I managed to get it done by rigging up a lot of vines, I am ashamed to say the solution was pretty simple. Rig, skin then use the IK-Spline handle tool to attach them to the curves on the arms then you can scale the vines along those curves by keying the joint scale as long as it is kept uniform. Can also animate the IK…
yep IK Spline works too! didn't think of it. joint rotation is a draw back, similar to using motion path constraints. you can give ribbons a go too, handles joint rotation much better thank SplineIK. otherwise works pretty much the same. hacks maya's hair system to pin joints a long a nurbs surface. A lot of stretchy limbs…