cgmRigs: How to get the most out of them

Knowledge.Tutorials

Getting Started

  • Install the toolbox – If you want to fully experience our rigs, you’re going to need our tools.

Tips

  • Beware the pose library. It works fine for Josh, but crashes David’s maya. The rest should be working fine.
  • Set keys for speed – If you open the rig and it is slow, this is to be expected. To enable parallel evaluation you must have at least two slightly different keys on the timeline for Maya to evaluate properly and things will speed up a great deal. We’re seeing ~real time playback.

It’s important to note that most of our rigs are setup with MRS – the Morpheus Rigging System. As such, you’re going to want to check out some demos on how to use the system.

 

MRS Standard Features

Template Driven Rigging System

  • Proxy geo creation from rigBlocks to save modeler time
  • Build Profiles  – One template, multiple build type system

mrsAnimate – Animation UI/Marking Menu for rig interaction

  • Control,Part,Puppet,Scene contextual functionality
    • Mirroring
    • Mode switching
    • Resetting
    • Toggling options
    • Pose System | modified use of  Red9’s pose config

mrsBuilder – Rig builder UI

  • Manage, add, connect rigBlocks
  • Push rigBlocks through build states
  • Generate puppet mesh

Quality of Life

  • Display layer setup per asset
  • Sets – QSS sets puppet, each part, Bake, Delete
  • Clean Hierarchy setup

Tech

  • Controller Support | pickwalking, parallel targeted
  • Joint Tags | Maya tagging for better functionality with maya tools
  • Joint Based Facial setup being expanding and improved
  • Direct joint control with transparent proxy shapes where possible for selection ease
  • IK
    • Ribbon setup
    • Stretch
    • Lock mid where possible
    • Explicit control of ik handles
  •  FK
    • Mirror behavior
    • Unlocked translates for more control
  • Segment
    • No flip bases
    • Ribbon twist setup
  • Ribbons
    • Reparameterization blending
  • Scale
    • Scalable controls
    • Squash stretch setups | single, both
    • Multiple methods | ArcLen, PointDist
  • Bank setup
    • Full featured foot setup with multiple points of articulation
  • Space Pivots – setup for IK controls to have constrainable spaces for those controls
  • rigNodes – Blocks buffer all nodes during build to aid in later optimization pushes and clean rig deletion
Josh Burton

[MRS Project Lead | CG Monks] Josh is an animator turned TD who hails from Oklahoma, pre-undergrad in the Marine Corps, animation basics at Savannah College of Art and Design, cut his teeth in gaming and commercials before co-founding CG Monks and more recently the CG Monastery. The Morpheus Rigging System is a culmination of years of R&D and he is now thrilled to see what users can create, collaborate and expand on with this open source MRS platform.