HI, I am new to blender and have been devouring tutorials and info from the web. However in my current project I’m having a hard time applying most of the rigging info I’ve found to my specific problem.
The only movable parts I have planned are the arms and the claw hands. And prob the head when I get to it but I’ll worry about that later. The upper claw is mirrored to the lower one so they “grab” symmetrically, and the left arm is mirrored to the right.
Should I use two armatures since arms are only thing that moves, or connect the arms with an arrangement of fixed bones in the torso that make it one armature? I don’t know if using 2 armatures on same character is a no-no.
Also, is there a way to easily synchronize the bones on both sides?
Right now the only path I think I can do would be to tediously apply all mirrors so that there are objects to child the bones with, and then make all the bones the same on both sides manually. Then I would have to figure out how to mirror the claw bones so that they “grab”.
I think I would get more learning out of this project if I found a more efficient method than described above. Any help would be awesome!
It’s going to be easier in the end to use a single armature. Adding an extra bone or two to connect them is not difficult and will allow you to manipulate the entire rig without having to continually switch to Object mode and back to Pose mode every time.
It’s been a while since I made a rig, but I know you can let Blender mirror bones for you quite easily. Just look in the Armature menu in the 3D viewer when in Edit mode. There is a Mirror option. I think you can alternately use a mirror modifier.
You will want to use IKs on your arms. They’re easy to apply from the Tools menu once you’ve set up all your bones.
Thanks for the replies. I did not realize you could have bones not physically connected be in the same armature until I watched the video you linked norvman.
I think I will be watching or at least skimming that whole series before I move on. I’m doing this for learning more than the end result anyway.
You honestly can’t do better than Nathan Vegdahl when it comes to Rigging… his videos are very clear and in depth for the subject he is covering… He also doesn’t ramble like alot of tutorial makers on the web-o-sphere… by the time your done watching them you will have a fantastic base for Rigging just about anything in Blender… I personally wish that Nathan would make more tutorials… unfortunately He does not have videos that cover every subject involved in Rigging… but he certainly will give you a good foundation for Rigging and keep things organized… I have watched this particular series probably 20 times over and still find things I missed the first time I ever went through it… These are Essential Learning IMHO for Rigging in Blender… your Rigging life will be soooooo much easier after watching these…
here is another youtube site that may have a more complete set of these…
also don’t forget you can order this series from the Blender site…
with more money in Nathans pocket he may be more inspired to make more… who knows… ?
