Secondery Action After Body Turn?

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Ahayut
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Secondery Action After Body Turn?

Post by Ahayut »

Dear all,

I have been designing a rig for unnfortunately a very complex character (not mine). Everything works pretty well in front position incl body parts bend etc, and looked quite alright in body turn, but I got stuck because the body turn has shifted parts about and now when trying to animate a walk or any bend of the legs things are quite off.
I have already made a couple of smart actions for each of the characters leg bones to get a proper bend for the front pose, but when I turn the body 3/4 in whichever direction the bends and lifting of legs are not clean.
Can/should I keep adding smart actions to a bone?
or, in short, does anyone here have ideas about how to tackle this issue, I'd be very thankful.

Thanks a bunch,
Ahayut,
Ahayut
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Re: Secondery Action After Body Turn?

Post by Ahayut »

Maybe I should add... PLEASE HELP!!!
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Greenlaw
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Re: Secondery Action After Body Turn?

Post by Greenlaw »

I'm not sure how your rig is set up but I typically create separate Smart Bone Dials (SBD) to turn body parts individually. For example, one SDB to turn the Head, another for Body, and one for each leg rotating at the hip, knee or ankle depending on the character design. Some but not all characters may also need SBDs to turn the arms or a tail.

For some characters, I might even create a separate SDB for upper and lower torso turns, with the lower torso SDB driving the upper torso SBD. This way, I can animate the upper torso SDB additively to the lower torso SBD's keyframes. A good example is a panda bear rig I made at work where there it was ambiguous where the body ended and neck started.

I normally avoid building Arm and Leg positions into the Body Turn SBD because this can severely limits what you can do with the rig during animation. It might seem like a good idea in theory but it's a real pain in the butt to animate when you don't know what surprising pose or actions the storyboard artists will throw at you after you've built the rig. Better to keep your posing options as open as possible. :)

The above is for multi-purpose rigs that are meant to be used in many scenes, even for a whole series. Where I work, our rigs can be very complex but, because other artists besides me will be animating the rigs, I try to make the rigs as flexible as possible by making more controls that do simple things, rather than fewer controls that do very complex things, preferring adaptability over automation. When you build in too much automation, it actually makes it more difficult for the animator who, at some point, will probably need to break and reconfigure the rig (i.e., remove the automation) so it can do what's needed---and that can waste a lot of time for everybody.

Hope this helps.
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Greenlaw
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Re: Secondery Action After Body Turn?

Post by Greenlaw »

An example you can study is the 'Puss' rig I built for the interactive episode of 'The Adventures of Puss In Boots' on Netflix.

The first part of this video shows the rig and controls, and if you look closely, you'll see the individual body part SDB controls. This rig is actually a bit 'crude' compared to the rigs we're making nowadays (i.e., Boss Baby,) but the foundation of the 'general purpose' rig setup is all there. (I animated Puss in late 2016 or early 2017, so using Anime Studio 11, not Moho 12.)

Sorry, at the moment, I don't have more detailed or more modern rigs to demonstrate in public, but I've been working on narrated walk-through videos using some of my personal rigs, and will post them in the near future.
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Designspaceman
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Re: Secondery Action After Body Turn?

Post by Designspaceman »

Hey Greenlaw,
I really would like to see a more complex rig. Most of all the smart actions behind it :idea:
You seem to be a professional (I'm more a hobbyist), but I would like to master this bodyturn challenge.
Thanks a lot.
Ahayut
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Re: Secondery Action After Body Turn?

Post by Ahayut »

First of all many many thanks for your reply,
Secondly the Puss rig and design are incredible! Yes please upload more rigs. I'v Got quite a few Ideas from watching it.
In regards to my issue, I have been designing the rig more or less the way you described. I have a front-3/4 right and left turn rig, whichs devided into head turn, torso and hip turn, and individual feet L/R turn.
To quickly describe my issue again, to perfect the front poses and flexibilty I've created few Smart Bones Actions (SBA :D ) to the limbs, they do not assist the rig after the turn as limbs and vector points shift, now I'm not sure how to progress other than correcting the points on the fly. A possibility but one that I'd prefer to avoid.
Not sure If I should better design the turn or if possible apply more SBA's
I have a quick video of the issue but not sure if it's possible to upload :oops:

Thanks again for your reply.
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