Thrust Vectoring Nozzle Rig

HAWK12HT

Hi everyone, looking to learn some 3ds max mechanical rigging particularly thrust vectoring nozzle of jet engines and I must be doing a wrong search all I see are hydraulic crane tutorials and pistons. Do note I havent given a proper time yet going through all the stuff I have found on youtube and vimeo regarding mechanical rigging in 3ds max I am pretty sure those will get me going for basics.Just if anyone know more advanced 3ds mechanical rigging stuff that would help a lot. Thank you

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ss96tsbG5KY

Eric Chadwick

Moving this from General Discussion to Technical Talk.

Also I recommend embedding youtube to make it easier to see (✅ How to embed Youtube). People are more likely to respond when you make it easier for them.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ss96tsbG5KY

HAWK12HT

Hey thanks Eric, usually the videos get auto embed here this is a first it just stayed as link. 

Eric Chadwick

Yeah it used to just work, but as of about 2 years ago Vanilla Forums changed the code so now it interprets all http:// to be links. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

HAWK12HT

oh got it, so by any chance know some place I can get into advance IK FK stuff without max script coding?  I found few on youtube lets see what I can do with those but I doubt it would be anything close to this. 

Eric Chadwick

That articulated nozzle is pretty insane, lots of sliding joints and constraints. 

If I had to set this up I'd try to abstract it a bit. In 3ds Max I would try setting up some control Splines, with the meshes on Path Constraints, or something similar.

This may be too complex for a starting task though. If you want to start to learn rigging, I would choose some standard rig ideas, like a foot-heel IK rig. Or a rotating wrist rig. Then you can take the things you learn from those rigs and apply them to more complex things. 

Eric Chadwick

What rigs have you made already? Have you done anything from scratch yet?

Have you seen Paul Neale's site?
http://paulneale.com/tutorials/facial-rigging-method-which-is-best-for-you-and-your-production/

HAWK12HT

I have done long long time ago those crane IK FK , Leg joints, look at constraints, robot arms so I have the general idea and making those.
Found Neales 4 hour long videos on Youtube that might help also found one on Vimeo this one shows making sliders to control (set limit) to your joints so gonna follow this up. 

for now I just want to go for the back nozzles only widening and contracting without intersecting meshes, plus at the moment not sure if this constraint and control spline will work in Unreal or not. Setting myself for a fail lol    

https://vimeo.com/242992222

Eric Chadwick

Only forward kinematics hierarchies will export/import to Unreal afaik.

HAWK12HT

this just got interesting, so much to look into. So far the tutorials I have found are using IK and or look at stuff with expressions controllers etc. Guess I should first focus on getting my rig as its just overwhelming thinking ahead for unreal at this stage. Thank you, please do share more light on the rigging if you have more sources! 

Eric Chadwick

I haven't done a ton of this. But I have seen riggers create a complex rig for animation and editing, then add an abstraction layer on top that converts all motion into standard FK for export. So, the IK drives the FK.

For example, a complex cloth sim drives individual FK bones that then drive a simplified cloth which can be exported via FBX.

HAWK12HT

I ll pretend I understood everything you said  

Time to make this happen!!! Thanks a lot mate!