What’s new in 2013

Release Date: 8/25/2012

Point Releases

• What’s new in 2013.1
• What’s new in 2013.2
• What’s new in 2013.3
• What’s new in 2013.4

Major New Features

• FBX Pipeline
• Confidence Scores
• Python Plugins
• Improvements to .clientspec files

Major Structural Changes

• Dropped support for all MotionBuilder plugins.
• Dropped support for analysis plugins.  Plugins are now free, and cannot analyze audio.  All audio analysis occurs in FaceFX Studio.
• Dropped support for FaceFX Studio Free. 
• Added support for building core SDKs with Visual Studio 2010.

Supported Animation Packages (32 and 64-bit)

• 3ds Max- 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013
• Maya- 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013
• XSI - 7, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013

New Scripting Capabilities

• Added the following FaceFX commands:

  • exportframe

• Added the following python functions:

  • FxStudio.containsUnsavedChanges

  • FxStudio.createLogFileName

  • FxStudio.createLogFileFullPath

  • FxMenu.removeItemById

  • FxMenu.removeItemByCaption

  • FxMenu.removeSeparator

  • FxStudio.isActorLoaded

  • FxStudio.getSearchPath

• Added the following console variables:

  • fbx_export_input_file

  • fbx_export_format

  • fbx_export_key_precision

  • g_logsdirectory (formerly g_logdirectory)

  • g_templatesdirectory (formerly g_templatedirectory)

• Added the following python signals:

  • idle (max fire frequency currently of 6 seconds, only when app has focus)

