Trying to make wheels on a car spin

[Anonymous]

Hello,

I'm using 3DS Max 2017 on a Windows 10 PC laptop.

I have a model of a Jeep Cherokee, and all the parts in it are grouped.

I've grabbed the wheel, attempted to rotate it, both by making my own keys and by using auto key.   It creates the keys, I can see them in the timeline.

But when I scrub back and forth on the timeline, the wheel does not spin.

I'm sure there's probably more complicated ways to do this with rigging and all, but this is a very simple project and doesn't require a high degree of accuracy, so simply rotating the tires a number of times as the car moves along would be just fine.

Thanks in advance for any help anyone can give.  

[RobH2]

I've rotated things before and when scrubbing have not seen them spin either. But, often they are. The screen draw just doesn't look like it. Have you tried to render some frames and checked to make sure?

Also, to help see the spinning, make a dummy and link it to the outside of the wheel. Then scrub. If the wheel is turning you'll see the dummy rotating around. 

If it's not as simple as what I describe, can you upload the file, maybe just the wheels to keep the file small, and I'll look at it?

[irishman_team_kilber]

@Anonymous make sure you ungroup the car select the four tires use the autokey, not the set key and then you will able to set the keys up and rotate them, if you have the object grouped then  it will cause the whole car to rotate when you only want the tires to rotate.

[Anonymous]

Thank you very much for the replies!

@irishman_team_kilber  Do I have to ungroup the vehicle?  Or can I just open the group?

If I ungroup the vehicle, will I lose the key frames that moved the car forward?

[Anonymous]

@RobH2  

I tried advancing the scrb bar one frame at a time, and I would think that I'd see some kind of movement then, unless I'm wrong.

I removed the key frames for rotation on the wheels of the Jeep, but I'll be happy to upload the file anyway.

[irishman_team_kilber]

sorry i am having a lot of problem getting tons of errors  with this site.

@Anonymous try this tutorials https://knowledge.autodesk.com/support/3ds-max/getting-started/caas/CloudHelp/cloudhelp/2015/ENU/3DS...

[Anonymous]

Thanks for the reply.  

To be honest, that's a bit more than what I need.  I'm not looking to get that detailed, and algebra really isn't my strong suit.  lol

All I really need to do is rotate the tires enough to make it look like they're turning.  They don't have to be exact, just convincing enough.

[Anonymous]

I tried opening the group (rather than ungrouping), and rotated the tire with AutoKey selected, and it still doesn't seem to take.

I guess I'll try rendering a few frames to see if there's actual movement or not.

[Anonymous]

---

@RobH2 wrote:

I've rotated things before and when scrubbing have not seen them spin either. But, often they are. The screen draw just doesn't look like it. Have you tried to render some frames and checked to make sure?

---

Well, I just rendered out a few frames, and there's definitely no movement in the wheel whatsoever.  

It's so frustrating.

I select the wheel with the rotation gimble, I rotate it a good number of times to get some halfway believable rotation out of it, I have AutoKey on so keyframes are automatically created, yet there's no rotation in the wheel.

And I checked the wheel itself, the mag, and the tire are all one object.

[Anonymous]

What's also weird, is that when I rotate the wheel with the gimble tool, I can see the wheel physically turning, but it won't rotate while scrubbing, and now after a render.

[irishman_team_kilber]

are you moving the time slider when you are rotating? each key is store under the time slider in the box saying "1 to whatever time you have set"

Example turn autokey on start at 0 then animate the rotate, then move the time slider to 5 keep doing this until you reach the end of your time, then max should store it. on the time line, click the play button or move the time slider then you should see your tires animating!

The link i have you is the same on all of them even in the autodesk video so you are getting into a compicated area if your new to it

animating a car along a path autodesk video part 2, the tutor shows you how to animate the tires in 11:01

http://area.autodesk.com/learning/3ds-max-animating-a-car-on-a-path-spinning-the-wheels-part-2

[RobH2]

Here is your file back. I grouped the car "without" the tires. Then, I linked the tires to the car group. You can animate the car group forward and the tires will follow. 

Now, I replaced the rotation controller on the tires. It had a TBC Controller on them. I replaced the rotation controller with the default, "Euler XYZ." I then animated the rotation of the x-axis. The tire turns and is visible turning in the viewport. Open the file and reverse engineer it. Go to the "Motion" panel to see the swapped rotation controller. Do the same to the other 3 tires. Also, learn how to open the "Curve Editor" as it will make things easier for you as you can see the keys and the curve. 

