Basic Rigging Question

[user_deleted]

This is my first attempt at rigging a character and i need to know how to link joints to my mesh so i can control the mesh by the joints. The character i made is cockroach and i realize this may not be the simplest thing to rig for my attempt at rigging but I have to, so if anyone could help I would really appreciate it.

[drblacksnake]

parent or bind depending on things You have and want to acheive with rig.

[doug-hines]

Decided to post here, because I'm sure my problem is just as a beginner question as the one that started this thread.

Anyways. It has been my experience in the past, then when you move an IK handle in maya, key it, and then go back to a previous key.. the IK mesh follows where the IK has been keyed (2). However, as you can see in the picture, this is not the case in this instance (1). The IK moves around, but the mesh.. not so much so... and yes, the mesh is skinned.

Anyone know why this is happening? Maybe just a visual glitch.. I hope.

[doug-hines]

Ok, as good a place as any to add another question:

Is it possible to set up a rig to scale in ANY direction according to controls?

For example, if i wanted to use a box around a wrist to stretch that wrist in whatever direction i wanted.. how would I go about doing that?

Thanks again.

[failure]

It is. You connect nodes and then you connect some more nodes. Until node network starts doing what you want it to. That's all there is to rigging in maya.

[doug-hines]

Could this be done in the connection editor? Say, connect the transition of the box, to the scale of the arm?

Yeah, i tried it. My arm disapeared....

[failure]

Basically yes, that's the idea but something that's really useful would include a bit more complex node network. It really depends on what type of control you need.

[doug-hines]

All i want it to do is stretch out the arm when i drag the box further than the skeleton goes...

[failure]

"stretch arm" is realy stretchable construct. It all depends on your specific setup. How many joints you want to scale and how etc... It's not trivial

[doug-hines]

Updates and other issues:

I thought I had figured out a way to get my arm to stretch and bend where I wanted it to. I attempted to parent a box to the wrist joint as an experiement. Without IK, it appeared to stretch the end of the arm, just like I wanted it to. However, when I added an IK (or added the box to an already IKd arm setup) the arm freaks out when I attempt to move it via either the box or IK handle . So, back to the drawing board for me
x.x

issue I:I've been fiddling with a way to make my character bend at the hips, without it looking like it bent completely in half. I have a total of 3 joints between the hip_root and the joint between the clavicles. Every time I set up the spine IK for the 3 joints, the whole spine ends up twisting to the left, and my shoulders become off centered.

              |head\_joint|
              |neck\_joint|

clavicle - spine_joint - clavicle
|joint|
|joint|
|joint|
|hip_root|

If pictures are required, let me know. It's a very simple skeleton setup. clavicle-shoulder-elbow-wrist. that's it. no fingers.

issue II: I setup a blendshape for breathing on my stupidly low poly character. Problem is, when I convert>subd, the blendshape no longer holds. Any ideas on how to fix this? I was thinking a wrap deformer, but someone, whom shall rename nameless, although s/he knows who s/he is, stated that those were heavy on the computing and should be avoided if possible. So, barring wrap deformers, any ideas?

Issue II, section b: Is there a way to limit how far an object can translate, making it only able to move between the values of 0 an 1?