Animating Freeform Mesh Distortion back to default

[Roland R. kahlenberg]

Sounds like you’re animating the Grid values instead of just animating the using the Mesh Controls. You may want to try the COW’s FreeForm Forum here – https://forums.creativecow.net/freeformpro

Good Luck
RoRK

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[Kevin Reiner]

Thanks Roland, didn’t know there was a separate forum. I’ll post there.

However, I’m not animating the grid values, I’m animating the mesh distortion. Do a test yourself. Do a quick bend in FreeForm, then set a keyframe. Move down a 30 frames and set another keyframe, and then reset the Mesh Distortion for that keyframe. Doesn’t work like it should. It acts like a hold keyframe.

Thanks,
Kevin

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[Roland R. kahlenberg]

Heya Kevin, so it’s 3 keyframes then. If so then I see what you mean. I believe that the FF manual touches on this issue and the workaround is to create a KF at time zero of the default Mesh. Put this KF down the Timeline and only delete it if you really decide that you don’t want to use it.

In your case, create this KF with the default settings and move it down the Timeline. Once the other two KFs are in place, you should move this default KF to where you want it to occur.

HTH
RoRK

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[Chris Bobotis]

Roland, thanks for chiming in.

Kevin, I sent you a file that resolves this.

The problem:
The bundled version of FreeForm will not respect user deformations when you change the number of rows and columns. Instead it will snap back to a flat shape. FreeForm Pro does… this is just one of the many things we added to FreeForm Pro.

In your case, you had set 1 row x 2 columns. Default is 2 x 2, so when you reset Freeform to get back to a flat shape from your funnel shape, you also reset it to 2 x 2.

What I did to resolve this:
The trick is to reset and then immediately adjust the rows and columns to 1 x 2. This will respect and create the animation between the flat shape and the funnel because both keyframes now have the same number of rows and columns. As you see in the project file I sent you, this now works.

HTH

Cheers,
Chris
mettle.com

[Kevin Reiner]

Thanks for your help. I look forward to trying out Freeform Pro.

Mac Pro 2 x 3 GHz 6-Core Intel Xeon
32GB Memory
Dual-channel 4Gb Fibre Channel PCI Express card
Dell Display (23″ flat panel)
ATI Radeon HD 5770
AJA Kona LSi SD/HD capture card
Rourke 16 TB
Flanders 2460

SOFTWARE
Mac OS X 10.6.5
FCP 7
After Effects CS5
Boris Continuum
Sapphire Plug Ins
All Trapcode Plugs
Zaxwerks Invig