Week 9 - Advanced Body Mechanics

 

Fig.1- MG Picker

Today was an intriguing lesson as we installed MG-Picker. With this plug-in, we were able to locate any part of the tangent on the body from an advanced rig. During the lesson, I was able to learn a lot about rigging, FK and IK. Studying advanced rigs made me realise how much can be put into a character's body, and would love to learn more about rigging in the future. We were then given half of the day to experiment with the character's mechanics. I decided to do a typical cowboy stance with him kneeling down and holding a gun. Whilst posing this character I started understanding the basics of the rig and how sophisticated it must have been to create this. I was struggling for most of the posing, as there are secret parts of the mechanics that you can unlock to have more access to fluidity in parts of the body. In conclusion, controlling the rig was hard work, however, having the day to experiment and understand the rig, I was able to be more flexible with the mechanics. In addition, the MG-picker engine is a very useful tool to use to locate a sophisticated advanced rig like this one, although I did fall in love with the mechanics. 

Fig.2 - Posing using a plug-in