

You select the BVH, add it into the cart, checkout (they're free.)  It then emails links to the files.

thx fr the lnk, vance.  with the spine group, they may work better in carrara after
imported bvh skellington is attached to imported obj file of some human figure.
freebones from truebones.com also work o.k. in poser.  no walk-to-crouch.bvh
seen in the freebones, however.

in c6pro, poser manikin.obz file (with ohio Female1_B24_WalkToCrouch.bvh skeleton attached to it) animates as above. maybe phil (or somebody) has got a script that attaches a bvh skeleton to a poser geom file.  or maybe there'll be said function in poser 8.  try the Female1_B24_WalkToCrouch.bvh instead of the Male2_WalkToCrouch.bvh.  they've both got the same bodyparts excepting the tallywhacker AFAIK.