merging animation layers not to bake on 1's

[stevenfila7]

Good day all,

Apologies since I am new to the all animLayer thing.  Every time I merge anim layers it automatically bakes them on 1's.  The merge works fine but how do I stop it from baking all the merged combined layers on 1's.

I am missing a step.  I have seen it done before where when the layers are merged it does not automatically bake all layers.

Please advise with screen shots-

Thank you-

Steve

[jordan.giboney]

Hi @stevenfila7

Thanks for posting! Can you tell me what version of Maya you are working with? I am working with 2018.5 and was able to merge a couple of really simple layers without it showing up on 1's. If I right click on the layers, then hit the merge options box (2), these are the default settings that worked for me:

If those are the settings you are using as well, I would suggest resetting your Maya Preferences to default - there may have been some corruption that happened in the tool 🙂 

Thanks for your time! I look forward to hearing back from you.

[jordan.giboney]

Hi @stevenfila7

Hope you are doing well! Just wanted to check in and see how things were going - any new developments I can help with? 🙂

Thanks for your time!

[stevenfila7]

Hi,

Thanks for the post and screen shots. Greatly appreciated.  I will try later on today.  Unfortunately, I am not in front of my workstation.

I will be in touch shortly.

Thank you,
Steve

[stevenfila7]

Hi,

Still baked on 1's.  I tried your settings.

Unfortunately, it did not work as of yet.

Please advise-thanks,

Steve

[jordan.giboney]

Hi @stevenfila7

Thanks for trying that out! 🙂 Would you be able to share the scene you are working with? There may be something specific to the characters causing this - you can either zip up the file and upload it directly in this thread, or share it with me in a private message.

After testing the settings, did you also try resetting your preferences? Any difference in behavior after doing that?

Thanks again for your willingness to try these suggestions!

[stevenfila7]

Hi Jordan,

My pleasure, no worries.  However, I am updating to 2018.5.  I'd rather not delete my prefs because I have too many scripts and what not and don't want to mess that up.

Oh well.  I hope the update resolves the issue.

I will try again.  Get back with screen shots.

[jordan.giboney]

@stevenfila7

No worries, I totally get it - I come from a production background myself, so I completely understand the custom scripts scenario 🙂 Whenever I encounter something that *might* be preferences related, I always just rename the folder rather than deleting it. If that fixes the issue, I then systematically add stuff back into the new prefs folder to see what is causing the issue (sometimes I would be able to add everything back in and it would be resolved!)

Let me know if the issue persists after updating to 2018.5 🙂 Happy to keep working together until we figure this out!

[stevenfila7]

Ok.  here you go.

Screenshots.  Still did not work.

You will see I selected all layers and then merged.

you will also notice the tick marks are all on 1's

[jordan.giboney]

Ah okay, so this is happening with all scenes, not just one specific rig/animation, right? 🙂 

Just to make sure I understand, are the screenshots above from 2018.5? 

Have the preferences been reset yet? < This is our next testing step

Thanks again for your efforts!

[stevenfila7]

Hi-
Yes latest version.

Sorry Can you please send screenshots of not ruining my preferences.
Thank you

[jordan.giboney]

Hi @stevenfila7

Sorry for the delay! Here's how to go about it (assuming you are on windows):

1. Shut down Maya completely
2. Open a file browser and navigate to Documents > Maya > 2018
3. In that folder, you will see your preferences folder. Right-click on it and rename it to something like "Prefs_old"
4. Re-open Maya 
5. When re-opening, a window will pop up asking if you would like to use old preferences or create new default preferences. Select "Create New Default Preferences"
   • This will create a new set of preferences, but not delete the "Prefs_old" folder (your original/customized preferences)

After creating default preferences, test out the merge keys workflow again. If it works as expected, this means that there is something within the custom preferences causing the issue 🙂

Let me know how that test go! 🙂 I would be happy to help if the problem persists! 

[stevenfila7]

Thank you but I am on a mac.  My OS is High Sierra but I think any old OS for mac will work just fine.
Please provide the steps so I do not delete any scripts, icons or prefs.  A video is best.

I am afraid of losing all data.

Thank you,

Steve

[mspeer]

Hi!

That's why you should rename the folder and not delete it.

You can't loose data by renaming a folder (for example "prefs" to "prefs_old" or "prefs_backup").

[stevenfila7]

Hi,

Thanks for your prompt response.  

Apologies but how do I provide the new folder with the old scripts, icons and hotkeys as well?  I am new to this whole thing.

Please provide screen shots.

Thank you

[mspeer · Accepted solution]

Hi!

Don't do step 2 before 1. The procedure is at first to test if it works with new and clean preferences. So forget all your scripts and user settings. Rename the folder, test it and then simply switch back to your old settings, by renaming again your backup folder to "pref".

(Maybe better do this with the folder "2018", so everything will be reset to default.)

!!! BUT !!!

Please let me understand your problem first, because i don't understand what you mean with "not to bake on 1's".

1. When you merge layers they will of course being baked.

Two options:

a) specify values for Sample by and Oversampling Rate

b) enable Smart Bake (to only sample where keys are present) // I guess this is what you are searching for

2. All selected layers will get baked down to one layer

Two options:

a) Top Selected Layer

b) Bottom Selected Layer.

So what does not work?

Please show screenshots and upload a scene-file with a step by step instruction how to reproduce this.

[stevenfila7]

YES!!! This was the answer I was looking for my friend!

Just tried it!

Enabling Smart bake did the trick!!!

Thank you and enjoy your weekend!

Steve