How to make three bones from a prop moving together ?

Elor

Hello,

I'm converting Polyhaven's metal tool chest for Daz Studio.

Previous props I converted for Daz were more basic (my biggest project was a magic broom and the most difficult part was rigging the chain holding a lantern), but the toolchest is more complex.

The lid of the metal toolchest has three bones involved and in Blender, they are moving together, as show on this screenshot:

In Daz Studio, I have a bone for the lid itself and one bone per metal arm: the upper one is attached to the lid bone, the lower one is attache to the hip bone of the prop (it can be change if necessary, it just felt, from my uninformed point of view, better this way). At worse, I keep everything that way and closing the lid works fine as it is (the upper metal arm is moving with it, so it doesn't stick outside of the box, and the lower one is low enough to stay inside too).

A screenshot of the bones currently in place (I also rigged the drawers, but it was the easy part):

So my question: how to make these three bones moving together when I'm closing the lid, using the lid bone I created?

Richard Haseltine

One approach is to use the Point At parameters to have the bones point at a common object on their hinges - then if you work out the correct rotations for one of them, which can be linked to the lid's roataion, the other should automatically track it. That is the tricvk that has been used for things like pistons, but this is a little more complex as the arms are not permanently in alignment.

crosswind

You can simply create ERC links in Property Hierarchy with the rotation properties of those three Bones,  better by using ERC [KEYED] to get precise rotation results. This is the best and most precise way.

For example: Lid Bone can be the Controller, then assign Upper Bone / Lower Bone to Lid Bone as Sub-Components, then set ERC type and values on each Bone with proper values. Assure correct rigging has been done (with proper value limits...) for each bone beforehand ...

Then re-label the relevant Rotation property or create a separate Control property as needed.

Elor

Thank you both, I'll see what I'm able to do with your advices :)