New hand rig results

phastraq · Post by **phastraq** » Sat Feb 21, 2009 6:33 am

Ok so I understand (for the most part) what the rig is doing but at the same time I still have a few questions.

1) How exactly are these bones attached to the object? i.e. point binding or region binding? I think it's point binding but for some reason I'm not seeing any points in particular attached to any bones in particular.

2) I was amazed that your sample had only one layer and that the points were all connected. Is it then really necessary to use layer sorting as you mentioned in your first post and if not can this be converted to work with older versions of AS?

3) I'm guessing that the very small bones are for 'stabilizing' parts of the shape and the larger bones really just adjust the space in-between these shapes and some of the larger bones adjust the angle of these said shapes. Is this the same way that the arm and leg are constructed?

I know I'm asking a lot of questions but I am just so awe inspired by your work. It's a lot simpler than I expected it to be but the most genius ideas are usually founded on the most basic of concepts. Thanks again for sharing this awesome rig.

synthsin75 · Post by **synthsin75** » Sat Feb 21, 2009 7:04 am

heyvern wrote:... it's not even as close as yours though.

Wow, I consider that high praise. Thanks Vern.

phastraq,

1) If you select the vector layer, you can click on each bone with the bind points tool to see what is bound where. (You may need to enable construction curves for the bone layer so the bones can be seen from the vector layer) It's all point bound.

2) Depends on the complexity and detail of your character. But I would always use layer sorting, since that is the only way to convincingly do the 180 degree rotation. If you only need a front to side view turn, you probably could set it up well enough to avoid any layer sorting, making it compatible with older versions of AS.

I used layer sorting where I could have easily used animated line widths. I was trying to keep all of the keyframing to the bone layer, but that is not at all a necessary.

3) Yes, the small bones maintain the volume, so to speak, of the 2.9D shapes, so they are not scaled flat. The arm and leg are much simpler. They only need to maintain the top and bottom volumes (i.e shoulder and elbow of arm, elbow and wrist of forearm). They do not really need to be rotated since their shapes don't change so much, so they are only rigged to foreshorten. Same with the fingers.

It's a lot simpler than I expected it to be but the most genius ideas are usually founded on the most basic of concepts.

Yeah, I really want to keep this as simple as possible. I'm hoping, once I finish this, that this will be easy enough to construct, rig, and use that everyone can get these great results with AS. No scripts, no complicated constraints tweeking, just a very straight forward approach.

heyvern · Post by **heyvern** » Sat Feb 21, 2009 7:50 am

But of course once I get my hands on it... expect me to try and add bunches of constraints and scripts to eliminate extra key framing. I am after all, terminally lazy.

-vern

synthsin75 · Post by **synthsin75** » Sat Feb 21, 2009 8:43 am

By all means, Vern. At least you'll have a nice clean slate to start with.

larpon · Post by **larpon** » Tue Feb 24, 2009 2:09 pm

Nifty idea and work Synth!

I can't seem to find out why the bones with scale constraints on the hip, waist and upper torso are moving towards eachother when their constraints are set to bind with the bones in the spine?

where's the connection between them and the handles you scale to rotate the parts with?

synthsin75 · Post by **synthsin75** » Tue Feb 24, 2009 10:51 pm

Larpon,

Those bones that are scale constrained to the spine only scale when those spine bones are scaled. The moving of those bones is because they are parented to the horizontal bones. So when you scale the horizontal bones to turn the shapes they are moving their child bones.

Sage · Post by **Sage** » Wed Feb 25, 2009 5:02 am

Syn,

This is my first post but been reading the forums for several months. I am super impressed with this rig but alittle lost on some things. I am new to this so excuse me if I am missing something obvious.

The main thing I am trying to do is the hand and arm set up. Where I am getting the problem is the shape ordering. Anytime I use hide line, things don't line up right if used on the top circle for the bottom knuckle. Am I wrong thinking this is how it is hiding the line so the circles don't show?

Also by chance are you going to do a tutorial on this at some point? For those newer to AS it is not as easy as I am sure it is to many of you.

Thanks in advance.

synthsin75 · Post by **synthsin75** » Wed Feb 25, 2009 5:37 am

Hey Sage, welcome to the forum.

For one, I hardly ever use hide edge, since it is not an animated feature. I usually use line width exclusively.

I'm not real sure what you mean by 'things don't line up'. If you see the screen shot of the hand on the first page of this thread, you'll see that the fingers are two separate shapes (as opposed to the body example file).

The outlines are all separate shapes from the fills. I select all the points of both parts of a finger (or arm, etc) and make an outline of them. Then I create the fill-only shapes as shown in the example file animation. The fill-only shapes are above the outline shape in the shape order, so they cover all the outline except for the exposed edges.

