3ds Max: Character Rigging

Learn how to rig your 3D characters for realistic motion and animation with 3ds Max.

Introduction

• Welcome
• Using the exercise files

1. Getting Set Up

• Prepping the model for rigging
• Setting up layers
• Naming schemes

2. Creating Skeletons

• Drawing the leg chain
• Adding bone fins
• Mirroring the leg chains with bone tools
• Positioning the hip bone
• Drawing the spine
• Positioning arm bones
• Creating hand skeletons
• Mirroring arm skeletons

3. Creating Leg and Foot Controls

• Positioning the foot control splines
• Setting up inverse kinematics (IK) chains
• Rigging the heel and toe controls
• Rigging the main foot control
• Controlling knee direction

4. Creating Hip and Spine Controls

• Configuring the main control
• Setting up the spine
• Head and neck controls
• Creating shoulder controls

5. Creating FK/IK Controls

• Creating control skeletons for the arm
• Constraining the control skeletons
• Setting up the forward kinematics (FK) skeleton controls
• Setting up the IK skeleton controls
• Wiring up the FK/IK switch
• Making controls appear and disappear

6. Rigging Hands

• Setting up the wrist control
• Setting up finger FK controls
• Getting the fingers to curl
• Creating a control pane using attributes
• Controlling finger spread
• Rigging the thumb

7. Skinning Characters

• Applying the Skin modifier
• Adjusting envelopes
• Fine-tuning vertex weights
• Advanced weighting tools
• Mirroring weights

8. Face Rigging

• Understanding morph targets
• Setting up a single-axis slider
• Wiring parameters to control blinks
• Setting up multiple-axis controls
• Connecting parameters using Reactor
• Creating a jawbone
• Skinning the head
• Controlling the jawbone
• Controlling eye direction
• Finalizing the face rig

Conclusion

• Next steps