Maya for 3D Printing - Rapid Prototyping
In this course we're going to look at something a little different, creating technically accurate 3D printed parts.
# 1 24-08-2007 , 08:20 PM
Registered User
Join Date: May 2007
Posts: 15

Rigging question...

This is my first attempt at rigging, so bear with me. I have read numerous posts, and a great deal of the book "Mastering Maya 8.5". But I have not found the answer to this question.

I have created a monster and I want to rig it so that, among other things, the lower jaw opens and closes. My first attempt didn't have sufficient bones in the rest of the skull to prevent parts of the skin from participating in the jaw movement which I did not want to move. Adding a few more bones, specifically in the upper jaw, seemed to solve most of the problem.

But now, when I open the lower jaw, all the teeth elongate! In a weird sort of way this makes sense, I haven't told Maya that the teeth are supposed to move intact with the jaw, but I don't know how to do that. How does one designate that certain parts of a skin are ridged and are not deformed even when the entire section of the skin to which they are attached is deforming?

Thanks in advance!

# 2 24-08-2007 , 08:41 PM
mastone's Avatar
Maniacal boy king of Babylon
Join Date: Aug 2005
Location: the netherlands
Posts: 1,605
i think you should separate the teeth from the mesh, then i would parent the upperteeth to the upperjaw joints and the lowerteeth to the lowerjaw joints.

# 3 26-08-2007 , 04:35 AM
Xander-0's Avatar
Registered User
Join Date: Feb 2005
Location: This Place
Posts: 220
yes, that is generally (well, I think so) the reccommended way to animate non-deforming parts of skeletons (actually, if you were doing just a skeleton, that's how you'd rig it).

Additionally, you can look into something called skin weights - I believe there are a couple of tutorials in the maya documentation, beyond what you can find elsewhere. Skin weights allow you to tell geometry how much they're affected by certain joints (and how much a joint affects certain geometry). Haven't messed with it myself, but I know the basic concept.


Book Wise

https://X4nd5r.deviantart.com
# 4 26-08-2007 , 03:24 PM
Registered User
Join Date: May 2007
Posts: 15
Thank you. Tried both methods, they both work, although it took me a while to figure that I have to lock down the weights for a particular bone after I'm done making assignments to it, else Maya just automatically undoes all my work. I think I'm going with weights for the moment. It seems like the more "general" approach, and I need to learn all the details of how it works (or doesn't work) for future work.

Thanks for the help.

Posting Rules Forum Rules
You may not post new threads | You may not post replies | You may not post attachments | You may not edit your posts | BB code is On | Smilies are On | [IMG] code is On | HTML code is Off

Similar Threads