Poser has suddenly decided to refuse to export an animation I'm working on. I've attached the file to this thread.

When I try to export this anim as .bvh, poser freezes up indefinitely. The bvh file is created, but it's size is 0 bytes, and opening it with notepad just gives an empty document.

Can someone try exporting it for me, and see if it works for you ?

OK, hmm. The file refuses to attach. SDays it doesn't have a valid extension,. It's a .pz3 file though. Any idea what might be wrong ?

I'll host a download myself: one moment...

Ok, here we go: http://magotek-industries.com/Files/draw_back.pz3

It's created in poser 7

I've tried exporting other scenes, and they seem to be working fine, so there's definitely a problem with this one.

I can't fully load the file because I don't have the mesh SL_MALE.OBJ...
but it hung up on trying to export a BVH just as you said.

When I look through your PZ3 and compare it with a known good one, I see
something important is missing.

After a reference to an OBJ, Poser needs to have a list of declarations
matching body parts to groups in the OBJ.

For instance:

figureResFile C:Poser 4RuntimeGeometriesP4NudeWomanP4NudeWom.obj
actor BODY:1
    {
    }
actor hip:1
    {
    storageOffset 0 0 0
    geomHandlerGeom 13 hip
    }
actor abdomen:1
    {
    storageOffset 0 0 0
    geomHandlerGeom 13 abdomen
    }
And so on.

==================

In your PZ3, those matching sections are missing for some reason.
After the figureResFile, it goes straight to the 'channels' section without
giving the group associations first.

figureResFile :Downloads:SL_Male.obj
actor BODY:1
    {
    name    BODY
    on
    bend 1
    dynamicsLock        1
    hidden      0
    addToMenu   1
    castsShadow     1
    includeInDepthCue       1
    useZBuffer      1
    parent UNIVERSE
    creaseAngle 80
    channels
        {
And so on.

=====================

It could be that your figure itself was built wrongly, or maybe the PZ3 lost
something through many loadings and reloadings.

Looking at it again: What's missing is *before *that figureResFile line,
not after it.  There should be a figureResFile, then the group associations,
then a repeat of the figureResFile, then the channel paragraphs.  The
one figureResFile line in your PZ3 must be the second one, the repeat. 

Look at the original CR2 for the figure, and you should be able to copy and paste
the missing part into the PZ3. 

Locate the first figureResFile line in the CR2; copy and paste that line
along with everything up to (but not including) the second figureResFile line.

And looking at it for a third time :) I see that the groups are present, but
so is a lot of other stuff like attached props.  Try detaching the swords and
other attached things before exporting the BVH.   

Alternatively, just save the motions as an animated pose (pz2) instead of BVH.
The pose won't be usable in some other programs, but it will be much easier
for other Poserites to use.

I'm confused here. I'm not seeing that part missing. I have two figureres lines, with the appropriate stuff after them.

First:

figureResFile :Downloads:SL_Male.obj
actor BODY:1
    {

    }
controlProp GoalCenterOfMass:1
    {

    }
controlProp CenterOfMass:1
    {

    }
actor hip:1
    {
    storageOffset 0 0 0
    geomHandlerGeom 13 hip 
    }
actor abdomen:1
    {
    storageOffset 0 0 0
    geomHandlerGeom 13 abdomen 
    }
actor chest:1
    {
    storageOffset 0 0 0
    geomHandlerGeom 13 chest 
    }
actor neck:1
    {
    storageOffset 0 0 0
    geomHandlerGeom 13 neck 
    }

etc...

Then, much farther down

===========================
figureResFile :Downloads:SL_Male.obj

actor BODY:1
    {
    name    BODY
    on
    bend 1
    dynamicsLock        1
    hidden        0
    addToMenu    1
    castsShadow        1
    includeInDepthCue        1
    useZBuffer        1
    parent UNIVERSE
    creaseAngle 80
    channels
        {
        groups
            {
            groupNode Transform
                {
                parmNode scale
                parmNode xScale
                parmNode yScale
                etc...
=======================

What am I missing? It seeems to look how you've described it should

oh, wait, you noticed that.

alright, what should I do with the props ? just un-parent them or delete them completely ?

hmm, I tried deleting the props, and exporting again. This time it didn't hang, but crashed outright

"poser.exe has enountered an error and needs to close.... blah blah"

ok, I missed one of the props in the above attempt. A small invisible cube I used for attaching the left hand to the sword. After deleting this, poser crashed on saving the pz3, before I even got to bvh :(

The figure is he Second Life avatar. It's available for download here: http://secondlife.com/community/avatar.php

just in case that'll help with diagnosing the problem..

Looking within the PZ3 I can see that there is an IK chain set on for the right arm. The  inkyParent of the right hand is eagle_winged_longsword:1. However the sword is parented to the hand. The goal of the IK chain is the right hand.

If you are having difficulty following that then it is very possible that Poser is also. :)

I hand edited the PZ3 to remove all references to the right arm IK chain. This was both the chain and the parenting lines within the actor sections. Save with new name.

Loaded this revised PZ3 and was now able to save an animated pose to the library and export out a BVH file.

Attempting to attach zip to this post.

Plan B
File at http://www.philc.serveftp.net/temp/draw_back_3.zip

Plan C
email me and I'll send it :)

pcooke@philc.net

Thank you. I seem to have fixed it myself, I think, but this will be useful as a backup.

I wonder why this causes poser to crash. It should be deigned to warn the user of errors and abort the operation, instead of freezing up silently.

Hmm, a little more advice needed. I think I have an idea of how this came about.

Basically, I had the sword in there parented to the hand, so that it would move properly with swings and such. However, for that particular .pz3, I was making an unsheathing animation.

It's pretty much necessary to have the sword move perfectly out of the sheath, and not clip through the edges. This didn't seem to be possible by simply positioning joints, at least not without spending days repositioning tiny parts.

The simple solution I used, was to reverse the parenting. Parent the hand to the sword instead. Then I translated the sword along one of it's local axes so that it moved perfectly smoothly out of the sheath, with the right arm readjusting itself naturally to hold it

Clearly, this is where something has gotten mixed up though. Is there any way I can use this technique, but prevent this corruption from ocurring again ?

Yes but don't have an IK chain in the arm. That is not just the IK turned off but no IK chain in there at all.

You can delete IK chains using the Hierarchy Window. Select then hit the delete key. Or you can use my edited PZ3 file and re-parent the hand to the sword.

Wouldn't not having an IK chain in the arm not make it move when the sword does? that seems pointless. Am I understanding correctly ?