Ready to Rig model , need help with the topology !
This one is model using for game, cause it gonna be use for some cutscenes and game menu so i have i have to increase its polycount, it will have some LOD models using for gameplay later .
The reason i split it into parts cause i think this one is wearing armor so i if want these splitted parts wont be deform by skinning weight affect by other armor part on his body when i do the rigging and their texture wont be strecth out.
I wanna ask for some insight and feedbacks cause i still new to rigging model and maybe there is something i didnt know about
usually i alway mergeing the mesh of the model into 1 single mesh but this one is wearing armor so im not sure about some parts on his body
Like his arm,fist,foot and head mesh and shoulder armor are seperate mesh,
I think its better for weight value and avoid strecht out on some part i dont want to like the bracelet on his wrist
Happy to receive any ideas, comments as I don't have much experience with rigging and only started to learn by myself recently.
Best,
Replies
You might get more help here: https://polycount.com/categories/technical-talk
I think you have loads of optimizing to do. The mesh is really dense and in many places just doesn't need it. Almost all my figures are broken up into 3 or 4 parts depending on overlap and proximity. Are you going to bake textures for this, or hand paint them? Maybe spelling out what your end goal is and what software you are using would help.
@kanga thank you for the help ! this one is model using for game, cause it gonna be use for some cutscenes and game menu so i have i have to increase its polycount, it will have some LOD models using for gameplay later .
The reason i split it into parts cause this one is wearing armor so i want these splitted parts wont be deform by skinning weight affect by other armor part on his body when i do the rigging and their texture wont be strecth out.
I wanna ask for some insight and feedbacks cause i still new to rigging model and maybe there is something i didnt know about
Hey! I think having seperate parts is fine.
I would start by skin weighting the underlying body to joint hierarchy, then rigid part to their respective joints. For areas that should follow the body, one can transfer skin weights from the body.
You can also look into transferring skin weights from proxy meshes, might help to get consistent weights across multiple parts.
Also important to have a test animation to scrub through for checking the deformations.
@Fabi_G thank you alot for the info !!!
For the parts of your mesh that are going to deform I think it's better to have clean edgeloops running perpendicular to the bone. It seems like the upper arms, neck, abdominal region, groin, and the back of the knee are the parts of this mesh that are going to deform, while everything else is solid armor, so those are the parts I would personally consider retopologizing. I wouldn't even worry about losing detail, normal maps really let you get away with a lot.
You could get away with using this topology, it's just going to make weight painting more of a headache. The reason clean edgeloops are nice is because you can make the transition of influence between two bones a smooth gradient.
By the way, I'm a big Kamen Rider fan too, can't wait to see the finished result! 😁
Usually these issues are thouthg about when designing the character, long before the modeling is started.
If it's difficult to judge range of movement just in a 2D concept, or to figure out how things would deform, then it's often helpful to make a simple blockout model and do a quick rig and animation for it. Then the rough shapes can be refined, and the concept cleaned up for style etc.
But yeah you've kind of backed yourself into a corner, with a character that's not designed for animated movement.
for armor i'd just give flat 100% assignment of each shell to the nearest joint, then run it through the various animations and smooth out specific parts where needed (like probably the torso).
that would probably be the most efficient way to get the skinning good.
also go and make sure you set realistic expectations - often in AAA games you see rigid armor pieces that bend unrealistically, and even occasional clipping. Perfection may be possible but probably not worth weeks of time to prevent tiny amount of clipping.
i always recommend the ng skin tools plugin for maya because it allows you to work with non-destructive layers.
I don't see what is the issue here - it looks like something totally standard really, as semi organic armors like this are common place ever since, say, UTIII.
Plus it looks like the character is from Tokusatsu/Kamen Rider anyways, and toku armors are made of foam ...
What is precisely the issue ? It sounds like you are worried about skin weighting, but you aren't showing any posed screenshots.
Just transfer the skin weights from any clean base body you have from this project (or auto-weight from the bones), then set the parts that dont need to deform as rigid, and ... done, really. It's less than an hour worth of work.