Detailed Changelist

• Brand new clientspec framework making it easier to store assets in your source control system.
• Syncing to a template’s Face Graph now behaves more like a merge operation, keeping links that aren’t in the template’s Face Graph.
• Face Graph node positions are now stored in template files and we attempt to restore nodes to their original position when syncing to templates.
• Added idle Python signal that takes no Arguments to signal plugins and scripts about idle time in FaceFX Studio. This signal fires every 6 seconds when Studio has focus and is idle.
• Files can now be drag-n-dropped onto viewports.
• Added filesdroppedonviewport Python signal that takes a list of strings representing each file dropped onto a viewport which FaceFX Studio itself did not recognize and handle (note directories that are dropped are never sent to Python).
• Added -refpose flag to the bonepose -addbone and bonepose -removebones commands. -refpose should be used in the place of the -name string and it is simply a flag with no Arguments. It is not allowed to specify -name and -refpose in the same command.
• Added -clientspec command line option which allows you to specify a .clientspec file other than the default facefx.clientspec in the settings directory (note that all .clientspec files must be in the same directory as the default facefx.clientspec).
• Actor instances can now be ticked concurrently in the SDK.
• Face graph node positions are now stored in templates and an attempt is made to intelligently set node positions when syncing to template face graphs. -forcenodepositions will force all positions to come from the template if positions are present, and automatically select any nodes that were positioned by the sync operation.
• Added the ability to remove menu items and separators from menus added by Python.
• Any nodes that were added via syncing to a template are now selected after the sync is complete.
• Added bonepose -replacewithcurrentframe command that accepts -restpose or -name “boneposename”.
• Added boneweight command.
• Updated ICU to version 49.1.1.
• Updated libsndfile to version 1.0.25.
• Updated Ogre content exporters to support 3dsmax 2013 and Maya 2013.
• Updated Ogre to version 1.8.0 and removed CEGUI dependency.
• The actor’s default analysis actor is now used when appropriate rather than the app-wide g_defaultanalysisactor console variable.
• Added exportframe command which will export a target setup based on what is happening on the current frame.
• Added FxStudio.containsUnsavedChanges() Python method.
• Updated ExampleGameEngineIntegration to vs10 and added 64-bit versions.
• Added a default frame rate Studio option for defining the default frame rate for newly created animations.
• Added FxStudio.createLogFileName() and FxStudio.createLogFileFullPath() functions to aid plugins in creating correctly named log files in the correct location.
• Added messagelogged Python signal that is fired every time Studio logs a string. It takes two string parameters: the first is the log type, which can be Info, Command, Warning, Error, Critical, Dev, or Unknown; the second is the message logged from Studio.
• Added a formalized plugin interface for FaceFX Studio plugins.
• Added the ability to drag a .facefx file onto a viewport to load it.
• Added the ability to drag a .animset file onto a viewport to mount it.
• Added clientspec_root as a valid directory name to pass to FxStudio.getDirectory().
• Added a BatchSummarizer plugin to print a report about the batch analysis when the batch is completed (for Unlimited and Batch Subscription builds).
• Ogre .scene files can now contain nested scene nodes allowing for transforming entire branches of the scene (scale, rotation, etc).  Nested nodes will not load correctly in versions of FaceFX Studio prior to 2013, and the .mesh file is loaded instead.
• Added a viewport toolbar button and command to toggle the default lighting on and off (ogre -enabledefaultlighting / ogre -disabledefaultlighting).
• During publishing, events with custom payloads are now baked and a different structure is created in their place to fire the custom payloads.
• Added Ctrl+Shift+Right mouse drag as an alias for zoom to selection box in the curve editor for easier use on laptops and mice without middle buttons (Ctrl+Shift+Middle mouse drag still works as well).
• Added FxStudio.setVisibleTimeRange Python method.
• The primary viewport’s workspace and camera selections are now remembered when saving and restored when loading.
• Added -guiexec command line option to execute a script after the Studio application as been fully initialized.
• Better SDK logging for actor and actor instance operations.
• Added FxResourceManager::FindActor() and FxResourceManager::FindAnimSet(), each taking a key argument, to help avoid any unnecessary work prior to calling the various memory related load functions.
• Unified the FaceFX SDK error codes and added FxSDKGetErrorString to return a string representation of the error code.
• Added FxBool FxActorInstance::IsPlaying(FxSize clientEventID) const
• Added FxEventManager::ClearAudioCallback() and FxEventManager::ClearCustomEventCallback()
• Toned down the gradient drawing on most custom drawn GUI elements.
• Setting the render asset name to its current setting now refreshes the render asset.
• Removed vs8 FaceFX SDK projects.
• Changed the way Ogre resource locations are found to allow the user or plugins to add more directories which are automatically indexed.
• Added the ability to drag a .animset file onto a viewport to import it by holding down the control key when dropping the file onto the viewport.
• Added the ability to drag an actor .xml file onto a viewport to import it.
• Added the ability to drag a template file (.fxt) onto a viewport to sync to it (this syncs everything in the template).
• Adding a node in the Face Graph via the right click menu now inserts the node at the click position rather than the middle of the window.
• Added gradient background to the viewports (controllable via renderer options).
• Added “Set All” button to Bone Weight dialog.
• Command processing is now case-insensitive (for command names only). For example, loadactor, loadactor, LOADACTOR, and LoadActor will now all reference the one and only load actor command.
• Added Reanalyze Audio & Text option to the Animation menu, which will reanalyze the source audio (and text if it is present).  Owned by user curves are copied along with preview animation settings, but changes to the phoneme bar and events will be lost in the new animation.
• Added wireframe rendering mode to the preview window. Accessible via “Show renderer controls” panel in the preview window toolbar.
• Fixed a rare start up crash related to multiple installs of wxPython.
• Fixed crash when pressing the down arrow when on last animation of dropdown list.
• Fixed a rare bug where importing an XML actor containing more bones than the currently loaded actor contains could cause a crash.
