Customizing an AO?

[MissBegotten]

I have bought a couple of AOs and also have a couple of free ones.  In one I like the stands but not the walks.  in another I like the walks better.  The last AO I bought said in the note card that I can add annimations to it.  Is there a way I can use the walks from one of my free AOs and comebine it with the stands in another?  If so how di I di it?

[Jennifer Boyle]

If you have modify rights to both, you can.  It's actually pretty simple.  Helping Haven has periodic cl;asses in which they teach how to make an AO.  I am a member; you can look at my groups, join the Helping Haven Fan group, and ask about it in group chat.

[Czari Zenovka]

I checked out that group and, although it does say all are welcome in the group description, there is no join button showing up.  I'm using Singularity Viewer in case that has any bearing on it; don't see why it should, but just in case.   Wondering if this is a SL glitch or if one now needs to ask for an invitation?

[MissBegotten]

yeah i'm using firestorm and had the same trouble. no join button.

[Venus Petrov]

I sent you a free ZHAO AO to use to setup your custom AO. Just follow the instructions on the notecard to add your stands, walks, sits, whatever.  Very easy to use.  It may be considered olde school in some respects, but it has worked for me for years.

 

 

[MissBegotten]

Thanks, I got it.  I loaded all my animations into it, but I'm having trouble.  I think my problems are in the notecard.  I have dyslexia and getting things like this is very hard for me.  I'll keep at it though.  I can do this.

[Czari Zenovka]

I agree with Venus that a ZHAO is, imo, the way to go.  Not sure if the newer AOs that come pre-packaged (such as the Vistas) still use them, but if I do update my AO if they don't already come in a ZHAO I will pull the animations out and load them into one.

It can seem confusing the first time you do it, mainly typing in the names of each animation in the right spot with the right "punctuation" but like Venus said, just take your time and read the instructions while looking at the default notecard that is probably already in the ZHAO - that helped me to look at how the default notecard was already set up.  If you would like any help with that (I was tweaking mine this week) please feel free to IM me in world.

[MissBegotten]

i loaded all my animations into the ZHAO that Venus sent me.  At first it all seened to work great.  but when I teleported to another spot i get script error messages and some of the animations stopped working. now none of them work.   I'm getting this error message:

ZHAO-II [script:ZHAO-II-core 7/29.1] Script run-time error
Stack-Heap Collision

 

[Venus Petrov]

If it seemed to work great to start, it is not likely your card that is at fault.  Since it has been several hours, are you still noticing the problem? 

[MissBegotten]

No, it's still not working. I think I'm going to simply clear everything out and start from scratch in the morning.  This time going more slowly and checking every line one at a time.

Exactly what I did was take animations from two different AOs, put them into the Z and copy and paste the lines from the notcards in the original NCs onto the new NC.  I thought doing it this way it would be impossible for me to make a mistake.  But something isn't right.

One more thing.  One of the original AOs had a dance I wanted to to use as well, but it's not mentioned on that AOs NC at all.  How does that work?

[MissBegotten]

I solved you AO problem!  What I did was to simply load all my animations into the firestorm AO and everything worked like a charm.  I didn;t even need a notecard.

Big thanks to Venus and Czari flr the help they gave me.

[Venus Petrov]

I am glad your problem is resolved

[Czari Zenovka]

So glad you got them working.   I've never tried the built in viewer AOs...sounds like I may have to give that a try.

ETA:  Just tried the built in AO in the Singularity viewer and WOW!!!  Why haven't I tried this before??  The upper left corner on my viewer will seem empty now...lol.  Thank *you* MissBegotten.

[MissBegotten]

Useing the firestorm AO I've now made two more AOs (one just for dances) and I can switch from one to the other with NO LAG TIME.  I do have a little trouble that the flying animation stops when I cross into another sim.  it looks like i'm standing still but still flying.  Just stop for a sec then it clicks in again.  I can deal with this little glitch because I don't fly much anyway.

[Pussycat Catnap]

EDIT: For people not using or lacking a viewer AO...

 

Try the blank AO sold my Akeyo (and also liscensed to Humanoid if you want it with different logos - same price either way).

You can drop any animation you want into it, and it will auto add them - popup menus will show up if you add an animation its never heard of before, with choices for what kind of animation it is.

The best thing about it is you can have an unlimited number of animations in every category - then set them to a specific one, random, or in order. And you can remove animations using the buttons on the AO itself (a setup button). It also doubles as a dance HUD with the ability to invite others to dance as well.

 

ZHAO is nice, and free - so the standard in almost every older AO in SL. Akeyo's is nicer.