Rig layout - Crane

I've had a quick think about Eddie's Crane's skeleton and these are my initial thoughts.

As Ed's experience with animating in Maya is pretty limited the salient factor here is to keep it as simple and easy to use as possible - so he can become acquainted with it asap (times a tickin!)

Another consideration to bear in mind is the animation style of the 2d stuff. This will eventually be composited on an after effects animation (2d) and as far as I know it will be animated in a cut out origami style. So whilst the Crane's animations should be consistent with the rest of the piece (so as not to look out of place), it should also be anatomically accurate in order to mimmick the creatures real movements.

This initial rig (minus the wings) uses a spline ik to control the neck - Cranes have a lot of articulation in this area, and I was considering using a dynamic chain to control its body (at least in flight) to reduce controls. 

The legs will be controlled by a standard ik rp solver with non-flip polevector controller for when the bird is walking around.


There will also need to be some sort of hand/finger setup as birds use their feet to grip like humans do with their hands. Because the shot we are after is fairly static in this area, nothing fancy is required, a set driven key allowing a clenching ability will suffice.

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Testing

I've tested this setup and it doesn't achieve the correct articulation - the head will not remain locked - independant of the body and the neck could do with more joints to achieve tighter arcs.

Origami Crane modeling reference

Great example of an origami crane, I've shown this to Ed and he agrees it is the sort of look we're after.

Nice pose it is pulling, I have gathered other pieces of reference material which show how the crane will be animated. This will affect how the models topology will be layed out.

crane reference

Home video footage of a crane for reference which illustrates their ranges of motion quite nicely whilst pottering around on the ground. It's clear to see Cranes are not fast movers (at least these ones aren't) and amble along at their own pace. 

Clearly the most expressive part of the Crane is the neck and will be an important part of the rig and I have made a few observation based on these pieces of footage:

• The Cranes neck is able to rotate and pivot at any point.
• When the head moves around the body tends to stay still and when the body moves around the head stays still, as if it were locked onto something or like the two were disjointed.
• Thus poses and shapes created with the neck are not solely down to head movement, but on some occasions the head locks still and the body moves into position.
• When the crane bends down it pivots from the hips like a see-saw motion - on this occasion the back end stuck up as the head went down - perhaps the neck and spine have to remain fairly straight so the bird cant have its tail and head on the ground simoultaneously?
• They make horrible noises

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Crane Dance

Much of the same here, but with a little more interaction with each other. Wing flap similar motion to take off -they have a sense of weightlessness (obviously) and appear to defy gravity. This is good wingflap reference material as it goes through the ranges of motions and also shows how they tuck away - another aspect of the rig I shall have to consider. 

The legs go in a reverse direction to humans - the upper thigh is at a reverse angle to its shin, so that's something to look out for when thinking about its rigid walk cycle - it's legs remain pretty stiff despite the joint, so might look into ik stiffness to achieve this.   

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Key areas for consideration

1. the head and the body - the ability to lock one off and move the other to create pose (which is achievable through ik)
2. Having enough articulation in the neck areas to form those tight bends (geometry will have to be generous for decent enough deformation).
3. The root should be placed at the bottom of the neck/top of the back so the crane bends at this point.
4. The back itself appears quite rigid (I will look into some skeletal informaion to confirm this) so wont require a huge number of joints.
5. Legs are on backwards, walk cycle quite stiff and hip rather than knee reliant.

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Image Reference

Nice shot of the Cranes wing which gives some indication how the wings fold and the inclination of the lower leg area.

The neck of the background bird has retracted slightly into the body making it appear shorter and importantly fatter! The neck joint structure, i'm thinking will resemble a spinewave rig, with squash and stretch which maintains volume.

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Crane  Skull

Image of a Crane skull, the entire skeleton has eluded me for now but this gives some indication of the bone density thats present in the neck to allow all that movement.

