Rigging a Mesh Garment That Poses The Avatar When Worn

[FaolanNeverwood]

I'm rigging a cardgian/shawl, and the sleeves are... I don't even know what they're called, i guess they're somewhere in between a kimono sleeve and a batwing sleeve, and the it's meant to have a pose animation included that keeps the arms down at the sides for the sleeves to work properly (I've seen this on over the shoulder jackets and winter ponchos). This is the cardigan here. 

I'm confused a little about the rigging process here, I've been playing around with it - I parented it to the armature with automatic weights as a starting point, then i removed the weights from the shoulder and collar bone and repainted the weights on the chest and torso to give it a clean bend and make the sleeves move with those bones rather than the arms. [Pic]

When I moved the arms into the position they'll be held in, everything worked perfectly when I moved the torso bone around - the arms stayed in the sleeves and it moved well, my problem is with the chest bone. No matter how high or low the weight on the sleeves, when I move the chest bone, my arms pop out. [pic]

The only solution I can think of is to incorporate the chest bone into the final animation and make it stay within the 'safe zone' where I have no arm breaks, but is there another way to rig this that I'm missing?

[Gaia Clary]

can you show the weightmap of the Torso please ?

[FaolanNeverwood]

Yes Here it is.

[Gaia Clary]

the torso weights on the shoulders are your issue. I actually wonder why you need to weight the shoulders to the torso at all.

[FaolanNeverwood]

I just removed the weighting from the shoulders (and sleeves, actually) on the torso bones, and it worked! Thank you so much!