Autodesk Maya 2013 Essentials

Chapter 11

Rigging Your Character

With your skeleton in place and attached to your model, the next step is to rig your character for animation. Character rigging creates controls for making rotating joints easier and speeding up your animation workflow.

• Understanding basic rigging concepts
• Setting up the leg controls
• Setting up the torso control
• Setting up the character control
• Creating a custom shelf

Understanding Basic Rigging Concepts

Before you get started, it’s helpful to understand the two types of joint rotation you’ll be working with: forward kinematics and inverse kinematics. Kinematics describes the motion of objects and groups of objects without considering the force that moves those objects—in other words, how the joints in our ...