Can someone please tell me on how I can manage to do something like that? I’ve tried doing it many times, but my characters facial expressions always end up looking super creepy for some reason. I just don’t know what all of those bones are suppose to do or where to place them.
Can anyone explain it to me, or maybe you know of a guide/tutorial that does so? I have compeletly run out of options here.
Search out the “Humane Rigging” tutorials - they are excellent! I don’t have time to look at your file right now, but if you are new to Blender, animating facial expressions is not a good place to start learning, as you have found out. This can be very complicated and involve use of shapekeys and armatures to get the right result.
I took a look at your file, and from what I can see, the biggest issues are 1) there really are not enough bones to do a thorough job on the face, and those there are aren’t well-placed in many cases; 2) the vertex weighting is not at all effective; 3) the stack order of the modifiers is wrong – Armature should be placed above SubSurf. The topology of the face looks good, and should not present any major deformation issues if the above problems are addressed. Some ideas:
Study facial deformation in real people and learn to identify how faces in general react to various expressive situations. Take the time to learn some facial anatomy as well, because it is the actions of the muscles that deform a face into an expression, and your rig has to mimic that to one degree or another. Place your “face bones” in such a way that their transforms (location, rotation & scale) accomplish that mimicry, and don’t be too stingy in creating what bones are needed.
Vertex weighting the face is tricky, to say the least. Auto-weighting alone will just not cut it. You have to take into account that the facial muscle groups work together, and that activating one activates another in many cases. Also, in most cases simple broad patches of weight distribution in the vertices isn’t enough, you have to go in and paint/adjust weight depending on how the area functions in expressive deformations. The cheeks are good examples, where the bones must not only move the general area around, but move it in such a way that the naso-labial fold (the common crease from the sides of the nostrils down toward the corners of the mouth and lateral chin area) is modulated properly. If you don’t account for such a common facial “landmark,” things won’t look right at all. Keep in mind at all times you are not working with flesh, underlying tissue & bone. A mesh will not naturally and easily deform to match the organic equivalent, you have to carefully weight its deformation to do so.
Modifier stack order is an important consideration many people take for granted or simply ignore. The modifiers are applied sequentially, not simultaneously, so be sure they act logically. Placing the armature higher on the stack insures that the deformation calculations it generates are performed before the mesh is made more dense by Subsurf. This not only speeds up the UI processes & rendering (the Armature does not have as many calculations to make), but also improves overall deformation quality, as the Subsurf will tend to smooth over any minor irregularities in the mesh’s base deformation. It’s a good idea to do your initial vertex weighting with Subsurf disabled – get the base cage looking good and it will look even better when Subsurf is activated. And when Subsurf is active, enable the Optimal Display option so you see ONLY the base cage loops and lines. it makes analyzing vertex weight and deformation issues much easier because you’re looking at true base cage geometry.
I highly recomend these videos for more information on how to do these…
Take note that some of the new developments in Blender 2.78 using ‘Bendy Bones’ will make a big difference in how you build some of the Riggs for Facial Animation…