If I have a dog rig made, with the skinned bones and controller bones and constraints, and I want to use that rig on another dog with longer legs and a longer neck, can I do that?
And if so is there any video around that shows how to do this?
Thanks.
Hi, i donât think that will be possible, because the head, face and the control bones will be in deferent position.
But if you have the original rigify base rig you can make these changes and re apply all transforms and regenerate rigify rig.
Okay. Thanks for the reply digitvisions!
I didnât use rigify.
Yes, absolutely. Youâll need to retarget the rig, thereâs some good videos on retargeting on YouTube
Thanks Joseph, I will look some up using âretargeting rigsâ as the query.
Seems all I find are for Autorig Pro and or retargeting animated rigs.
Will these apply to vanilla-created rigs also?
I canât find any videos that apply. Maybe retargeting is not the correct term.
I want to take bones and the subsequent generated rigs and apply them to another model.
If I reposition the bones in the new model and then rig with automatic weights, how then can I use the generated rig from the old model and adjust it to fit the bones on the new model?
I think there is a terminology problem here, or maybe a misunderstanding on my part.
So this is not a rigify rig? Itâs a custom rig? If you are unsure how to tell the difference, ask me and Iâll explain it.
Hereâs where I get confused -
If itâs not a rigify rig, then there is nothing generated. I think when you are saying âgenerated rigâ you are referring to all the other bones in the rig.
Rigs/Armatures can be incredibly complex things to deal with. Controller bones, deform bones, FK bone chains, bone constraints and drivers, and bla, bla, blaâŚ
Absolutely you can use a rig from one character to another character of different size, but itâs a ton of work to do so. The more complex the rig, the more work that is needed.
Basically, you need to reposition all the bones to match the new characterâs size. All of the rigâs bone collections would have to be enabled and in edit mode for the rig, the bones would have to be moved around to match the character. This could very well break some parts of the rig, like constraints and drivers.
The simpler the rig, the less work it would be. I would suggest starting small and working up from there. Do the hips and lower legs first, size them correctly, then test that the rig functions in pose mode as it should. Do the spine and upper arms next, and test the rig. Weighting the mesh to the rig would be the last thing to be done. Get the rig functioning first.
just my thoughts,
Randy
Hi Randy,
Thanks for the in-depth reply.
I am taking the VFX Grace Animal Creation Course. The model he is using is of a wolf. I am following along but applying what he is doing to a dog model I have created.
I am asking if it is possible to apply his bones and the rig, with controller bones, deform bones, FK and IK bones with lot of constraints because the course is tough to follow.
Tough is a gentle way to describe it. It is impossible to follow in many parts and I am having a tough time communicating this to the instructor. I paid a lot of money for the course and I would like to be able to complete it but I have hit so many roadblocks that I wonder if I should.
So after seeing your reply, I should just continue my frustrating journey of trying to get help from the instructor as the rig is fairly complex.
I donât want to badmouth the instructor as he does respond, usually within 24 to 48 hours but he seldom gives me the information I need to proceed further.
So again thank you for taking you time to reply.
I suspect the VFX Grace course is a pretty advance, full custom/manual rigging course. As such, is it possible you maybe need something a little more beginner friendly that covers all those basics before dividing into a full on advance production ready rigging setup.
I mean lets face it, rigging can get pretty complex very quickly, so it doesnât take much to find yourself lost. Which likely isnât helped by the fact you are trying to adjust the course from a wolf to your own dog model.
Now sure, all in all they arenât that different, but even so, itâs not the base supplied wolf model and hence instructions that donât exactly match. As such, you are trying to currently do 2 things at once. Learn how to rig and adapt it to your own requirements.
Maybe at the very least, put the dog aside for a bit and just fully follow the course and rig the wolf. Then with that knowledge, watch the videos again, but this time rig the dog.
Sure itâs a double up, but a lot of the time, trying to take shortcuts doesnât work out that well and just ends up taking longer.
Letâs put it like this, retargetting manually is kinda difficult. I could help you out in real time if you could put the blend file down.
But honestly, if youâre just new to blender and your taking a course like that, maybe stick to mastering every aspect of that course first before you try and do something custom.
