Command to define an empty bone?

[Michael Hartlef]

Hi folks,

is there a command that I oversaw, that will create and empty bone?

Cheers
Michael

[Petr Schreiber]

Hi Mike,

thanks for your interest in bones :)

I am not sure what do you mean by "empty bone". To empty bone definition, TBGL_m15DefBoneReset+TBGL_m15EraseChildbones should serve.
To manually add vertices to it, you can then use TBGL_m15DefBoneAddVertex.


Bye,
Petr

[Michael Hartlef]

I want to use TBGL_m15DefBoneAddVertex but need an existing bone first, or? I guess then I have to create a bone with one of the variants first, delete the vertices with TBGL_m15DefBoneReset and then add the needed Vertices via TBGL_m15DefBoneAddVertex.

[Petr Schreiber]

Hi Mike,

you can add vertices directly in current TBGL, as seen in scary 3 cubes (http://community.thinbasic.com/index.php?topic=871.msg5653#msg5653).

Fact is more I think of it, more dirty it looks to me, and you are right it could look better with first creating empty bone ( internally TBGL_m15DefBoneReset+TBGL_m15EraseChildbones ) + addition.

My proposal - add TBGL_DefBoneEmpty, as a recommended way for people who does clean code, while maintaining compatibility with older scripts. Is it ok?


Thanks,
Petr

[Michael Hartlef]

Yes, that would be a good addition.

[kryton9]

Does this empty bone act like a null object in 3D apps?

That is you don't see it, but it can be the center of other child objects etc?

[Michael Hartlef]

You could use it like that or when you manually add vertices to a bone, then you need an empty one. Ofcourse, you can create a bone now and delete all connected vertices but for clean coding, it would be much more nice to have this command.

[kryton9]

I know null object is very very useful for 3d apps, so I can appreciate what it can bring to 3d programming, great suggestion Mike.