One of the first things I did after Bondware bought Poser was to file a report about the issue with layers. The problem with layers has been there since they were added. A lot of the problem is the programmers only planned for two layers. You can see this in the scene file if you look at the movement values. Below is the report I submitted.

Animation Layers Issues

To see the issue open Poser and it is easiest to put in a simple prop such as a box. Go to the last frame and move a single channel such as Y Translate to a value. This puts in two Key frames one at 1 and the last at 30. Now open the Animation Palette and put in a new Layer with a start of frame of 10 and end of 20. With The Base layer selected you will see a nice line going from 0 to the value at 30. Now select the new Layer and put the cursor at frame 15 (somewhere in the middle of the layer) making sure to be the same channel as in the Base Layer. On the Graph click on the RED line and it will create the start and end points and the point in the middle. The Start point of the RED line will be placed Above Zero on the BLACK line. The Middle point will be placed at a random location. The End point will be on the Zero line like it should be. Since all Three points are Zero and you can see that if you look at the PZ3 if you save it they should all be on the Zero line instead of having a shape that looks a shark fin.

This problem has existed ever since Poser put Animation Layers in with Poser 7, although with slightly different symptoms. In Poser 9 if you added a layer the adjustment line (RED) would start at zero and end at zero and the middle adjustment would show the actual value. At least for the first couple of clicks and then it goes bonkers. This is especially true if you add in more Layers. The Problem is that for the Base Layer Poser only adds a in a K value format of (k 29 1) Where k stands for Key Frame the 29 is the Frame where the Key is placed and then 1 is the movement value of the channel movement. When you get to the Layers not only do you get a K input you also have another Key called KDF (Key Difference Frame???). This is in the format of (kfd 0.172414 -0.310345) the first value (at least in Poser 11.1.1) appears to be the Value the channel is suppose to have. The second value is difference between the Base Layer Value at the frame and the Key Value. Listed is the condensed list of values from a Layer. layer kfrm Layer_1 k 0 0.310345 kfd 0.310345 0 k 5 0.172414 kfd 0.172414 -0.310345 k 10 0.655172 kfd 0.655172 0

The problem is the KDF as it appears to be an attempt to be able to toggle between Add and Replace a Layer. This might work if all you can have is TWO Layers Base and One more. However You can have a large number of them and they can be toggled On and Off to add the effect of the Layer to the overall Value. So if you have Three or more Layers what is the First Value of KDF suppose to be? The way the manual explains Layers is that if you are in Add Mode then if the Base Layer (Total of all layers added together) is say 90 if you Add in -20 then the overall value should be 70. 90-20=70. In Replace Mode the values below the Layer that is Replace should be removed from the calculation and the Value of the Replace Layer and any Layer above it that is in Add Mode should be what the channel value becomes. And the RED line should start off at Start Zero and End Zero until the User moves the Points instead of trying to connect the points outside the Layer Range into a smooth graph.

@an0malaus If you find any functions in Poser Python please let me know as I have not found any. There is the value channels functions and some from the Animation Sets, however nothing for the Layers Functions. The ones listed are for Material Layers.

When and If Bondware gets to testing the next version of Poser I really hope they get at least one tester who uses the animation functions.

Poser 5, 6, 7, 8, Poser Pro 9 (2012), 10 (2014), 11, 12, 13