[Anonymous]

Thanks much!

Okay, so I see on the Motion Tab, where the Rotation is assigned Euler XYZ, and each of the Rotation axis is Bezier Float.

I assigned the same Euler XYZ to the back wheel, but when I scrub it doesn't turn.

I put the scrubber on the 60frame mark where they keyframe is for the other tire.

I set Autokey, rotate the tire 360 degrees, and it turns, but then stops after I pass the second keyframe.

I go to Graph Editors> Track View - Curve Editor, and the curve editor won't open.

[Anonymous]

are you moving the time slider when you are rotating? each key is store under the time slider in the box saying "1 to whatever time you have set"

Yes, I am definitely moving the time slider when I rotate, so that two keys are created at different points along the timeline.

animating a car along a path autodesk video part 2, the tutor shows you how to animate the tires in 11:01

http://area.autodesk.com/learning/3ds-max-animating-a-car-on-a-path-spinning-the-wheels-part-2

Thank you, but at this point in time, all I'm really interested in doing is animating some rotation in the wheel.  I'm not really concerned with accuracy or rigging at this point.  I'm looking for a simple solution if there is one.  I've animated objects before by rotating them rather simply, and don't understand why the wheel doesn't work the same way.

[Anonymous]

Thank you all for the responses, but I don't think any of these solutions are going to work for me.

I cheated a bit on the car, I couldn't figure out how to make the rest of the wheels work so I copied the working wheel and replaced the back wheel.  The car was only going to be viewed from one side anyway, so this seemed like a simple solution.

But upon importing it into my file, and attempting to animate it's movement, instead of traveling in a straight line in the way that I moved it, it's moving along some kind of curve, which is another problem entirely.

I think I'll probably just try to fake the wheels rotating in After Effects.

[RobH2]

What I sent you is the solution. You are doing something wrong. 

Select a new wheel. 

Go to motion panel and change the rotation controller to Euler XYZ

Select wheel

Turn on Autokey

Set wheel gizmo space to Local

Rotate wheel a bit at frame zero to set a key

move slider to say, 200

Rotate wheel just under 360 degrees

Turn off Autokey

Slide timeline slider

It just works. 

The reason the wheel stops is that there is not a keyframe beyond that last key set. You can either add an "out-of-range" curve to the key in the Curve Editor (which you can look up) or you can get "Curve Editor" open and move the key to the right and up at the same angle until you have it at the end of your animation and up high enough to have the wheels spin at a speed that looks good. 

Lastly, right click on your window and choose "Curve Editor" .  It should open. Find the wheel and  zoom the extents . Review the keys. 

You are doing something wrong concerning one of the most basic animation tasks. If you don't figure this out you'll never progress in 3d. I know you are in a hurry and hesitate to do a tutorial, but find some basic ones and do them. It really will help you. Doing it in After Effects is like going out your front door and coming in your back door just to go to your kitchen. 

[irishman_team_kilber]

@Anonymous here is a basic tutorial on Wheel Rotation you cannot get anymore basic than this link also at the bottom,

Hope this helps

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D0sP5-jO9P4

[Anonymous]

Oh, I'm definitely doing something wrong on my end.  I didn't mean to imply otherwise.  Sorry if I did.

For some reason, when I attempt to open up the curve editor, the viewport darkens in the background, it kind of blinks with black, but the curve editor doesn't open.

And then there's the new problem of the car not moving in a straight path after I animate it to do so, when imported into my main file.

I'll definitely review the tutorials when I have more time to tinker, but right now I think I'll have to settle for less due to time constraints.

Again, thanks much for the feedback.

[Anonymous]

In the mean time, if there's anyone out there who can lead me as to how I can just put a couple of simple rotation keyframes onto the wheels and make them spin, just so I can animate some basic rotation and not have to worry about rigging or controllers in motion tabs for the time being, that would be greatly appreciated.  

[Anonymous]

In the mean time, if there's anyone out there who can lead me as to how I can just put a couple of simple rotation keyframes onto the wheels, just so I can animate some basic rotation and not have to worry about rigging or controllers in motion tabs for the time being, that would be greatly appreciated.