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3 Dimensional Chat / Rigging and animation tips anyone? (Milkshape)

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Fallout
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Posted: 8th Nov 2006 14:11
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I just wondered if any of you old pros could offer me a few tips on rigging and modelling to make joints bend properly? Specifically in Milkshape. I can rig my models such that the joints bend well for short distances, but normally when more then 45 degrees of rotation occurs, vertices start to move through faces, geometry gets warped and the model starts to look crap. This is obviously a problem for joints like elbows and hips which bend 180 degrees, or more.

Here's a foxy lady I have been playing with (wayhey!) and trying to rig. I can't take much credit for the model as I've been adapting it from a generic model I downloaded, but the textures are all my own work. She's like a h2h combat chick.


Here she is in a very forgiving pose. Everything looks fine, although her right elbow is already looking a bit dodgy.


Here is a more extreme pose, although she'll obviously have a lot more movement as a hand 2 hand fighter character, so it would be more extreme than this.


The key areas in this one that start to look bad are:


The elbow now looks really bad, and the legs move through the belt and her arse has seen better days.

How can I go about adding verts and faces to make these bends better, and how should I be connecting verts to joints? Are their tricks to positioning joints in unnatural places to improve the animation, or is it just that milkshape's joint/vertex manipulation isn't any good because its not weighted? Any suggestions or ideas would be great chaps. Cheers.


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wildbill
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Posted: 8th Nov 2006 14:54
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I had this same issue with a tunic on a dude I was modeling. While I do not work in Milkshape, I would look at the default skinning vertex. In True Space you can attach the skin to bones instead of joints. This way the skin only moves when the bone itself moves and makes for a smoother flow.
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RadiusOFT
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Posted: 8th Nov 2006 16:56
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well.. I guess you could assign vertecies to different points on the cloth and just model it to move along with the leg. As far as the Defiguration goes, you will probably have to move some of 'de vertecies around until it looks right, as i have come to learn milkshape kinda sucks at animating ( i just love it's interface)

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indi
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Posted: 9th Nov 2006 00:06
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when modelling, not only do you have to make it uv wrap correctly, but you also need to have polys that will stretch in the places you need for the fake joints.

usually doubling up on polygons in the areas that it will bend will allow you to create a crease or seam of sorts. Just double up on the insides of seams and it should look a lot healthy in creasing problems.

create a new test model, just an arm per say, add extra polys to the inside of the elbow and align them so half of the new polys is on the one side of the crease and the other for the other side.

the tricky part to describe to you is what polys to assign to what bones, but a simple test like that will show you clearly.

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Fallout
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Posted: 9th Nov 2006 01:03
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Cheers guys and cheers indi. That's kinda what I thought, although its hard to visualise. I'll hack off the arms and then try and add a few polys inbetween for stretching and see how that works out.

Here's something else I've always wondered .. what is the best pose for your character to start with? The most common pose the character stands in, or a pose where the limbs are bent half way between their maximum limits, or the typical crucified type pose we always see? My thinking is that, if you have the right pose to start with the problems with limb rotations will be minimized.


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indi
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Posted: 9th Nov 2006 01:08 Edited at: 9th Nov 2006 01:09
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from the tutes i have about character rigging and modelling for maya, the designer tests each action by bending the model as if he is animating, it eventually gets handed over to the animator, but in essence the standard starting pose is what i can see they all start with after the initial modelling stage.

the davinci stance per say is great for uv wrapping but not required when rigging.

milkshape does not have a feature that allows you to control certain polygons to puff out as if muscles are bulging in areas so there is a limit to what you can achieve.

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Seppuku Arts
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Posted: 9th Nov 2006 01:10
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Its all about wear you position the bones, I had this problem in Cinema 4D, I myself done the exact spot from each part, but if you encounter problems, usually you experiment for the desired result, unfortunately, you won't get physically accurate rigs for game models, as that is getting into more advanced rigs, but it also depends on where you connect rigs to the vertices, in some cases, using your vertices like this, in a rig isn't a good idea.



Notice on this dudes shoulder how the vertices are selected for the rig, this method works for me at least, whether its the proper way, I don't know.




Which incidentally by moving the bone, the shoulder there should be fine. Try applying the same principle, perhaps thinks will look better.



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dark heart
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Posted: 9th Nov 2006 01:56
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lol she looks angry! nice model.
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Xenocythe
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Posted: 9th Nov 2006 04:01
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Great Model

I myself am pretty good at milkshape animation. You can rotate the elbow then move the joint around until it fits, or re-rig the elbow portions. Thats usually what I do.

