Help me pick best customizable AO HUD for Aesthetic

[apoapostolov]

Hello,

I am using Niramyth Aesthetic model (Smith) and I want to change the default AO with the best option possible for male mesh. Price is never an issue, customizability is. This is what makes choice harder than usual. 

I want to be able to add additional animation as I buy or custom order them, modify moods sets, have random walks, etc. The typical stuff. The more options I have the better, but it has to be focused on mesh models. The goal is to have a power user friendly AO HUD. 

Thanks in advance. 

[Alwin Alcott]

because mesh uses the exact same bone and movement structure as default avatars almost all AO's will work fine.

Merchants claiming it works with mesh are only using a sales talk.

As soon project bento goes live you perhaps can see more developed AO's but again for default ánd mesh. Because also the default avatar will most likely get the new bonestructure.

 

Go marketplace, and go visit the LM you find there to the different creators...  try them out in their stores, and buy what YOU like most.

[apoapostolov]

Thanks for your reply. I am aware of the basic bone rigging of mesh models, with the only exception of the face where some head mesh designers go the extra mile to develop expressions but very few do (none for Aesthetic). 

However my inqury is about the most COMPLEX AO HUD when it comes to simulating behavior. It is great if it comes from established AO seller with many options with great animations, however it may even come with 0 animations as long as it is the most flexible basis for a power user.

[Marianne Little]

Do you use Firestorm? I found that it makes it most easy to switch between AOs.

I can have several AOs in there, and they are accessible by clicking on the screen, no need to open inventory (that can lag) I have a quad for instance, a tough guy, a calm one. No need to take off an AO in case an event has script limits.

[apoapostolov]

No, I am on the standard client. I will check Firestorm, it may answer what I need without an AO HUD in particular. 

[NordenTafali]

Hi. I second using the firestorm ao. It´s 1 of only 2 reasons really that make me go back to firestorm everytime I try an update of the LL viewer, when I see they still haven´t got that option in.

I don´t use Niramyth, so didn´t try it out, but when I was at Vista Animations last time, they had an AO that said it was made for Niramyth, maybe try that out. I think it could make a difference actually, just like I sometimes have to delete certain animations from my firestorm aos, when I notice they are at odds with my avatar's body or clothes, I just can´t watch him moving in a way his hands go too much into his body, or setting his hands on his hips only ending in the air cause his hips aren´t as wide as the ao-creator´s model's and such, I´m much more finicky with my aos than clothes or hair actually.

Something to keep in mind If you go for individual animations to create a really personal AO:

when you test animations, and like something, don´t start to buy them yet - first go through them all and keep a count on how many of them you´d want, it adds up fast, and might be the better option to buy the whole AO, if you end up liking a lot of it. I found it´s a good method to find an ao you mostly like, get that as your base to cover stuff like turns, flight etc, use the stands and what else you like from it and add some individual stands, or a walk or whatever, you like best from some others.

You can still rez a 'whole AO', copy all the animations to your inventory and then mix and match to your heart´s delight, either only those of one ao or add other individually  bought animations from other aos or creators for the firestorm inbuilt ao, or edit an AO to your tastes, either by notecard, or website, depending on the creator.

And like someone else said, it´s useful to make different versions, so your avatar won´t look hyperactive in situations he´d just stand there like a rock and so on.

[apoapostolov]

Great advice, thanks a lot NordenTafali!

I actually went out and bought Rock AO that you speak of. My initial impression is very mixed - HUD is very old school, arm stretching animations are a bit over the top and don't fit Aesthetic very well, and has a horrible, dealbreaking running animation I am glad I was able to edit out of the AO. Now I use a mix of Aethetic AO (based on ZHOU) and Rock AO. Bit of overhead to the UI, I will definitely look into merging them into one custom, ultimate AO just for me. I am open to ideas if there's a good and very rich featured AO HUD to do that. All I found is ZHOU II but it is very simple and ugly unless you take time to mod its resources as well. 

If I make the switch to Firestorm I will definitely migrate completely towards client-based Animation Overrider. Not sure if I can fully replicate Rock AO since it has Breathing animation, separate cycles of standing and arm stretching, etc. Can all this be replicated in Firestorm client UI?

What do you think about AKEYO PowerAO?

[NordenTafali]

I´m in SL over 9 years and I´ve used and customized a lot of AO HUDs including the zhao and akeyo, but really since switching to the Firestorm one I never looked back. To me it´s the most elegant option there is, built right into your viewer, you know, nothing additional to fiddle around with and clutter your screen, you´re flexible and have it all in 1 place, plus the added bonus of never having to ponder if you should take off your AO to meet some sim´s limits. 

I´d save myself the time to get used to whatever specific AO and spend it to put together a few AOs in Firestorm, it´s as easy as clicking and dragging animations over. 

You can have several animations for whatever, not just stands, and set them either to play only the first animation in any category, or to cycle through them (randomized or in order option too), say you could put in 20 stands and set them to cycle, and put 3 walks and 5 jumps and set those to play only the top one if you want that one 90% of the time and manually forward to a different walk and jump as the occasion warrants etc. You can set up as many as you might need, or you could like choose a very neutral calm animation as the first one to be played, and if you want to talk to a friend and not have your avatar run around and through any furniture, wall and person nearby just turn cycle off so he simply stays on the first animation, and so on. I can´t really see any disadvantages to any AO out there, apart maybe if you´re a 'professional dancer' or something' and have an AO optimized for that. If you just go to a club to dance there´s no need for anything other than the Firestorm AO, you could just make one AO 'dancing' and put dances in instead of the walks and switch between that and your other AO(s) as needed, you´re really flexible with the Firestorm inbuilt one.