For the whole body I showed, I also duplicated layers so that each part has a 'crease' layer. These layers just have an outline with line width adjustments, and I layer sort them as needed to give those extra details.

I hope that makes sense. I do plan on doing a tutorial, but only after I see if I can use this technique for the whole character. (Working on the head now.) Let me know if any of that needs further clarifying.

Sage · Post by **Sage** » Wed Feb 25, 2009 5:55 am

ok I think I understand what I was doing wrong. Say for a finger, you have the two sections. In each section there are 2 circles and the middle part. What you're saying is you're only filling the 2 sections with fill. I was trying to fill the circles and then the middle seperate area so I had 6 shapes for one finger. I think what you're saying is you have 2 fill shapes per finger. Is this correct?

Great suggestion on the Line Width though, I should use that more.

synthsin75 · Post by **synthsin75** » Wed Feb 25, 2009 6:11 am

Not quite. You should actually have a minimum of seven shapes for each finger. One outline-only shape for all of the points of the finger, and six fill-only shapes (three for each part of the finger).

Notice the black outline-only shape is made first, and then fill-only shapes are made that hide everything but the edge outline.

larpon · Post by **larpon** » Fri Feb 27, 2009 3:23 pm

Hey synth..

I've been playing around with your rig and made a similar rig for one of my own figures...

What I might have missed is the advantage in your point binding...

But in my current test rig (just a torso) I tried using auto/flexi binding the points and set sensible bone strengths to it and haven't seen any differences in the movement/scale possibilities yet?

So I was wondering why you choose to specifically use manual binding of the points?

And I also wonder why you use several shapes instead of just one shape for eg. the torso?

I'm pretty sure you have your good reasons but I'd like to hear your view on this

Thought it might help newcomers as manual binding can get a bit crazy for the not-so-experienced

Just asking out of curiosity -not to criticize your wicked idea...

heyvern · Post by **heyvern** » Fri Feb 27, 2009 6:44 pm

I can't speak for Synth but the concept of using bone strength instead of binding can work well in most situations. As long as the points and bones are far enough apart and don't adversely interfere it works. When you get "small" and close together (fingers?)... that's when you might need to use point binding.

As for using multiple shapes... I always think that way myself... how can I make this all one contiguous smooth shape?

For instance you could easily make the whole torso "one mesh" on the "outside". Still having multiple shapes, and the points falling in the same area as they would the other way but now would bend and move smoothly.

That's why we all share these ideas. To take them and expand on them.

-vern

synthsin75 · Post by **synthsin75** » Fri Feb 27, 2009 11:00 pm

Larpon,

What I might have missed is the advantage in your point binding...

Well the gif I posted of the shapes being offset I did just for demonstration purposes. I actually move all of these to their final positions before rigging. Also most of the small bones would need a huge strength to cover the shapes they need to. The ones for the chest would need a strength envelope as big as the whole chest. For the most part it's just a personal preference, but I do expect point binding to be more necessary for details and the head.

And I also wonder why you use several shapes instead of just one shape for eg. the torso?

Well with simple enough body shapes, this rig can easily do 180 degree turn by scaling to -1. In that case, you need all of the separate shapes so that the volume is filled at every angle. But you're right about a setup that only does a 90 degree turn, it could be done with one, or at least fewer, shapes. On that full body gif, I opted for better looking, more detailed shapes instead of a simpler, more flexible one.

And Vern is of course correct about assuming that the whole torso (chest, midriff, and hips) could be a single shape. It all depends on what you need the model to do.

larpon · Post by **larpon** » Sun Mar 01, 2009 3:25 pm

Thanks for sorting that out for me

I'll play some more with the rig now

--edit

I've tried the technique on a rig of my own now:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0OmAQStMToY

The head turn is a good old fashioned switch layer interpolation as I can't figure out how to make it with bones:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZKvl0j_xPfE

And here's a short starring the above character (before I tried synth's approach):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Be892_lVo1w

Onionskin · Post by **Onionskin** » Wed Mar 04, 2009 3:35 pm

synthsin75 wrote:Not quite. You should actually have a minimum of seven shapes for each finger. One outline-only shape for all of the points of the finger, and six fill-only shapes (three for each part of the finger).

Notice the black outline-only shape is made first, and then fill-only shapes are made that hide everything but the edge outline.

First time writing on this forum, so Hi to all of you!

I try to draw fill over outline like in sample, but I just don't know how to do that.
So please synth, or any of you guys, what did I mist, is there on forum some tutorial about it?

And sorry because of this secondary question in such revolutionary topic