MAYA Mesh Rigging Issue - Avatars

[Iain Pinelli]

I managed to sucessfully rig a mesh avatar previously, following the;

 

>Create mesh model

>Import Second Life Skeleton [no extra joints]

>Move and rotate the skeleton to suit the mesh

>Smooth Bind mesh to avatar.

>Check to see if joints move

>Use OPENCollada or DAE_FDX_Exporter

>Upload Mesh Model to Second Life [joints, weights options were there]

>Wear and dance about like a fool

 

THIS is where my issue lies, I took another 3D model, and started rigging it as a secondary test.

After uploading several new models, some had no rigging or weights options, they were greyed out.

And the models that somehow managed to get the rigging attach and weights, simply crushed into a crumpled deformed mess.

 

I am not sure whats wrong. This avatar rigged perfectly as you can see in the image here: https://marketplace.secondlife.com/p/Ps-Sofia-Mesh-Avatar/3167681

 

Any suggestions?

[Cathy Foil]

A couple of things come to mind.  You mention that you rotate the skeleton in maya to fit the mesh.  From what I know you can not rotate the joints of the default skeleton.  YOu can make them longer or shorter but you can not rotate them otherwise the mesh will become distorted.

Another thought was perhaps you don't have Maya set to Z as up or that maybe you are not selecting the skeleton and mesh when you export selected out of Maya.

I also found it necessary to delete history and Freeze Transformations on both the skeleton and mesh before I Smooth Bind the mesh to the skeleton.

I hope that helps.

[Iain Pinelli]

Im still having some issues sadly.

 

I was able to rotate the skeleton previously, and i've deleted the history before but not frozen the transformations.

I'm still having reoccuring issues with all my rigg projects. I was able to rotate that Sofia mesh avatar's skeletons to suit the shape. I had to rotate the skeleton to get it to fit the original 3D mesh. So i'm not sure thats what the issue is.

 

I still have the problem where I have no option to upload joins or weights on alot of my projects aswell.

I'm thinking of learning to rig in 3DS rather than Maya at this rate.

[Cathy Foil]

If you were able to rotate your skeleton before was it durring the Beta Testing before mesh went live?

Is possible that LL has changed things so that you can not rotate the skeleton like before?

OK before you give up on Maya you might want to try a few things.

1. Download a new skeleton here a link:  http://abbloch.com/slmaya/skeleton.ma

2. Be sure to set Z to up in Maya.

3. Don't do anything fancy just take a polygon sphere and weight it to the arm or leg and export as you normally do.

4. Open up the DAE file in a word processing program like Microsoft Word.  Look to make sure Z is set to up and that it says Collada version = 1.4.0.  From what I hear Maya and Collada version 1.4.1 doesn't work with weighted / skinned mesh.  At least it doesn't with older Maya versions.

5. If you are exporting out of Maya as an FBX and then bringing it into Autodesk FBX Converter to be converted to DAE that isn't going to work from what I know.  I tried that route myself and it didn't work no matter what I did.

6. If you are still having problems with a simple weighted polygon sphere could you upload the file here in a post and I will try and export it.  Be sure to save it as a "ma" file not an "mb" file because I am using an older version of Maya and won't be able to open newer Maya versions "mb" file.  I can edit "ma" files to open in my older version.