3ds Max 2012 a Little Biped Rigging Help Please :)

News & General Discussion
1

Hi there! I’ve been trying to follow the tutorials I found on the net about rigging/skinning a character in 3ds Max, but I always end up not being able to make the model follow what the skeleton is doing. Here’s what I do…

  1. I import an obj of a model (called machoman) I made some time ago and right click on it then choose Freeze All Selection so it won’t be disturbed.

  2. I click on Systems and then click the Biped button.

  3. From the toe of my “machoman” model, I click and drag the mouse all the way to the top of his head until I have the right height.

  4. I click on Motion, and then under the Biped section I click the Figure icon.

  5. Now I can scale and fit the skeleton inside “machoman’s” half body.

  6. After adjusting a bit, I then go down to the Copy/Paste section and click Create Collection, and then below it I click Copy Posture, and finally Paste Posture Opposite.

  7. Now I have a full model with a skeleton inside at the right places. I then click Select By Name somewhere at the top of the screen, and then choose the machoman, I also make sure that NONE of the biped parts are selected.

  8. I then go to Modify, and then choose Physique in the modifiers list of choices.

9 . On the Physique section I click Attach to Node. Nothing happens or shows up. This is the part that gets confusing.

  1. According to the tutorials, I should pick the very “root” of the biped skeleton. I go back to Select By Name and then choose the one called Bip001 and I click OK. Nothing happens. The window I’m supposed to see is nowhere to be found.

So that’s where I’m stuck now, I wonder what mistake I could have made. Can someone please check my steps? Or maybe someone can kindly write a more detailed step by step process on this is done. I’m using 3ds Max 2012 by the way.

Thanks in advance and I hope to find a solution to this ugly problem

2

Hmmm intersting , i dont use this method at all , not even close , really.

-Drag and draw drop Biped to scene…

  • Go to Motion, Configure in Figure Mode as you like (In fact you can leave it figure mode till you go to animate with key frames)

  • Go to modifiers , add a SKIN modifier …

  • Under SKIN properties , select the Bones ADD button , and add every bone …

  • Now use the skin / Envelope properties to weight all the bones appropriately

-Finalise … Turn off figure mode

-Animate

  • Export model

Haha , heres my first char model after a little tweaking , im still pretty nub.

http://willcotter.elementfx.com/CyborgLocomotor.htm

3

WOW thank you very much! My machoman is actually moving along with the bones now and there’s not much enveloping to fix! How come most of the tutorials on the net always teach the method I tried before lol! This skin method seems to be easier and faster:o

And good job on your cyborg guy, at least you’re already in the part where you can use your models in unity, that’s a lot more fun than connecting and welding vertices lol! Thanks again and have fun :smile:

4

Hehe , glad it worked , have fun!

5

To use physique instead of skin: In step 9 of your list, when you click “attach to node”, you have to click on the root bip01 object. It looks like a diamond wireframe hidden inside the hip bone, so it’s probably easier to pick it from the list. Once that node is assigned, you’ll get a dialogue box. The default settings should be fine, so click on Initialize.

That should do it for you. I’m new to rigging/skinning myself, and just went through a tutorial on using biped+physique. Apparently the skin modifier is better suited for custom-created rigs as opposed to the biped system, from what I’ve read.