Multiple animations using the same model

Hi everyone,

so I am using this model over here:


… and what I am trying to do is create different animations for the 2 hands. Like signs. But every time I start a new one it messes up the previous one. I am very new to blender and I have been trying to do it using the action editor but the problem is it creates a new action for the different hands. Is there any way around this? I just need to create different animations independent from one another.

Your clicking the new or the +button? Sometimes it displays the name of the action. That’s where you give it a name.
Welcome to BA.
Im not a expert in action editor. The people in games know this stuff more better.

Well, without seeing the file, I’ll take a SWAG (Scientific Wild Ass Guess) at it and say it’s your bone names. I’m guessing both left and right hand’s bones have the same name. Every bone that is key framed gets a channel in the dope sheet/action editor and an animation curve in the f-curve editor (both the dope sheet & f-curve editor display the same data, it’s just presented differently). This is what controls it’s movement, so if the bones have the same name, they will behave the same.

You’ll need to rename the bones of both hands so they have different names, so they have different animation data. Best way to do this is to add a suffix to the name, Hand.L or hand_L or whatever, but make the suffix match from left to right. So if the left hand bone is hand.l then the right hand bone should be hand.r

Keeping a consistent naming convention of bones will allow you to copy poses from the left side, and paste them to the right side. Naming things in general, which most new users should learn early on, helps in general when projects grow in size…

Randy