Three.js clone FBX with animation - animation

Question

I can’t seem to be able to clone an FBX model (FBX downloaded from Mixamo) while retaining animation keyframes.
Have attempted a number of approaches including using the cloneFbx gist (included in the example below); all to no avail. Even placing the entire FBXLoader() function inside a loop does not work as expected since only one of the models will animate at a time.
This issue has been partially addressed here, but I cannot seem to ‘copy’ the animation sequence as answer suggests.
Can anyone point out where I’m going wrong?
Here's a rough example of one of my tests:
Load fbx model and store animation:
var loader = new THREE.FBXLoader();
loader.load( 'models/Walking.fbx', function ( fbx ) {
clip = fbx.animations[ 0 ];
// createVehicle(fbx); // Works! Creates one animated model via FBX
// cloneFbx via: https://gist.github.com/kevincharm/bf12a2c673b43a3988f0f171a05794c1
for (var i = 0; i < 2; i++) {
const model = cloneFbx(fbx);
createVehicle(model);
}
});
Add mixers and actions based on stored clip, add model to scene:
function createVehicle(model){
model.mixer = new THREE.AnimationMixer( model );
mixers.push( model.mixer );
var action = model.mixer.clipAction( clip );
action.play();
model.traverse( function ( child ) {
if ( child.isMesh ) {
child.castShadow = true;
child.receiveShadow = true;
}
});
const x = Math.random() * groundSize - groundSize/2;
const z = Math.random() * groundSize - groundSize/2;
model.position.set(x, 0, z);
const vehicle = new Vehicle(model, x, z);
vehicles.push(vehicle);
scene.add( model );
}
Animation cycle:
if ( mixers.length > 0 ) {
for ( var i = 0; i < mixers.length; i ++ ) {
mixers[ 0 ].update( clock.getDelta() );
}
}

Answer 1

Couldn’t figure out an elegant solution to this. Best I could come up with is creating a loop with the loading sequence inside of it; this is very slow (since the FBX has to be parsed each time).
The key here was having an animation mixer controlling the animated objects as a group as opposed to creating a mixer per animated object.
If anyone can figure out a better solution, I would be super keen to hear it (perhaps using the cloneFbx script properly).
Create mixer, load FBX:
// Create mixer to run animations
mixer = new THREE.AnimationMixer( scene );
// Load fbx
var loader = new THREE.FBXLoader();
for (var i = 0; i < 5; i++) {
loader.load( 'models/Walking.fbx', function ( fbx ) {
mixer.clipAction( fbx.animations[ 0 ], fbx )
.startAt( - Math.random() )
.play();
createVehicle(fbx);
});
}
Create class instances, add to scene:
function createVehicle(model){
const x = Math.random() * groundSize - groundSize/2;
const z = Math.random() * groundSize - groundSize/2;
model.position.set(x, 0, z);
const vehicle = new Vehicle(model, x, z);
vehicles.push(vehicle);
scene.add( model );
}
Draw cycle:
mixer.update( clock.getDelta() );

Answer 2

I found out that SkeletonUtils.clone() works good for me.
https://threejs.org/docs/index.html#examples/en/utils/SkeletonUtils.clone