Last year I enrolled myself into CGMA Python for VFX and animation with Alexander Richter. There I learned the foundation in Python and how to be able to start to create my own tools. I highly recommend this course if you are interested in learning Python to help with your work. When it comes to creating rigs, the process can be complex and the steps to finalizing can keep adding to the workload. With Python it helps me to automate some of the process.

It’s been some time since I have finished these scripts and I wanted to share what they can do now.

Copy Skin Cluster Tool

The first tool is a copy skin cluster. This tool allows the user to copy an existing skin cluster to a new mesh or even better a mesh that has been updated without destroying the original skin weights. Allows for multiple mesh editing without loosing all that time in skin weighting!

Clean Channel box Tool

The second script is to clean the outputs in the channel box. Sometimes with additional connections the channel box becomes messy. This tool can hide or reveal output nodes.

Thanks to Gleb Fedorovskiy, I've been working on a new rig with one of my favorite characters. One of my goals with this rig is trying to learn new methods about rigging with clothes. I tried a new driving system for the clothes using Maya's muscle keep out nodes. So far the results are looking good. Now I just need to iron out the skin weights. 

I recently got into scripting more in Python to build tools for rigging. Currently I am working on building a rig and took a break to review other facial rigging methods, specifically for the mouth. I found Antony Ward “AntCGI” rigging series on YouTube and found it a great resource. I really liked the use of moving the mouth joints in an arc around the face. So, I worked on building a script that followed a similar setup.

For the script I changed a few steps in his tutorial and combined them so the work is compressed. When the script is executed the custom controller and groups will be positioned to the selected joint as well as be renamed to the selection. Then all of the controllers will have the attributes connected directly to the joints and have custom attributes for movement speed, offset, and gradient.  Also, for a bonus if the joint has a prefix name, for example, l_, r_, or c_ the controllers will be colored accordingly to them. For now, the script is a success and now back to rigging Hellboy.