Urgent Having a problem with Animation setup controllers.

[ogiejao]

"so if I orient-constraint the arm joints, which is freeze transformed of course, with controllers"

This is a mistake.
Sorry I should have said
"so if I orient-constrain the arm joints with controllers, which are freeze-transformed or course."

I didn't freeze transform joints. Dont need to do it..

[Darksuit]

orient constraint may not be the best tool for what you are lookng to do. you can rotate the arm joint to match a Tee pose then place your controller where you would like it and Zero out the control with the Moidfy freeze Transforms. Once in place you can use a PARENT CONSTRATINT (rotate only) with Maintain Offset turned on.

The parent contstaint will achieve the effect you are looking for more cleanly than the orient constraint.

[ogiejao]

rient constraint may not be the best tool for what you are lookng to do. you can rotate the arm joint to match a Tee pose then place your controller where you would like it and Zero out the control with the Moidfy freeze Transforms. Once in place you can use a PARENT CONSTRATINT (rotate only) with Maintain Offset turned on.

The parent contstaint will achieve the effect you are looking for more cleanly than the orient constraint.

Thank you for your reply.
It works fine, but still cant have a clean rotation status of shoulder joint to get the first non-T stance pose. This non-T stance pose that I made first is the pose that I want to have as a default pose because it is easy to animate for my clip. Anyway, why do you recoomend using parent constraint? It seems same as using orient constraint with offset turned on. If any difference plz tll me. I am a newbie..

While I am waiting, I managed to find a way to avoid this problem, it is to use group node ,I should say null node? Place it to where the joint is using point constraint and orient constraint and still have a clean controller status that is parented to the null node.
I should make a useless null node, but it works fine too.

[Darksuit]

From the maya help docs

An orient constraint matches the orientation of one object to one or more other objects. This constraint is useful for making several objects orient simultaneously.

With a parent constraint, you can relate the position—translation and rotation—of one object to another, so that they behave as if part of a parent-child relationship that has multiple target parents.

the second is what you actually want to be doing not the first. One of the issues is that you are changing the orientation of your object, even if the offset is turned on with the orient constraint you are still effecting the orientation. That is not what you want to be doing. You want to be effecting the rotation of the object.

With rigging a single character you want to be mimicing the parent child relationship of the joints. especially with an FK setup. So you start with the controllers at the root joint and build the controls up from there. Parenting the controls to each other to mimic the bone structure.

[ogiejao]

Constraint system is difficult to understand at least for me.
Its movement is unpredictable.
Anyway thank your for your advice Darksuit.

[ramdas]

I have a way cause I was facing same problem earlier
first
1 ) Group Ur controller to itself in grid origin
2 ) parent the group to the joint u want to control
3 ) Zero Out all translation and rotation ( not freeze tranform)
4 ) Unparent the group

It will orient and translate Ur controler to the joint and u will have zero rotation and translate to cintroller as we made changes to Group only


Hope it help

[ogiejao]

Oh, It works great!
And it is better than my way because
dont need to have a group node between joint and controller.
Thank you for your advice ramdas!

Anyway this is kinda complicated,isnt it? It is not mere modeling, but more mathematics thing.
I must have to refer to someone's models that is for free and they use the way I did to
get a clean controller rotation status. uum.

[Darksuit]

some notes:
If you freeze the trasnformation on a control object it will Zero out the Translations and Rotations. It will also reset the alignment of the orientation. Which is one reason freeze Transforms.

If you parent then unparent it. It will alter your roation when you Unparent.

This is no Different then Frrezing YOUR control then rotating it to match the joint parent constraining the joint to the control then zeroing out (typing in Zero in the Rotation in the channelBox).

While you can use an orient constraint it is not the best tool for what you are doing.

[ogiejao]

Thanx for your comment Darksuit.
I have to study a lot more.

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