How to animate smoothly. Help here.

I found this very helpful. Thanks to Jeb.

Thanks, stupid me, I was trying 4 joints...

This should help a lot thanks :D

for lower poly joints if there is more then one person in your model or something like hopefalls recent chariot you should weld the 2 inner verts so it forms a triangle at the vertex.

Very close to correct, but you guys just bent it the wrong way....

For low poly joints, the 2 verts belong on the side that squashes, and the 1 rigid vert belongs on the outside that stretches....
This will produce much better quality animations...

Hope this helps!

Peace,
-DB

yes, if you go by jeb's, than everytime someone would bend their arm, they would add another segment in the middle, and of course, as we all know, thats not what happens.

very useful

-STICKIED-

well if your going to sticky it, edit the post to make sure that the right information is at the top

Actually Sturm, the information at the top isnt wrong, its right... it just doesnt show us much more than the fact that 1 and 2 height segments isnt enough for animation....
The only problem was the first joint example that explained the bending backwards.. I just wanted to make sure people didn't get too confused when they tried rigging a character.

Peace,

that was pure genious....i've been struggling with animating my guy for over a week.....and only now have gotten decent animations. i should have tried that, but sometimes you need someone else to pull you far enough away from your own stuff to really see where things aren't working out. thanks.

but i will say this; it is possible to set up the 4 verts on the side that fans out and get good animations......but the time it takes to manually assign the weights to specific verts.....well, it takes a long time and is probably not worth the effort involved (ask me how i know).

btw, does anyone have any insight as to how to set up the legs so that they bend proper at the thigh to waist interface? i don't want to add poly's but the butt is pulling and the top of the inner leg is kind of disappearing into the crotch area of my mesh.

You can do the same thing for the groin area as you do for the knee area.. just reversed in direction on the model...
This picture should help you figure it out!
Peace!

thanks for the advice.....btw, your pics are awesome for training purposes. have you ever considered making a full length tut on the subject? i don't know how many times i have read tutorials where the pictures just don't make sense.......your's are perfect. thanks again.

No problem damageinc...

Well no I havent thought of it.. but it would be nice
I just dont have time right now to teach the subject... I need to get myself a job first.

Once I get settled in a job somewhere i guess i might make some tutorials to teach modders how to model...
Not any time soon tho, sorry

Just keep practicing!

To help answer a question about how to build low poly mesh, i took some time to demonstrate how Blizzard uses low poly modeling, uses every last edge, and great texturing to make low poly characters look high...

First of all, when making a leg or arm, you shouldnt start it as a box with the front and back of the legs having planes and the sides each having planes, this makes a very boxy looking model, like a lego man....
you should start with a rotated box, or a diamond...so that instead of planes in the front and back, and sides you have seams, or "splines" With smoothing groups, this makes a very smooth looking, yet simple mesh...

Then, as you shape the leg, your divisions shouldnt run straight around your leg or arm in a circle...you should use every edge to define the shape of the model.
Blizzard has every edge shifted perfectly so that there are no segments that run completely around the model evenly.. they are all zigzagged... this is import to saving on polys...
Also, the torso should use these same techniques to give it a very organic feel.

Anyway if you dont understand that, just study this picture very closely... it is pretty much the underlying mesh of the Orc in the picture. Each edge was used wisely, and turned perfectly... if yo dont know about Turning edges yet, thats a huge part of low poly modeling, and you need to study tutorials!

OK thats all i have time for today
Peace!

Thanks, that'll help a lot :D