Caveman

[TNT]

Hello,

 

I thought I would take a chance and show a model I have been working on.

I'd welcome critiques on his appeal and the modeling.

I have been working to rig him with the TSM2 rig.

I am referencing Caroline's tut on the TSM2 rig and it has helped impove my previous attempts.

I am still having trouble at the shoulder.

When I move the arm forward the chest wants to push in a bit too much but looks pretty good when moved up and down.

I have not tried smart skin yet.

How much smart skinning should be required if I have the fan bone and CP weighting right?

I'm having a hard time knowing how much of each solution is the right amount.

Any opinions and critiques are appreciated.

 

Also, I used the "fur" material on his clothes but it seems to almost glow. Not sure how to fix that either.

Glow is not set.

 

[totlover]

Haha great model.

He looks very good and the hair is also nice.

I cant really help you with rigging problems.

 

and yea i see that glow on the vest but it kinda looks cool

[robcat2075]

That's a great looking character! great shaggy hair!

 

How much smart skinning should be required if I have the fan bone and CP weighting right?

No rule of thumb really, since each model is a unique case.

 

I'm having a hard time knowing how much of each solution is the right amount.

Any opinions and critiques are appreciated.

 

 

SS should be your last resort after you get as close as possible with fanning and CP weighting. You might show a mov of one arm doing a sample move on each axis and someone might pop in with suggestions.

 

edit: and render it in shaded wireframe so we know where the CPs are.

 

 

 

Also, I used the "fur" material on his clothes but it seems to almost glow. Not sure how to fix that either.

Glow is not set.

 

My first guess is that the hair "color" has a gradient inadvertently set on it. you could post the hair material you created and get feedback.

[Animus]

Really great character! He already looks alive and funny. I love it.

I read you have started rigging with TSM2, but if you have time for experimenting,

you should try the 2008 rig Mark built, it is easy to install and uses A:M latest improvements.

That guy could be very fun to animate.

 

Michel

[TNT]

That's a great looking character! great shaggy hair!

 

How much smart skinning should be required if I have the fan bone and CP weighting right?

No rule of thumb really, since each model is a unique case.

 

I'm having a hard time knowing how much of each solution is the right amount.

Any opinions and critiques are appreciated.

 

 

SS should be your last resort after you get as close as possible with fanning and CP weighting. You might show a mov of one arm doing a sample move on each axis and someone might pop in with suggestions.

 

edit: and render it in shaded wireframe so we know where the CPs are.

 

 

 

Also, I used the "fur" material on his clothes but it seems to almost glow. Not sure how to fix that either.

Glow is not set.

 

My first guess is that the hair "color" has a gradient inadvertently set on it. you could post the hair material you created and get feedback.

 

Sorry for the long delay.

I have not made many renders before either.

I am just trying to learn as I go.

I have a movie rendering to show the arm movement with the splines.

I will post it with the material for his hair and the fur I used for his clothes as soon as I can.

It looks like about 2 more hours till the render will finish.

 

I have also downloaded the 2008 rig as suggested. Maybe I will have time to play with it a little also.

 

Thanks,

[TheSpleen]

Great face!

[TNT]

Great face!

 

 

Thanks,

I've been watching your post too.

Lot s of stuff there for me to learn from.

Can't wait to see your character finished.

 

It seems to me that designing a great body is harder than the heads.

Bodies are as unique as faces but I'm not as aware of how to characterize them.

Maybe I need to develop more of an artists eye for the rest of the character.

One thing at a time I guess.

[TNT]

That's a great looking character! great shaggy hair!

 

How much smart skinning should be required if I have the fan bone and CP weighting right?

No rule of thumb really, since each model is a unique case.

 

I'm having a hard time knowing how much of each solution is the right amount.

Any opinions and critiques are appreciated.

 

 

SS should be your last resort after you get as close as possible with fanning and CP weighting. You might show a mov of one arm doing a sample move on each axis and someone might pop in with suggestions.

 

edit: and render it in shaded wireframe so we know where the CPs are.

 

 

 

Also, I used the "fur" material on his clothes but it seems to almost glow. Not sure how to fix that either.

Glow is not set.

 

My first guess is that the hair "color" has a gradient inadvertently set on it. you could post the hair material you created and get feedback.

 

 

OK, here is the render and screen grabs of the materials.

It seems you can't post the .mat files here.

