Max bones

Eric Chadwick

Haven't created a bones rig in awhile. What's the best way of duplicating the finger bones? I created the index finger, but shift-copying for the other three causes all sorts of wonkiness. Mirroring works fine to get the opposite limb, but to create the first hand, I guess I need to create each of the five digits manually?

Mark Dygert

Unlink the first bone in the finger from the rest of the hand, mirror the finger, move it, and re-link each of the first finger bones to the hand. Make sure to use the "mirror bone" in Animation > Bone Tools, not the regular mirror tool.

Eric Chadwick

Ah, unlink. Thanks Vig.

Another question... is there a way to set the default bone width & height? I wish they were 1 instead of 4.

Eric Chadwick

If I move the root Spine bone in Bone Edit mode, the upper spine bones move with it but the femur bones do not. Maybe I'm not supposed to use the Link tool to link the femurs to the root?

Mark Dygert

Before you create a bone, edit the properties in the creation "Bone parameters tab" any bone created after that during this session will default to those properties.

You can also select bones in mass and in bone tools > Fin Adjustment Tools you can redefine the bones height/width and fin parameters.

I'm not understanding the edit bone question...

Eric Chadwick

Doing everything in Bone Tools. First click near the belly button, then clicked at the femur top, then knee, heel, toe. Mirrored this. I guess I should be creating the pelvis/sacrum bone first? Then select this and Create Bones to start chain for the hip/femur/tibia/heel/toe?

Mark Dygert

Well if you already have a bone there, you can use refine and then click on the femur near the top and it will divide the bone into two, and use refine to slide the new bone around into position.

If you create the legs separately without selecting the root bone first you'll need to link them manually to the root. If everything comes from the root (legs flow down, spine flows up) then you should be doing it right.

Eric Chadwick

Annoying to see Max is still doing goofy crap with their Bones. Like if I attempt to move a child in Bone Edit Mode, its siblings are left behind, they don't realign with the parent. Or if I move the root bone in Bone Edit Mode, its length goes nuts.

Mark Dygert

I previously didn't see that you where in bone edit mode, yea things get dodgy quick with that turned on, especially with more then one bone linked to the one your editing. works fine in a straight chain... except it doesn't like undoing anything done in bone edit mode. =/

Mark Dygert

One thing I also forgot to mention...

You can get around some of the 3+ bone linking issues by placing a dummy at the beginning of each bone hierarchy. So for example, each leg bone would start with a dummy that links to the root bone (your center of mass can be a dummy also), instead of linking the bones directly to other bones. It helps keep your bone chains separate chains. It also helps with bone edit tools.

Eric Chadwick

Ah, nice tip. Thanks Vig.