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Looking for someone to rig models


cribbidaj

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I'm looking for an A:M user adept at rigging models (mostly cartoon human and animal) who would be willing to rig some of my models. I've used Anzovin's TSM2, tried to create my own custom rigs, have studied tutorial after tutorial, have experimented with smartskinning and bone constraints, and have achieved mixed results in my rigged models. I've come to realize that my grasp of creating control bones and use of nulls and fan bones is going to be long in coming. I understand that rigging is a deep and complex area, but my needs are probably pretty basic for someone with rigging experience.

 

Thanks,

Chris

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A lot of times, a model that appears to be poorly rigged has its problems in a model that is actually built poorly.

Have you taken a good honest look the models you have built?

Are they built with consideration about joints and keeping things nice and neat?

Also the shape of the object has a lot to do with how it looks when it bends and twists...

 

Just something to keep in mind.

 

But you are right, rigging is hard, and unless I'm working on my own models, I'm not about to do it

for free....

 

Mike Fitz

www.3dartz.com

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Hi Mike -

 

I'm not the most advanced modeler, but I have spent some quality time with my models and feel they're moderately well built. Naturally, I wouldn't expect anyone to rig a model for me for free. Tomorrow I'll attach one to a post when I have time and you can look at it and see if it's workable and then we can discuss price.

 

thanks,

Chris

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Hey Chris,

I wasn't necessarily suggesting that I wanted you to pay me....

but I'll certainly take a look at the material you post and give you my impression on if

it's ready to be rigged.

 

But what I was thinking that you would want to learn how to rig it yourself.

There are a lot of complicated rigs out there that work well, but there are also very simple rigs

that actually work just as well.

 

Let's see how your models look and if they are ready to be rigged...

 

Thanks

Mike Fitz

www.3dartz.com

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Okay, Mike. Attached are a few of my models. I've looked at your site and see that you have a rigging tutorial CD that I might be interested in buying. My only hesitation comes from having purchased a lot of A:M tutorial CD's already. I've bought a package of CD's from the Anzovin site when I purchased TSM, including "Rigging a Face" and "Secrets of A:M 2003". I've recently surmised from this forum that a lot of users feel TSM is not necessarily the best route for rigging, and I'm impressed with many of the results I've seen on the forum and in A:M Films with artists using their own custom rigs. It just seems that everytime I rig a character I get bogged down with weird cp and smartskinning issues that take a long time to pseudo-resolve. Although I understand 3d modeling and animation to be a lifelong process with ups and downs along the way, and I've only been using A:M for a few years, I have in those two years spent a lot of hours with the software on a relatively fast PC and am getting frustrated with my inability to get even a short 20 second animation to look relatively professional. Perhaps my talent (or lack thereof) is the problem. Because the issues of animating (rigging, lighting, acting) are so involved I'm at the point where I'd like to hire someone to at least alleviate some of the responsibility of getting a character animation-ready from my shoulders.

 

Thanks,

Chris

CW_Woman.mdl

CW_Pianimator.mdl

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Hey Chris,

okay I downloaded your female model and took a look.

Not trying to be harsh, but helpful.....

First of all, as far as modeling goes.... they are ok.... just barely.

The head is too spline heavy for the detail you have.... translation: you can

delete splines and still have the same shape.

2. the shape of the head is pretty bad.... looks like a block... unles this is an alien? I don't think you

can get away with "Stylized" here either.

The arms and shoulders: actually they are built okay. not too spline heavy, pretty good.

Looks neat and managable to cleanly assign control points.

The dress? I certainly would not want to rig it, but could be easier if it was built lighter spline wise.

 

The bones you have in the model now.... where did you come up with this technique? Doesn't make sense to me.

 

Okay, I think that the problems start with the way the model is built.... they don't look so good from the side, but they look okay from the front.... but this is a 3d model and you'll see all sides..... and if it doesn't look right from one side, the brain will reject what it's seeing. That doesn't mean it has to look human, but it has to look acceptable that somethign alive would grow like that.

Next, do you understand parent child relationships in the bone system?

Like the attached to parent checkbox in the bones properties window? on, IK travels the chain, off, IK stops at that point.

 

do you know how to set up a "controllable" IK chain?

 

You would probably make great leaps and bounds if you played with the constriant system on simple bone setups.

 

Mike Fitz

www.3dartz.com

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Mike, thanks for your constructive criticisms. The bone setup on that model is the pre-rigged TSZM2 setup. All accept the facial bones are the standard TSM bones.

 

I'll mess with simplfying the head with less splines, but part of the odd-shape is because I didn't include my hair material with the attachment. As far as rigging, though, the head is the least of my problems.

 

I do not know how to set up a "controllable" IK chain, but I have messed with simple constraints and bones and can't seem to translate anything to a working skeleton. Honestly, I get overwhelmed and confused pretty quickly - I spent a few hours once trying to create a spine with five bones starting at the torso bone and ending with a neck and head bone and could not get the spine with it's "orient-like" constraints (in compensate mode) to react properly. Working through a tutorial in 3D WORLD magazine (August 2005) several times, I get confused with the attachment, direction, and cp assignment of 'fan-bones' in the knees, hips, and shoulders of my models. I see advanced rigs with "control nulls" that seem to make shoulders and elbows work effortlessly, and that's what I want, but I can't even get through these other, seemingly simple, operations. Again, I have spent a lot of hours on this and am a bit frustrated - at times I feel a bit of a dunce. The Anzovin tutorials have a section on constraints, but I think what I really need is a "paint-by-numbers" approach. I need to have someone rig a character 'from the ground up', step-by-step, in front of me so that I get every concept as it relates to the model. Although all models are different, it seems a standard rig for a bi-ped character that needs only a few tweaks to make the model react in some animatable fashion is what someone like me needs. I thought TSM would do this, but it has opened a pandora's box for me.

 

Thanks for your input and any further info or suggestions are welcome.

 

Thanks,

Chris

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Okay,

I think you are trying to run before you can crawl so to speak.

 

A spine is actually somewhat of a difficult bone chain to setup because it sort of has 2 dominant parents, ie... hips and shoulders, not too mention that one can bend in the middle if the person so feels the need, keeping the top and bottom relatively still....

You would be better off trying an arm first or a leg.

What I did to understand constraints was the following... when I first got the software,

I created a model that had 2 bones. I would then, in an action window go through and try out constriants and see what was doing what.

then I would delete constraints and try another.

You need to do that, no matter how stupid it sounds, as you need to know what the constraints do.

I literally had a piece of paper next to me and I would write down, in diagram form what the constraints would do and then I would refer to that as I tried more complex setups.

After you understand that, and only then, can you go on to effectively using constraints.

If you want, I will post a simple file that containts 2 bones that are not a parent child relationship, or you could easily create it. I would position them like the number 11, one next to the other, with some distance between them.

Then go through and for example, tell bone 1 to orient like bone 2. then test it out. play with the values.

Then after you feel good about it, delete it. Then try to translate bone1 to bone 2. with and then without compensate. play with the values.

 

So on and so forth. Report back with any questions or comments and I am sure the first person that reads the post, that understands this stuff will jump in and get involved and be glad to help out.

 

what say you?

 

Mike Fitz

www.3dartz.com

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