Week 6: Rigging Problems

This week was a frustrating one as almost all my concentration went into finalising the Molly rig. The main problem was the arms, switching between IK and FK.

 

Problem 1: The first problem I came across was in the shoulders. When the switch occurred between IK/FK, the whole topography of the shoulders changed (refer to images). After asking the teacher, Wei, then redoing a few times, it seemed that I solved the problem. This problem was in relation to the orientation or angle of the joints used within Molly.

 

 

 

To solve the problem I reconstructed the arms on Wednesday with success, I thought. However, when I started to test the rig again, I incurred another problem.  

 

Problem 2: This entailed not a change in the model but the rotation of the shoulders and elbows when doing the switch. At first I thought it was just a painting weights issue, but on closer inspection I realised that when doing the switch between IK and FK, the skin joint was rotating between the two. Back to the drawing board.

 

Success: Upon doing it for the third time (on Thursday) after a handful of attempts, redoing the entire joint structure and just duplicating the joints over the others without touching them, the switch worked successfully.

 

As of now, I have been fixing up the weights and ensuring there is no deformation. This has of course taken a few days, and I believe Molly is now ready to start blocking with all scenes. At this stage, texture hasn’t occurred but this will happen on Monday.  

 

Despite the hard ache, pain and frustration, making all these mistakes have made me realise that it’s ok to make mistakes and that every time I do a rig for my characters I am learning. I also know that with every new character I may make as many mistakes as the last, but that is all part of the learning process.

 

To ensure mistakes will be lowered next time, I am using the Molly rig (without Molly’s model) and just modifying the structure where necessary.   I hope this will help reduce practice time and will ensure that animation can begin as soon as possible.