Upcoming module meeting agenda

_The meeting will be on [date=2025-12-11 time=18:00:00 timezone="Europe/Amsterdam"]. It is open for everybody interested to join the video call (link below)._ People present are referred to by first name for brevity. Others are referred to by full name. Present: Christoph Sybren Jeremy Lastodamo Demeter David Nacho ## Links - **[Video Call][videocall]** - [A&R Module Meetings calendar][calendar] for inclusion in your own calendar app - [Previous][prev] & [next][next] meeting notes - [Long Term Plans][longterm] & [Current Focus][current] - [Issues][issues] & [Pull Requests][PRs] - [#module-animation][chat] chat channel - [Draft agenda][draft] for any upcoming meetings [prev]: https://devtalk.blender.org/t/2025-12-02-animation-rigging-module-meeting/43587 [next]: https://hackmd.io/@anim-rigging/rkRuV4Nc3 [videocall]: https://meet.google.com/otb-wyte-xec [calendar]: https://stuvel.eu/anim-meetings/ [draft]: https://hackmd.io/@anim-rigging/rkRuV4Nc3 [issues]: https://projects.blender.org/blender/blender/issues?state=open&labels=268 [PRs]: https://projects.blender.org/blender/blender/pulls?state=open&labels=268 [chat]: https://chat.blender.org/#/room/#module-animation:blender.org [longterm]: https://developer.blender.org/docs/features/animation/module/bigger_projects/ [current]: https://projects.blender.org/blender/blender/projects/1 ## Opening - Please **raise your hand when you don't understand** things for any reason. The purpose of these meetings is collaboration. It is absolutely fine to ask for explanations. - There are **no recordings** of the meeting. This way everybody is free to say or show anything they want. ## Since the Last Meeting / Announcements - 5.0.1 branch is locked, release is planned for next week. ![image](https://hackmd.io/_uploads/SJ4mdOdf-x.png) - Animation evaluation goes brrrrr ## Landed Names are from the Git log. This list is limited to functional improvements & bugfixes. **Blender** - [48df8120bc1: Fix #150862: Weight Paint gradient context menu missing/error](https://projects.blender.org/blender/blender/commit/48df8120bc1) (*Philipp Oeser*) - [6058dbe4be5: Fix #150131: Selection state of edit bone root/tip not preserved](https://projects.blender.org/blender/blender/commit/6058dbe4be5) (*Christoph Lendenfeld*) - [160932a5f76: Fix #151082: Crashing upon adding bone under certain conditions](https://projects.blender.org/blender/blender/commit/160932a5f76) (*Philipp Oeser*) - [58880c403c2: Fix #151067: Absolute shape keys do not display "frame" value in UI](https://projects.blender.org/blender/blender/commit/58880c403c2) (*Pratik Borhade*) - [6fbaa1559b2: Fix: prevent opening blend files in pose library poll functions](https://projects.blender.org/blender/blender/commit/6fbaa1559b2) (*Sybren A. Stüvel*) - [f671f277978: Fix: restore accidentally changed default for 'Allow Negative Frames' pref](https://projects.blender.org/blender/blender/commit/f671f277978) (*Sybren A. Stüvel*) - [e647eaf2eb6: Anim: Simplify function for relative shapekey evaluation](https://projects.blender.org/blender/blender/commit/e647eaf2eb6) (*Christoph Lendenfeld*) - [b06ec13db7d: Refactor: shapekey copy function](https://projects.blender.org/blender/blender/commit/b06ec13db7d) (*Christoph Lendenfeld*) - [5de8b339902: Refactor: shapekey - simpler copy function](https://projects.blender.org/blender/blender/commit/5de8b339902) (*Christoph Lendenfeld*) - [cd7cb054ae4: Refactor: Remove legacy action code from animrig](https://projects.blender.org/blender/blender/commit/cd7cb054ae4) (*Christoph Lendenfeld*) - [799a34fef4f: Refactor: Simplify shapkey copy function](https://projects.blender.org/blender/blender/commit/799a34fef4f) (*Christoph Lendenfeld*) - [84f1b948e86: Fix #150272: Shape key panel autoscrolls when opening context menu](https://projects.blender.org/blender/blender/commit/84f1b948e86) (*Pratik Borhade*) - [b4fa5aba576: Refactor: Shapekey - remove range argument](https://projects.blender.org/blender/blender/commit/b4fa5aba576) (*Christoph Lendenfeld*) - [df9da159fdb: Refactor: Shapekey - evaluate absolute](https://projects.blender.org/blender/blender/commit/df9da159fdb) (*Christoph Lendenfeld*) TODO: include Falk's commit about the deg activation **Technical Documentation** - [71b11ade: Release Notes: Animation - Add changes to playhead with subframes](https://projects.blender.org/blender/blender/commit/71b11ade) (*Christoph Lendenfeld*) ## Ongoing Work [weekly-c]: https://projects.blender.org/ChrisLend/.profile/src/branch/main/reports/2025.md [weekly-n]: https://projects.blender.org/nathanvegdahl/.profile/src/branch/main/reports/2025.md [weekly-s]: https://projects.blender.org/dr.sybren/.profile/src/branch/main/reports/2025.md [weekly-a]: https://projects.blender.org/andybeers/.profile/src/branch/main/reports/2025.md [highseverity]: https://projects.blender.org/blender/blender/issues?state=open&labels=268%2c285 - [High Severity][highseverity] bugs: - [#151351: Grouping a keyframed single node results in removed animation](https://projects.blender.org/blender/blender/issues/151351) ([fix under review](https://projects.blender.org/blender/blender/pulls/151495)) - Christoph: - [Christoph's weekly report][weekly-c] - Working