Action graph nodes

The Action graph decides what moves and how: clips, keys, generated motions and the filters between them. Each node has a page with what it takes and gives and every setting.

How the graph works, with examples: the Action graph in the manual. Other graphs: Style graph · Scene graph · Asset graph.

Inputs

  • Clip: A clip the model came with: a channel for every number of every bone it moves.
  • Keyframes: Keys set by hand: move things in the 3D View and key them (I), and change the keys and their curves on the timeline.
  • Routine: One of the project's routines, by name: channels made once and played wherever they are wanted.
  • Action: Another action, played inside this one: a scene's whole motion as part of a bigger one, timed as a Clip.

Generators

  • Scene time: The time of the frame, in seconds or in frames, as a channel called time.
  • Constant: A channel that holds one value.
  • Wave: A channel that goes up and down: a sine, a square, a triangle or a saw.
  • Noise: A channel that jumps about, smoothly or not: a flame's light, a nervous twitch.
  • Ramp: A channel from one value to another along a curve.
  • Spin: Turns round and round about an axis.
  • Bob: Lifts up and lets down again.
  • Swing: Swings to and fro about an axis, like a pendulum or a sign.
  • Pulse: Grows and shrinks back, like a heartbeat.
  • Slide: Moves by an offset over the frames.

Filters

  • Maths: Every channel worked with a number: added, multiplied, wrapped, bounced, held to steps.
  • Blend: Two motions as one: blend goes from the first to the second by the factor (0.5 is half way), add puts the second's change on top of the first.
  • Merge: Every channel of every input; where two have the same, the later one.
  • Sequence: The first motion, then the second.
  • Time shift: The motion later (or earlier, less than 0), by seconds.
  • Speed: The motion faster (more than 1) or slower.
  • Trim: Only the part of the motion between two times.
  • Repeat: The motion this many times in a row.
  • Reverse: The motion backwards.
  • Lag: The motion smoothed: every change takes this long to arrive.
  • Step: The motion held on whole steps: on twos, on threes, the way hand-drawn frames are.
  • Limit: Every channel kept between two values.
  • Rename: Channels renamed: the start of a name taken off, or another put on.
  • Select: Only the channels whose name has these words in it.

Outputs

  • Instances: The motion on every copy the Scene graph made, each its own instance, each later than the one before by an offset and a random jitter: a crowd that does not move as one.
  • Apply to: Gives the channels that belong to nothing yet to a thing of the scene, by name: added to where it stands, or set.
  • Output: The motion this network makes: how long (0: as long as what comes in), how fast, and whether it loops.

Values