Rigging Models Guide?

[Ace-Angel]

Hey to all,

I was wondering if anyone could recommend me a decent way or tutorial to rig model, specifically, joints.

The reason is so far I have used Biped rigs, and while rigging most parts is fine, I'm having nightmares for joints. I tried everything from manual vertices rigging to Skin AOE to creating models bendable joints and all.
But almost always, I get nasty bends, compression and other bazillion craps here and there.

Anyone have advice?

Thanks in advance, cheers and ciao.

PS: I also tried creating custom rigs and even used CAT rigs, still am lost on it.

[D.Hynes]

http://www.pig-brain.com/tut02/tut02_02.htm is an awesome tutorial for low poly joint modeling with a focus on how they will deform. as you go through the tut he'll go over knees/elbows, fingers, and pelvis and shoulder joints.

[cookepuss]

Yeah, but that's not really rigging. That's just modeling for animation. Even then, that's all subjective since your rig, weighting, & poly count all play into the final deformation.

The thing about rigging is that it's all too big of a category for a single tutorial. I could point you to an old 101 tutorial like http://www.3dtotal.com/team/Tutorials/rigging101/Rigging101.php or http://www.free3dtutorials.com/rigging/maya/simple-game-riging.php and it won't be enough.

There's a reason why rigging is its own unique job. It's a big topic.

C4D R10/R11 came with video tutorials on rigging that make up 10 or so hours. Even that isn't enough, as it only covers bipeds.

Rigging is more than about slapping some bones on and binding them to the skin. There's weighting, constraints, controllers, scripts, event driven keys, targets, etc.

Basic rigging, for the purpose of slapping together a beauty pose is simple. Set up the joints. Bind them to the skin. Readjust the locations & maybe reweight some vertices. Pose.

For anything more complex than that.... I really suggest that you invest some money in a good book or training DVD. It's not a small topic. Facial animation alone would take up its own book.

[D.Hynes]

you're totally right puss and thanks for the links. from what i gathered from the OP though its its the modeling/topology that is giving him issues. (i.e. the pinching/artifacting)

[Ace-Angel]

Hey guys, sorry about the long delay, had PC issues.

Anyhow, yes, that's pretty much it. Even for basic beauty poses, I'm having a hard time to set them up. I have my anatomy book next to me and more or less try to mimick the joints and all of that area's but the weights are really killing me.
I even have a few DT DVD's, hell, I even have CG Academy rigging tuts but they all lack one thing: Weight Mapping ideas.

I'm using Max 10 BTW.

For example, I create a hand, with all the joints in it, how can I get a reasonable-game quality bend on my characters hand? Half of the time, the upper-thumb is pulling the lower bones as well the metacarpals of the thumb, all the way to the palm towards the outside.

This means the edge of my hand at the thumb bulks out like a square.

So yeah that is my issue. Not animation or IK rigs or topology...

[D.Hynes]

so its a skinning issue? super confused now tbh. maybe post a couple screenshots as examples?