Rest-Position (T) and Replay Triggers / How to ease from hanging arms? (video attached)

[Andreas__m]

Most puppets are rigged from a T position, and I read here in the forum that this leads to smoother arm movements - so I did that as well. So the rest position for my character is the T and this cannot be changed (other threads here in the forum about this already). Here is my issue (short video attached, which demonstrates it):

I would like to record replay triggers, for example a double thumbs up from a natural hanging arms position. So I record frame (1) arms hanging and frame (2) arms raised to chest with thumbs up.  I extend the thumbs up frame to use the handles and ease in - but CH does not ease in from the previous frame but from the rest position, which is the T - so I can't use the handles and would have to record everything frame by frame, which takes time and is difficult due to a lack of onion skinning in CH.

Is there any way to use the handles and override the T position? 

A 'Define/Change Rest Position' feature would make me very happy - as the T shape is getting really annoying. Is rigging from a hanging arms position (and accepting a lower quality arm animation) really the only option?

[oksamurai · Accepted solution]

Hmmm - I haven't made a T-pose character in a while so I'm not sure how it changes things, but the way I make characters like Sirr and Willy on okaysamurai.com/puppets is to give them a bunch of blended arm poses and set one as the default. If you try one of those characters and go through all their poses, you shouldn't ever see their default A-pose — it should just jump from one pose directly to the next. I hope checking out those characters helps with your situation a little?

[Andreas__m]

Thank you, what I have also found out is that I can overlap two poses and blend them 'into each other', which resolves the issue of the T-position showing up in between.