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[edit] Some Beginner Rigs

This page will assume that you're still new to working with armatures and snapping operations, so these tutorials will be more specific about how to do each step. All of the following tutorials will assume that you know when to use operations like snapping.

If you having trouble with the directions on this page, then please refer to The Armature Object page.

[edit] The Squash n' Stretch Ball

See this article's discussion page for some additional information about this tutorial.

This is a great first-time rig. We're going to use the principle of squash n' stretch to make this animatable bouncing ball.

Start off with an empty scene and set the cursor to the origin, Shift C. Add a sphere. I'm going to use an icosphere because I like 'em. Set smooth on the sphere so it looks nice and not all faceted. Exit EDIT mode, clear the rotation with Alt R, and then reenter EDIT mode. Place the cursor 1 unit above the origin and snap it to the grid withShift S. Press the . key to use the cursor as the pivot point. Now scale the sphere down to 0.5, holding the Ctrl key. Exit edit mode.

Place the cursor back to the origin and add an armature. Turn on X-Ray in the Armature panel. In OBJECT mode, clear the rotation of the armature with Alt R. Enter EDIT mode and place the tip of the bone as shown.

Snap the cursor to the tip point and add a new bone. Select the new bone and scale it down to 0.3, while holding Ctrl.

Name the big bone, "stretch", and the little bone, "target".

Change the bone display mode to Envelope. Select the bone and scale it up, as shown. Select target and turn Deform off, in the F9 Armature Bones panel.

Exit EDIT mode and select the mesh. Give it an Armature Modifier(link), and type "Armature" (no quotes) into the Ob: field. Give the mesh three constraints: Location, Rotation, and Scale. Put "Armature" (no quotes) into the Ob: field for each constraint.

Now for one last step. Select the armature, enter POSE mode, select stretcho, and give it a Stretch To constraint. Put "Armature" in the OB: field, and put "target" in the BO: field.

To make the rig easy to work with, you should put it back into octahedron display mode.

[edit] Some Extra Info

The reason why you want to use Stretch To for this character is that it automates the squashing and stretching for you. If you animated the rotating and scaling by hand, then you would have to create the squash n' stretch (expanding and thinning) effect manually (very inefficient).

You can probably animate the armature object to make the ball bounce around. If you want, you could instead use a COG bone, where both bones would be the children. See the rigging preface for info on COG bones.

[edit] The Dancing Palm Tree

The completed file is here : Media:The_Dancing_Palm_Tree.blend

Switch to the FrontView NumPad 1, reset the cursor with Shift C, add an armature, and clear its rotation Alt R in object mode. Change the Rotation/Scale Pivot to 3D cursor(.). In edit mode, make the bone 2 units tall, standing parallel with the Z axis. Use Shift S where needed. Select the bone and subdivide it (W) two times. Enable X-Axis Mirror, select the tip point at the end of the chain and mirror-extrude it with Shift E, extrude twice more with E to make the leafy-looking chains (these are just for show; after all, it is a palm tree!), then disable X-Axis Mirror. Return Rotation/Scale Pivot to Bounding Box Center (,).

Snap the cursor to the tip again (of the fourth "vertical" bone), add a new bone, and name it "target". Snap the cursor to the root point at the bottom (beginning of the chain), add a new bone, and name it "warped". Add another new bone, and move the tip down 0.2 units (holding Ctrl), just so we can see it. Name this bone "widget". (It is easier to select the "widget" bone in wire frame.)

Select widget, and then Shift select warped, and press Ctrl P, and choose "Keep Offset" from the Make Parent menu. Select target and then Shift select widget, and use Ctrl P again, and choose the same option. You've now got a hierarchy like this:

• warped
  • widget
    • target
• other bones...

In pose mode, select target and then select the last of the vertical bones in the chain, press Shift I (and then confirm) to IK constrain the chain to target.

In pose mode, select warped and press S to scale, followed by Shift Z to scale on X and Y only, and take it down to 0.5. Place warped and target onto (bone)layer 3, M3 and place widget into layer M2. You should only have layers 1 and 2 visible. (Bone Layers Display Panel) Now rotate widget and watch it dance!

[edit] Some Extra Info

You could also do something like this with a propagating rotations spine rig, but you would have to have a rotating parent bone at the root of the spine to make the base rotate side to side.

[edit] Expanding Punching Glove Arm

Add your armature and--as always--clear its rotation while in object mode. In side view, draw some bones as shown. Be precise with your bone placements, especially for this rig.

Place the cursor back at the origin (Ctrl C), select all the bones, set the cursor as the pivot point (.), press Ctrl M to mirror the bones, and select the "Z Global" option from the pop-up menu.

Editor's note Note that it is possible to create such a rig by using the setup presented above and by adding a separate armature to control stretch of original bones. The separate stretch armature should contain one bone like in the image. After you have separate armature for scaling, make it parent of the original armature. Now if you scale the scaling armature on x axis, punching glove expands/shrinks as it should. Further you can add a scaling constraint on scaling armature. Set minY, minZ, maxY and maxZ on and put 1.00 as their value. This will ensure that scaling will scale only x axis automatically. Note that you are not limited to use only armature as scaling object. You can practically use any object for that. Just remember to make it parent of the original armature and add a scaling constraint if you feel like it.

Sorry, I gotta shift my focus to the other pages right now, but I will be back!

--Wavez 13:16, 18 July 2006 (CEST)

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