So I had this idea:

I’m working with a bunch of designer’s who are really good with illustrator, and keyframe animating, but don’t have the time to animate all the movements (each head, body, upper arm x2 lower arm x2, legs, hands, feet… well you get the idea). So I needed a way to reduce the number of animations that the designers would be needed for, but also not create too many Tweeners or other hard coded animation solutions. I really needed bones, but those don’t seem to be arriving for a while, so the next best thing was automatically animated elbows (and knees). Fortunately for me the illustrator I was working with designed the robot’s arms and legs with even length upper and lower lengths so I could do some trig and get this:

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var theta:Number = Math.acos((distance/2)/limbL)*180/Math.PI;
 
this.limb.rotation =  baseRotation - theta;
this.omoLimb.rotation = theta * 2;

Click and drag the hand or foot to see the automagic joint rotation

AS3 Joint class source file

Right now it’s limited to even length bones, but my little brother with the physics and math degrees, says he has a better equation, so as soon as I have time I’ll update the classes. A public SVN repository is in the works too, stay tuned.

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