tsloire
Controls
Here's the control system for my face.
The eye direction is controlled by another smaller nurbs curve control infront of the face. It's like zorro's eye mask thing.
All the controls here are made from nurbs curves and clusters. I followed the Digitial Tutors tutorial along with some of Jasons material to create my blendshapes and controls. There is also my own personal touch in there too when it comes to the controls, as sometimes I thought the controls mentioned in the DT tutorials were VERY vague. Such as using a box to control the tongue when yo ualready have another half a dozen boxes controlling everything else.
So I made my own shapes which are by FAR easier to use and understand. An F for the f shape your mouth makes which all you have to do is scale F in the Y to change. Same for the U and M apart from the fact that you scale the U on the X axis to get the desired result. The chinc ontrol is there also as a round shape at the bottom and the arrow over it is the jaw roll.
Then there is the mouth shape with various controls inside and to the sides of it. The mouth shape isn't a control in itself, the arrow within the mouth shape is. That is linked to a cluster which controls vertices of the mouth shape to make it appears as if the mouth shape is either smiling or not smiling thus making it easier to recognise what your face is doing. The smaller peanutty shape in the middle of the mouth is the tongue control. The two arrows by the side of the motuh shape are the right and left grin controls.
The nose shape in the middle of the G.U.I. controls the main snarl where as the two arrows by either side are parented to this control and control the left and right snarl. The peanut shapes under the eyes control the left and right eye twitches, the lower of the two shapes above the eyes controls the left and right blink/wink and the two shapes above those control the eyebrow raises. All of th eye controls use the Translate Y axis for movement.
The final shape within the G.U.I. controls the angry and sad expressions. The circle does nothing but represent the face, whilst the arrow has the same function as the mouth/smile/frown control; it moves vertices to make a sad/menacing face. As for the exclamation above the head that makes the characters eyes go wide with shock and slightly adjusts the area around the eyes when moved up and down. All the controls are linked to the outside face shape for ease of movement if they are in the way.
I decided to link my cluster controls to arrows because cluster can be hard to select at the best of times and it saves me having to unslect the selection boxes in the Maya G.U.I.
Controls
Here's the control system for my face.
The eye direction is controlled by another smaller nurbs curve control infront of the face. It's like zorro's eye mask thing.
All the controls here are made from nurbs curves and clusters. I followed the Digitial Tutors tutorial along with some of Jasons material to create my blendshapes and controls. There is also my own personal touch in there too when it comes to the controls, as sometimes I thought the controls mentioned in the DT tutorials were VERY vague. Such as using a box to control the tongue when yo ualready have another half a dozen boxes controlling everything else.
So I made my own shapes which are by FAR easier to use and understand. An F for the f shape your mouth makes which all you have to do is scale F in the Y to change. Same for the U and M apart from the fact that you scale the U on the X axis to get the desired result. The chinc ontrol is there also as a round shape at the bottom and the arrow over it is the jaw roll.
Then there is the mouth shape with various controls inside and to the sides of it. The mouth shape isn't a control in itself, the arrow within the mouth shape is. That is linked to a cluster which controls vertices of the mouth shape to make it appears as if the mouth shape is either smiling or not smiling thus making it easier to recognise what your face is doing. The smaller peanutty shape in the middle of the mouth is the tongue control. The two arrows by the side of the motuh shape are the right and left grin controls.
The nose shape in the middle of the G.U.I. controls the main snarl where as the two arrows by either side are parented to this control and control the left and right snarl. The peanut shapes under the eyes control the left and right eye twitches, the lower of the two shapes above the eyes controls the left and right blink/wink and the two shapes above those control the eyebrow raises. All of th eye controls use the Translate Y axis for movement.
The final shape within the G.U.I. controls the angry and sad expressions. The circle does nothing but represent the face, whilst the arrow has the same function as the mouth/smile/frown control; it moves vertices to make a sad/menacing face. As for the exclamation above the head that makes the characters eyes go wide with shock and slightly adjusts the area around the eyes when moved up and down. All the controls are linked to the outside face shape for ease of movement if they are in the way.
I decided to link my cluster controls to arrows because cluster can be hard to select at the best of times and it saves me having to unslect the selection boxes in the Maya G.U.I.