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Bird Skeleton

Found this image of a bird skeleton, not sure of the species - doubt its a Crane, but looks fairly similar. The hip placement appears higher than the Cranes, but the back and ribcage are totally rigid like I suspected  in the first video reference. This will simplify the body rigging process.

Gradient Control

Useful link I found regarding working with the "Gradient Control" command which creates a ramp widget. This I have seen in a rigging showreel used to good effect to control the deformation of a characters torso/limbs and could be useful for the usbman rig.

Workflow

bad animation rig:

• Confusing interaction - Move controller to the right, character moves to the left, doesn't correspond.
• Difficult to find controls.
• Animator thinks more about the technology than the art - computer animation is difficult, shouldn't have to think about the technology more than needs to be.
• Medically damaging - Physically (RSI) and mentally (postal) - make rig thats least painful as possible, don't have to do too many things at once.

good animation rig:

• Easy to use.
• Consistent behavior.
• Gives the animator the control they need - dont over provide, gets confusing.
• Fast and interactive. 
• Provides the right amount of detail at the right time. 
• Allows the animator to do their job without compromising their ideas

balance:

• Performance requirements of char or prop.
• Manipulation and interaction needs of the animator.
• Technical requirements of the character or prop - function and purpose, solve performance requirements only.
• Communicate any limitations with the animator.

steps to creating a good anomation rig:                                                           

1. Analyze the problem.
2. Test possible solutions.
3. Analyze the solution.
4. Re-create the solution cleanly - make sure there are no surplus nodes.
5. Re-create the solution again using code, easier to alter in future than re-creating the whole rig.

developing guidelines:                                                                                   

• How the rig should work
• Animation Requirements:
• How the character should act
• What it needs to be able to do
• Rig Requirements
• Standard animation rig specs
• Determined to help ensure consistency,ease of use etc.

professional tips:

• Keep a copy of the scene (geo only) saved separately - when you work on
• different components of the rig you can keep referring to it and be sure there are no extra "dirty nodes" that may clutter the scene.
• Make it transferable - be able to update the rig with later models/names.
• This can be done by using controls for movemen.
• Controls should be unique and understandable - Iconic representation (could use
• text symbols). ask animators feedback - what types of things makes sense to them.
• Arrows movement - arcs rotation
• Naming conventions - make it solid, develop one that makes sense :

_geo Geometry

_anim Animation controls

_joint Joints

_skin Joints used for skinning

_grp Group Nodes

_shad Shaders

_tex Textures

• Limited keyability - hide channel box attributes that are not needed.
• Create a work in progress directory (WIP) and place in same directory as Library folder.
• Set the project in here - incremental saves should be placed in here.
• Investigate best solution for problems.

gimbal mode:                                                                                                

• Set rotation order according to movement ie, which axis will be used the most should notn affect the other axis. Animation should be done in Gimbal to keep track of animation curve to maintain readability.
• Which axis is most important for the animator?

 

automation:

• Does animation occur by itself (ie using expressions/dynamics) or does the animator arbitrate it?

post requirements:                                                                                        

• Limit Control Selection
• Clean Rig Presentation
• RRP - Rig Relocation Program, allow for rig to be moved and rotated anywhere in the scene and still work within all space.

Test Animation Rig - Either yourself or get an animator to do it!!

Story Board

1.

These are the initial sketches handed to me by Dave for the toxic boy poem. From these images I can assertain what sorts of ranges of motion is required from the rig and determine what is required.


The establishing frames feature a rat navigating the air vents until he reaches a grate - toxic boy is sat in the room behind sucking up intoxicants.

As far as the rig requirements goes here, some articulation in the mask to allow his breathing pipe to sniff about and a dynamic switch over so maya can sort out the secondary stuff in future scenes. 


2.

3.

Rig Requirements

Torso Rig

• Allows for rotation of the hips and shoulders
• Allows for rotation in all axis - bend twist and side
• Allows for independant motion of hips and shoulders