More animations for Kerbals EVAs.

[baggers]

Cool animations we have:

- funny stuff in IVA.

- walking, running, turning...

- Swimming!

- fall and recover.

- start and stop jetpacks.

- freefall/0G

- Plant a flag

- ...

Animations lacking:

1 - Open crew door and go outside if starting an EVA. (same on a Boarding)

2 - take some dust with hands and put it in a pocket if taking a surface sample.

3 - funny stuff if not in EVA direct control. (taking a camera for a shot, taking selfies, making cool or bored positions, shake hands...)

4 - repack a chute.

And some more.

I really miss the 1- crew door animations, I think it will add some immersion/life. And it's an action performed very often!

[sumghai]

1 - Open crew door and go outside if starting an EVA. (same on a Boarding)

This would require SQUAD (and every modder) to remake their command / crew pods to include an animation for the door opening/closing, and possibly showing the internals of the pod itself from inside the door, along with the Kerbal animation itself. Not a trivial task.

2 - take some dust with hands and put it in a pocket if taking a surface sample.

Dan Rosas made the following animation, although it has (to date) never been implemented in the game:

3 - funny stuff if not in EVA direct control. (taking a camera for a shot, taking selfies, making cool or bored positions, shake hands...)

Idle animations would be interesting, yes, although they need to be disabled if the out-of-focus Kerbal is hanging off a ladder.

4 - repack a chute.

Another (unused) animation by Dan Rosas, this time a "repair" or "repack" animation:

[baggers]

Ohoh, thanks for these animations ^^.

Yes, the "boarding" one could be tricky if you add the pods internals, I think.

Some of the crew hatchs are very small, and a Kerbal helmet/body barely pass through, so you could probably ignore it as it would be mostly hidden by the kerbal body/head along the animation?

[Fel]

This would require SQUAD (and every modder) to remake their command / crew pods to include an animation for the door opening/closing, and possibly showing the internals of the pod itself from inside the door, along with the Kerbal animation itself. Not a trivial task.

We could, you know, just have a static image represent the internals, or map that image onto a sphere if you really want to go fancy... but no one said ANYTHING about the animation actually needing to interact; even the beginning of an animation before it changes cameras is enough to give the impression that something happened.

This topic lives so often, and dies so often... but really, Kerbals deserve better.

Edited May 11, 2015 by Fel

[Rocketfeline]

Yeah, I would like a animation for falling. Besides my kerbal in a static position and well. Falling.

[r4pt0r]

Dan Rosas made the following animation, although it has (to date) never been implemented in the game:

https://danrpaulsen.files.wordpress.com/2013/02/pickupa.gif

Idle animations would be interesting, yes, although they need to be disabled if the out-of-focus Kerbal is hanging off a ladder.

Another (unused) animation by Dan Rosas, this time a "repair" or "repack" animation:

https://danrpaulsen.files.wordpress.com/2013/02/workc.gif

Why would they not implement perfectly good animations he spent time on?

[sumghai]

We could, you know, just have a static image represent the internals, or map that image onto a sphere if you really want to go fancy... but no one said ANYTHING about the animation actually needing to interact; even the beginning of an animation before it changes cameras is enough to give the impression that something happened.

At the very least, you would need to model/texture the inner surface of the hatches.

Some parts, such as the Mk1-2 Pod, would also need to be completely reworked because their hatches are far too small for a Kerbal to actually fit through.

Personally, I think the exit-from-airlock animation is a visually-appealing idea that's more trouble than it's worth.

Why would they not implement perfectly good animations he spent time on?

Most likely because SQUAD decided they weren't necessary, at least for the broad-strokes approach towards developing game features leading up to 1.0.

[baggers]

An opening/close door animation on the actual parts is certainly not that big deal. We already have moving parts.

No insides, but a standard animation as a Kerbal emerges from the dark head first as the door open, close door and grab, will be a very good first step. As I previously say, a small hatch and animation doesn't give enought time to look at the insides.

I agree some hatch could be rework in the process, but It's mostly textures.

