Corrective Deformations in Maya 2018

Name: Corrective Deformations in Maya 2018
Rating: 4.5 (13 reviews)

Correcting deformation problems in your Maya 2018 character rigs

Created byEric Kunzendorf

Last updated 7/2018

English

English [Auto],

What you'll learn

Implement solutions to bind deformations in character rigs

Course content

1 section • 13 lectures • 1h 29m total length

Course Introduction5:23
Master corrective deformations in Maya 2018 to achieve smoothly deforming characters beyond weight painting, focusing on hips, elbows, shoulders with blend shapes, orientation constraints, and distance-based poses.
Forearm Twist Correction8:17
Learn to implement forearm twist correction in Maya 2018 by adding a forearm upper form helper joint, orienting it, and painting weights to dampen wrist rotation.
Shoulder Helper Joint8:40
Create a shoulder helper joint in Maya 2018 to dampen the shoulder's x axis twist, using a multi linear node and counter joint, then transfer weights to prevent twisting.
Right Side Shoulder Helper Joint5:09
Duplicate the left shoulder setup to the right side, delete the unused upper arm, and transfer weights to the right shoulder joint using the paint weights tool and skin cluster.
Left Hip and Upper Leg Deformation Correction8:38
Create left and right hip joints in Maya 2018, set hip counters, duplicate and position a joint to control knee twist, transfer influences, and drive twist with a multi-node setup.
Right Hip and Upper Leg Deformation Correction8:08
Mirror skin weights to correct right hip and upper leg deformation in Maya, using a multi linear node trick to dampen knee twist and add hip and upper leg twist.
Elbow Blend Shape Creation7:53
Create an elbow blend shape in Maya to increase elbow pointedness and reduce the fold, using the shape editor after correcting the wrist constraint and rotation order.
Set Driven Keying Elbow Blend Shapes6:04
Set up elbow blend shapes with set driven keying, duplicate targets for symmetrical right and left arms, and load them as driven to control elbow rotation and blend shape values.
Creating Front Blend Shapes for the Legs7:13
Create left leg up front blend shapes in maya 2018 by adding a new target, sculpting and smoothing vertices, and using soft select to refine leg deformation.
Modeling Side and Back Blend Shapes for the Legs5:12
Model side and back leg blend shapes in Maya 2018 by sculpting left leg side and left leg back, then duplicate and flip to create six hip targets.
Setting Up Locators for Pose Triggered Deformation7:23
Create a locator-based system to fire corrective blend shapes for leg poses by measuring distances between hip locators and using a set range and linear multiply with master scale.
Pose Triggered Deformation by Setting Range6:40
Learn to drive pose triggered deformation in Maya 2018 by mapping distance to 0–1 with set range nodes and wiring to limb controls.
Creating and Connecting a Master Scale Attribute to the Pose Triggered System5:13
Learn how to connect a master scale attribute to a pose-triggered system in Maya 2018, using three multi double linear notes to ensure corrective deformation fires across the motion range.

Requirements

Ideally, you should have completed my course “Rigging a Low Poly Character in Maya 2018” or….
…You should have rigged characters before

Description

Are the shoulders of your rigs collapsing? Do your characters legs deform weirdly? Do the wrists and forearms of your characters collapse in mid-twist?

This course presents different techniques for creating corrective deformations to compensate for the inherent problems with joint based deformations. Helper joints and Blend Shapes are the two main Maya features the author explores and combines these with Set Driven Key techniques. The author also presents a node-based, Pose-triggered corrective technique using Maya's internal node structures.

Who this course is for:

Artists looking for solutions to deformation problems in their rigs