I have a situation where I am animating a 3rd person Character and am not sure what the proper solution would be. I have 3 possible solution but each has its own issue it causes.
Situation: I have a 3rd person character pawn that I have implemented a climbing system with and am working on the animation for. I am having problems with the climb down animation specifically lining up where the hands are currently in the hanging idle animation and where the hand are when the climb down animation begins.
Solution 1: I adjusted the animation loop so that it starts as close to the animation for the hanging idle so that the transition motion is as smooth as possible between climb down from hanging idle.
Problem 1: This solution causes me to move the hip location off the animation so high that the collision capsule for the character is not accurately located on the 3rd person character.
Solution 2: I adjusted the location of the hips so that it naturally sits correctly inside the collision capsule
Problem 2: This causes the hands to now (clip through/ move down) and cause an incorrect location of the hands from ledge hanging to climbing down.
Solution 3: I adjusted the animation loop again so that the hands line up correctly and the 3rd person char be properly located inside the collision capsule.
Problem 3: The animation has some quick motions in it when transitioning from hanging idle to climb down. The motion isn’t too unnatural, but enough of a difference between the two animations that it isn’t smooth.
This is then where I became stuck. I want the animations to have smooth transitions, but I also know its important to keep the animations properly centered in the collision capsule. Should I take the hit to the animation transitions or should I be more concerned with keeping the collision capsule properly located? Which solution would cause the least amount of problems down the road.