Puppet head floats up at very end of scene

Report · Apr 17, 2023

I am using The Professional puppet to create a five short training videos. I have exported the puppet from the first video, and re-used the same puppet with the same rigging in all five videos.

In four of the videos, the puppet's head looks normal. In the fifth video, his head looks normal for 98% of the video. See normal head/neck position below.

During the last few seconds at the end of the fifth training video, yellow text appears that tells the viewers to pause the video and complete the activity. During those seconds, the puppet's head floats way up.

This behavior does not happen anywhere else in this video, or in any of the other videos.

Rigging: Head is NOT independent (or it wouldn't stay attached to the body), and the head/neck handle is just below the chin. He has a head/neck handle for both the "Left Quarter" as well as for the "Head," and the handles are in the same place.

I have tried making the head/neck handle "Fixed," and it didn't change anything. I have also re-recorded the head movement (camera input), and it always does the same thing. I have tried extending the puppet's track to well beyond the scene's duration, and it didn't help.

Does anyone know how I can stop the head from floating upwards during the last 3 seconds?

Thank you!

Report · Apr 17, 2023

Do you think the text is triggering the detatchment? Is it possible to remove it and see whet happens?

Report · Apr 17, 2023

Thanks for the idea.

1. I imported the text as a PNG file and did not change any Physics or Transform properties.

2. When I removed the text, the puppet's neck still stretched per the photo above.

3. I have the same kind of text that appears throughout the five videos, and his neck never stretches anywhere else.

Bottom line: It's not the text.

I have tried extending the puppet track, the background track, and they Camera Input track, and it doesn't fix it.

I am mystified.

Report · Apr 17, 2023

Here is the Left Quarter rigging:

Here is the Head rigging:

Here are the body properties:

Thanks again for any ideas.

Report · Apr 17, 2023

Does the character have a layer for the face? That appears to be independent. Can you locate it and make it dependent?

Report · Apr 17, 2023

Yes, there is a layer for the face. I changed it to dependent. Now the neck has three different lengths in the video.

When the puppet's head is NOT leaning right:

When the puppet's head is leaning right:

And when he neck stretches during the last three seconds:

I think I like the head movement better with the head dependent, so I am definitly going to start doing that.

However, the neck-stretching did not change.

Thanks again for trying to help!