Sprint 2 Contributions
1. Finished First Pass Rig for animator stress test
For this sprint contribution, I handed off the first-pass rig to animators to stress-test it and gather feedback on which control systems they need.
The rig has:
- Stretch and Squash hybrid FK/ IK spline matrix. The stretch and squash are matrix-based and distribute the joint volume evenly when it is stretched or squashed
- Auto Foot controls for foot rolls, heel twist, toe twist, side bank, and toe tap
- IK/FK Limb Switch
- Matrix Limb Stretch
- All main control joints, minus the hair and facial joints, due to needing to wait for an updated topology/structure to the first pass model
-Basic skinned weights
- Auto Finger Controls
- Hair Rig
- Facial Rig
- Better skin weights pass
2. Tested out ribbon-based controls for the yarn
I did a test for the yarn rig using a technique called ribbon-based controls in rigging using Maya's nHair. In my test, for the loose-string part of the yarn that will primarily serve as its "limbs," I created a long plane that matches the entire string geometry. Through this, I learned that for the actual yarn rig, I will probably have to split the plane into two so the string has higher-fidelity movement -- a plane for the string closer to the yarn ball, and a plane for the string that is actually loose. From the test, I also concluded that the loose-string geometry needs many more edge loops than initially thought, so that the deformation used to create shapes from the string would look better, and that having more control joints would also serve the rig better. This information has been passed to the 3D artist who will model the yarn character.
Plane, with hair follicles in each edge loop:
