Chapter 9 - Further Animation Practices - 11/17/2008
Skeletons and Kinematics - The Block Man - pages 360 thru 373

Chapter 9 - More Animation - 10/23/2009
Skeletons and Kinematics - The Block Man - pages 387 thru 402
Introducing Maya 2009 textbook (by Dariush Derakhshani)

  1. Character Setup Maya tutorials.

  2. Skeletons, Joints, and Rigging: Character setup or rigging is the general term used for the preparation of 3D models with their accompanying joints and skeletons for animation.

  3. Skeletons, Joints, Forward and Inverse Kinematics, Posing a character or object using the Skeleton.
  1. Here are the Maya version 8 files if you have trouble with opening Maya version 2008 files with your Maya PLE (Personal Learning Edition).
  2. What is the difference between Forward Kinematics and Inverse Kinematics? FK and IK are two different approaches to animating a rig, to animating a skeletal system.
  3. This lesson uses Forward Kinematics to animate the Block Man's walking action. Later in the chapter there will be more complicated animation that demonstrates IK, and how to apply it to make a smoother walking motion.
  4. Know the concepts of Hierarchy. Root, parent, child, sibling. All of the joints in the skeleton will be part of one hierarchy.
  5. Carefully read the material on the Pelvis being the Root and how that is traditionally the basis of all biped rigging, whether it be a Kung Fu Panda that seems to be more of a biped than a quadriped or a person or a character like Donald Duck.
  6. Skeleton menu, Joint tool.
  7. What is pick walking? What does the up arrow key do? What does the down arrow key do? What will the left arrow and the right arrow do?
  8. How do you attach a piece of geometry to a skeleton you have created?
  9. Notice that r_foot is a child of rt_ankle and is a sibling of rt_foot. r_foot is geometry (NURBS or POLYGON). rt_ankle and rt_foot are both joints and part of the skeleton hierarchy. There is a bone fromm rt_ankle joint to rt_foot joint. Study the following two diagrams very carefully here and in the textbook and in MAYA as work with these examples.
  10. Quiz on Wednesday, November 19th will cover only pages 360 to 366. The Block Man: Walk Cycle will NOT be on the quiz.

Download and practice files: The Block Man scene files (for Maya PLE version 8)

Download and practice files: The Block Man Scene files (for Autodesk Maya 2009).