after my “rigging research” during most of my last year Blending there has came the time to set up a cartoon character rig for animation.
First step - the mesh for rigging
I tried to model really average and simple (not too extreme cartoon style) but at the same time nice looking (I hope) character. So the rig may be suitable for really different scenes or shorts without being predetermined by its strong style. I really tried to avoid the Animation Mentor style (Bishop etc.) but maybe as I focused to avoid this he has some kind of it.
The topology is straight to be easily animated I hope. As the face is really simple nothing much to solve here.
I don’t think you should try to “not” model your character after animation mentor, or “not” after anything at all. Just try to model the character as you like it, because everything has been done before anyway.
I think you could loose a lot of loops around the mouth and the eyes. Should help with making deformations easier to set and smoother. Try and model a hand that’s not so symmetrical, bend the finger a little bit, also makes it easier to rig imo. Dito for the arms and legs, bend them a little bit.
The hip is also probably by design, but it looks like he’s got no volume/strength there. He could do with a bit more or a defined shoulderarea as well.
just my 2 cents. it’s your design, make it as you want it.
Quoted for agreement. But if its mainly a generic character your trying out I think your on the right path anyways.
I’m very interested to see that your modeling the eyes and face as one mesh - I’ve never seen that!
I actually think you have a good amount of loops around the mouth, and eyes. My experience has been that you can never have enough geometry in that area, it will give you ‘more flex’ when it comes to setting up shape keys. You should be able to make some good expressions with that face.
Thank you very much for response. Concerning the slight bend of the limbs I will probably apply it following skinning results. But I guess the slight bend will be better and needed for the IK chain.
Amount of loops is intentional. I believe that they could be reduced nut in my experiences it is better to have them more rather then increase the value of subssurf.
The eyes will be separated for skinning probably.
Thank you once more. I hope to post update quite soon.
Here is the update. The torso rig is ready.
Blend for testing: http://rapidshare.com/files/182015955/Spine7.blend
I did not bother much with skinning. Really fast and dirty result. Sorry. When the rig will be done I will do proper skinning of the whole model.
Some pictures:
Features:
FK (lila controllers)
fk rotations as a main control for the torso
multiple rotations possible (you can select all FK bones and rotate them all just by one rotation
hip FK bone also controls whole torso rig
IK (green controllers)
IK is considered to be animated “on the top” of the FK, to twaek basic KF pose
rotation and translation of IK shoulder and hips bone for IK effect
mid IK bones for fine tuning
not the best but probably quite suitable solution for IK torso in Blender as we do not have IK spline
independent rotation in Z of IK shoulder and hips (if you rotate shoulder 90 Z and then hips 90 Z the same direction torso (spine bones) will line in correctly)
SS
torso can be stretched and squashed by the IK controls - still on to do list to make it more controllable
I hope gizmos (controlres) are easy to understand. If you use AnimSys2 build all bonse are in Euler mode.
C&C really welcomed
PS: The rig has also the name. I call him George
Next step - Head
So the neck has the possibility to:
Move (translate) in
its own space
in shoulders space
in hips space
Rotate in
its own space
in shoulders space
in hips space
The head has the possibility to:
Move (translate) in
its own space
in neck space
in shoulders space
in hips space
Rotate in
its own space
in neck space
in shoulders space
in hips space
Just play with head and neck constraints sliders. I have given them understandable names. Of course some combinations maybe does not make sense. But I let the animators freedom to decide what combination will be the most suitable for them.
Rig GUI (sliders in 3d view) will be add later of course.
Now I have to implement squash and stretch IK chain into the neck. Will be rather similar to IK spine but with some automatisation (will be fully controlled by the head and the shoulders, no own controlers). Here is the concept if someone is interested: http://rapidshare.com/files/181000627/Neck.blend
OK, neck and head seems to be done as well. IK efect implemented even though it was quite a challenge. Not all features that were in my prototype were possible because Blender seems to have some difficulties with clear offset for Child of constraint :-(.
I get the “This file is not a blend file” error… I still think you could do with less loops around the eyes and mouth (without needing to up the subsurf), because it will be easier to rig and get clear deformations with less loops. Can’t comment on the rig because I can’t open it…
Nice rig - but your CTRL armature isn’t zeroed out. This could cause issues if you plan to link it.
But thanks for sharing - I never thought to make a deforming armature and a ctrl armature seperate - it actually makes sense, as then the animator only proxies the CTRL one- and is less likely to break it.
mikahl, thank you very much. What an idiot am I? Big thank for finding this bud! It has already caused some troubles with Child of constraint and that was probably the reason.
That’s why its a good idea to share your rigging ‘as you go’
I entirely rigged a human about 2 months ago, only to find out the armature was rotated -90 degrees! I had to reconnect so many of the constraints - it was painful.
OK, here I present rather final torso, neck and head rig solution. I have changed the way how Z (vertical) rotation was construed. Now it is really how I like it. Please give me feedback regarding your testing of the rig. http://rapidshare.com/files/182201286/NeckHead16.blend
New progress. Shoulder rig is ready. It has nice feature that animator will have the switch to control the hinge effect (whether arm follows the rotation of the body or of the shoulder part or is independent). Just play with the constraint sliders of the Shoulder_Mechan bone and DEF_UpArm bone. 3d view rig GUI (sliders) will be added later on of course
I have also updated the model and made it more lighter as FreakyDude has suggested. Thank you.
for some reason I keep getting that “this is not a blender file” error. I managed to open a previous version, but I already deleted it and don’t know which one, sorry.
I have re-saved it with standard Blender. Previously I was using Blender with .B file provided by Aligorith with his nice theme. Let me know if this helps. I hope so.