• Fixed random wxWidgets assert regarding timers that could sometimes happen during progress dialogs.
• Fixed a rare crash when changing the render asset to one that does not contain a skeleton when the currently loaded actor contains bones.
• Collapsing an actor now preserves events with custom payloads by inserting dummy events.
• Fixed a bug in batch analysis mode where non-audio files could accidentally be inserted into the list of files to analyze.
• Fixed a bug where the currently selected named camera was not properly preserved in all viewports after a render asset name change.
• Added support for GB2312 Simplified Chinese and various other Asian text encodings.
• Fixed a bug with how the % character was treated when being logged from the analysis system.
• Added fbx_export_format and fbx_export_key_precision console variables.
• Fixed an exception popping up when loading an actor if no previous actor was loaded.
• Fixed a bug where it was possible for the user to inadvertently add a bone pose node in the Face Graph editor.
• Fixed an issue where the Direct3D9 render system interfered with certain Python timing functions (the time module, datetime module, etc).
• Removed the non-working “Average Inputs” and “Average Non-zero Inputs” node input operations from the node properties interface.
• Removed the obsolete bonepose -refbones command.
• Removed the obsolete prepareEvolver.py script.
• Fixed a bug in the FaceFX SDK where client events with a start time in the future would cause the current frame processing to think it has work to do when in fact it doesn’t, which could cause bone weight snapping.
• Added -changedbones flag to execbatch command for use when adding/removing/editing reference pose bones.
• Fixed a crash when loading EUC-KR encoded Korean text files.
• If a Python signal handler raises an exception that exception is now printed to the transient Python output window.
• Do not allow signal connections if the function signature does not match what the signal expects. Does not work with non-signature-preserving decorators.
• All places where text is dropped during analysis now print a warning to the log with the phase “Discarding text” to make analysis of logs easier.
• Added support for 32-bit and 64-bit WAVE_FORMAT_IEEE_FLOAT .wav files.
• Fixed an assert that would fire when restoring default options on the Audio View.
• Imported legacy .fxa files no longer show up in Recent Files.
• Corrected the help string for FxStudio.getSingleChoiceFromUser(), FxStudio.displayDirectorySelectionDialog(), FxStudio.displayFileOpenDialog(), and FxStudio.displayFileSaveDialog() to state that they return None if the user presses cancel.
• Fixed bug in 3DS Max FaceFX plugin where a case-insensitive string compare in GetINodeByName caused bone transforms to be incorrect in some content.
• Unified FaceFX SDK resource manager key types.
• Improved crash report information.
• Fixed a bug where some connected Python signal listeners would fail to be notified if a signal “in front” of them in the chain failed.
• Removed MotionBuilder plugin.
• Fixed a bug where syncing only a template’s Face Graph resulting in incorrect drawing behavior in the Face Graph editor.
• No longer show a warning message box for the “no lights detected in scene” warning case.
• Improved the way the 3dsmax Ogre exporter rotates the scene.
• Fixed broken preview animation blend in and blend out.
• Morph only animations can now be selected as the preview animation and be inserted into the animation blend tree via event custom payloads.
• Exporting an FBX file from the file menu now uses the FaceFX Studio timeline to set the bounds of the exported animation.
• Fixed a bug where changing the phoneme mapping or pressing the “Sync current anim to mapping” button would only update the animation some of the time.
• The currently selected animation is now always kept in sync with the phoneme mapping and the sync button in the mapping tab has been changed to sync all animations to the mapping (via new map -syncall command).
• Added a Reanalyze Audio and Text Files button to the main toolbar.
• The progress bar display now stops any currently playing animation to avoid a perceived hang in the app (no hang was present – it just appeared to hang since nothing updated until playback was complete).
• The actor consistency checks are now only run on load actor and save actor operations to cut down on log warning spam.
• Removed blend-in/blend-out times of 0 on preview animations can cause pops and snaps warning spam.
• Fixed a bug where deleting a camera would sometimes select a different camera in other viewports.
• Fixed a bug where the Python tab would sometimes draw with a magenta color.
• Removed error messages and dialog boxes related to missing rendering assets.
• Removed “licensee mismatch while loading archive” logging messages.
• Removed -reducekeys option from FBX command and replaced with -keyprecision (0 or less means no key reduction). The command uses fbx_export_key_precision and fbx_export_format console variables to set default values.
• The Maya Ogre exporter no longer prunes morph tagets with 0 vertices.
• Removed a missing resource file from the AnalyzeAudio sample project.
• Opening a recent file now updates the last actor path.
• The loadactor command now automatically updates the last used actor directory if the load succeeded.
• The analyze command now automatically updates the last used audio directory if the analysis succeeded.
• The loadactor -import command now automatically updates the last used import directory if the import succeeded.
• The saveactor command now automatically updates the last used actor directory if the save succeeded.
• The animset command now automatically updates the last used animset directory if a mount or import operation succeeded.
• The implementation details of FaceFX SDK FxResourceManager are now hidden from its header.
• Removed resource names from the FxResourceManager interface in the FaceFX SDK.
• The actorxml -import command now automatically updates the last used import directory if the import succeeded.
• The animset -importfxe command now automatically updates the last used import directory if the import succeeded.
• Removed confusing error message boxes when failing to attach a camera to a bone.
• Removed g_loopallfromhere console variable.
• Fixed a logic error in the operator_bool methods of FxActorLoadResult and FxAnimSetLoadResult.
• Importing an old .fxa file now sets the render asset name to the name of the actor that was imported rather than leaving it empty.
• When the loadactor command fails, the title bar now correctly reads [No Actor Loaded] instead of the path to the previously-loaded asset.
• Fixed a cosmetic bug where the ogre preview animation could be drawn with the incorrect length if the .skeleton file was modified outside of facefx studio.

See Also

• What’s new in 2013.4
• What’s new in 2013.3
• What’s new in 2013.2
• What’s new in 2013.1
• What’s new in 2013

See Also

• What’s new in 2012
• What’s new in 2010
• What’s new in 2009