looks good. tho I juts HAVE to ask, 'jiggle bones'?

When skinning a character, you have to use dummy polygons called "bones" in order to pose and animate the character. A "jiggle bone", however is simply the name given to an assigned bone that will be used to simulate physics in the Source engine (used for HL2, VtM: Bloodlines and Dark Messiah of Might and Magic as well as the Orange Box games). The "jiggle bone" feature was added in the Orange Box version of the engine, and allows for a real-time usage of physics for things like hair, cloth or even simple jiggles that add some life to a character, object or creature.

If you have the Orange Box (or just HL2: Episode 2) you can see one example of the "jiggle bone" in action via the Antlion Guard, as well as the collapsing bridge at the beginning of the game.

I'm hoping that I'm making sense.

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I love humanity with all my heart. I just wish it dead from time to time.
Stupidity is the true power of evil.

Thanks, Az. Yes your answer does make sense to me. sounds like animation is lots of work. for that matter all 3d stuff seems to be lots of work.

By the way, d'you know anything about Carrera 3d express? I just got a copy installed on my computer later yesterday.

I heard about it, but never took the time to fiddle with it. So far, I know 3DS Max, Mudbox, Zbrush and a bit of the following: Blender, Maya, and Softimage XSI.

From what I can see on the website, it's made by the same people as Bryce and Poser, so if falls squarely in the "quick'n'easy" 3D, which is something I tend to avoid.

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I love humanity with all my heart. I just wish it dead from time to time.
Stupidity is the true power of evil.

fair 'nuff. with my limited computer skills. quick'n easy is something I kinda need.

Yeah, I can't judge people who use that type of 3D software when they use it to creat somethign beautiful. Just look at the works of TSHamlby, all fantastic stuff done with Poser.

I do, however, take issue with people using these programs (or at least their assets) to accelerate a process other people might be willing to build from scratch, as is the case with the Fakefactory Half-Life 2 "Cinematic Mod".

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I love humanity with all my heart. I just wish it dead from time to time.
Stupidity is the true power of evil.

*nods* ok. I think I see your point. It's about being lazy and abusing other people's hard work. right?

Yeah. Sorry if I made half-sense, brain was still leaky. Thankfully, it was shot alive by yesterday's show.

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I love humanity with all my heart. I just wish it dead from time to time.
Stupidity is the true power of evil.

Enough did make sense so that I could piece the rest together. At least it isn;t your normal state unlike some people.