Adding custom attributes and controllers - Final


This week I have successfully rigged the hands of the model and then prepared the rig for animation as well as cleaned the scene.

            Rigging the hands was a straight forward task that did not involve anything new that I haven’t done before. I have started by creating a controller for each of the five fingers and aligned it with the third joint (the closest to the hand) on each finger. I have then linked the third joint with its newly added controller on each finger. The controllers were then linked to the hand bone so that the fingers remain attached to the hand (and move with it), but also independently.


            Similar to the other controllers, I froze the transform and then locked their movement and scaling on the XYZ axis. The fingers should be able to go up and down (Z axis), left and right (Y axis), but they shouldn’t be allowed to rotate. Locking the rotation on the X axis did just that.

           I have then added an ‘Attribute Holder’ modifier and copied it on each of the finger controllers. In the attribute holder menu I have created a new parameter that controls each of the fingers curl level. For example, if I wanted to curl up the index finger, I would simply move the slider for ‘Index Curl’ to 10. The parameters were then linked to the bones in the reaction manager:



            After rigging the left hand, I moved on to the right hand and repeated the same process.

            To clean the scene, I resized all of the goals so that they’re barely visible, as they won’t be used in animation. I have also changed the colours of the controllers so that the FK controllers are in blue and the IK controllers in yellow (colour coding). The IK and FK arms bone chains were then hidden as there’s no purpose in seeing them anymore now that the controllers were set in place. I have grouped the helpers, controls and bones on three different layers, named accordingly. A master controller had been also added so that I can move the whole rig at once, if necessary.



            The model is now ready for animation.

References:

YouTube. (2012). Rigging a Character in 3ds Max - Part 16 - Preparing Character Rig for the Animator. [online] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pNSzgOs_6Ug&index=40&list=PLnKw1txyYzRlxh1-BT4CifPXC5TBg2vUd [Accessed 11 Mar. 2019].


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