Advanced Rigging

Finishing Up

Introduction

This will help you clean up your rig an get it ready for an animator to use. You have just created a very high quality rig! Great work!

Tutorial

  1. Parent mime_subD, mime_lowPoly, bind_skeleton, and doNotTouch_wraps into the doNotTouch_grp.
  2. Now we have to fix the fact that if you move all_anim, the model seems to have a double transformation. Click on doNotTouch_wraps and open the attribute editor. Uncheck the Inherits Transform box. Do the same for mime_lowPoly and mime_subD.
  3. Create a new layer called "low_poly_geo_layer".
  4. Add the cut up segments of the mime to this layer (for example: l_upArm_geo, neck_geo, torso_1_geo). Make sure every piece of the geometry is in this layer. DO NOT ADD ANYTHING IN mime_lowPoly OR mime_subD!!!
  5. Select settings_anim and right click in the channel box. Choose Attributes > Add Attribute.
  6. Name the new setting mesh_state, make the data type be "Enum", make the Enum names be "hi_poly", "med_poly", and "low_poly".
  7. Open up the expression editor in Window > Animation Editors > Expression Editor.
  8. Change the select filter to By Expression Name
  9. Go to your visibility expression.
  10. Under the "//determine state" comment, lets determine whether the mesh state is hi, med, or low. Type the line:
    $mesh_state = (settings_anim.mesh_state)/2;
  11. Now lets determine whether we should turn on the low poly segmented geometry, lowPoly, or subD version of the mime. Type in the following block of code:
    //set mesh visibility
    low_poly_geo_layer.visibility = floor($mesh_state);
    mime_subD.visibility = floor(1 - $mesh_state);
    geo_layer.visibility = 1 - floor($mesh_state) - floor(1 - $mesh_state);
  12. Click the edit button when you are done. Now you should be able to toggle the mesh_state and the mime will show a different number of polygons. This will be really useful for animators because subD is generally to heavy to animate with and won't play back in real time, but it is nice to be able to flip a switch and go straight to a renerable version. low_poly is useful for extremely heavy scenes, but med_poly will give the animator the best idea of what their animation will look like without slowing down too much.
  13. Now lets do some quick clean up. There shouldn't be on the top level of the outliner except the default cameras, default lighting groups, and all_anim. If there is anything else, either delete it, or if it is important, figure out where it goes.
  14. In all_anim, there should only be anim_grp, settings_anim, and doNotTouch_grp. If there is anything else (say head_anim_target...blahblahlbah) then put it in the doNotTouch_grp. MAKE SURE YOUR RIG ISN'T BROKEN after you have moved things.
  15. Now to clean up your controls. All of the FK controls should have the translation and scale locked and hidden. The visibility for all controls should be hidden. The scale for the ik conrols should be locked and hidden.
  16. Every control should be zeroed out in the channel box when you are finished (or anything that is showing anyway). You need to freeze transformations on anything that has a value in the channel box.
  17. Hooray! All done!