The head hair does have 3 emitters. They are all identical except the color to give a bit of highlights. Maybe there is too much difference in the 3 colors.

I worked with the fur and it does not glow quite as bad but it still glows too much for me. Any ideas?

 

I hope I made a good enough render to see the troubled spots.

 

Thanks in advance for any help.

 

TSM2ARM.mov

[robcat2075]

The arm doesn't look bad , but of course from this angle we can't tell much about how it looks when the arm bends forward.

 

I think if you did just one corrective smartskin key at each 90° bend (or maybe something less like 75°) it would be ready to go. Lots of incremental keys tend not to work well.

 

With TSM2 it's best to do your smartskinning after you have your fan bones in and constrained and after you have your CPs weighted, but BEFORE you run Rigger. Then it's still easy to move your geometry bones individually if you want to smartskin at a certain angle for them. You want to do smartskin on geometry bones, not on the control bones that TSM2 adds on top of them.

 

I think Caroline's tut covers that so maybe you've done it that way.

 

It seems you can't post the .mat files here.

you can put anything in a Zip and post it

 

 

closing tip... it's better to not up load movies in "Animation"codec (that's the default codec in Quicktime settings only because it's first alphabetically). It makes the file size so enormous that most people won't try. It eats up server space too. You can reload animations into the images folder in A:M and resave them with better compression (Sor 3 or MPEG4) if they are big.

 

But i downloaded it.

[mtpeak2]

Nice character.

 

Check the surface properties of the model or group that the material is applied to. There may be something you set on the model or group that is affecting the fur (other materials or surface settings).

[TNT]

The arm doesn't look bad , but of course from this angle we can't tell much about how it looks when the arm bends forward.

 

I think if you did just one corrective smartskin key at each 90° bend (or maybe something less like 75°) it would be ready to go. Lots of incremental keys tend not to work well.

 

With TSM2 it's best to do your smartskinning after you have your fan bones in and constrained and after you have your CPs weighted, but BEFORE you run Rigger. Then it's still easy to move your geometry bones individually if you want to smartskin at a certain angle for them. You want to do smartskin on geometry bones, not on the control bones that TSM2 adds on top of them.

 

I think Caroline's tut covers that so maybe you've done it that way.

 

It seems you can't post the .mat files here.

you can put anything in a Zip and post it

 

 

closing tip... it's better to not up load movies in "Animation"codec (that's the default codec in Quicktime settings only because it's first alphabetically). It makes the file size so enormous that most people won't try. It eats up server space too. You can reload animations into the images folder in A:M and resave them with better compression (Sor 3 or MPEG4) if they are big.

 

But i downloaded it.

 

 

sorry about the file size. I thought it was huge but didn't know what I did wrong.

I guess I learned more than I meant to. The forums are great.

I found the codec settings and I will make the files smaller from now on.

 

I am following Caroline's tut and being sure to do everything in the order and way suggested. It is very easy to follow so far.

Since I am applying the principles to a different model I just needed to know if I was getting it.

Thanks for looking at it for me.

I will continue to follow Caroline's tut to smart skin him.

Just to be clear, you are saying I should need 4 smart skins, one near straight up, one near straight down, one forward, and one rotated back maybe as far as the arm would bend that direction?

I assume the same principles apply to the hip?

 

Thanks,

[TNT]

Nice character.

 

Check the surface properties of the model or group that the material is applied to. There may be something you set on the model or group that is affecting the fur (other materials or surface settings).

 

 

I thought about that.

There is nothing set but the diffuse color on his underlying clothes surface.

Any more possible goofs I've made?

[noober]

Looking realy good man... The decal on the eyeball is awesome.

 

 

Think i could get the eye decal from you? If not no big deal.

[robcat2075]

Just to be clear, you are saying I should need 4 smart skins, one near straight up, one near straight down, one forward, and one rotated back maybe as far as the arm would bend that direction?

 

and maybe one axial rotation 45° in each direction

 

that would be for the "upper arm."

 

I believe it can all be in the same smartskin. One key in each direction but all in the same smartskin.

 

You'd probably do a separate SS for the shoulder bone (called "arm" in TSM2") if your CP weighting doesn't fully fixx the motion it does up and down. But the shoulder moves so little that CP weighting might do it all.

 

I assume the same principles apply to the hip?

 

Yes. you might do one at 90 forward, 45 forward if needed, 45 outward (probably excessive), and some small angle backward... 30?