A different thing is probably the MK2 pods and other aircraft pods, unless they have some hatch-like door.

A lack of animations is a bit immersion-breaking, somewhat.

[sumghai]

An opening/close door animation on the actual parts is certainly not that big deal. We already have moving parts.

I'm not saying that animations are inherently difficult - as an add-on author, I frequently make animated parts regularly.

What I'm saying is that the time and effort put into adding a door animation to each and every crew pod are better spent on other, more critical features.

No insides, but a standard animation as a Kerbal emerges from the dark head first as the door open, close door and grab, will be a very good first step.

Have you ever examined a KSP from inside out? You'll find that it is not "dark" but transparent to whatever's in the flight scene, because model mesh faces in Unity are inherently one-sided. In order to have a "dark" space for a Kerbal to emerge from, you will need to modify the pod model by having a cuboid mesh with reversed normals textured black, located near the hatch opening.

As I previously say, a small hatch and animation doesn't give enought time to look at the insides.

A user's camera may be oriented in a manner that allows a good glimpse of the (lack of) insides of a pod even during that short animated duration.

I agree some hatch could be rework in the process, but It's mostly textures.

While for some pods it is only the textures that need to be reworked, for other pods, the hatch may be enlarged/shifted, which requires the corresponding airlock spawn collider / ladder colliders to be redone. Again, it might be easy to do for one or two pods, but very time consuming for the developers to go through all the stock pods and implement this change.

[baggers]

Thank you for theses precisions.

But in the case of Squad decide to spend/planning some time on this particular subject, wich animations do you feel is lacking and should be implemented first, in the time allowed by Squad for that task?

[Starwhip]

Idles. Immersion is a big part of this game.

[RAINCRAFTER]

Maybe this will all be implemented with Multiplayer. Let's hope!

[Moesly_Armlis]

Looking around on Vimeo I came across this video:

Dan R Paulson Animation Reel.

Had to do a little research to confirm it was the same kerbal, DanRosas.

Love to see these EVA animations, illustrated at time 0:36 in the video, implemented within the game Soon^tm.

P.S. Cats are cool and mine loves catnip and chives. I planted some in a window box and Pumpkin chomps some everyday.

Edited July 19, 2015 by MoeslyArmlis

[NWM]

I miss the animations of the idle Kerbals. They are just standing rigidly - like a statue. They would have to do something like:

scratching their arses,

shagging their shoulders, bellies,

playing with their mobile phones,

talking with each others (if they are nearby)

ore something else...

[tater]

I'd like to see more than just idles. I'd like stations and bases (any vessel renamed with those 2 icons, perhaps) have crew aboard randomly EVA. Add a tether part for space flight. They'd only move within XX meters of the craft, straight out from the door, then look like they are doing something (an idle animation). It would make things seem much more alive to land at a base, or dock with a station to see a couple kerbals doing anything.

[Kuu Lightwing]

I miss the animations of the idle Kerbals. They are just standing rigidly - like a statue. They would have to do something like:

scratching their arses,

shagging their shoulders, bellies,

playing with their mobile phones,

talking with each others (if they are nearby)

ore something else...

Taking their helmets off

[klgraham1013]

Looking around on Vimeo I came across this video:

Dan R Paulson Animation Reel.

https://vimeo.com/129854707

Had to do a little research to confirm it was the same kerbal, DanRosas.

Love to see these EVA animations, illustrated at time 0:36 in the video, implemented within the game Soon^tm.

P.S. Cats are cool and mine loves catnip and chives. I planted some in a window box and Pumpkin chomps some everyday.

I like the KSP game animations section of the video, where it shows a bunch of animations that aren't in the game. (sad face)

[Moesly_Armlis]

Can anyone confirm if the animations shown in the video are updates to the ones posted as GIFs.

In the video @ 0:53 the rock is smaller and the kerbal puts it back down.

The video @ 0:59 shows a kerbal open a service hatch and then adjust something.

Dan keeps mentioning in the last two dev notes about assets that he is working on.

[Whirligig Girl]

I feel like making a list of possible idle EVA activities for no other reason than the joy it give me to make lists.

