I've created a short walking path using poser 10. I want to animate Andy for a while at the end of the first path, then continue walking. At the end of the first walking path, I am unable to animate Andy. No movements will respond. Probably a simple answer, but I don't know yet what that is.

Moving this to the Main Poser forum!

There may be another way to do it, and i do understand that you probably wantt to have continuous motion, but I think the way you have to do it is to create one path and have the figure walk down it to where you want it to stop. Once you've recorded this scene, you'll create the next one where the figure will do whatever transition movements you want it to and stop again and record. then finally, you'll create the final walk path, and apply the walk to it using the Walk designer. Once you have all three scenes recorded you can edit them together for your one continuous scene. Admittedly, I don't use the animation tools much, (which is weird considering I actually first bought Poser for that very reason), so if I'm wrong, I'm sure someone who knows a better way can let you know.

Most likely it has to do with layers. There is the BASE layer which you can not get rid of and controls the length of your animation. My first tip is never to put any animation on the BASE layer. The BASE layer in my workflow is only used to set the starting position and direction of objects and I use constant section keys on this layer. Each time you make a walk path it asks if you want to put it on another layer (this you should do). If you open the Animation Palette on the layers tab you should see a stack of layers BASE layer at the bottom. On the left side there is a composite Method. If it is set to Add then what every movements are on that layer are added to the one below it. If it is set to replace then the movements on the lower layers are ignored. This action only applies to any motion on the layer. So if you have two figures one on layer 1 and one on layer 2 even if both layers are set to replace both of them will move. The only time replace comes into effect is if there is a motion in the joint and only for the movement in the joint. So if you have two layers and have the arm go forward and backwards on the top layer and up and down on the other layer they will both combine together because there is nothing to replace (cancel) below. The reason your Andy does not move is that you are trying to affect him on a lower layer that has replace in effect in an upper layer. Applying a walk cycle will affect almost every joint in a figure so it will appear that Andy will not change. However if you select the top most layer you will find that you can move him again.

To be honest, I don't know myself. I do know that you can have two walk paths existing at the same time, but you can only select ONE walk path at a time, which is pretty much what he wants. The problem is, that you can't switch walk paths on the fly, I don't think, and the reason Andy doesn't move is because you have to use the Walk Designer to apply the walk cycle to the 2nd walk path, which I just told you you can't switch to on the fly.

True you can only apply the walk designer to one path at a time. The flow would go something like this: Make path 1 and walk design that takes 400 frames. Path 2 takes 450 frames. Now you can go into the time line and add at least 850 frames (400+450) or add some more lets say 150 to make it no round 1000 frames. You apply the first walk to path 1 starting at frame 1 this will cause Andy to walk for 400 frames, at which point he stops. One of the options in walk designer is to apply the walk to a new layer or choose the layer from a drop down. The other option is which frame to start the walk on. Then go to frame 550 and then apply a walk to the second path. If you apply the walk to any layer except BASE then if you change to a layer lower then the layer in which you applied the walk to and the layer on which to it is on has Replace as the method (which is the default) Then any joint that is moved in the upper layer will override any changes that you try to apply in a lower layer.

To prove this go to the animation palette and create a new layer. With the new layer selected move a part of figure (such as arm up/down). Now select the BASE layer and try to move the same body part in the same direction. It will not move. Now move it forward/backward and it does move. The reason Andy does not move is that joints are all moved when applying a walk cycle

thanks all! will give it a go:)

One more point is the walk path is only used to position the body along the path. Once you apply a walk to the path and figure the motions are recorded as key frames in the animation palette and you can change/delete the walk path and it will not affect the currently applied walk. You can also go in the animation palette and move/change any key frames you want. So if you want to move the arm to a different position you can and it will not affect the rest of the walk cycle.