A rigging question

jman86

Hello everyone. I hope all is well. I have a question that I hope someone can shed a little light on. I know this might sound dumb but I just need clarification on a few things. I'm rigging in Maya, and my mesh is broken down like it should with the removal of parts that will never be seen. I know that you would tend to rig the body first and then any additional things, but since the mesh is broken up the way it is, should I consider the body, suit, gloves, shin pieces, and shoes as the "body" and rig that together? And then after that, add or copy joints or paint weights to the accessories? 

antweiler

I recommend to build a (kind of low rez) mesh for the whole body, on which you can paint weights comfortly. When you use this "Base skin" to copy the weights to the individual parts, you get identical weights on overlapping parts.

jman86

antweiler said:

I recommend to build a (kind of low rez) mesh for the whole body, on which you can paint weights comfortly. When you use this "Base skin" to copy the weights to the individual parts, you get identical weights on overlapping parts.

Okay, so if I"m understanding right, basically create a much lower res of the whole body, weight it and copy on to the game mesh version and tweak from there.

antweiler

It can be lower where you want the weights to be smooth on the target, but should carry the detail you need.