Maya 6 for Windows and Macintosh: Visual QuickStart Guide

Chapter 10. Skeletons and Inverse Kinematics

Once you model a character, you need to place a skeleton inside it in order to animate it. The skeleton is built as a hierarchy of individual joints connected by bones.

In general, nature serves as the best template for placing joints: Use pictures of skeletons, human or animal (Figure 10.1). A shoulder joint should go at the shoulder; an elbow joint should go at the elbow; and so on. However, you don’t need to be too literal. For example, although the human foot has 26 bones, you can animate a shoe with three bones. Wherever you want something to bend, that’s where you need a joint.

Figure 10.1. Inside ...