Hey all,

 Over the past month I've been working hard at animation, and have learned quite a bit, thanks in large part to this forum!

 Something still really bugs me however.. I feel like I could be saving so much more time using some form of IK. Right now I'm not using any sort of IK.. I just use two spheres by each feet and then try my best to match it up through dial spinning.. which takes a long time, and has average results. (Still a bit of sliding and sinking into floor.)

 I plan to sell my animations.. so the option of having camera angles that hide problem areas is not an option.. so I'm trying to get things as perfect as I can.

 I've pretty much given up on Poser IK. I've tried everything..  I can't live with the jittering it creates.. it's just so unnatural and odd looking. Even doing a test with 2 simple frames.. no inbetweens, shows how frustrating it is. The feet fidget slightly with a simple hip rotation.. and that translates to the shin and thigh, like a chain reaction!

 So.. with that said. Do I have any alternatives? Is there another 3D program I can load my animation into, use the IK in it (If it's any better than Poser) and then export it back to Poser? I'd be willing to spend more money since it'd save a TON of time.

 Or should I just continue using my current method and match things up the best I can?

Any advice/info would be much appreciated.

Thanks!

I guess you are using animation layers...

Yeah, for some tasks I do use animation layers.

 Is there some way they can prevents the IK jitter?

I don't see how it can.. as just with a default empty scene.. taking V4 from default pose on one frame, to shifting her weight to one leg more on the next frame causes the feet to reposition themselves slightly... that's just with two frames! Add the inbetweens and the jittering is so bad.. 

Dont use the animation layer. Have you seen....

looks for the link

Attached Link: http://www.renderosity.com/mod/forumpro/showthread.php?thread_id=2772661

Those are great animation tutorials.

A little while ago Ockham posted an explanation of why using IK within an animation causes the jitters.

As I understood it his advice was to use IK for preparing keyframe poses, but not during the animation sequence itself.

It might be worth doing a search for "ockham" and "IK" to find that thread... it was quite recent, I think.

I was actually the one who started that thread where Ockham posted, haha. :]

 What I'm trying to say is..  I did use IK just to prepare the keyframe poses. I took 2 frames ONLY. First frame start position, second frame with IK on I leaned the person's weight on one leg. Now scrolling between those two poses, you can still see that the feet are moving slightly, so you just know that there's going to be jitter.

 I went a step further and retimed the animation from 2 to 30 frames, and there's the jitter!

 I then saved the animation, loaded a new scene with the figure.. IK off, loaded the animation.. Still the same problem.

Here's the quote from Ockham in the other thread:

"The jittering is a common problem.  There are usually two or three possible
solutions to each IK calculation.  One solution may involve (eg) the right knee
bent slightly forward, the other may have the right knee bent slightly backward.
You don't notice the alternate solutions in a still pose, but in an animation
Poser will pick the one that seems closest for each frame.  And the best
solution for frame 10 may have the knee bent backward, then for frame 11 the
knee bent forward, then for 12 backward again......."

 Which I think means that there's no fixing the jitter, it's just the way Poser calculates IK and cannot be helped?

blush oops, sorry! :O)

Nono, my fault - I should've posted my new thing in old thread. Thanks for trying to help!

Hi
Poser uses what we call "Hard" Ik Chains
( yeah Ironic I know).
Meaning the Ik chain lengths are based on a completely Zeroed Figure position.
This is very limiting frankly

For example If I load a figure that has IK on for the legs as a default. and do NOT move him, Especially the hip
translations,
then Immediately load up walk designer
and create a simple walk cycle , he walks
fine with no "Knee snaps".

However if I load my figure and turn off IK for the legs and move him /her around THEN activate IK
for the legs I get Major Jitter problems for the feet& legs.
Many Figure Creators& Non animators Think they are doing you a favor by Having Figures that have no Ik or load with IK OFF as the Default. but such nonsense is a detriment to Character animation

I had major problems with "dorks" Feet when creating
the Stair Climbing tutorial until I Zeroed him using the
joint editor tool."Resetting" his IK chains.

You results may Vary dependent upon the figure you are using
but try Zeroing out the figure using the Joint Editor tool.
before Doing any IK related tasks.

Hope this helps

Cheers.