Rigging issues with a seated character

[raisedbytheboys]

Hi All,

Having some dramas with a seated character:  Thomas.puppet - Google Drive

I'd love to have the character move like this: 

With the head position effecting poses and the legs kept to the ground.

For some reason I am unable to achieve this effect. The current rig has all the body parts swim around and the legs stretch and warp with the movements.

Would really love some pointers on how to get the rig moving in the fashion I'm after!

Thanks All!

[KJerryK]

I looked at your puppet. Nice.

But I don't see the the limb distortions you mention. The head moves well, the bottle shake seems okay (I assume you want a cycle there). Could you be more specific on what you would like to see?

[raisedbytheboys]

Thanks for helping once again with a rigging issue KJerryK

For some reason I cant get the arm to stay stationary as it swims away from the body.

Also the legs drift down past the "ground". Any idea how to staple the arm to the body and the legs to the "ground"?

Thanks again!

[KJerryK]

Hi raisedbytheboys

I'm just wondering if you are getting Thomas to do what you want. I got back to it and came up with this example.

[alank99101739]

If you turn on mesh, the mesh is not good (not contour) which can result in unwanted side effects. (Because its all connected, things move even on the other side of pins.)

So here are a few suggestions in case they help

• Turn the crown on the root "Titties" puppet. That gets rid of the mesh.
• If you want the head movements to affect the body, you cannot have the head independent. Independence stops say the head from affecting the body.
• I also removed the independence from the ug boots. After that it seems to work a fair bit better
• You may also want to try reducing the "Head Scale Strength" in the Face properties so moving the head towards/away from camera has less effect (unless you like it as it is of course).

WIth the cleaner mesh the pins do their job of stopping movement going past. You probably don't need so many pins, or put a stick across the waist, but what you have works so that is optional.

[alank99101739]

Oh, if you want the head to swivel, then I think you will have to make the head independent. If you do that, you might want to decrease the head position strength to stop the head moving away from the body so much. But how to get the body moving? You can either put a dragger on the body, or get creative!

I put the "Head" tag on the nested "Body" layer, put a second Face Behavior on the parent Body layer, put a few sticks on the parent Body layer to stop twisting, and now the webcam can rotate the head and move the body backwards and forwards. (It worked better than I expected to be honest!)

Sticks on the parent Body layer - one across the shoulders to keep them straight, then a spine down a bit so the back stays straight.