Hello - well, I have been having some major headaches over the last few days. I managed to rig the body without any problems, but the head has been a real pain.

I built the blend shapes and then bound the head to my skeleton - However when I started rotating the neck I started seeing some horrible dark patches appear on the head - obviously a problem with the normals. I have tried using the edit vertex normal tool before binding and blend shapes as well as after, but have had no luck - the normals look fine when the head is in bind pose, but not when the neck is rotated. I posted the problem https://forums.simplymaya.com/showthr...986#post201986 , and a couple of people suggested using the set normal to face option which worked pretty well, but I still have some dodgy dark patches behind the ears and around the eyes. Not really sure what to try next. I would have thought that it would be best to edit before binding, but when i tried that, it just made the normals look fine in the bind pose, but not when i start rotating joints. aaaghh! Am I even making any sense??
Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Anyway, here are a few of my blend shape expressions in the mean time.

Attached Thumbnails

---

arran3D

arran3D blog

Looking good, Arran!

I'm assuming this is a low poly model and that the dark parches over his eyes are Nurbs shapes to attach fur.

Nice expressions! He doesn't look anywhere near as villanous as when I first saw him! :-)

The top right screenshot looks as if a fair chunk of his head has been lopped off. I'm guessing that's the low poly head at that angle, so I'll say no more!

As for the dark patches, I can think of a couple of possibilities other than normals. Please disregard if they are irrelevant, but in my own experience, I have found AFTER THE FACT that I missed something simple!

I presume you did a texture reference object for the head. If not, I'll wager THAT is your problem!

There is the possibility that you have a non-topological edge, face, or vertex somewhere. Check in the area of the dark spots and make sure all the egometry matches up. I have often found two faces of a poly right on top of each other! I check using the "vertex/face" tool

Finally, you might want to recheck the bind itself! Use the "paint skin weights" tool to ensure that all of the head is bound to a joint!

It might help if you posted a picture of the "dodgy spots" so I can get a better idea of what you mean.

Otherwise, keep up the good work, shipmate!

---

"Ad astra per aspera..."

Ahoy there matey!
Thanks for all of your suggestions Lt Jim. They are much appreciated.

Right after I posted, I took another look at my model and after much head scratching I think I may have sorted it out. Basically, in all of the problem areas I selected each vertex, set the normal to face and then went back over the areas and used the soften normals tool to smooth out the geometry. This has added quite a bit of history, but I guess I can detach and rebind if it is a problem. Now when I rotate the head everything seems to look fine, so hopefully I should be able to move on.

Actually the dark patches over his eyes are just polygons that I am using with a transparency map for his eyebrows, though they do kind of look a bit naff.

You mentioned whether I had used 'texture reference object' and I was just wondering what that is, as I haven't heard of it before.

Anyway, I must admit I am getting a little tired of vacuum guy - I am looking forward to the next challenge so I have something else to work on.

Thanks again Lt Jim.

---

arran3D

arran3D blog

Arran,


A Texture Reference Object allows a texture to deform with the object it is attached to. As usual, I learned it all the hard way! :-)

Basically, anything that moves on a character should have a texture reference object. If your entire character is one mesh, you only need one TRO for the mesh. If you have seperate textures for, say, the arms, shirt, teeth/tongue, &c, all of those will require a TRO.

So how do you make a TRO? SIMPLE!!!!!!!!!

Select the object you want a TRO made for, and then go to "Rendering>Texturing>Create Texture Reference Object". That's all there is to it! Of course you'll want to hide the TRO's in a layer or otherwise make them invisible, but believe me they WORK, and most of the "swimming texture" problems people have are due to lack of a TRO!

Hope this helps down the road, especially if you do a UV map for your character!

---

"Ad astra per aspera..."

Thanks for the explanation Lt Jim - actually my character already does have a UV map for his textures. I hadn't heard of a TRO before though, so I'll take a look into it.

---

arran3D

arran3D blog

ha, this dude is very cool...
great work mate.

---

Sometimes you eat the bear...Sometimes the bear eats you...
Either way...shit happens

https://www.fadedseoul.com

hey - thanks traindog!

He's on hold at the moment, but I am hoping to start animating him soon.

---

arran3D

arran3D blog

oh yeahhh...he will be fun to animate...

---

Sometimes you eat the bear...Sometimes the bear eats you...
Either way...shit happens

https://www.fadedseoul.com

Nice comcept i tought you would be doing this high polly, but anyway is great

---

PIXELDISFUNCTION.COM
_________________________

Pelican spaceship

thanks Helder - yeah, I would definitely like to make a high poly version of him or of a character with a similar build.

I actually just got back into this project over the last week - at the moment I am re-rigging him and I am hoping to finally start animating a walk cycle in the next few days.

---

arran3D

arran3D blog

Nice one Arran, be good to see this guy completed and walking, should be fun.

Are you going to make the walk cycle with his pack on so that the weight will affect his walking? Sohuld be a challenge to get it right if you go down this route.

cheers gster! I think I'm going to do a walk cycle without his pack first and then I'll try one with all of his gear on - hunched over and looking grumpy. Aside from a tutorial or two, I haven't done any animating yet, so sorting out the weight will probably be a headache, but we will see.

---

arran3D

arran3D blog

Hello everyone - well, after plenty of headaches I have finally animated my first walk cycle.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zlKtBRUihzY

As you can see it's kind of crappy - so any advice on how to get rid of the jerkiness or how to add some weight or any other comments are very much appreciated!

cheers!

---

arran3D

arran3D blog

i think when it comes to animating a walk cycle for a character it's most important to get the regular timing down and get a feel for the most important poses during the cycle before you start to give the walk its own character or embellish any movements.

This Book is what we used in class and it makes you aware of timing, motion, sway, arcs, etc. to make everything look more smooth and lifelike. if you're interested in learning animation i highly recommend it. if i remember correctly (i can take a look at the book when i get home, i still own it) there's only about 10 or so pages dedicated to the walk cycle, but they give images from different views and explain why things should move the way they recommend... there's a second book that comes after (and now a third i see, which after looking it up for a while seems to be an update of the original 'digital character animation 2') but it mostly deals with animating for what i would consider more cartoony actions... talking about timing, squash and stretch, anticipation movement, etc.

---

Accept no substitutions.

film yourself from the front and side walking if you can arran (not in any dodgy way )
Reference material will definately be important in seeing all the little movements. Watch people when you're in town and see how they walk, its amazing how similar but different people can make the same motions.

I vaguely remember you saying that you had mike's new book. On the DVD is a video or two on walk cycles which are good to watch.

Finally there are a couple of good tutorials out there which break the walk cycle down. Here's one that I always keep looking back at and trying to memorise the parts of:
https://www.rubberbug.com/walking.htm

Si

---

Examples of bTraffic - a traffic animation tool for Maya
bFlocking - a tool for Maya 8.5+ to generate flocking and swarming behaviours
Jan/Feb Challenge 2007 Entry and W.I.P
May/Jun Challenge 2006 Entry and W.I.P
Mar/Apr Challenge 2006 Entry and W.I.P
Jan/Feb Challenge 2006 Entry and W.I.P
Nov/Dec Challenge 2005 Entry and W.I.P
Sep/Oct Challenge 2005 Entry and W.I.P
Jul/Aug Challenge 2005 Entry
www.flash-fx.net