[TNT]

Looking realy good man... The decal on the eyeball is awesome.

 

 

Think i could get the eye decal from you? If not no big deal.

 

 

I didn't make the iris decal.

I believe I found it on the internet at a sight on eyes but can't remember.

Here are all the files for the eye the way I learned to make one that was pretty real.

It could still use some veins for more realism and bit wetter look.

If you get those let me know.

 

eye_ball.mdl Eye.prj Black_Gloss.zip

[TNT]

Just to be clear, you are saying I should need 4 smart skins, one near straight up, one near straight down, one forward, and one rotated back maybe as far as the arm would bend that direction?

 

and maybe one axial rotation 45° in each direction

 

that would be for the "upper arm."

 

I believe it can all be in the same smartskin. One key in each direction but all in the same smartskin.

 

You'd probably do a separate SS for the shoulder bone (called "arm" in TSM2") if your CP weighting doesn't fully fixx the motion it does up and down. But the shoulder moves so little that CP weighting might do it all.

 

I assume the same principles apply to the hip?

 

Yes. you might do one at 90 forward, 45 forward if needed, 45 outward (probably excessive), and some small angle backward... 30?

 

 

I'll give it a try.

thanks again

[noober]

Thanks for the eye image.

[Paul Forwood]

Ha! Great looking caveman character!

 

Your post prompted me to take another look at my cavemen. Here is one with A:M 15 hair:

Not so much fun as yours.

 

Maybe they will meet someday.

[TNT]

Ha! Great looking caveman character!

 

Your post prompted me to take another look at my cavemen. Here is one with A:M 15 hair:

Not so much fun as yours.

 

Maybe they will meet someday.

 

 

I like him!

I'm working in v14. It does more than I know how to use.

 

I've been toying with the idea of a series type animation to motivate me to learn all the steps of animation: "Gorloc the Inventor". A kind of Tim the Toolman Taylor caveman with great ideas and bad execution.

Solving the day to day problems of 2000 BC with todays solutions that just didn't quite have all the kinks worked out.

Don't know....just a motivation to keep me more focused.

[TNT]

I have hit a wall trying to rig the caveman.

I have followed Carolines tut and think I did everything correctly.????

I made sure the bone names had "right" in them with no capitals.

I grouped the entire right side and made sure it certer splines were on "X0".

With the entire right half of the model selected I ran the "Mirrorbone" wizard.

This is what I get.

I even went back and deleated teh left half and re mirrored it to make sure everything was symmetrical.

I am running AM version 14c.

Do I need AM15 to make this work?

 

Any ideas?

 

 

[robcat2075]

It sounds like "MirrorBones" is doing something odd. That's not an official part of TSM2, however.

 

 

Try flipping with TSMFlipper. It won't mirror CP assignments but you will get bones flipped.

[TNT]

Ok,

I think I got the TSM2 rigging problems worked out on the caveman thanks to this forum.

 

I have added the CP weighting and some SmartSkin to clean up the joints.

 

I wanted to give him a little test drive and try my hand at a Walk Cycle and rendered him without the hair and clothes to better see his movement.

 

I used the TaoA:M "Take a Walk" tut and the "Animate! with Cristin McKee" series.

 

The walk is a little slow and labored and the hands jerk a bit on the extremes I think.

 

I hope to get some critiques on what I have so far. I would like to develop maximum appeal in this character.

 

I was thinking of calling him Torlak. Any thoughts?

 

Thanks to all,

 

Walk2.mov

[bighop]

Looks good. So you're making the clothes as a separate model?

 

I also purchased the Cristen McKee series. I like it better the Jeff Lew.

[robcat2075]

He's naked! Torlak sounds like a good name.

 

In the tut link in my sig there are some videos I made on "walks" that might give you additional ideas

[noober]

The walk looks good but I have a suggestion. The key frame when he lands should be peaked in the curve editor. It needs to "land" more than its doing. The rest of it looks great though. Hope that helps.

[TNT]

Looks good. So you're making the clothes as a separate model?

 

I also purchased the Cristen McKee series. I like it better the Jeff Lew.

 

 

Thanks for the feedback.

 

Yes, I have a wooley skin for him to wear that hangs on one shoulder.

My rev 14c blows up every time I try to do a cloth sim though.

I have a bata version of 15 that works so I have to do all the cloth simulation testing in that.

 

I was having some trouble with the fur on his clothes wanting to almost glow for some reason.

