Bake actions operator converting F-curves to linear #109528

New Issue

Hassan-Charafeddine · 2023-06-29T20:07:26+02:00

2023-06-29 20:07:26 +02:00

System Information
Operating system: windows 10
Graphics card: Nvidia RTX 3080

Blender Version
Broken: ( 3.5.1 , e1ccd9d4a1 , master, 2023-04-24

Worked: (3.3.8, 6a4c537c21, master, 2023-06-19 )

Short description of error
baking actions (object or pose mode) converts F-curves to linear interpolation in blender 3.5 and 3.6 but the accuracy of keyframe placement is higher opposed to 3.4 and 3.3 where the interpolation of the curves remains unchanged but for complex custom interpolation the keyframe placement after bake is unaccurate

Exact steps for others to reproduce the error
use the default cube to key a 30 frame loopable action (increasing the Z transform on frame 15 will do),
go to the graph editor,
turn the handle type to free and make custom interpolations like the attached files
bake action
image2: orginal unbaked
image1: baked in 3.6/3.5
image3: baked in 3.3/3.4

**System Information** Operating system: windows 10 Graphics card: Nvidia RTX 3080 **Blender Version** Broken: ( 3.5.1 , e1ccd9d4a1d3 , master, 2023-04-24 Worked: (3.3.8, 6a4c537c211e, master, 2023-06-19 ) **Short description of error** baking actions (object or pose mode) converts F-curves to linear interpolation in blender 3.5 and 3.6 but the accuracy of keyframe placement is higher opposed to 3.4 and 3.3 where the interpolation of the curves remains unchanged but for complex custom interpolation the keyframe placement after bake is unaccurate **Exact steps for others to reproduce the error** use the default cube to key a 30 frame loopable action (increasing the Z transform on frame 15 will do), go to the graph editor, turn the handle type to free and make custom interpolations like the attached files bake action image2: orginal unbaked image1: baked in 3.6/3.5 image3: baked in 3.3/3.4

image_2023-06-29_210302733.png

78 KiB

image_2023-06-29_210507928.png

82 KiB

image_2023-06-29_210431723.png

94 KiB

Hassan-Charafeddine added the

labels 2023-06-29 20:07:27 +02:00

Nate Rupsis added the

Module

Animation & Rigging

label 2023-06-29 20:51:22 +02:00

Nate Rupsis added this to the Animation & Rigging project 2023-06-29 20:51:27 +02:00

YimingWu commented

2023-06-30 07:13:24 +02:00

I'm not sure if it really affects anything, since after baking, you will have one key for one frame and blender won't render a in-between frame anyway.

Not sure if this is gonna have a significant effect on motion blur, if so I'd suggest adding an option for keeping the curve.

I'm not sure if it really affects anything, since after baking, you will have one key for one frame and blender won't render a in-between frame anyway. Not sure if this is gonna have a significant effect on motion blur, if so I'd suggest adding an option for keeping the curve.

YimingWu added

Status

Needs Info from Developers

and removed

Status

Needs Triage

labels 2023-06-30 07:13:34 +02:00

Nathan Vegdahl commented

2023-07-07 17:01:33 +02:00

This isn't a bug, it's an intentionally changed behavior. But it looks like it was never documented, which we should definitely fix.

@Hassan-Charafeddine is there a reason that you want non-linear interpolation after a bake? The bezier screenshot you've shared shows that it ends up wobbly and weird, which at least doesn't seem any better to me than linear.

This isn't a bug, it's an intentionally changed behavior. But it looks like it was never documented, which we should definitely fix. @Hassan-Charafeddine is there a reason that you want non-linear interpolation after a bake? The bezier screenshot you've shared shows that it ends up wobbly and weird, which at least doesn't seem any better to me than linear.

Hassan-Charafeddine commented

2023-07-07 17:17:24 +02:00

yes I understand that the The bezier screenshot breaks but that's the point in the older version 3.3 it is bezier but isn't accurate as 3.6 but in current versions of blender it is linear and is accurate on bake, however keep in mind this is a simple F curve, not a rig with multiple controllers as I need to reconvert my f curves to bezier again to get my motion be the exact same again, it might seem the same but it's not not, point is on bake my fcurves should not change my motion even 1%, honestly I don't know if that's unreasonable or not but if that is a default going forward then a lot of clean up for animators is going to be happening in the graph editor after baking

Hassan-Charafeddine commented

2023-07-07 17:21:30 +02:00

Oh maybe I understand the issue, maybe this change was made in regards to animating in blender for movies, sorry I was thinking in regards to animating for games and exporting for unreal and unity without change to my data, sorry I should've been more clear on that matter, even after I finish editing after I bake I still need to export, so If my fcurve aren't the same that's the issue

Christoph Lendenfeld commented

2023-10-31 17:49:34 +01:00

@nathanvegdahl what was the reason this was changed to linear and not to auto clamped?

Nathan Vegdahl commented

2023-11-07 15:27:55 +01:00

Gah, I should have linked to what I found when I responded before. The change was made before I was part of the animation module. But I can at least give my own rationale of why I think it makes sense:

Baking, as Blender does it right now, is just taking point samples. There's no logic to try to accurately preserve curvature by e.g. placing bezier handles appropriately. So the interpolation mode chosen is literally just about interpolating point samples with zero additional information. Linear is a good default for this because it's at least always well behaved. Bezier is smoother, of course, but you have to choose between either auto (which produces over-shoot in sub-frames) or auto-clamped (which introduces weird unpredictable wiggles in sub-frames), neither of which are consistently well behaved.

In the future it would be great to introduce some kind of smart bake that tries to position bezier handles appropriately. Additionally, we may want to preserve constant-interpolation keys (but notably, the previous versions of Blender didn't do that either).

But short of those, linear is a good, predictable default. If desired, the user can easily change the interpolation mode of the keys after the bake, to exactly the same results as if it were default.

Gah, I should have linked to what I found when I responded before. The change was made before I was part of the animation module. But I can at least give my own rationale of why I think it makes sense: Baking, as Blender does it right now, is just taking point samples. There's no logic to try to accurately preserve curvature by e.g. placing bezier handles appropriately. So the interpolation mode chosen is literally just about interpolating point samples with zero additional information. Linear is a good default for this because it's at least always well behaved. Bezier is smoother, of course, but you have to choose between either auto (which produces over-shoot in sub-frames) or auto-clamped (which introduces weird unpredictable wiggles in sub-frames), neither of which are consistently well behaved. In the future it would be great to introduce some kind of smart bake that tries to position bezier handles appropriately. Additionally, we may want to preserve constant-interpolation keys (but notably, the previous versions of Blender didn't do that either). But short of those, linear is a good, predictable default. If desired, the user can easily change the interpolation mode of the keys after the bake, to exactly the same results as if it were default.

Christoph Lendenfeld added

and removed

labels 2023-11-07 15:35:41 +01:00

Christoph Lendenfeld commented

2023-11-07 15:36:02 +01:00

@nathanvegdahl In that case I put it down as known issue, since there is no good way to fix this right now

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