README ------ Intro ---------------------------------------------- Welcome to the js_greasePencil script! This script is meant to help you plan out your animations in Maya by providing a way to sketch in any of the camera views. It is a complete and total hack, so if you find it acts weird.. well.. then that's why. It's available free and as-is. If you find it useful, please say so at my webiste: http://jonhandhisdog.com/shh-life-er And if you find it uber-useful and feel extremely generous, then you're welcome to donate a few bucks to my coffee fund at at PayPal by sending money to jschleifer@mac.com. (http://www.paypal.com). Install Me! ---------------------------------------------- Installing the script should be pretty basic.. simply copy the js_greasePencil_4.mel script to your maya scripts directory, and place all the icons into the icons folder in your prefs directory. On windows, these should be located at: My Documents\maya\scripts My Documents\maya\[ver]\prefs\icons On Unix/Linux they are located: $HOME/maya/scripts $HOME/maya/[ver]/prefs/icons On Mac they are located: $HOME/Library/Preferences/Alias/maya/scripts $HOME/Library/Preferences/Alias/maya/[ver]/prefs/icons In all cases, replace [ver] with the version of maya you're running.. for example, if you're running Maya6.0 on a Mac, you would put the files in: $HOME/Library/Preferences/Alias/maya/6.0/prefs/icons Run Me! ---------------------------------------------- To run the script, start Maya and in the command line type: js_greasePencil_4; I find it easiest to make a shelf button to bring it up. How to use me?? ---------------------------------------------- Hopefully the script is pretty self explanatory.. but if you're having trouble, I have a movie available of an earlier version of the script located here: http://jonhandhisdog.com/movies/js_greasePencil_movie.zip It's similar, except instead of having to "store" a frame to have more than one "layer" of grease pencils, you can now add as many layers as you want. I LOVE IT! --------------------------------------------- Awesome! I'm glad it's helpful! Drop by my blog (http://jonhandhisdog.com/shh-life-er), or my Plog (production weblog and forum - http://jonhandhisdog.com) and say hi! FAQ --------------------------------------------- Q) This is so cool! Why aren't you charging for it? A) It's just a simple script. I've had the script in my head for over 10 years now, and have discussed it with so many people over the years, it doesn't feel right to charge for it. I'm just happy to get it out in people's hands. Q) Can I control the line thickness? A) Not right now.. it's something I'd like to add in the future. Q) What about color? A) Nope, not for now. I have an idea on how to do half of it.. but I can't get the ghosting to work with color yet, so it's not implimented. Q) Can I "erase"? A) "sort of".. you can select individual sketch lines and delete them by clicking the "edit" button with the frame selected (then click "lock" to turn off editing for that frame). Q) Why can't you add an eraser? A) Because I'm not that good a programmer. And the program is a total hack. It's not actually drawing A bitmapped image, so I can't "erase". Q) Well, what's it doing? A) Are you sure you want to know? Q) I asked didn't I? A) Well, yeah, but I- Q) If I wasn't interested, why would I ask? A) Okay Okay, settle down. Like I said.. it's a hack. What I'm doing is creating nurbs planes and placing them directly in front of the camera. then when you click the "Use Draw Tool" button it turns on a script job which checks to see what frame is visible and not templated, and then makes that plane "live". Then it puts you in the sketch pencil tool.. which means what you're really doing is drawing nurbs curves on non-renderable nurbs planes which get hidden and shown depending on which frame you're currently viewing. Q) .... A) yeah, like i said. It's a hack.