Social - There are two or more idle Kerbals standing next to each other.

-Roughhouse: One of the Kerbals punches the other's shoulder, and depending on courage of the other, he punches back or rubs his shoulder and frowns at the other Kerbal

-Chatter: One Kerbal looks at the other and starts talking. The other Kerbal looks at the first and then responds if they have a compatible dumbness level (within 10%.)

-Insult: One Kerbal starts yelling at the other. Depending on courage of the other, they might yell back or look down and frown.

Idle fiddling. No other Kerbal is within 2 meters.

-Examine environment: Science Career Only. The Kerbal takes a moment to take it all in. Looking at the sky, the stars, the planets, looking at the rocks and regolith, everything around them.

-Hand movements: Basically the same motion that Kerbals in command pods do. Clapping, moving hands back and forth.

-Stare at hand: Only kerbals with dumbness of 90% or higher do this. They just look concerned at their hand, moving it around, back and front of the hand.

-Head bobbing to the music: Head slowly moves in a speed that matches most of the stock music.

-Grasp Helmet: Just to make sure it doesn't come off.

Walking around This can be disabled on the Kerbal's context menu, but a Kerbal might want to just walk around the lander or rover, jump a bit, stop, do some idle fiddling or talk to a Kerbal, and move away. Maybe fall around get back up again.

Other

-Worship. This is done if the Kerbal is within 15 meters of a monument or easter egg, and the Kerbal has stupidity higher than 50%. They turn to face the object, and bow down in front of it.

-Chatter on Radio. Every once in a while, the Kerbal may chatter to seemingly no one in particular. Maybe he's talking to himself, maybe he's talking to KSC. Maybe he's chatting with the guy in the Command Pod. Maybe he's chatting with the other guys elsewhere on the surface. (If its the latter, the other Kerbals with chatter shorty after the first one chatters.) This form of chatter occurs always, regardless of whether you are in control of the Kerbal. You can turn it off in the context menu, however.

[Moesly_Armlis]

I really enjoyed reading that list.

You have some very interesting ideas GregroxMun.

The social ideas would crack me up and would give more character to the kerbals.

The idle actions are only seen when in IVA and currently do not get much of the limelight.

The chatter would mesh so beautifully with the mod Chatterer.

Only issue I have with kerbals walking around is if they are close to a precipice, and being a kerbal, would go directly towards that edge and tumble down. I can picture Valentina doing this and you know how that would turn out. Slope detection would need to be implemented.

[sumghai]

-snip-

Those are definitely very nice QoL improvements.

[klgraham1013]

Only issue I have with kerbals walking around is if they are close to a precipice, and being a kerbal, would go directly towards that edge and tumble down. I can picture Valentina doing this and you know how that would turn out. Slope detection would need to be implemented.

You could just restrict them to a specific radius around their parent ship and rely on players not to park near cliffs.

[Whirligig Girl]

Those are definitely very nice QoL improvements.

I think calling them Quality of Life improvements is giving them a bit too much credit XD

Nevertheless I would still like to have them, but they are pretty much the lowest priority.

[HafCoJoe]

I just want to point out if it hasn't been said yet, that adding more facial expressions and animations would make player made cinematics remarkably better. In my 1.0 tribute video I had to reverse a clip in order to get a kerbal to smile on demand. A simple keybind... A simple LITTLE keybind to toggle expression would be amazing.

Just saying, there's a reason why none of Nassault's films have a kerbal talking when on screen. Not even when someone is yelling a one syllable word. Ever time there is something said by a kerbal it is always over radio because that way you don't have to show talking animations.

Edited July 22, 2015 by Avera9eJoe

[SmallFatFetus]

Aver9geJoe, you raise a good point. Maybe a button that would be similar to "taunting" in Team Fortress. Useless, but fun.

I tend to think of Kerbals as capable engineers, but childish and immature (fart jokes!). So I can totally see them joking around while on a multi-billion dollar, history making mission.

Also, perhaps they whip out a pencil and pad and scribble some notes for an EVA report?