[RIGGING] Pinning locators to verts [Maya]

slipsius

Hey all,

Ive started to look into facial rigging for games, and Im using a PDF by Jeremy Ernst, about his presentation at GDC. Its called "Fast and Efficient Facial Rigging in Gears of War 3". Absolutely amazing setup he used, but Im having issues duplicating it. Not surprising seeing as he works at epic and I'm just learning, but none the less, I'm trying it.

His setup lets you animate with blend shapes, but the blend shapes then transfer over to bones, which is AWESOME because I much prefer blend shapes.

So, my main issue so far is that I don't know how to pin a locator to verts in maya. From what I understand is that I need to pin a locator to a vert, then parent my bone to the locator (Im skipping the offset part of it). Ive tried using the "point on poly" constraint, but, the locator rotates all funky, and spins when just translating the vert. And if i parent my bone to that, the joint translations dont change, so baking the animation wouldnt do anything in game?

Anyone have any tips of advice? Cheers

Stefan

Edit: Figured how to get the bone to move with the locator, and have translation values changed. Used a point constraint. So now when i move the vert, the locator moves, which moves the joint and applies a translation change. But the locator still spins all wonky and stuff. its weird

Warheart

With the point on poly constraint the constrained object will rotate to match the normal of the surface at the point it is constrained. Is that what it looks like, or is there 'weird' rotation that does not follow the normal of the surface?

MikeF

Try checking out the rivet .mel script. I dont have a direct link since im on a tablet rite now, but i believe its on creativecrash. I use it on a daily basis for pretty much exactly what you need it for, its a life saver

Wesley

Why are you skipping the offset part?

slipsius

I dont need the offset part. Dont need it to be that high quality.

rivet.mel eh? ill give it a shot. thanks mike

and warheart, ill move the vert 2 inches in the positive x, and the locator will spin around 20 times.

Warheart

@MikeF what benefit does the rivet script have over the 'point on poly' constraint? I know the theory behind how it works (i.e. attachment to surface via hair follicle) but I've never used it.

I was under the impression that the point on poly constraint effectively outmoded that rivet script.

@slipsius the position of the point on poly constraint is based off the UV coordinates if I remember rightly. Did you make any changes to your UVs between the base mesh and the blendshapes?