Custom jobs like this are different because a part of it is figuring what to do and how to do it,
and VFX Grace is a pretty busy guy so Iâd doubt youâd get a valuable answer without a lot of effort in support messages if he hasnât already chosen to ignore you, so good luck trying to get him to help you with a tedious job like this.
Important Part
Truth is, yes you can do what youâre asking and yes it is retargetting.
From what I understand, youâre trying to take an Animated rig that works on one mesh (aka the wolf) and apply it somewhere else. Correct?
If Iâm correct, youâd need to use a retargetting addon, like Rokokko (Free) or Auto-Rig Pro. (Paid) If no addon then youâd have to weight paint manually. If you need help, hop on my DMs and Iâll see if I can help you (may make a video explaining this concept for you).
Or you could edit the mesh in edit mode, make sure the rig wraps the mesh without editing the actual metarig (or the generated rig you generated yourself lol. RIGGIFY IS A TIMESAVER BRO, INVEST! My opinion) and then use automatic weights to parent the mesh to the rig.
Again, DM me for more info if u need it
I think by the time you will experiment with all the options suggested you could just use rigify dog rig you will save a lot of time and effort, unless you want to turn it into a long learning curve. good luck with what ever you chose to do. 
I donât know the course or the author, but this will probably not get you very far. You might want to consider this -
To learn more about rigging, if thatâs what you want to do, learn more about rigging.
If you just want to get to animating your dog then maybe -
So itâs up to you, which way do you want to go?
Randy
WowâŚthanks for all the replies. I should not have left my explanation about the VFX Grace course so full of holes. To clarify, I have used Rigify. And I used it for my first rig on my dog. It worked fairly well. I had a few problems with it and even weight painting couldnât solve them.
Learned Rigify from the CG Dive courses. I am also taking the P2Design Rigging course, so I know I have a learning curve ahead of me and to make it even more challenging, my 76-year-old mind doesnât hold on to things like it did even 10 years ago. But I love learning, especially now that I am retired.
I cannot explain, without going into a lengthy diatribe, why the course is hard to follow. The P2Design course is very in-depth yet it is easy to follow. the CG Boost course on Sculpting is also in-depth on that subject yet it is very easy to follow along. I am sorry I am unable to explain. It is not that rigging is complicated, it definitely is, it is more a matter of how the course is taught. VFX Grace obviously is a master at creating animals. Impressively so. But teaching what one knows is an entirely different ball game.
I will leave it at that. I know you canât see any of the videos in the VFX Grace courseâŚbut if you could then I would point you to video 17 of the rigging section. He used Blender 3.6 to create the course. The bone layers in 3.6 is very different from the bone collection system in 4.2. As he used many layers in 3.6, it is difficult to know which bone is being selected as a number of bones are of the exact size as ones that are used for constraints. So a bone in a certain position might be a deforming bone or it could be controller bone or an IK or a âhelperâ bone ( his term ).
When he selects a bone, the name is displayed at the top left of Blenderâs 3D viewport and I was able to follow along that way. He goes so fast I have to play the videos at half speed and I pause them every few seconds and rewind (old term) them a number of times to be able to catch everything that he is doing, but I have been successful at that.
However, in video 17, he box-selects bones. And in Blender, when a bone is box-selected, its name isnât displayed. And he often uses bones in âstickâ form when there are many that clutter the screen in octahedral form. So it is easy to get lost with wondering what bones he has selected that he is performing some function with.
Sorry to have rattled on so long.
Thank you all for your help. I am quite certain that any of you here on this forum who have helped me so much on all of my queries in the past would have no trouble doing this course. The knowledge I have gained from everyone who has helped me over hurdles in the past has been a gold mine for me.
I sure hope I donât get kicked out of the course as I know I will be a better Blender user if I can make it to the end.
Thanks again to everyone here.
I have no doubt that would not be helping, along with the fact Iâm pretty sure there has been some keyboard shortcut changes as well.
I did have a quick look at the course page and the final results, etc and that is one pretty full on production rig for the wolf. So it wouldnât be hard to get lost fairly quickly, especially over somewhat different Blender versions.
Iâm interspersing P2Designâs âThe Art of Effective Rigging 2â course with it. A very well-structured and documented course even though it was developed with Blender 3,4.
I will make it through the VFX Grace course. Jerry, the one who answers the comment section in the course, has been very responsive and is doing his best to answer my questions.
Thanks for the reply theTony20.