Rigging Tutorials?
franontheedge
Posts: 342
Hi,
I have a selection of 3d models I've made in Wings3d, they are UVMapped but not rigged.
I want to animate these characters.
They are nothing whatsoever to do with Genesis or Viki or Mike or any other humanoid figure except in so much as they do have feet, and some have arms too.
They are nothing to do with clothes for Genesis or anything else – except one figure has a hat, boots and a scarf, I would also like to animate the scarf etc.
Also one character has shoes and one has a skirt made of large long petals, I would like to animate this skirt too, other characters have a staff or trident, and a walking stick, these too I would like to animate. (These clothing items are also my own models and nothing to do with Genesis et al.)
I have looked around for tutorials on rigging and have got the legs and feet of one character rigged in Cinema4d rel 10.5 (I do not have the latest version of Cinema and will never be able to afford it.)
This is a very, very simple rig, (just a foot controller with a thigh pole and ankle, foot and toes goals for each leg, there is also weight mapping applied but that's it, (this was as far as the tutorial went.)
I don't know if this is importable to DS4.6 with all controls in place or not.
But there are so few tuts for C4d rel 10 now that I can't really continue with it in Cinema4d.
So I need a free program that will enable rigging and animating, and I seem to be reduced to a choice of either DazStudio or Blender.
I haven't yet found any tutorials for rigging in Blender (I'm sure there must be some.) but I have found 2 tutorials for rigging in DazStudio.
But they are pay for tuts, not free, one is this one:
http://www.daz3d.com/rigging-original-figures-in-ds4-pro
But there is also this one:
http://www.daz3d.com/advanced-rigging-in-daz-studio-4-pro
I cannot afford both. Not without a huge effort.
Question 1) I need to know if the first one will enable me to rig and animate my characters in DazStudio, or is it really meant for people who just want to create clothing for Genesis?
(Most everything else seems to be for that.)
In fact the 2nd (advanced) tutorial talks a lot about clothing for Genesis, something called 'GeoGrafting' and this:
Although it is intended primarily for people who make (or want to make) add-ons for Genesis, it contains information useful to anyone who uses DAZ Studio and wants to gain a better understanding of 'how things work'-- for instance, 'Why do these boots look so terrible when I bring them into DS with the Transfer Utility?'
Which also seems aimed at clothing creators – which I am not.
Question 2) So do I really, really need both to animate my characters?
Or will the 1st one let me do all I need, without my needing the advanced one at all?
The advanced one mentions joint orientation, does this mean I'd need this advanced one because the 1st one doesn't mention this? Or is it in the 1st one too?
Having done a little rigging I'd imagine I would need to ensure that the joints are properly aligned, or animating the figures might be impossible.
Yes? No? or does this not apply in DazStudio like it does in C4D?
Question 3) I heard someone mention that there was a discount if you bought both these tutorials together, but I can't see that mentioned anywhere, is this still in effect, or has it gone now?
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Comments
On 1 and 2, I think the first tutorial is all you need - and it is about "original" figures, not Genesis etc. add-ons. It would certainly be a good place to start.
Affordable:
http://docs.daz3d.com/doku.php/public/software/dazstudio/4/userguide/creating_content/rigging/tutorials/basic_rigging_preparation/start
http://docs.daz3d.com/doku.php/public/software/dazstudio/4/userguide/creating_content/rigging/tutorials/adding_bones_for_rigging/start
http://docs.daz3d.com/doku.php/public/software/dazstudio/4/userguide/creating_content/rigging/tutorials/weight_mapping_a_figure/start
I've bought it - unfortunately I can't download it:
http://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/39101/
But thanks for the information that I'll only need the basic rigging one.
Yes. Those may well be free, but as for how useful they are... well.
All the images on there that I've seen so far are impossible to see, they are A) too small and B) when enlarged they are just a massive blur - pointless having them really.
But thanks for trying - it would have been great if there had been free tutorials.
Yes. Those may well be free, but as for how useful they are... well.
All the images on there that I've seen so far are impossible to see, they are A) too small and B) when enlarged they are just a massive blur - pointless having them really.
But thanks for trying - it would have been great if there had been free tutorials.
All the images I clicked on produced the largest available image and they were none of them blurred.
All the images I clicked on produced the largest available image and they were none of them blurred.
Really? Lucky you.
But that's very odd...
It might be something to do with the settings (screen resolution) on my machine then, but I can't change it. I did try, but although it increased the size of the text at the top of the menu in DazStudio, it also badly messed up my PhotoShop, which I use almost every day and for a lot of the time each day, so I had to change it back.
(which messed up my desktop - twice)
I can use a large handheld magnifying glass to see the DazStudio fonts (pity we can't change them in preferences, that would solve a lot), but that doesn't help me with blurred tutorial images.
There used to be a gizmo (PlugIn or extension) that increased the size of images on the web - but I don't think it's compatible with FireFox any more - and even if it is - it might do just the same as ctrl &+, and give me bigger, but blurred images...
Sigh.
All the images I clicked on produced the largest available image and they were none of them blurred.
Really? Lucky you.
But that's very odd...
It might be something to do with the settings (screen resolution) on my machine then, but I can't change it. I did try, but although it increased the size of the text at the top of the menu in DazStudio, it also badly messed up my PhotoShop, which I use almost every day and for a lot of the time each day, so I had to change it back.
(which messed up my desktop - twice)
I can use a large handheld magnifying glass to see the DazStudio fonts (pity we can't change them in preferences, that would solve a lot), but that doesn't help me with blurred tutorial images.
There used to be a gizmo (PlugIn or extension) that increased the size of images on the web - but I don't think it's compatible with FireFox any more - and even if it is - it might do just the same as ctrl &+, and give me bigger, but blurred images...
Sigh.
Well if you're clicking "on" the image, and the image that comes up is 'blurry', it might be that your monitor screen needs adjusting or replacing. That does happen now and then too.
I snagged one off of their tutorials so you can see the size I'm talking about.
The larger one is a screen shot of the snagged one scrolled as large as this little ol' top's window can show. It's not super sharp, but it's quite readable.
Just found this thread.
Question after explanation ..
I created a simple loin cloth. Instead of staying with the default rigging transferred over from Genesis 2 Male I removed the thigh bones and replaced them with child bones coming from the Pelvis. FrontLoin and BackLoin. They are weight mapped to my satisfaction but
Question: Is there a way to get them to follow the figures legs without having the end user manually move out the loin pieces and twist them to look more natural in movement along with the figures movement?
Gracias...
Don't mean to go off on a tangent.
But.
By any chance do you have any version of Poser?.
Or know someone with it.
Reason, is that for a simple figure ( 2 legged, vs 4 legged) there is a feature
that lets you copy the rigging of an exisiting figure to yours.
This feature exisited in most version of Poser so if there is an old one around....
I used it in an emergency, worked great.
Best of luck
Well, if you still had the thighs you could have left them, made any adjustments needed, then turned off auto-normalisation in Tool Settings and added the loincloth bones - that's a feature designed to support handles. How well it would work in a given situation is harder to predict. I think you could get there by redoing the rigging from scratch on a new copy of the OBJ, then adding the bones and finally copying the handle weights across to them - but try it on a basic transfer utility rig before spending time doing it properly.
DS can do that, if I understand what you are saying - Transfer Utility for weight mapped figures. Or for older figures, you can use the Figure Setup pane to copy the basic skeleton. I should add that that's OK for distribution if you are making an add-on for the donor figure, you can't share the result if you use a piece of clothing, say, by another artist to help you make your own piece of clothing (unless it's sold as a merchant resource for that purpose).