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Squash/Stretch

The createBendSetup() function is creating some general squash/stretch setup. They are two additional skinClusters, suffixed with __BEND and __BENDTOP.

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Blueprints

When you click Create BPs,
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he just creates some colored joints that you need to lay out to the shape of the head:
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Ctrl Shapes

After running the createBendSetup() function, move those ctrl shapes to the right place, just be dragging their cvs: Alt text
And of course after that export the ctrls shapes.

Weights

It's very important to create the weights using the Kangaroo tools, because those are setting some important things that other skinning tools won't.
These are the joints: Alt text But don't worry you don't actually have to look for them or select them in the scene or outliner. just follow the instructions how to do that with the Flood tool , and you'll be done with this in no time.

Using the Flood tool

To create the skinClusters, having the main mesh selected start by clicking the buttons connect Influences (selectded Meshes) and connectInfluences TOP (selected meshes):
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Then apply the rom animation by clicking the button create rom anim

In the Choose Skin Cluster field, specify __BEND, and click the Alt text (reload) button.

Bind everything above the neck to the jnt_m_faceBendMiddle. This is the main cube ctrl - frame 0 - 30 in the ROM. Alt text

Then in the flood tool select the jnt_m_botFaceBendSquash_001 joint and bind the bottom part of the face to it.
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Note

Even though there's more bottom joints, the bottom part usually works better with painted to just one joint.

Next, the Choose Skin Cluster field, specify __BENDTOP, and click the Alt text (reload) button. And bind the whole head to all the top influence joints Alt text

Transfer from main mesh to others

This can be easily done with the SkinCluster -> Transfer tool: Set the From to the name of the skinCluster that you created before, and turn Auto Create New SkinCluster on Alt text

Warning

Do not forget the Auto Create New SkinCluster! Running it without it would damage your existing weights.

Note

The auto create new skinCluster option doesn't always create new skinCluster. If the skinCluster with the proper suffix (__BEND or __BENDTOP) is already present, he'll use that instead of creating new one

Smooth

Especially the eyeballs will likely get some sharp corners from the weight transfer.
But those are easily fixed with the Smooth tool. Just make sure to enter __BENDTOP (or __BEND), and click smooth Alt text

Tweak it

When you look at the Rom or play around with the ctrls, it's probably not looking perfect yet.

You can adjust the squash/stretch values with the attributes on the passers of the ctrls:
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Those get saved with the ** === DEFAULT ATTRS === ** button.

And apart from that you might still need to spend some time tweaking the weights with the Smooth, Flood or Move tool.

Only one skinCluster option

You probably saw that the connect Influences (..) button added all the bottom AND top joints into the __BEND skinCluster.
You could theoretically skip the __BENDTOP skinCluster and solve it all with __BEND. You'd just have to adjust the blueprints so the lower and upper blueprints are not overlapping each other.

Ctrls Following

Kangaroo tries to have most ctrls follow the squash/streth setup. This won't change the deformations, but animators still appreciate it if ctrls are always staying with the face geo.
For all the facial setups this should happen automatically in the function parallelAttachCtrls().
But if you have some extra puppet limbs, you'll have to set this with the FaceExtraMove flag:
Alt text Limbs that have this attribute are spine, singleTransform, singleBone and belt

Note

on some limbs that attribute might be a further below under the FK feature:
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