3DS Max How to bind a skeleton to a biped

TorQue[MoD]

Hey all,

In this video https://youtu.be/rQqjPZNRLv8?t=16m20s

Frank talks about how he binds a skeleton to a biped so that he can take advantage of biped's ability to import mocap data and having everything seamlessly work in-engine (UDK).

I'm trying to figure out how he bound the two skeletons together. I remember re-creating this years ago but I can't for the life of me remember how it was done and I can't find any info on this online. Anyone here have any ideas?

antweiler

i have little knowledge of Max, but in Maya i would write a simple script that parent constrains the bones to the corresponding bones of the biped. You can then bake your animation or export it directly. This should be equally possible in Max. To have an animationrig (in this case biped) and an exportskeleton separated, is a common workflow.

TorQue[MoD]

I seem to remember that there was already a modifier in max to take care of this for you but maybe that's wishful memory? I found my original file where I re-created this but I can't see any evidence of the skeletons being constrained to each other. Maybe I did find a script for taking care of this but the gods only know what that was called.

laforced

http://www.scriptspot.com/3ds-max/scripts/character-on-biped

http://www.paulneale.com/temp/evolver/evolverBipedBinder.html

http://www.geoffsamuel.com/Projects.php

TorQue[MoD]

Thank you laforced! These are some great links. I believe Evolver Biped Binder is the one I want because I need to bind to an exisiting skeleton, not one I'm creating. I couldn't find a download link for it on that page though or anywhere else on the net for that matter.

laforced

Looks like Autodesk owns the website now.....
You could contact Paul Neale about the script,
he may have it archived somewhere.

laforced

In case you do not find a script, you can do it by hand.

1. Create biped that matches the bones in original skeleton and
align it to the original bone structure.

2. Then LINK each of the original bones to the matching biped bone.

It can take some time to do. The only tut I know of showing the
procedure was this guy http://www.trepaning.com/ however I
do not see the video listed. It was titled > D3_Rigging_3dsMax_Biped.avi
You may be able to dig around and find it, it was for Doom3, but showed
the linking bones to biped by hand.

NOTE: He does have a video that suggests bones and biped in Max, but have
not watched it so do not know if it covers the steps, it's the one called
Monster rigging bones and biped.

jgg

Has anyone got the evolverbinder script?

poopipe

If you link, you break the skeleton hierarchy and have to rebuild it when you export your skeleton-assuming it doesn't smash up all your transforms and ruin everything. It also doesn't guarantee your joints end up in the same place as the biped ones

  If you use position and orientation constraints for binding to the biped all those problems go away. 

However... 
If your biped isn't exactly the same shape as your original skeleton you're going to get distorted bones which you then have to fix.
 Building your skeleton based on the  biped in the first place is the simplest way to resolve this but there's nothing stopping you copying the animation over to an undistorted version of the skeleton. 

SchoolHomeVR

jgg said:

Has anyone got the evolverbinder script?

It is so useful to this day, there seems to be nothing better.  I finally found a copy, one hidden copy on all the web, and at a really obscure site that wasn't about 3dsmax! (I think it was stored even, HIDDEN there, to be found later!)  I have uploaded it, here is a link, PLEASE Try to spread it around, upload it to ScriptSpot or??