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evrik

Flexible Aerials / Antenna

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I am in the process of creating a JTAC radio backpack for a BAF unit. I have the pack made and have used an aerial from a Jackal to make the large radio antenna on the back of the pack. However, it is static. I would like it to sway back and forth as the unit moves to make it look more realistic. Does anyone know how I would go about doing that? I have been told that RHS managed to do it for their vehicles, making them bend as the vehicle accelerates/ decelerates and when it corners at speed, so it must be possible.

Any help would be great.

Thanks.

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RHS managed to do it for their vehicles, making them bend as the vehicle accelerates/ decelerates and when it corners at speed, so it must be possible.

The animation system for vehicles is completely different to the system used for character-worn items.

With character models, you're kind of limited to the available skeleton bones that already exist in the character model and weighing the various parts of your model to that skeleton so they match the way the skeleton is told to move by game's .rtm animation files. Things like backpacks and vests are weighed to fit the character skeleton the same way as the character model itself, so have to use the same skeleton as the character wearing the item.

Vehicles on the other hand are easy to make completely custom skeletons and bones for, and program you own animations because they're independent of the .rtm files.

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i am gonna chip in here. What monkey is saying is that you need to try it out a bit, i would weight actually weight the top of the antenna (soft select) to the the legs (10%LL, 10%RL, 80% spine3) or so. You'll need to experience with it, but should be possible.

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Thanks guys. I had hoped it would be a little easier. One day I will learn. I will have a play around and see if I can change something. If not....hmm.......maybe I'll shorten the aerial. :)

PuFu, how exactly would I add weight just to the top?

Oh, and another thought. Do you think it would be possible to add a flag to the aerial?

Edited by evrik

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would be possible to add a flag to the aerial?

Yes you can add one in the model, but it would look like cardboard basically and won't deform unless you really go out of your way...

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1. i don't understand the question about the weights. I am talking about skining/rigging here, not about weights in KGs or whatever. In short, every vertices needs to be "weighted" for a bone. For arma, every vert needs to have 100% total weight, but that can be 85% spine3 and 15% one of the legs or whatever.

2. Yes you can do that, but don't expect it to behave correctly. For an antenna, be it for a vehicle or character is a lot easier than a flag, simply because the resulting animation wouldn't even come close to cloth animation (which arma is not capable of).

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Apologies, PuFu, I guess I misunderstood your initial reply where you mentioned weights. I thought you meant assigning the tip of the aerial some sort of mass for physx purposes. Nevermind. I'll try that split of assigning the antenna to different bones. The flag question is for a possible Falklands War scenario. There is a famous picture with a Royal Marine radioman with a Union Flag on the aerial of his pack.

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