If you set up more than 1 AO in the Firestorm one, you get to choose one of them as the default, which will be active when you log in, so you make your favourite/everyday one the default, and if you feel like another one, simply click the button integrated in your viewer and switch.

Really can´t recommend it enough lol I´d say since Firestorm and it´s AO is free, just give it a try with the animations you already have now, before you get anything else!

 

edited to add:

I use a wild collection/combination of different animations from almost exclusively Vista, Sinse, Akeyo and SEmotion, anything else I got didn´t get much use. I usually prefer calm not over the top animations and some that are memorable for different flavours (I´m a roleplayer so need to distinguish characters not just by looks but by 'body language' too to satisfy my perfectionism ) but not recognizable as 'oh, that AO', hence mix and matching beyond brands too. It´s just a matter of patience then, hop any of the animation trying things and cycle through them, even if the ad of the AO doesn´t speak to you, there might be some nice animation hidden in there.  Hope that helps. Have fun playing around until you get your perfect AO/s!

 

Here´s a link to Firestorm´s AO info page - if you choose the 'create AO manually' and not NC method, I don´t think you need any info though really, I didn´t, I had my AOs up and running before I even ever got the idea to look at Firestorm´s page for that, to me it's intuitive, but you can get an idea of what it can do, if you read it.

http://wiki.phoenixviewer.com/animation_overrider

[apoapostolov]

Thank you for the very elaborate review, it seems what I need is indeed in Firestorm. I downloaded and merged my Rock AO with Aesthetic AO, and so far I am loving the ease that I can add and remove animations to it. 

Just one question regarding Firestorm - can I have one active list of animation for standing, one that contains my standing legs movements, and one that contains my arm movements, each on a desynced cycle so that it creates interesting combinations.

[Pussycat Catnap]

My guess is that what you need is not a choice of AO HUD, but a choice of specific animations.

For that, all I can say is look for motion capture, and test it to be sure its motion capture and not just claiming that.

I buy my animations individually for individual effects, rather than a pack.

For a HUD, I use the one from Akeyo because it does dances also, and will allow for multiple animations for every animation-type. The common ZHAO only allows for one animation for several categories, and I rather like having a random one of my animations fire off when I do something.

- But all of this is a matter of preference. There is no 'best'.

 

That said... IF the firestorm one will handle multuple animatons in every category, and a choice between random, sequence, or fixed for each category - like Akeyo does... then it would be the best choice - because it is viewer built in. I would be very interested in knowing if it comes with any performance hit for being so. I don't see any reason it should though.

 

[Aethelwine]

The firestorm AO doesn't use scripts so I would have thought its performance was marginally better. You can add multiple animations to cycle randomly or in order to any of the types.

I am pretty sure Zhao based AOs allow multiple walks, stands and sits.

I don't fully agree about Mocap always being best. Whilst I am sure Oracul use Mocap for some AOs the ones they sell that don't are still very high quality. The walks I use are from them and them in whatever other AO I am using at the time because the stride length and timing is spot on.

[apoapostolov]

Hello guys,

First, thanks everyone for sharing your thoughts and advice. Based on this, I have moved to Firestorm Viewer and configured its internal AO with all animations I have purchased from various packs. It really helps having everything in one place, and since I do not do dances, I am increasingly perfectly fine with it.

However, I am encountering weird bugs with Firestorm that I am not sure if these are common knowledge:

• Sometimes when I alt-tab to another application, on returning to Firestorm I find my character running in place. Not sure if this is local animation or played in-world.
• Frequently when I stop running or walking, the animation keeps playing for a second or two before switching to standing. Again, never sure if this happens in-world or locally. 

 

 

[Aethelwine]

I would imagine they are local, but it would be hard to test

[Claireschen Hesten]

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Pussycat Catnap wrote:

 

For a HUD, I use the one from Akeyo because it does dances also, and will allow for multiple animations for every animation-type. The common ZHAO only allows for one animation for several categories, and I rather like having a random one of my animations fire off when I do something.

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Fellow Akeyo user here too easiest AO to set up if you aren't buying animations from Akeyo just drag and drop your animations in to the contents in edit mode and it does all the hard work problem i have had with Akeyo and using the same AO for years (old HUD) is i found the set up side simply became unresponsive i couldn't change my run when i tried to try a different one nothing on the set up side did anything ended up having to buy a new AO (which i had planned to anyway) once mine kept getting script errors and breaking opted for the giana wild over getting the kimchan (which i got as a gift) again i don't think the animations flow as well 

[Pussycat Catnap]

Re: Firestorm running-man animation.

Do you have an away timer set? If so, I think this is triggering that. Especially if you have it set to make you sit when you're away time comes up.

I am pretty sure it is NOT local. But if you have Firestorm open twice, you can test this with two alts. When one of them starts doing running-man, does the other see it?