I have the alien rig in Cat for 2010 (this also happens in 2009).  i place an absolute layer and then start animating.  When I move the arm in IK with auto key on it drops a key on the timeline.  When I rotate the hand it drops the keyframe for the rotations 15 ticks earlier and switches the format of the timeline to frames and ticks.  This results in a popping motion which is resolved if I slide the rotation key to the correct whole frame.  Any ideas?

I had the same thing happen to me, too.  I’m not sure how I ‘broke’ the layer (or maybe it’s a feature that can be accidentally turned on by hitting some hotkey?), but I worked around it by just creating a clip of the animation I had up to that point.  I then deleted my original absolute layer and created a brand-new one.  I then loaded my animation clip back onto my character, and things worked fine.  Maybe try that?

As far as how it happened in the first place, I wouldn’t mind knowing that, too.

This is a totally fresh install of 2010 trial.  The other is a trial version of 2009.  I will try it on my subscription version at home tonight.  I seriously did nothing but the steps above on a new install so I don’t know what keyboard command would have turned it on.

I’m using a subscription (MAX 2009).  Since Max, and thus CAT, is kinda buggy, I’m never sure if it’s just something I’ve done on my side, or something that just happens in MAX.  Did you try the process I mentioned above?

I just tried it on another machine at home and same thing.  I tried to save the clip and delete the layer and still the same thing whenever I rotate with auto key on it places the rotate key on the frame and one a few tick before sub framed.

you can try using a link constraint on the ik target with a dummy or other object and rotating the dummy to set keys for the hand

I guess I could to the link constraint to a dummy, but does the basic rig work fine for you?  Why is it doing this?  I have it happening on 4 different machines.  What am I doing wrong?

Also if I use the “k” for set a key it shows a key on the timeline and curve editor but does not record a change in value (makes a flat curve) and the animated arm/palm does not move even though it has keys.  Someone please try using the “k” to set a key and tell me if it works for them.  Thanks.

I found a work around but do not know why it is doing this.  First if you have your timeline starting at 0 like normal and add an absolute animation layer, I noticed that it places a key on frame 1 and 100.  When I try to animate the arm the transform key works fine but when you rotate it with autokey on it drops the rotate key several ticks/subframes before.  I deleted that layer, changed the timeline to start at frame 1 and added an absolute layer (which sets keys at 1 and 100 on the cat parent) and all seems to work fine.  Seems like a bug.  Does anyone know how to report bugs?  Also when the timeline starts at frame 1, you add a new layer and you use the “k” to set a key it seems to be working.

Something is off on when a layer gets added to the rigs and on the cat parent root node (the triangle arrow base) sets keys on the timeline from frame 1 to 100.  The keys that are set on the cat parent are the time warp keys.  Perhaps this is causing the rotate keys to “warp” and be placed on subframes.

The animation layer appears to start setting subframe keys once you use the “k” to set keys.  Once you have done this, it continues to cause the subframe keys until you delete the layer and autokey on a new layer.  If you start a new animation layer at frame 1 and never press"k" or the key button and ONLY use autokey it seems to hold up.  But once you press either of these it starts setting subframes on rotate keys.  Auotkey frame only seems to work when you create a new layer with the timeline started at frame 1 before you create the layer.

I posted this as a bug on the master thread for 2010.  http://area.autodesk.com/for...max--3ds-max-design-2010/

This is what I think it might be, -but it’s just my guess, I have not tested this on all of the rigs ( I tested the steps you described Mnemonicimage, and this seemed to fix that problem ) ; The old ‘ .rig ‘ format is being used.  If you use the new CAT rig format, ‘ .rg3 ‘ , hopefully this issue will be avoided. 

When I looked at my default install for 3ds Max 2010 64bit (Vista Ultimate) CAT 3 (Build Number:  2009041613 ) install, the location for the CAT rigs used was/is; C:\Users\<user name here>\AppData\Local\Autodesk\3dsMax\2010 - 64bit\enu\plugcfg\CAT\CATRigs *

(*to find this path you may need to unhide hidden folders on your system).

For me, when I looked on my system, all of the CAT rigs in that directory are , ‘ .rig ‘ formats.

The solution I used (which seemed to work in fixing this issue) was to create the CAT rig, then save it (and rename it with a new name / tell it apart from the old rigs, etc. ) & create the new saved CAT rig (which hopefully should now be saved as a .rg3 file ). 

Hope that works.  So far I’ve just tested this on the Alien rig (moving the arm with AutoKey on in IK, and then rotating the hand, etc.).  Good luck!  Feel free to let me know what results you get.

I have had the same problems occur even when I create a rig from scratch.  I have not tried your idea of creating a rig and saving it out and then using that one.  I will test it. 

The animation layer appears to start setting subframe keys once you use the “k” to set keys.  Once you have done this, it continues to cause the subframe keys until you delete the layer and autokey on a new layer.  If you start a new animation layer at frame 1 and never press"k" or the key button and ONLY use autokey it seems to hold up.  But once you press either of these it starts setting subframes on rotate keys.  Auotkey frame only seems to work when you create a new layer with the timeline started at frame 1 before you create the layer.

I just saved out a new rig and reloaded it and set my timeline to 0 and added a layer and then animated and it dropped a subframe for the rotate keys.  Looks like it is in the fact that the layer has to be created with the timeline at frame 1 not 0 and never use “k”.  That is what I can tell.

joshpurple, is your timeline set to start at frame 0?  You also have to animate once on the layer after it has been created and then delete it and make a new one in order for it to not drop subframe keys.