Maya Tutorials -- Rigging for Animation

Tutorial: Page (6) of 7 - 01/28/04

Maya Tutorials -- Rigging for Animation Tips and techniques to help improve your workflow Each control should be clear and precise in what it does. If it says ?armTranslateX?, then it should move just the arm up and down, not the shoulder with it. What if the animator doesn?t want the shoulder to go up? You?ve just made their job harder, and chances are they will be frustrated with you to boot.

I?ve seen this argument go both ways. This is an example of a typical conversation a TD might have with a couple of animators:

TD to Animator: ?I decided to add in an automatic shoulder control to compensate whenever the arms go up and down. If you raise the arm control, then the shoulder will go up with it. Hopefully this will save you some time.?

Animator1 to TD: ?No, no, no! All you?ve done is made me have to animate the shoulder going back down against itself! What if I don?t like the way you made it move? What if I want to make it move differently for a particular shot? This is not what I needed.?

Animator2 to TD: ?Hey, this is really great, now every time I move the arm, I don?t have to worry about the shoulder as much. I can just add in what I need. Great!?

So, as you can see, different people will have different opinions. As it stands, though, the majority of animators I have talked to prefer to have total control. Any type of automated movement just annoys them, and makes their job that much harder. You can avoid creating counter animation by better understanding how your character will move. Talk to the animators; try to understand what their needs are. Let them know what you?re thinking about doing before you add it into the rig. Communication can save you a lot of time, especially when the clock is ticking.

In the end, usually the best approach is to look at the anatomy of the character to see how things are connected. Make it a point to communicate with anyone who will be animating with your rig. If the animators are happy with it, then you should be, too.

Clean Your Scene
Remember when your mother used to tell you to clean your room? The same applies when an animator is trying to animate with your rigs. Nobody wants to clean up after your mess. Usually throughout the process of rigging, you end up with some leftover unused controls and transforms. Those nodes that are just sitting there, and you're scratching your head going, "Now what was that for again?" If you can't figure it out, then believe me, nobody else will be able to either.

Hierarchy Ex. 2 (Click for larger view)

Cleaning up after yourself shouldn't be a last step, it should be an ongoing process. Prep the model by deleting your history, freezing the transforms, and putting the character at the origin. Pace yourself; everytime you finish a set of controls, delete the uneccessary junk that might have been created along with them. You should test your rig throughout the process, attempt to break it as often as possible. If it doesn't work for you, then it won't work for the person animating it.

Delete History

The whole idea is pretty logical really, it's just a simple task of keeping yourself organized. It will save you time in the end. Another good habit is to make sure your final rig and character are all under one node in the scene. This is considered the standard in a production enviornment, so even if you're working at home by yourself, it's good practice to stay organized all the time. Once you get used to cleaning up after yourself, you won't even notice that you're doing it.

Hierarchy Ex. 3 (Click for larger view)

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