As for the belt, maybe its not that bad... I honestly forget about it in-game

But thats just me.


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Van B
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Posted: 9th Nov 2006 08:37
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I think the important thing is the share those vertices. Like a leg for example, maybe a bone from the ankle to the toes, but definately one from the ankle to the knee and one from the knee to the hip. I'd rig the top of the hip down to the row of verts past the knee bone onto the hip joint, then the row of verts above the knee bone downto the ankle onto the knee joint. That way the bones above and below the knee are 50/50, so they bend depending on both bones. If you don't rig some vertices to the shoulder, your elbows won't bend correctly because it's like the skin around the joints is stiff. Next time I'd suggest adding some extra vertices on the joints, like try to give them proper elbows helps no end in making your joints move smoothly.

Setting the weights is often necessary to get extra control, but with Milkshape I'm not sure how that works - I use CharacterFX which has really quick and easy bone rigging and vertice weight smoothing.

''Stick that in your text and scroll it!.''
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Fallout
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Posted: 9th Nov 2006 10:38
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Yeah, I think that's one of the main problems. I dont believe there are any weights in milkshape. You don't assign vertices to bones. Instead you assign them to joints and then any vertex assigned to a joint will have 100% effect/rotation around that joint. So where Seppuku appears to have weighting that fades out at the end of the bones, Milkshape isn't capable of doing that. I could be mistaken, but I don't think I am as I've been using this proggy for ages.

I think I can accept imperfection. The legs for example, I dont mind if they move through the belt so much, so long as they keep their general shape and polygons dont get inverted. Perhaps its time to try something else like CharacterFX? Van, have you successfully imported rigged/animated models from character fx into DBP?


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indi
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Posted: 9th Nov 2006 11:30
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I have a long time ago. I posted an animated centaur testing the package.
from that i realized it was more important to create a ground bone so i could balance the 4 legs off the ground at any point. same for bipeds as well if you want to add the jump to an animation without code etc..

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Seppuku Arts
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Posted: 9th Nov 2006 12:32
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I know Milkshape isn't capable of weighting, but I thought you could select the vertices as group to be effected by the bone, I showed the weight to illustrate better what I have selected, incidently, that should work, but if you can select the specific vertice in MS then thats of no use to you

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Van B
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Posted: 9th Nov 2006 13:52 Edited at: 9th Nov 2006 13:56
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CharacterFX is all I use for bone animations, it's just so easy, and I learnt it really quickly so I've kinda stuck with it - I tend to appreciate exact software, like being able to set the exact weight for a vertice attached to a joint, it kinda encourages you to persevere till it's right. The other factor is solid parts, like her boots - really you'd expect them to stay rigid, so the whole solid bit of boot would be assigned to a single bone. CFX gives good control for peanuts, that's if the author is still charging for it! - I'm not sure how well it's supported these days if at all though (although I've never had serious problems).

CharacterFX can import milkshape models, and simply exporting to .X with the default setting from CFX is enough to get it working in DBPro.

''Stick that in your text and scroll it!.''
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Fallout
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Posted: 9th Nov 2006 19:59
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Cool, thanks Van. Gonna check out the free trial version now, and if it's any good, I'll buy it. It's under £10 anyway, so that's a cheap fix if it helps me with my problemo.


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Seppuku Arts
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Posted: 9th Nov 2006 20:05
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Well...If you're going to buy an animator, best not waste that £10 on something like that, surely if you're will to pay that, I'm sure you can afford Endorphin which is a measly £8000, definitely worth it, or motion builder, still in the thousands...

Or you can just hit me with a spanner.

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Fallout
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Posted: 10th Nov 2006 00:42
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Hey, I think I might give that a miss. Although £8000 is tiny sum of money that someone like me would consider mere wishing-well fodder and would throw into the lap of a tramp just to ridicule him for his cheapness, I still dont think I'll pick it up. Not for financial reasons though, clearly ...

CharacterFX looks like it'll help, but I'm finding it a bit cumbersome. For example, rotating the perspective view to select vertices unselects "vertex assignment" mode, so you have to keep clicking between rotating the viewport and assigning vertex weights everytime. Or am I missing something? I was finding it was taking me a long time to just work on one section of the body. I'll stick at it though for a bit and see if I speed up my through-put a bit.


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Van B
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Posted: 10th Nov 2006 08:36
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One thing that does annoy is the windows system, you can do what you like with it, but you have to do it yourself. I tend to use 3 windows plus a perspective window, left, front, top and perspective. You can scroll and zoom with the mouse wheel, but yeah, it does take a little getting used to (stick with it though).

''Stick that in your text and scroll it!.''
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