Rig arms without deformation like in After Effects

[HDready Graphic]

Hi,

after hours of research (video, articles, discussions) I don't figure out how to do that, or even it is possible.

The most closest reponse I found is there (I think) : https://community.adobe.com/t5/character-animator-discussions/segmented-arms-that-work-like-an-actua...

There is the arm.

The idea is to rig the different part : upper arm, lower arm and hand, but no puppt deformation, like that :

No bind, no scale.

Here in Illustrator :

I tryed many options in CA but none worked as expected.

Thank you for your help (next step is animating in After Effects after all ^^)

[oksamurai · Accepted solution]

Yeah, the system in the secrets video in the linked thread is the best bet for segmented arms. But if you don't want deformation in CH, your main avenue is using as many sticks as humanly possible + Limb IK, and even then I think you're not going to get at the same level of precision and everything matchin up as you would using nulls and rotations in AE. So for this system AE might be a better fit IMO.

[HDready Graphic]

Hi, thank you for this answer. Knowing CA is not the best solution is very useful. By the way, it's odd to me that is feature doesn't exist and even more, is not the default one. It seams technically easier that deforming an asset. If I use this in my animation I can already imagine my client say : "There is a little strange deformation on the elbow, can't you do something about it?".

So, thank you, you save me a lot of time. I will use CH to animate the face and import it in AE 😉

[oksamurai]

Yeah I hear you. Right now most behaviors like Face, dragger, and Motion Library are based around mesh deformation, mainly for speed and ease of use. We have always wanted to support more complex rigs, and I think to truly do this we would need a clearer parent/child system. Maybe one day! Thanks for the feedback!