on cleaning up the shapekey code in preparation for threading - Removing legacy action code :broom: - Nathan: - [Nathan's weekly report][weekly-n] - Sybren: - [Sybren's weekly report][weekly-s] - Issues with negative frame numbers. Sound playback libraries do **not** like negative time. Also physics simulation can go haywire. Removal of the option was discussed in 2025-03-06 but there never was a follow-up. TODO: insert link to meeting notes - [#132762: Fix #120833: Align Reset to Default with Preferences Defaults](https://projects.blender.org/blender/blender/pulls/132762) accidentally turned on "Allow Negative Frames" in v4.4, v4.5, and v5.0. - Sybren: If we remove the option, do we always allow playback of negative frames, or always prevent it? - Demeter & others: negative frames can be used to 'hide' certain poses for easy reference. - Nacho: you could use the Action's Manual Frame Range option here. - Sybren: the biggest problem is with audio playback, many audio systems don't support negative time. Also some exporters go haywire. - Nacho: in 4.5 I cannot set the Scene start range to a negative number, even with Allow Negative Frames. - Sybren: in 5.0 that's also the case, and in that version playback starts at the Scene Start frame. So negative frames can be scrubbed, but not played back any more. But while it's playing back, you can still play back negative frames. We've been discussing changing that as well though (to make it consistent with clicking beyond the Scene End frame). - Sybren: the Preview Range can be set to start at a negative frame. - Nacho: even with "Allow Negative Frames" disabled, the Preview Range can start at a negative frame. - Sybren: and then the "Jump to Endpoint" button also jumps to the negative start frame of the playback range. - Christoph: if you create the preview range with `P`, it does clamp to zero. - Nacho: Preview Range should be limited to the scene range. - Sybren: might still have uses, for example for physics pre-roll. But it should definitely respect the "Allow Negative Frames" option. - Sybren: suggest change wording of the preference, to make it clear it can cause problems. Maybe also the location, to something more "hidden". - Jeremy: don't remove it entirely, though, because it's a great place to store poses. It's like a "junk drawer" that we can put stuff into. - In new year: much design work (for UI/UX, not technical implementation) for layered animation. - Sybren: there's concern by Franceso & Sergey that this is going to become a huge project that takes far too long. - Christoph: depends on what we're defining as "done". What we discussed at the last workshop doesn't need much tooling work. But creating all the fancy tooling that make things easy and intuitive to use, we can keep building those forever. - Nacho: even just having layers (with infinite strips) are already super handy. - Nacho: layered animation is the missing feature of Blender to be adopted for animation by studios. The NLA is so painful to work with, also on a technical level, that add-ons for layered animation are also not working well in certain cases. Felipe concurs. ## Patches: Review & Decision Time - [#151221: WIP: Anim: Extend the 'Add Bone' redo panel](https://projects.blender.org/blender/blender/pulls/151221) - Sybren: feels a bit oddly specific to have "Up" in object space, but "Back" in world space. Should probably be the same space in both options. - Module agrees. - Demeter: currently, when the Object is rotated, a new bone is going to be pointed up in world space, which can make it appear like it is rolled. - Sybren: I think the options could be: - *Space: World or Object* as another option, because it's independent of the direction of the bone. - *Align: Up*: makes the bone point up, just like it does now by default. In the future, when bone axes are configurable, this may mean that whatever the "along the bone" axis is, it is pointing upwards in the new bone. - *Align: Axes*: makes the bone axis align with the chosen 'space', so `bone-{X,Y,Z}` is pointing at `space-{X,Y,Z}`, - Christoph: suggests splitting up the PR, into one that has the simple options in the redo panel, and then a followup to add the "space magic". - Demeter: this makes it possible to configure these options in the keymap as well. Should be promoted more in the PR description, could make it shine! :sparkles: :sparkler: :sparkle: - **Decision: conceptually a :+1: ** - [#151063: WIP: UI: Add Copy Constraints To CTRL+L (Link/Transfer Data) Menu](https://projects.blender.org/blender/blender/pulls/151063) - Sybren: it makes sense - Jeremy likes it - Demeter: the menu (as it is now in Blender) is a bit meh, and the Copy Attributes add-on hasn't been updated in a long time and has a nicer version of this operator. This is not blocking for this PR though. - We check, there is no Ctrl+L menu for Pose mode, so no need to ask the PR author to add it there too. - **Decision: :+1: ** ## Next Meeting The next meeting will be on [date=2025-12-16 time=12:00:00 timezone="Europe/Amsterdam"], and will be **our last module meeting of 2025!** Again it will be open for everybody who’s interested. The [provisionary meeting agenda][draft] will be updated before the meeting.