Doc:2.4/Tutorials/Animation/BSoD/Character Animation/Neck shoulders and arms

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Neck and shoulders

Starting from the head created in the last section of the tutorial, we'll extrude the rest of the body.

Note
In this section of the tutorial we're only worried about the geometry: which vertices are connected to which and how many vertices there are. So don't worry about extruding vertices exactly as they are in the screenshots. In the next section, there will be plenty of time for shaping the body.


  • Delete the vertex shown in Delete vertex to extrude neck.
  • AltRMB Template-RMB.png to loop-select the surrounding vertices, and extrude downward to form the neck as in Extrude the neck.
  • Shape the neck vertices so they're more even with each other, and loop cut (CtrlR) as shown in Reshape neck and loop cut around the head. This will give us more vertices to work with when creating the shoulder.
Delete vertex to extrude neck.
Extrude the neck.
Reshape neck and loop cut around the head.


During this tutorial we've been making many loop cuts. Most of the time, the way I know to tell you to make a loop cut is because after some trial and error, it looks like the next couple steps are going to need some extra vertices to make things come out correctly. For example, I tried making the shoulder without the loop cut we just made, and found it would be difficult. So I backed up a couple steps and made the loop cut, and that's where we are now.

When you're making your own model, generally you'll try to work with the vertices you have, and then make loop cuts or add vertices when you find you can't make the shapes you want with the vertices you have. This cuts down on unnecessary complexity of the mesh.

Extruding the neck and reshaping 2.
  • Extrude the neck and shape it as in Extruding the neck and reshaping 2.


Extruding the chest.
  • Extrude the front three vertices down, as in Extruding the chest as well as the back three vertices (you can see them extruded in Building the shoulder 1). )(SHOULD THIS SAY THE BACK TWO VERTICES? No, because this could very. How about, "Extrude the required number of back side vertices so that it mirrors the just extruded front.)


Building the shoulder 1.
  • Extrude the top corners of the shoulder down (Building the shoulder 1).


Building the shoulder 2.
  • Make triangle faces out of the newly extruded vertices and the neighboring vertices (Building the shoulder 2).


Building the shoulder 3.
  • Extrude the bottoms of the triangles down (Building the shoulder 3).


Building the shoulder 4.
  • Extrude the front middle two vertices down ('Building the shoulder 4).


Building the shoulder 5.
  • Make a quad face in the obvious spot (Building the shoulder 5).


Building the shoulder 6.
  • Make a quad face on the back to close the mesh (Building the shoulder 6).


Building the shoulder 7.
  • Connect the front and back below the armpit by selecting the 2 vertices and hitting F to make a 2-vertex face - that is, an edge (Building the shoulder 7).


Building the shoulder 8.
  • Extrude the entire bottom edge downward (Building the shoulder 8).


Building the shoulder 9.
  • Loop-cut the newly created face (Building the shoulder 9).


Shaping the root of the arm.
  • Finally, reshape the shoulder area so that the empty hole forms the shape of the arm (Shaping the root of the arm).


Extruding the arm

Next, we'll make the arm by extruding, moving, and scaling rings of vertices.

  • Select the ring of vertices shown in Shaping the root of the arm.
  • Extrude the vertices, move them to the right, and scale them a little.
  • Extrude, move, and scale for a total of 6 extrusions (Extruding the arm 1-6).
  • Note that we're putting an extra loop around the elbow. That will help it bend better when we start animating.
Extruding the arm 1.
Extruding the arm 2.
Extruding the arm 3.


Extruding the arm 4.
Extruding the arm 5.
Extruding the arm 6.


Making the hand

Now we'll make the hand. It'll be a simple "mitten" type hand since we're trying to keep it simple here . . .

  • Extrude the end of the arm several times to make the hand (Extruding the hand 1-4).
Extruding the hand 1.
Extruding the hand 2.


Extruding the hand 3.
Extruding the hand 4.


Widening the hand from top view.
  • Widen the hand (7 NumPad for top view, S to scale, Y to constrain scale axis), as in Widening the hand from top view.


  • Close off the end of the hand with faces (F, Closing off the hand).
Closing off the hand 1.
Closing off the hand 2.
Closing off the hand 3.


Shaped hand, with square face to extrude thumb from.
Thumb extruded from hand.
  • Now spend some time shaping the hand. I prefer to turn Subsurf on in Edit Mode when doing this kind of work.
  • While you're shaping, make room for the thumb to be extruded. I made sure there was a square face for the thumb to be extruded (Shaped hand, with square face to extrude thumb from).
  • Extrude the thumb from the hand, as in Thumb extruded from hand. Up until this point, everything we have extruded has been an edge. This is the first time we're extruding a face, so we'll get some options from an Extrude menu. Select Region from the extrude menu. This is the most commonly used option, and you can experiment with the other options to see what they do.
Note
When you extrude a face, there is a orange line that the extruded region moves along. This is so that the extruded faces have the same orientation as the "parent" face. To cancel this constrained move, click the MMB Template-MMB.png to get into free move mode.


Don't forget to save a version with F2-+ NumPad-↵ Enter!

The character so far is shown below. Next, we'll create the rest of the torso and make some legs.

The character so far.


Next: Torso, legs, and feet

Previous: Finishing the head

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