1. Set the project to simpleBox (File > Project > Set) from the File Pack.
2. Open simpleBox_start.mb and examine the file.
simpleBox is a very basic animated character. The mesh is just a box that has been resized and triangulated. There are 5 joints in the hierarchy. And the mesh is bound to the joints with a smooth skin. The joints have all been renamed to make it easier to identify them in Outliner and HyperGraph.
3. Open either Outliner or HyperGraph and examine the scene structure.
Notice that the child of start01 is root_JNT, the parent joint of the skeleton. simpleBox's mesh is at the scene's root level instead of being in the DTS hierarchy. This is the way skinned meshes work with the Torque Game Engine. Any mesh that is smooth skinned to a skeleton must be at the scene root level and not embedded in the DTS hierarchy.
Several things still need to be added to complete the scene.
First, create a bounding box and constrain it to move with simpleBox.
4. Create a bounding box. Ignore any warnings that you may see.
5. Select root_JNT, then shift-select bounds.
6. Go to Constrain > Parent options box.
7. Make sure that Translate Z is the only option checked. Leave the weight at 1.
8. Click the Add button.
Now, when simpleBox moves forward or backwards, bounds will follow accordingly. Vertical and side-to-side movements as well as rotations are ignored, because the parent constraint is only operating on Translate Z.
Next, scale the bounding box to contain simpleBox's animations and freeze its scale transforms to avoid errors when exporting.
9. Scrub through the timeline and adjust the scale of the bounding box so that simpleBox remains completely contained within it during all animations. You may use these values: scaleX = 1.55, scaleY = 6.4, scaleZ = 1.55.
10. With bounds selected, go to Modify > Freeze Transformations options box.
11. Uncheck Translate and Rotate. Scale should be the only option checked.
12. Click the Freeze Transform button.
Freeze Transformations makes the the current transformations on the selected objects to be the objects' zero position. Only the scale attributes need to be frozen, because the translate attributes are being controlled by the parent constraint, and the rotate attributes must remain where they are so that the shape is oriented correctly in the Torque Game Engine.
13. Save the Maya scene file as mySimpleBox.mb.
