[Gareth Randall]

I drew an open-ended shape using the Bezier tool and used that as a path (it was a complicated shape that would have been a pain to create by modifying the default motion path). The fact it was a shape meant that it had a scale value, and changing that obviously affected the animation.

[Gareth Randall]

All my software is up-to-date and I don’t run other apps when I’m running Motion.

I just had another “interesting” bug in the same project; a motion path suddenly decided to change scale from 100% to 21%. I didn’t accidentally change the scale myself, it did it by itself. And even weirder, when I set it back to 100% it didn’t come back to its original size; I actually had to make it 250% to get it back to the same size it was before.

[Gareth Randall]

It’s a 2D project and everything has the same Z position. As I say, grouping all the groups into a single uber-group works perfectly if you create the new group and then drag all the other groups into it; it *doesn’t* work if you highlight all the groups and then choose “Group” from the menu.

[Gareth Randall]

I’m afraid that doesn’t help, since all the objects in the composition change position as soon as you create the uber-group.

What’s the actual reason for the mass position shift? A bug?

EDIT – aha, I made it work! If you create a new group and then drag all the other groups into it, everything’s fine. The position shift occurs if you highlight all the groups and then choose “Group” from the Object menu.

[Gareth Randall]

Bummer. AE has a “trace” function that does something like that, hasn’t it?

[Gareth Randall]

Thanks guys. I figured that’s what I’d have to do, but I wanted to see if there was a behaviour-based way of achieving it, something I’d missed somewhere.

[Gareth Randall]

D’oh, of course, you can change the scale of the *camera*…

*slaps forehead*

Thanks again, Mark 🙂

[Gareth Randall]

Wow, a custom video tutorial – now that’s what I call service 🙂

Thanks very much Mark, that’s exactly what I wanted!

[Gareth Randall]

Sorry Mark, I’m probably being dumb but I’m not really sure what you’re suggesting there. I’ve tried adding a second sequence behaviour and all I’ve got is the squares mixing up to 100% (with the first behaviour) and then back down to 0% (with the second one). I still can’t find a way of specifying different final opacities to each replicated square.

[Gareth Randall]

Hi Jeff,

I’m afraid I can’t help you with the cables, but can I ask why you want to get a Dyaxis II up and running again? Pure nostalgia? Not that there’s anything wrong with that, it’s nostalgia that led to me Googling “Studer Dyaxis” and finding this thread 🙂

I used a Dyaxis II with MultiDesk at BBC Radio One in 1994-5. I remember how expensive and cutting edge it was at the time, way in advance of the *very* old green-screen AudioFile that was the centre of the main Radio One production suite and which would crash regularly, especially if you tried playing a clip shorter than about 1 second, which made it useless for the style of radio imaging that was coming into vogue back then.

But I also remember that Dyaxis was limited in other ways, for example it only offered snapshot, not dynamic automation. I can’t remember if there were any effects, reverbs or dynamics built in, my memory is that there weren’t. I moved over to ProTools in late 1995 and to be honest, I didn’t miss Dyaxis at all. But I’m very nostalgic about old tech, so I hope that one day I’ll get to play with one again, especially if it’s got MultiDesk attached 🙂