I set the surface color to black from white and that made the brown not glow so much. I don't understand it but it worked.

 

Christin McKee's CD's are good.

I also got Justin Barrett's "Animate a Face" and Raf Anzovin's "Rigging a Face".

I hope I can put them to good use when the time comes.

 

I figure I'll get the body and some basic animation cycles down and then try to finish rigging and animate the face.

[TNT]

He's naked! Torlak sounds like a good name.

 

In the tut link in my sig there are some videos I made on "walks" that might give you additional ideas

 

 

I just went and downloaded them to my tut directory.

I'll give them a watch and see what I can learn.

 

Was there anything in particular that looked out-of-whack that you would target fixing?

I'm green at this and would appreciate the critique.

[TNT]

The walk looks good but I have a suggestion. The key frame when he lands should be peaked in the curve editor. It needs to "land" more than its doing. The rest of it looks great though. Hope that helps.

 

 

Correct me if I'm wrong but you are saying that the left and right foot control bones are the bones to set to "peak" when they contact the ground?

Do I just "peak" the "Y" channel or all the channels for the foot control bones?

Sorry if this is obvious but this is the first real animation cycle I've tried to make.

[Animus]

Some things I notice in the walk cycle. The foot on the ground is slipping, make sure the the Z curve for that foot is a straight line,

it should correct that. There is a key on the arms going back that breaks the pendulum motion. Also, I think you need to give him body rotation

on the X axis, leaning more in front of him, that would give him more of a heavy feel. Your character is very funny and appealing.

 

Michel

[robcat2075]

You're right that the walk appears slow. It's not that people can't walk slowly but right now he looks like a faster walk shown in slow motion. You might video yourself walking at that speed and see how it differs

 

.

Was there anything in particular that looked out-of-whack that you would target fixing?

I'm green at this and would appreciate the critique.

 

Two quick things i notice...

 

 

 

-his trailing foot isn't really doing as much to push him forward as it could. It's getting pulled up before it gets a chance to extend more to push off on the ball of the foot

 

-seen from the front, his upper body is almost floating between his two feet. Walking that slowly he'd have to be transferring his weight between them more.

[TNT]

Some things I notice in the walk cycle. The foot on the ground is slipping, make sure the the Z curve for that foot is a straight line,

it should correct that. There is a key on the arms going back that breaks the pendulum motion. Also, I think you need to give him body rotation

on the X axis, leaning more in front of him, that would give him more of a heavy feel. Your character is very funny and appealing.

 

Michel

 

 

 

I used the "copy" and "mirror paste" to do the last half which added a lot of keys on every channel.

It did not do the mirror perfectly and I had to do a lot of adjustments to get it back.

I think I need to clear the extra keys to help smooth some of the motion out. That may be part of the arm problem.

I understand what you mean about the rotation and foot slippage and I'll fix that to.

This is the kind of help I needed.

[TNT]

You're right that the walk appears slow. It's not that people can't walk slowly but right now he looks like a faster walk shown in slow motion. You might video yourself walking at that speed and see how it differs

 

.

Was there anything in particular that looked out-of-whack that you would target fixing?

I'm green at this and would appreciate the critique.

 

Two quick things i notice...

 

 

 

-his trailing foot isn't really doing as much to push him forward as it could. It's getting pulled up before it gets a chance to extend more to push off on the ball of the foot

 

-seen from the front, his upper body is almost floating between his two feet. Walking that slowly he'd have to be transferring his weight between them more.

 

I saw this mentioned in the tut's you told me to reference.

I do see what you mean about the transfer of weight and the need to feel he is pushing himself forward more.

Cristin McKee also mentions acting out your animations to get the secondary movements correct.

I don't have a video camera but I bet I can find some references online.

I'll try to get the feeling of weight into it.

 

This is great help I can use.

Thanks for taking the time to critique my work.

[Gerry]

I would just mention one thing that might help. First, this is a great first try at a walk cycle!

 

If you decal an image, or a grid, on the ground plane, you can check foot slippage a lot more easily because you'll have reference points for how(and if) the feet move while they should be "planted".

[TNT]

I would just mention one thing that might help. First, this is a great first try at a walk cycle!

 

If you decal an image, or a grid, on the ground plane, you can check foot slippage a lot more easily because you'll have reference points for how(and if) the feet move while they should be "planted".

 

 

Thanks Gerry, I'll try that.