RNP shapes as a guide to average height?

[Ricky Shaftoe]

I have been working on some custom animations for a client, and she pointed me to RNP's suggested shapes for avatars. Those shapes date from 2012 or so, and I wonder whether they are too tall for today's avatars. When I wear the female shape on a female character, I see 2.04m height when I use appearance/edit shape. But threads in this forum suggest an average female height around 1.7 or 1.8m for women. Likewise, when I wear the male RNP shape, I get 2.14m. But threads here suggest an average male height of more like 1.9m these days. Maybe more importantly, the RNP shapes suggest only a .1m difference in height between the average man and woman, which impacts how to pose men and women when you want them touching each other. 

Maybe I should be measuring with a measuring stick, rather than the appearance /edit-shape screen?

I know there are other threads on this subject here, but they're all a bit out of date. Can anyone point me to up-to-date info? I know RNP is an influential and impressive animation house, but I'm reluctant to animate with those shapes as my base. If nothing else, it would be helpful to have some idea of the average height differential between men and women -- are men on average only 0.1m taller than women? For what it's worth, I typically test with a man of 1.95m height, and a woman of 1.70m height. 

Edited May 19, 2023 by Ricky Shaftoe

[RohanaRaven Zerbino]

[RNP] shapes are not a guide for anything, those are simply shapes I am using for years to create animations. You don't have to measure with the stick, it is correct what you saw in the appearance window Also, I strongly disagree there is such a thing as average height, and standing firmly with the statement that height is at the bottom of the list of important measurements when it comes to animations. Even more, it is all about the proportions of the rig.

Let me explain: when changing height, your entire rig is scaled so rig proportions stay the same. So if your height is 100% for example, and Arms length is 80%, what ever you change your height to Arms length will stay at 80%. If you would want to change the length of the Arms, you will have to adjust Arms length value it self. Bone proportions are way more important than any single value in the appearance window. Please note that I am talking only about rig controllers not the mesh ones in the appearance window. Mesh controllers would have to be more or less manually adjusted to make a more visually proportional shape. More on the subject here:

So take any animator's rig as an imaginary zero that serves to determine the basic proportions of the rig which leads us to the proportions between the male and female avatar you have noticed. Small difference is done on purpose, to create a sort of neutral position between the avatar's mutual positions that will make it easier for end users to handle rig differences in the process of personal animation position adjustments.

Different rigs are bringing different challenges in the process of creating animation, and yes it is important for you as an animator if, for example, arms are longer or shorter as that will require a different approach to how you will handle the upper body. So, if you are up to challenges, use what ever rig you want, but it might be wiser to explain to your customer your work will be faster and better if you are using rig you are used to.

[Ricky Shaftoe]

@RohanaRaven Zerbino Thanks for that detailed and helpful reply. You are certainly right that proportions are a more important metric than just height. I just happen to be working on an against-the-wall sex anim for which height (or at least height-affecting parameters, like "overall height" and "torso length" and "leg length") seems to be the most important variable -- but is also easy for the user to work around, simply  by moving one avatar up or down. Yes, side-to-side differences matter: her hands on his hips may end up inside his spleen, or 6 inches off his hip. But those horizontal differences not as much a deal-killer for this animation as height is, since if the genitals don't line up, nothing makes sense.

Near the end of the thread you linked (which was very helpful!), @WarmAnimations Lisa had an interesting post as what she sees as crucial shape parameters for women. I'm curious what your reaction is to that post. I may try applying her shape to my testing alt.

Do you think the coming puppetry feature will affect any of this?

Edited May 21, 2023 by Ricky Shaftoe
clarification

[Aglaia]

Before to start my anims, i've spent some time to decide what models i would use. So many considerations. Not only the size, but also, as mentionned by Rohana, the proportions. And also the meshbody itself, cause there can be big variations between, for example, Maitreya Lara and eBody Reborn, with a same shape.

About the size: First thing that i use is really just the intuition. I look avatars all the time, i compare mine to other ones, etc, and i figured out that generally speaking, i noticed that male avatars are one head higher than mine, if not more. Some are even higher/bigger. About females, i think i am a bit under the average. I did different tests. I also checked average sizes by Lou's bots: https://lounetizen.com/avdata/ which seems to be 1.70 for female and 2.00 for males. So i went for these values. Female 1.70 and Male 2.00. Please note that these are the values returned by the llGetAgentSize() function: they are smaller (but roughly proportional) to the ones shown in the Shape Editor. If using shape editors values, these average values would be higher.

About proportions, that is a big question too. I've decided to take the "Classic" shape that comes with Belleza Gen.X Classic for the female. Visually it looks super standard/average to me. That said, i often end up to leave some space between the male's hand and the female's body, especially around the butt. Genrally speaking, i prefer to leave more room than not enough: better to have the hand a bit too far from the body, than having the hand inside the body.

And for the meshbodies, i use Belleza GenX Classic for the female, and Signature Gianni for the male. But i always tests with different shapes and meshbodies, to make sure it looks roughly ok in most cases.

@Ricky Shaftoe I encourage you to buy Avastar or Bento Buddy and create your models  The ones that i have provided for Cascadeur are based on the Avatar Workbench, cause it is the only free not-copyrighted stuff that i know. But if you buy Avastar or Bento Buddy, you would be able to import a shape from SL into Blender and have your rig match these values

Edited May 21, 2023 by Aglaia

[Ricky Shaftoe]

Thanks for your reply, @Aglaia. Yeah, it sounds like I should buy Avastar or Bento Buddy. I'm still reeling from the $300 price for Cascadeur's Pro license, so I may wait a little bit, lol. But it would be nice to have one of those tools, for the reasons you describe. 

I also test with the Belleza GenX Classic, and with both Signature GIanni and Belleza Jake.