Hi
I am a professor in exercise physiology and nowadays I am writing a book on my subject and also I have started making videos on the same subject for YouTube. Finding your Z-anatomy my excitement cannot be expressed in words. I am really grateful to you for offering us with such a valuable thing.
I have been learning blender for last few years and I can see myself somewhat at intermediate level in the software.
I have read and still reading the documentation of Z-anatomy for last couple of days. But still could not figure out many important, obvious things. I am trying to figure out the issues I am facing with Z-anatomy in the following points:
1. After opening the 'Anatomy Blender' folder I have found 4 blender files, namely ‘blender’, ‘blender-launcher’, ‘Z-Anatomy’, ‘Z-Anatomy-lite’. I could not figure out what is what? The first 3 files take me to the same place. In the documentation, it is said that we should open the ‘blender’ file, and then we will be asked to ‘Allow scripts’. The files is opened, but no such prompt message is appeared.
2. The appearance of the 3D viewport of Z-anatomy is totally different. There are no grids, 3d cursor, camera, lights. I tried to restore it to the by-default view but failed.
3. Even when I add a mesh, camera, light, empty or any object, they are found in outliner, but not in the 3D viewport. Even I select them in the outliner, unhide them, still they are not visible in the viewport.
4. Even I hit 0, I do get the camera view, but that camera I do not find in the outliner. Even in property I did not get the camera options to change camera settings.
5. I tried to join the mesh, but after joining, half side of the mesh is washed out.
6. I also tried to rig the characters using rigify addon, but failed. I tried to export the character to upload into Mixamo to animate, but there too the character did not work at all.
In a nutshell, I can understand that this Z-anatomy works differently than a regular blender file. If I would get a detailed instruction about the procedure of operation of the Z-anatomy that would be a great help.
Above all, I am conveying my sincere gratitude to the team of Z-anatomy and all the contributors for making available such a great treasure for us.
1. This behavior has been created thanks to a script.
The software shared is a portable version of Blender.
This portable version has been chosen to enable:
-the pre-configuration of the software (shortcuts and userprefs)
-it can be launched from a USB key without installation
The 'z-anatomy-lite.blend' can be opened with a Right click>Open with>Choose the blender version contained in the folder.
This empty files goes with a script that allows to easily import each main collection, in order to alleviate the memory needed to run the file.
2. You can choose what appears in the 3D view here: (upper right corner of the 3D view);
3. to see the lights etc, see the options under the eye icon on the upper left corner of the previous picture.
4. See the filter icon's options above the outliner.
Also the camera is set as a child of the 'Take a picture object'; you may need to develop it to find it.
5.Same explanation as in the previous message: the symmetrical objects share the same mesh; you need to duplicate one side, erase the original object (of this side) rename the copy if necessary and then you'll get your result without any loss.
6.For all the armature matters, I'd recommend to get used first with the file shared here: https://www.z-anatomy.com/how-to
under 'Armature'.
Many models on 'Mixamo' are not in .bvh and won't be translated in the right way with the armature contained in this file. On the other hand; this file has a pre-configured interpretation of any .bvh file that reproduces to a certain point of accuracy the bio-mechanical movement of each bone.
If any of the shortcuts explained in this tutorial: https://youtu.be/JIxJnw1ARhs does not work, it means that the script is not running automatically -as it should.
You can run it from the text editor:
find 'z-anatomy_script' and press the 'play' icon of the upper toolbar of the text editor (hidden on the right).
Thank you again for your kind support. Now I could explore Z-anatomy better and many things of it are getting clear.
Though I tried to bring the camera in the 3d viewport so that I can animate it but failed.
Can you suggest how can I bring the camera in the 3d viewport?
In principle you do not need to see the camera but ..
To see the camera:
-Check the 'Extra' checkbox as in the image.
-Under the eye icon (two icons on the left from the developed one), check 'Camera'
-Select the camera from the outliner
-Change the lower right window to 'Properties'
-Under object (orange cube icon)>Visibility, check 'Viewports'
This camera is used in a setup:
-It is parented to the object named 'Take a picture',
-It gets therefor translated rotated and -thanks to a driver- scaled using only the 'Take a picture' empty, and these transforms of the empty can be keyframed.
You can of course add a new camera, set it as the active camera (Ctrl+O) and use it if you prefer, but I recommend using the object 'Take a picture' because it is much more convenient to move the target and control everything from it than to control only the camera.
Now I could understand that Z-anatomy has a huge potential and I also have to learn a lot more about blender.
May I request you to favor me by taking an online class about the Z-anatomy please.
We were supposed to do a webinar with Lluis Vinent and Esteban Barreiro within a week or two, but they seem to be too busy for the moment.
If you achieve to convince them to do it, you can reckon on me.
I'd rather wait for it to happen in order to have several people attending (many questions) and try to get a video recording that can be seen by everybody afterwards.
That will be a great opportunity. Can you tell me how can I get them to approach. Can you share any link or any detail of the webinar.
https://www.linkedin.com/in/llu%C3%ADs-vinent-776447227/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/barreiroesteban/
Thank you very much...
Good evening Pr Chakraborty,
Esteban and Lluis seem to be busy with other things for the moment.
Learning Blender is somewhat endless.
To use the atlas, I recommend to follow this tutorial first (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JIxJnw1ARhs) and the instructions for installation explained in the .txt files associated in the Anatomy Blender.7z.
If you are willing to have a class for all your students; and that they have already tried by themselves but still have questions; we could try and find a moment to speak together.
Hi Melodicpinpon
Sorry for late reply. Actually I need the z-anatomy for my person projects. My students would not be interested in it.
By the way, you talked about a webinar. Have the webinar been conducted? Can you share the video recording of the webinar please.
Will your personal projects be shared to improve the atlas?
Between all the things to do, the manual would be useful if some people were willing to contribute on the 3D content.
For the moment, if somebody works on it, I do not have access to his/her results.
Why wouldn't your students be interested?
The webinar was proposed by Esteban Barreiro who hasn't had the time/conditions to make it happen.
By the projects, I do mean my YouTube videos that I am making and the book that I am writing. Yes, I will share them with you whenever I will use Z-anatomy. Though my book will be in English language, but the YouTube videos I am making are in in a Indian language 'Hindi'.
And my students are in their under graduate course and exercise physiology that I am concerned with is one of the 16 subjects of their course. They study this subject in one semester only. And the other subjects are not related to anatomy and physiology. That's why I said that may be my students will not be interested. :)
The USER MANUAL is shared on the website, with the file, inside the atlas and in this video-tutorial: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JIxJnw1ARhs
A CONTRIBUTOR MANUAL made of several small .text files now provide explanations to the people who want to contribute or understand how it works: https://www.z-anatomy.com/forum/about-the-project/contributor-editor-manual
It is only the beginning.
Please let me know how to improve it.